It is hard to find an article in the past century more influential in economic methodology than Milton Friedman’s “The Methodology of Positive Economics.” Its significance lies not in presenting groundbreaking new ideas but in its power to organize and articulate existing ones that had already been shaping the subconscious of many economists. Since its publication in 1953, this essay has become a cornerstone of mainstream economic methodology—a mainstream economic “bible” of sorts.
However, there is a surprising twist: Friedman himself later regretted writing it. This revelation was as shocking to me as it might be to you. I first came across this claim while reading Deirdre McCloskey’s Beyond Positivism, Behaviorism, and Neo-Institutionalism in Economics. On page 60, McCloskey writes: “I have said, in Samuelson’s PhD thesis (1941) and in Friedman’s ‘The Methodology of Positive Economics’ (1953)—a paper, Friedman told me, that he later regretted.”
That was very hard to take because mainstream economics uses these method all the time!! He was one of the people most influential in using mathematics in economics! He thought it was a mistake after associating with Heyak.