I personally have started referring to those who refer to me as such, as believers in the regulatory religion. Anyone else come up with a good epitah to stick to the other side that will drive home to the man on the street these people’s worldview?
National Socialist usually gets some attention. Mind you, ad hominem isn’t very effective in spreading ideas.
I agree, it is mostly in response to some people that I debate who are fully entrenched and take ‘statist’ almost as a complement.
Hopefully in any decent debate simply pointing out that it’s an ad hominem should suffice. One comeback I like is paraphrasing Arthur C. Clarke by saying something along the lines of, “Any sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic/religion.” If you’re really not interested in persuading the opponent you could precede or end that statement with the clause “To the ignorant.”
Clue me in, what is so bad about “market fundamentalist”?
Lingustically I actually don’t think it is that bad, after all one belives in the market as the fundemental principle to guide human society. Mainly it is the connotations with radical Islamic or Christian fundementalists that the term tries to conjur in the minds of those not as well versed in econ when they here it, giving them a prejudice against free market economics.
“Not a big fan of labels. You?”
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Proud Market Fundamentalist here.
being a “market fundamentalist” strikes me as being something like a “geometry fundamentalist”.
It’s Joseph Stiglitz’s clever way of calling other economists another kind of “religious fundamentalist”.
But it’s a portmanteau term - it doesn’t really refer to free marketers. It’s a broad term applied to everybody with whom Stiglitz is in disagreement. So if you believe in using central bank in raising interest rates during a recession - MARKET FUNDAMENTALIST! If you favour one kind of taxes over another kind of taxes - MARKET FUNDAMENTALIST!
In short, the term could aptly be applied to people with whom we are also in disagreement. It’s Stiglitz’s clever way of clubbing all his opponents under one group, until it makes no sense. Sort of like how Marxists called everything “capitalist”.
I disagree with libertystudent. Such ad hominem works exceptionally well in today’s academia and propels such people upwards.
As much as i detest namecalling, and never plan to employ it, I think “state apologist” is in order. 10 years ago economists would have supported a free market in drilling, but now they’re saying all sorts of stupid things about how the government should take over. There’s no quality control on their ideas. Its just whatever fashion dictates. They’re too scared of looking un-PC to ever to to be scientifically correct.
Fundamentalism.
I would say National Socialist or Nazi, but some people don’t understand that. When you call someone a Nazi, most people assume you’re implying that they would like to kill people of the Jewish faith instead of criticizing their economic policies.
Because it’s an accusation of blind faith - a belief in the market, instead of what it is - the acceptance of reality.
To be fair, Conza, a lot of “free marketers” have used mathematics and statistics to prove their points about the free market, instead of straightforward logic, principles, and understanding of human nature. In that respect, anybody can accuse them of mere belief.