Does anybody need economists?
This is the subject of a fascinating polemic raised by our colleague Gregor MacDonald. He notes, in an incredible understatement, “economists don’t ‘do’ energy.” They are content to set Keynes and Hayek in a never-ending cage match over monetarism versus free markets, while petroleum dwindles, Boomers retire, technology flattens work hierarchies – while real things are actually happening.
Some of the debate is set off by the paper embedded below by a Federal Reserve Bank economist. As the title indicates, he doesn’t think much of the input of non-specialists. We then have a similar question for his profession – how is it that we all participate in economic activity, and only you feel qualified to comment on it? And while we’re on the subject, why didn’t you predict an absurdly obvious bubble and subsequent crash?
Some things are too difficult for the laity to understand. Most of the hard sciences are really impossible to comprehend to outsiders, and news reports on their breakthroughs are often comically misunderstood. But is economics a hard science? Isn’t it a social science based around people trading things? Can we discuss our economy without the need for technocrats of this sort?
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