197 sats \ 17 replies \ @Bell_curve 7h
Who are these economists that oppose tax cuts? 85 percent oppose making 2017 tax cuts permanent. Sounds like they oppose Trump more than his tax policies
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151 sats \ 13 replies \ @SimpleStacker OP 7h
I mean, most academic economists these days are democrats and default to believing that the government can solve most problems.
@Undisciplined and I have discussed this before, that the way Econ is taught biases the student towards government intervention because market failures and the corresponding “benevolent social planner” solutions are taught, but incentive problems within the government are usually ignored
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68 sats \ 6 replies \ @Undisciplined 7h
There's a deeper darker answer that I increasingly think plays a large roll. Oftentimes, academic economists are the only people who actually believe the regime's propaganda. They're clever enough to concoct fancy rationale's for policies that are obviously cynical to everyone else.
That role, giving intellectual cover to corrupt politicians, I believe is why our profession is so well funded by the state. There's no mystery in the lack of funding for free market economists.
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54 sats \ 5 replies \ @SimpleStacker OP 7h
So true. And oftentimes, the more fanciful you get the more academic success you get since only “novel” results are publishable. I could bitch about our profession all day lol
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37 sats \ 4 replies \ @Undisciplined 6h
Me too, and yet I still think it's one of the better academic disciplines.
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53 sats \ 3 replies \ @SimpleStacker OP 5h
Agreed. Still the most honest and rigorous among the social sciences. Not sure how it compares to history though
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34 sats \ 1 reply \ @Bell_curve 5h
History departments are terrible and one sided
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15 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined 5h
I think their issue is not operating out of a theoretical framework. They think that let's them be objective, but it actually leads to defaulting to whatever the prevailing propaganda version of events was.
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined 5h
I don't have a great feel for that, personally. However, I've certainly heard historians like Tom Woods and Thaddeus Russel bemoan the plight of their profession.
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11 sats \ 5 replies \ @Bell_curve 7h
Reminds me of the story about your daughter arguing against rent control and she couldn’t find any experts who oppose it
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50 sats \ 4 replies \ @SimpleStacker OP 7h
Not rent control, actually. Forgot if I misspoke. It was more so the concept of public housing that she couldn’t find much articles against.
Rent control is actually something even mainstream economists oppose
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41 sats \ 2 replies \ @Undisciplined 6h
Have you ever played the "Bomb Damage or Rent Control" game with your students?
It's pretty fun.
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41 sats \ 1 reply \ @SimpleStacker OP 5h
No. I don’t think I’ve heard of that but I think I know what it is lol
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34 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined 5h
IIRC, it's something Walter Williams came up with. I tried it with an intro class and we had some dark fun with it.
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13 sats \ 0 replies \ @Bell_curve 6h
Public housing has a terrible record since 1965
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93 sats \ 2 replies \ @Bell_curve 7h
There is a Rorschach test for every American on tax policy. Everyone views income in one of two ways: as belonging to the person who earned it, or as all belonging to the government, which allows the person who earned it to keep some of it.
https://news.yahoo.com/news/opinion-kamala-harris-raise-taxes-120000820.html
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11 sats \ 1 reply \ @Bell_curve 5h
I have a friend who views income as belonging to the government
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @SimpleStacker OP 5h
That’s a major yikes from me
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174 sats \ 1 reply \ @zuspotirko 3h
The average voters understanding of economics is basically this:
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @SimpleStacker OP 1h
lmao so true... i'm saving this image
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