At a general level is that not the point of education? If people who have studied economics dont understand economics, the benefits and perils of different economic policies and activities, better then those who have never thought about it, then surely there's something seriously wrong?
> In terms of acceptance of minorities, especially (gay, trans or just ethnic) I think that liberal mindset comes from an academic need to include minority opinions into discussion.
This is actually testable, physics, maths and other "hard" sciences gain nothing from including minority opinions (or any opinions) so by your logic science academics should be less liberal then social scientists or liberal arts professors. I doubt that's true though.
I suspect that the better educated a person is the wider their experience or people from other backgrounds and the wider the experience the more the acceptance. But that's just an educated guess ;-)