Economics Profession

How representation of data can contribute to, or dispel the false certainty of statistical and econometric technique.

In modern economies, individuals and companies engage in innovative activities, discovering new ways to use existing physical and human capital, and new technologies in which to invest. The institutional and broader social context within which these activities take place also changes in novel ways.

The economics profession stands on the fragile foundation of presuppositions adopted by professional agreement rather than as a result of empirical observation.

Amid mass unemployment and economic turmoil, instructors who lecture on the superiority of free markets without acknowledging the dysfunction in the wider economy are at risk of appearing out of touch and exacerbating antipathy towards economics.

INET published a paper, written by John Kay, that deals with the relationship between economics and the world we live in. The Map Is Not the Territory: An Essay on the State of Economics spells out methodological critiques of economic theory in general, and of DSGE models and rational expectations in particular.

The Toxic Textbooks movement devotes energy to curriculum reform as well. Its purpose is to galvanize student protests and “encourage schools and universities to use economics textbooks that engage honestly with the real world.”

Yesterday, Harvard students of Ec 10 staged a walkout to draw attention to the bias they detect in the course.

The optimism embedded in the efficient market hypothesis has been one of the main sources of the recent turmoil

The financial crisis of 2007-2009 should have been sufficient empirical evidence to indicate that the axiomatic basis of the mainstream theory needs to be replaced.

The future of macro, he says, may well make “the formation and revision of expectations an object of analysis in its own right.”

The reputation of economics and economists, never high, has been a victim of the crash of 2008.

Joseph Stiglitz at the Institute’s debut conference in Cambridge, UK (2010).

The purpose of the paper is to argue for attention to be paid, not only to choice of theory, but also to choice of theoretical approach, in order to address issues posed by the crisis.