Comment by millimeterman | Hacker News Reader

Comment by millimeterman | Hacker News Reader

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> Economics is the lies told by some middle class assholes with a degree and/or credential that get paid just enough by upper class assholes to trick low class rubes.

Why does nonsense like this get parroted so much? Economics is as much a science as any other social science. Which is to say that it's certainly imperfect and is subject to social problems surrounding science (e.g. the replication crisis), but it's still very much a science. Obviously it's an evolving field with many areas of disagreement among experts, but what science isn't? Plenty of economic principles/models have strong predictive power and broad consensus from economists.

As for your (apparent) critique, economics currently isn't very good at long-term (especially macroeconomic) forecasting. But then science isn't great at predicting weather or earthquakes long term, yet we don't dismiss those fields as lies propagated by the elite. This isn't a defense of Moody's or anything - they may well have ignored the risks of mortgage-backed securities for financial gain, and I can't speak to the accuracy of their podcast.

But your argument seems no different than claims that because pharmaceutical companies have lied and caused harm in the name of profits, the entire field of medicine is nothing but lies and propaganda and we should throw it out and switch to curing cancer with juice cleanses.

Any economic thought a bit further left than left-of-center gets quickly deemed "not economics."

Phrased differently, the field of economics dismisses any economic thought that doesn't serve the interests of capital and the people with the capital.

I don't think people take an issue with economists' predictions as much as their prescriptions. Younger econ doctoral candidates would do well to spend some time hanging out with the political scientists on campus. (They largely are doing this.)

The field will move forward one death at as time.

> Any economic thought a bit further left than left-of-center gets quickly deemed "not economics."

I would encourage you to listen to actual economics experts and academics, not right-wing hacks dressed in economic cosplay. Despite their posturing, libertarians and free-market fundamentalists are just as divorced from economic reality as anyone else.

Economists in the US actually skew significantly Democrat[1] and surveys of economists on various topics generally show left-of-center leanings[2]. It's worth noting though that the political leaning of an economist need not indicate the quality of their research and plenty of good results have come from economists with atypical views.

1. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1536-7150.2007...

2. https://www.igmchicago.org/igm-economic-experts-panel/

I totally agree with this comment. You put my thoughts into words. Unfortunately that kind of cheap comments (Economics is the lies told by some middle class assholes with a degree and/or credential that get paid just enough by upper class assholes to trick low class rubes.) are quite common over the internet and mainstream media. Just enough to keep people not thinking about it and everything is a lie by the elite and we can do nothing about it.

It's parroted because it's make sense. Every 'imperfection' of an economists idea has led to further concentration of capital in the hands of incumbents. Many of these incumbents have already failed and only exist by way of heinous regulatory choices, only to be bailed out because economists said its better this way or things will be worse (take hostages much?).

My critique is that the short term is all that matters because accountability and culpability aren't available to institutions and individuals because they are too important. There is seemingly an infinite amount of labor arbitrage to make when you can make horrible medium/long term capital decisions that appear good because of short term market gains, all because the fix (govt bailout) is in.

Does you think capital has product value without the application of technology or labor? Why is the most important aspect of the equation the least valued?

> It's parroted because it's make sense. Every 'imperfection' of an economists idea has led to further concentration of capital in the hands of incumbents.

Has it? Are you talking about actual economics research or conservative politics wrapping itself in free market fundamentalism disguised as economics? It's understandable but endlessly frustrating how politics has convinced the public that economics is a bunch of libertarian nonsense.

In reality, economists actually skew significantly left of center (by US standards): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1536-7150.2007...

The correct analogy would be the Healthcare system as a whole, and it would indeed hold water.

Social sciences is a complete misnomer. It should be social theories, there's zero scientific basis for them.

You can't compare the science of the physics of the universe to gender studies and economics. One studies the laws of the universe, the other simply talks about an irrational thing irrational beings created, and pretends its science.

This is also Michel Foucault's critique of the Leninist-Marxist use of the word 'science'

Hadn't heard of that before, thanks for sharing I had to look it up. Many pseudo-sciences seem to do this to steal credibility.

For my downvoters, if you doubt what I said, take a look at this rambling incoherent mess that is this thread's comments.

No one can even describe our economy anymore due to the complexity, we have economic 'laws' that are no more than one person's opinion.

It's just a mess. I don't know what the solution is, but this ain't it.

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