Can someone explain this Left Lib's post?

Economics Economics Questions
1

Since I am sick in bed for the next couple of days I am passing my time in odd ways. Maybe this is rude of me to post this, as this thread was not addressed at me in anyway (i was just lurking), and I am cutting and pasting this from another forum. Still, I am 99% sure it won’t do me any good to ask or raise questions on said forum.

So in relation to “social issues trumping econ issues” and asking to describe ones position to the question:

I’m a fan of intersectionalist holism, but I’m also pretty skeptical of economics as a profession and domain of knowledge. It’s largely overgeneralized and flawed models of behavior. Western political thought in general probably has been too tied to economics, it originally being “political economy” and all. I’d say that both classical marxism, some strains of traditional anarchism, neo-liberalism and free market libertarianism all often fall into economic reductionist tendencies in a variety of ways.

However, due to intersectionality, it doesn’t seem correct to frame the alternative to this as social issues trumping economic ones. It’s more that these divisions are somewhat arbitrary and what is put foreward as a box of something like “economics” is insufficiently descriptive or useful without being contextualized relative to everything else. It is erroneous to try to reduce the whole to such an unnecessarily restrictive box. But this doesn’t mean that the concerns that are typically thought of as being related to that domain are necessarily less important than other

Is anything being said here? I am not too sure I want a critique, rather than to know if anything is actually being said.

If so does anyone know the basis of the claims?

2

Am I wrong to say that at least in part, this is saying: “economics doesn’t mean anything, but it does mean something”. “It is important but isn’t important. It is however important only in a way which I am not going to state what my actual position is”.

Or am I way off base on this one?

3

Reads very much like mental masturbation. Ask him to define his terminology and then watch him squirm.

4

I think it’s just wrong lol. The poster says, “It is erroneous to try to reduce the whole to such an unnecessarily restrictive box.” It’s not reducing the whole, it’s finding necessary truths.

5

No, I was asking myself the exact same thing. “Is this guy going anywhere with this?” And by the end I pretty much came to the conclusion you did. “Economics doesn’t mean anything but it does mean something…not useful, but useful.” It’s about as much as I expected from something that begins with "I’m a fan of intersectionalist holism".

I think this is precisely one of those kinds of people that are not worth the time. What is there really to say to that anyway?

:EDIT:

The term “mental masturbation” when through my mind as well.

6

I think the meat of what hes saying is that economics is important but unreliable because it attempts to oversimplify everything.

7

Oy, I’m getting a head ache reading that. My best guess is that he’s building towards the old claim, “economics ignores broader social issues.” Economists and their models rely on economic man, but all persons live and all choices are made under specific conditions which models and economic man cannot take into account. Economic concerns and questions - or he might mean the ‘economic sphere of life,’ if that makes sense - still have value, it’s just that Marxists, neo-liberals and libertarians emphasize them at the expense of other factors.

8

I think the meat of what hes saying is that economics is important but unreliable because it attempts to oversimplify everything.

If that really is the point of what he is saying - how appropriate for him to make a very simple statement and turn it into a dizzyingly complex statement.

9

Sometimes I think there is wink and nod behind every left libertarian forum post.

10

Is being concise a burden to some people?

11

No.

12

Not so much a burden as it is a sedative. People who talk like that guy have very little knowledge of virtually anything they talk about, but they have a need to speak anyway. It makes them feel important and smart, and often times superior to other people. So they pontificate using nonsensical rhetoric and confusing terms…for one, so that they have something to say, and two, so that what they say sounds like more than the nothing it really is.

13

"Being profound and seeming profound – Those who know they are profound strive for clarity. Those who would like to seem profound strive for obscurity. For the crowd believes that if it cannot see to the bottom of something it must be profound. It is so timid and dislikes going into the water."

-Nietzche, The Gay Science.

2nd time I’ve used that quote on this forum

14

I think you’ve answered your own question

15

This poster sounds like they are one of those TZM or VP people, ie anarchocommunist. There basis for there claims is that scarcity is managable, you dont need to money to economically calculate (restrictive view), production by law of the minimum, capitalism is inefficient etc..

