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Comment by thrance | Hacker News Reader

The issue with this prize isn't that economics is not a real science. Nobel prizes are primarily vulgarization and communication tools, and as such are inhenrently political. The Sveriges Riksbank is piggy-backing off the popularity of Nobel Prizes to advocate for a certain vision (their vision) of economic orthodoxy. It is overwhelmingly awarded to white western men, who, more relevantly, all share an anglocentric neoliberalist vision of economics. This, I hope, we are allowed to take issue with.

EDIT: apparently not. I would rather you explain to me why than downvote mindlessly.

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White western men are no more represented in Economics than other hard sciences, and concensus in Economics is no different in East Asia and the rest of the world excepting the authoritarian Socialist experiments.

There's no "consensus" in economics, let alone.

Of course, there is consensus in economics.

It's a field which is mostly interested in models and anyone can agree that a model is consistant and implies surprising things even if they think the hypotheses it makes don't faithfully represent reality.

It's endlessly fascinating to me how some people will happily disparage economics while having very little idea of what it's actually about.

How is making a factual assertion (there is no conseusus in the discipline of economics) somehow "disparaging economics"???? There is no consensus, unlike harder sciences such as physics or biology, and like social sciences such as sociology or anthropology. Because economics is the latter and not the former.

And please do me the favour of not assuming I "have very little idea of what it's actually about". It's contrary to the site guidelines (and it's very annoying).

Modelling isn't the higher intellectual pursuit it's made out to be. Imo designing theoretical models post-hoc to "support" a desired conclusion is not unheard of in econ/finance.

It's tautological but models are models.

It doesn't really change anything to their inherent value that you build them from the hypotheses up or from the conclusions down. It holds the same that this set of interactions lead to this behaviour.

Sometimes going down can be equally interesting: "What would a system where tariff improves the overall well being of a country inhabitants look like?". Contrast the model requirements with empirical data and you have an interesting paper.

The 2019 economics prize went to empirical research.

The non-mainstrean economists (aka heterodox, aka cranks) are usually more obviously pursuing an agenda, but they definitely usually don't have better empirical evidence.

> The non-mainstrean economists (aka heterodox, aka cranks)

L M A O

Mate, this is not physics. This is not a field with a measurable reality where you can, in fact, say that those who reject the empirical evidence are cranks. Economics allows for multiple incompatible interpretations of the same empirical observations.

Economics has several characteristics that make it unlike other sciences: basically the "underlying observable" is not an objective thing with an independent existence; unlike an atom, the object of economics changes when it's being studied and changes with the underlying changes in political and economic structure. Even its aims are open for discussion! Economics has more in common with sociology or philosophy than any of the hard sciences.

It's easy to see, if nothing else, because economic theories fall in and out of fashion just like political ideologies do.

I think it's perfectly fine to disagree with non-mainstream economics, or to criticise it on some concrete grounds. But to pretend anyone who disagrees with $current_view is a crank... Well it's symptomatic of the quasi-orwellian reality which certain sectors want to impose: it's not enough to say "ours is the right way", they want to say "ours is the only possible way".

The bait-and-switch rhetorical tactics from the cranks like "not a science" is to feign that empirical evidence doesn't exist (for thee) and therefore we should embrace ideology (theirs). This is why the Is-ought problem is frequently brought up. Though this mostly only flies in sloppy online space; in academia, progressives became Rawls acolytes and eschewed Marx, because of baggage and serious errors that can't be overcome. This seems to have translated to a chimera everything-bagel ideology on social media, where they're Rawlsian (qua social justice) but also many don't want to give up Marx, 'cause Capitalism bad, and this doesn't square.

Precisely. To quote the famous economic dictum: it works in practice, but does it work in theory?

That's nonsensical. There is overwhelming consensus over many things, e.g. tariffs.

I don't see what point you're trying to make. Do you mean to claim that the Sveriges Riksbank is unbiased in who it chooses to give their price to? Unless you believe that 90% of economists come from the US (and the remaining 10% from the UK), you should take issue with this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nobel_Memorial_Prize_l...

> concensus in Economics

That's what I was talking about. This "consensus" is completely made-up and propped up by, among others, the Sveriges Riksbank. To the point that there are people like you who feel they should defend them against the evil "authoritarian Socialist", because of course, as we all know, that's all there is besides Neoliberalism. I sincerly hope you consider broadening your horizons, maybe start by Thomas Piketty's work: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Piketty

> I don't see what point you're trying to make. Do you mean to claim that the Sveriges Riksbank is unbiased in who it chooses to give their price to?

I made no such claim. I don't take issue with that list: the US by far leads in number of high‐profile economic researchers, high publication output, large number of employed economists.

Just as Mathematics is still Mathematics in the rest of the world, the broad perspective on Economics is not meaningfully different in the rest of the world. Even if it originated in the anglo-sphere, it's global. That's the point I made.

> This "consensus" is completely made-up and propped up by, among others, the Sveriges Riksbank.

Leading Economists globally find consensus on all manner of policy issues. Many academic papers model the effects of tariffs on prices, welfare, and the consensus is that tariffs generally harm consumers. Surveys conducted on Economists show strong consensus there.

> because of course, as we all know, that's all there is besides Neoliberalism

It's not a long list. Even Social Democracy darlings of Europe are effectively just Liberal with a bit more spending. Incidentally, France is in deep trouble because of this. Their public spending as a % of GDP far exceeds peers.

> maybe start by Thomas Piketty's work: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Piketty

Piketty is decidedly heterodox, and I've read Capital in the 21st Century, though not his latest which as I understand revisits much of the same. Wealth taxes have been tried in several countries including Austria, and promptly dropped. That's because they do not work well. It's difficult to implement and the returns just aren't good.

It's a, "They hate him because they told the truth," situation. Frankly, it applies to the Peace Prize as well, but this one has an even more naked agenda. It would be a disservice not to mention its history every time it's brought up, because it is ever-salient to any discussion of the merit of the winners.

Well you are on an anglo-centric neoliberalist imperialist site filled with people that are economic beneficiaries of that. Basic economic game theory that you'd be downvoted.

Extreme poverty rates have been plummeting precisely because East Asian countries became economic beneficiaries. The rest of the world operates on the same principles.

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