Are you guys desperately trying to drive away anybody who knows anything and gives a damn about economics as opposed to your libertarian nonsense?
yes?
Are you having a bad day?
I haven’t kept track of that thread since the initial argument emerged, but I take it people got outraged at an unpopular opinion, again?
ZOMG! People disagreed on the intarwebs?
That’s what the nice man with the flashy blog told me. I trust his sources.
Is this related to an existing thread? If yes, could someone please point to the statement(s) that enraged Giles so much?
I was referring to the fact that few people on these forums give a damn about economic science.
This is a forum for discussing economic science, particularly the economics of the neoclassical school which most people here would call “Austrian economics”. Yet, few people here can give an accurate account of Mises’ regression theorem, the dehomogenization of Mises and Hayek, the Austrian critique of the Cambridge controversy or Austrian macroeconomics. Let alone being able to give even the simplest about of RBCT, Friedman’s “Plucking Model” or even Keynesian thought, and as such couldn’t give an even handed, fair, and yet accurate critique of them. Simply dismissing those who disagree with them as “statist hacks” or whatever other epithet they seem to enjoy using to those who they consider to be wrong (conflating bad economics and wrong economics). I wonder how many of these people understand that Austrian economics is neoclassical economics or are aware of the affinities between Marshallian price theory and Austrian price theory.
See, most people see Austrian economics as being “libertarian economics”. Without understanding that if you want to understand economics you’ve got to put aside your (dogmatic) political views and that if you wish to further libertarianism you’d best forget about economics full stop and begin practising other techniques that may involve going outside (how such a notion scares libertarians).
It’s a shame that the level of economic disucssion that goes on in these forums is so low when the LvMI is first and foremost an institute for furthering economic science. Moreover, it’s an embarrasment that people consider journalists like Hazlitt to be good economics, or that they consider people like Rothbard to be “top” economists. Neither were anything of the sort, Hazlitt was a popular writer and Rothbard merely integrated many different parts of various schools of thought among various disciplines. In regards to the latter, some elements of the intergration as to be welcomed (his macroeconomics), others are very questionable (the fact that he felt the need to invoke the individualist anarchists).
First of all, economics is not a science. Second of all, why would we debate people using terminology they know nothing about? And lastly, economics is a pretty simple subject.
Yes, it is.
No, it’s not. But then, you’ve never read any serious economics work, so how would you know?
Then you obviously do not understand what science is. There is no way to test economics with a control. Economics is all about correlation, not causation.
This is why we talk about libertarianism so much, because it boils down to it is just plain wrong to take from others without consent.
How do you know what I have read and how are you able to evaluate whether it is is serious without knowing?
You mistake the definition of science with the methodology of many sciences.
Economics is about causation, it is about discovering the sequence, and concatenation of economic phenomena.
No. Otherwise you are just using a loose definition of science, something more akin to economics is knowledge or philosophy. Well so is everything.
But there is no way to prove the causation. Everything ends up being correlation, and then making the leap that it is causation. Again, there is no way to have a control sample to test any economic hypothesis.
You cannot prove that private education results in a wealthier society as opposed to publicly funded education. You can try if you like.
There’s no way to be sure you have a test in the physical sciences either, moreover, it is the physical sciences that rely purely on correlation because they cannot establish causation through observation. Only theory can do the latter task, and that is exactly why Austrianism is superior.
Prove it.
If you’ve read any of the following I’ll take back my comment:
- Mises - Human Action
- Rothbard - Man, Economy and State
- Hayek - Individualism and Economic Order
- Hayek - Prices and Production
- Varian - Intermediate Microeconomics
- Blanshard - Macroeconomics
- Garrison - Time and Money
I have no idea what you are talking about. Example maybe?
I should have said that we argue libertarianism because it is the most consistent political philosophy.
Nope, I have not read any of them. That still does not answer the question of how you can evaluate the seriousness of what I have read without knowing what I have read. But if you are so small-minded as to assume that these are the only serious works, then so be it.
Many Keynesian economists and layman followers of Keynesianism are both Keynesian economists AND active left-liberals. Many socialists economists and layman followers thereof are both socialists economists AND active political socialists. Friedman and other Chicagoites were both monetarists and, well, I’d call Friedmanite politics conservative or classical liberalism ultra-lite. Adam Smith and his cohorts were both classical economists and classical liberals. Turgot was both a classical economist and a classical liberal. The German Historicists were both historicist economists and promoters of German statism (correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m thinking of Schmoller here).
Given that all these people from non-Austrian schools combined the study of economics with their respective political beliefs why can’t Austrians combine their beliefs with libertarianism? And why hasn’t anyone told Block, Hoppe and all the other economists associated with this institute that this was the case?
Now should many people on this forum, myself included, probably intensify their study of economics? Sure. Personally, I keep on telling myself I’ll set aside more time for MESPM. Should we perhaps invest more time in understanding other schools of thought? That’s a good thing to do and another thing I have on my list. However, I cannot comprehend your point that this would necessitate us becoming less politically libertarian. I do not see why one cannot be both a libertarian and a supporter of Austrian economists. Also, I think your snipes at Rothbard are unfair. I think everyone on here can acknowledge Mises as being more original and more important in the development of Austrian economics. I think Rothbard himself wouldn’t deny this. Personally, I think it’s too early to make the case for Hoppe because I think that we can only begin putting people in their proper academic place after their death.
Surely, you wouldn’t deny Rothbard the title of the best Austrian economic historian for his History of Economic Thought?
I’m just here to swoop fly girls.
What do you mean by this, Giles?
This.
Also, I don’t beat down anyone as I’ve seen so far in regards to economics. Largely, I come at economics from the perspective of computer science (and information theory), so I’m more or less taking a quasi-Hayekian view of things here (with Rand in the mix). I love it when people debate the more cerebral issues of economics and avoiding the policy issues (how are we going to have X in a free market?).
Neoclassical Economics started out as the Marginal Revolution, which is from the Austrian school. It was in response to problems in the Classical theories as well as a rebuttal to German [Economic] Historicism.