Notice how he mentions mutple forms of society, and reflects that they “too often” use into the economics which is restrictivley limited under the assumptions that scarcity does not exists and that computers will make most decisions and “we” will all decide what is best.

Its a load…

16

This guy simply doesn’t know what he’s saying. He’s a typical example of an English major hiding behind his “big” words. lol

17

This doesn’t make any sense.

This argument implicitly assumes that (a) every single input available is required to produce a single and homogeneous unit of output (a single production function for the entire economy) and (b) this production function (which, again, represents the entire economy) is a fixed proportions production function (entirely ignores the concept of substitutability altogether). Additionally, the “scarcest factor” is entirely determined by the ordinal and subjective preferences of consumers, which are in continuous flux (still requires economic calculation, i.e. markets). One might be tempted to say that ‘labor and/or capital are the scarcest factors,’ but (a) this requires complete homogenization and aggregation and (b) doesn’t tell us anything/resolve the coordination/calculation problem (only tells us that labor and capital are required for production).

18

"I’m a fan of intersectionalist holism, but I’m also pretty skeptical of economics as a profession and domain of knowledge. It’s largely overgeneralized and flawed models of behavior."

I assume intersectionalist holism means something like a unified discipline rather than separate disciplines, studying objects like economy, society, law, political system, or the economic approach (scarcity and means-ends, praxeology or neoclassical rational choice approach) versus old-fashioned instinct psychology, or class-warfare Marxism, historical determinism etc.

He’s skeptical of flawed models. This probably means he thinks capitalism is bad. It also means he shares with Austrians a skepticism of modelling, but he can’t conceive of the Austrian theoretical alternative, just as he can’t conceive of the the liberal alternative to statist capitalism.

“Western political thought in general probably has been too tied to economics, it originally being “political economy” and all. I’d say that both classical marxism, some strains of traditional anarchism, neo-liberalism and free market libertarianism all often fall into economic reductionist tendencies in a variety of ways.”

Political thought too much associated with economic reasoning? Or too much about economic policies and economic systems? Economic reductionism would mean that a country, a society, life, everything is reduced to the economy. So Marxism reduces you to a worker or a capitalist. This obscures other dimensions of life and other struggles. Neoliberalism or libertarian reduces you to simply a consumer or an individual. This makes us think of all social relations in terms of buying and selling, or simply diverts our attention from other social relations. So we find it hard to truly appreciate the value of community, because we don’t really see how it is difficult from going to the mall or buying something from the internet.

“However, due to intersectionality, it doesn’t seem correct to frame the alternative to this as social issues trumping economic ones.”

The solution isn’t merely to say that community ought to trump the market. Or that environmental concerns mean polluting industries must be stopped, or whatever.

“It’s more that these divisions are somewhat arbitrary and what is put foreward as a box of something like “economics” is insufficiently descriptive or useful without being contextualized relative to everything else.”

Rather we are never just consumers or workers or whatever. We always simultaneously experience economic, social, political and environmental relations. Somehow analysis of all these things need to be combined.

“It is erroneous to try to reduce the whole to such an unnecessarily restrictive box.”

I assert that what I understand by economics is unnecessarily restrictive

"But this doesn’t mean that the concerns that are typically thought of as being related to that domain are necessarily less important than other"

But the economy is important!

What puzzles me is why he lumps traditional anarchism in as guilty of economic reductionism. I really don’t know why he thinks that! Maybe it’s because they seem hung up on “wage slavery.”

19

By “intersectionality”, the author is referring to this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersectionality

As the article explains, intersectionality is a feminist sociological theory. “Intersectionalist holism” is apparently being used in place of “the anti-categorical approach to intersectionality” (see the section “The complexities of intersectionality” in the above Wikipedia article):

In this context, the author seems to be challenging the traditional dichotomy (or separation) between “economic issues” and “social issues”. Given his adherence to the anti-categorical approach to intersectionality, he also considers many social issues to be irreducible to traditional economic analysis.

Hope this helps.

20

Thanks Sam and Autolykos, I think that may have helped abit, but I am still not so sure. I still am not too sure what is being said, and even if you guys are correct, I still think it seems a bit empty of meaning / pointless to say as it inherently leads to a lot of question begging.