Tag Archives: economics profession

I was reminded this week of an interesting studies published in 1987 by Arjo Klamer and David Colander on the influences that go into the training of a professional economist. This study was repeated by Colander in 2005. The results are rather disturbing although obviously I am an ‘insider’ in the sense I went through the process in one way or another myself (although not in a US graduate program). They demonstrate how far removed graduate students are from learning or being interested in...

The neoliberal economists, that is. There is no "market solution" to existential threats that require mobilization of real resources to meet the emergent challenge.Tax Research UKThe ‘economists’ have lost control of climate change Richard MurphySee alsoAlex Tabarrok is aware that addressing climate change is a global effort, which some people in the US apparently overlook or minimize. A US GND would be a step in the right direction, but it is not the solution.A single country, even the US...

Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) offers an understanding of sovereign (and non-sovereign) currencies that is applicable to a wide range of economic systems, including capitalist and socialist ones. Irrespective of the personal political preferences of its proponents, the theoretical framework in itself is neutral on the appropriate balance between public sector and private sector activity, or the relative merits of capitalism and socialism. In contrast to neoclassical theory, which starts from...

(The new issue of Jacobin has a piece by me on the state of economics ten years after the crisis. Since it’s not online yet, I’m posting the full text here, plus a few paragraphs that did not make it in. Even though they gave me plenty of space, and Seth Ackerman’s edits were as always superb, they still cut some material that, as king of the infinite space of this blog, I would rather include.) J. W. Mason's BlogIn Jacobin: A Demystifying Decade for EconomicsJW Mason | Assistant Professor...

Funny critique of economics as patent nonsense. The Radford Free PressThose Lumps MatterPeter Radford

I am recording some promotional videos in London today for Macmillan Higher Education who will publish our forthcoming textbook – Macroeconomics on March 11, 2019. These will be the first of many short videos to support the teaching program outlined in the textbook. At last Friday’s very successful launch of the – Gower Initiative for Modern Money Studies (GIMMS) – I was asked a question at the end of the first formal workshop I presented, which I was unable to answer due to time...

I wholeheartedly agree with our newest Nobel Laureate. Quite right that a large chunk of mainstream macroeconomics has made itself irrelevant. I’m not sure about the thirty years estimate as my feeling is that it goes back even further, but that’s an academic question. Regardless of when it started, the bottom line is that we are in a terrible place today. Economics graduate students are increasingly avoiding taking specializations in macroeconomics and our discipline was hopelessly...

Recommended reading on the history and philosophy of science, the philosophy of economics, and Milton Friedman's instrumentalism.EvonomicsEconomists Should Stop Defending Milton Friedman’s Pseudo-science George H. Blackford | former Chair of the Department of Economics at the University of Michigan-Flint

Econ 101. The standard model is misleading. Having gone through a handful of the most frequently used textbooks of economics at the undergraduate level today, I can only conclude that the models that are presented in these modern mainstream textbooks try to describe and analyze complex and heterogeneous real economies with a single rational-expectations-robot-imitation-representative-agent. That is, with something that has absolutely nothing to do with reality.….For almost forty years...

This is my short Wednesday offering, which will be quite short considering the last two days have been (necessary) epics. My three-part series created somewhat of a social media storm, which means people are interested in the topic and I think that is healthy. Democracy is strengthened if people educate themselves and contest propositions that are abroad in the debate. But, as I noted yesterday, social media storms have a way of getting out of control and out of the realm of being...