I mostly think economics education is fine... most high school graduates in the US come out with a good basic understanding of supply/demand and labor/capital basic inputs to businesses, etc. But that doesn't mean that people are prepared to talk about economics on a daily basis, especially when it comes to politics. People confuse personal finance and budgeting with economics in general and don't know how to correctly think about the difference between legal and economic incidence of taxes like tariffs on imports.
Do I think economics in higher education needs to change? no. But the base level of economics knowledge and principles are very lacking for the everyday person, to the detriment of society at large.
> People confuse personal finance and budgeting with economics in general and don't know how to correctly think about the difference between legal and economic incidence of taxes like tariffs on imports.
Or like treating the debt of a country in a similar fashion to household debt.
Economics - the business of creating a cover story for whatever the rich want to do. All dressed up in mathematically rigorous fictions claiming to model reality so it cannot be questioned by the hoi polloi. Never matters whether the forecast predictions ever match reality.
They serve the same role that soothsayers and captive religions used to play.
Econ 102 taught me most markets are not perfectly competitive and how to measure monopolistic control over markets. That and how to measure value each country gets from trading goods based on specialization.
This is conspiratorial anti science rhetoric, any econ student will tell you isn’t the case.
Ugh, paradigmatic. We've seen these same criticisms leveled against Mathematics. It makes no more sense here either.
Fringe activist asks "why does this not focus on fringe heterodox notions and topics completely irrelevant to the subject?" If you already know the answer, don't ask.
Even for STEM they ask to corrupt the pursuit of truth and scientific rigor in service of a worldview.
The effectiveness and pragmatism of economic theory aside -
It's interesting to observe that highly opinionated topics (such as economics) tend to follow a "team sports" pattern. More than day to day utility, people argue passionately for their "home team". It becomes a point of pride and identity.
Of further note is the role of education - generally considered a form of training to improve your personal wellbeing - yet it has a secondary function. It can convince you to "change teams."
rethinkeconomics.org says:
> The problem we face is the total dominance of one way of teaching, which promotes the marketisation of society, leading to increased inequality, injustice and significant harm to the natural world.
A cohesive society is one with "team support" parity between the people and government. It begs the question - what happens when society reverses parity?
Articles like this pop up a lot, and not just here. I took economics. On one hand, I did find my education to be very high quality, relevant, gave me a good understanding of the economy and all the principles are sound.
The problem with economics is that people and politicians either don't listen or want specific outcomes that aren't good for the economy as a whole.
Voters will always vote for handouts, not for a robust and sustainable economy for everyone. Rich people will always vote for things that increase inequality, because they're the beneficiaries. Homeowners will always vote to simply increase the value of their assets, after they bought them of course. And so on...
The only place anyone listens to economists is in banks and hedge funds. But then you're probably not creating the change that led you to consider economics in the first place...
I only agree with the “will always vote” statements here if asterisked with “in aggregate, given the current socioeconomic incentive structures”
Maybe this is pedantic hair-splitting, but cultures and material conditions change… even human nature can change on long enough time scales. Maybe Humans will evolve into Bonobos.
What you are saying is understating the problem. Today's debt-based national economics allows people alive today to gain benefits while placing the resultant costs/restrictions on the people who are not yet born (or are currently children).
Debt-based economics is one of the biggest subversion of democracy. Decisions are being made for people who can't vote.
As long as economics education continues to teach anything about the marginal cost of production just because David Ricardo thought he was clever with his lumberjack analogy two centuries ago, it's fair to say it's not fit for the 21th century.
Amazing what LLMs and the power of AI can do for you! Economists take note, you are all going to be replaced by ChatGPT 5. Future POTUS, AI literacy will now be your core competency.
Entirely useless recommendations and very dubious empirical claims here. Let’s take them one at a time….
- “The climate crisis and socio-ecological issues are broadly absent from economic curricula.”
-> I don’t believe that for a second. Externalities are taught in every Econ 101 class I’ve ever heard of.
“75% of universities do not teach any ecological economics”
-> as a whole class maybe not but that doesn’t mean the material doesn’t get covered.
“ instead, when issues of ecological sustainability are taught, environmental damage is considered as something that needs to be priced into market mechanisms.”
-> which is a completely normal, standard idea among economists for good reason!
“Economics education does not address historical and contemporary power imbalances”
-> that’s not our job? Wtf - that’s not part of economics at all. Does it get covered in statistics? In history? I don’t know who’s responsible but it’s not us.
“55% of universities do not provide meaningful teaching on questions of historical slavery, colonialism, or neocolonialism at all. History and ethics are absent from these discussions.”
-> economics departments are not being held responsible for this supposed omissions but I really doubt this supposed fact is true. Does an American history class count or not ? It’s just not possible that slavery is not taught.
“Mainstream neoclassical economics dominates the economic theories taught.”
-> also a good sign as that’s the standard. We don’t teach Marxist thought anymore. That’s progress.
“Of the 480 theory modules we graded, 88.3% of them included mainstream neoclassical economic thinking focusing on rational, self-interested individuals.”
-> Show me any alternative that’s credible. Also: behavioral methods are widely taught. We are plenty criticism of our own models. That’s also Econ 101 material.
“They are almost entirely taught through quantitative technical skills.”
->. Good. Also: as opposed to…? What exactly?
“Economics is taught in isolation from other social sciences. The discipline of economics should be embedded within the social sciences, and students should be encouraged to learn across other disciplines such as politics, sociology, geography, and history, but for the most part, it remains siloed”
-> that’s true of what happens in every other department too. Leave it up to universities to set distribution requirements.
“There are two programmes that are critical, climate-conscious, and provide an economics education fit for the 21st century. SOAS and the University of Greenwich introduce students to a range of intellectual and methodological perspectives within the economics discipline. They put a learning focus on climate, power, and inequality throughout the course.”
jlhawn|6 months ago
Do I think economics in higher education needs to change? no. But the base level of economics knowledge and principles are very lacking for the everyday person, to the detriment of society at large.
exolymph|6 months ago
I profoundly doubt this
barry-cotter|6 months ago
If this was true politics would be so profoundly different the entire world would be unrecognisable.
throw0101d|6 months ago
Or like treating the debt of a country in a similar fashion to household debt.
jgeada|6 months ago
They serve the same role that soothsayers and captive religions used to play.
throw0101d|6 months ago
… excepting those who call bad ideas "bad ideas" even if they help the rich:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_experiment
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_Cuts_and_Jobs_Act
lanfeust6|6 months ago
mason_mpls|6 months ago
This is conspiratorial anti science rhetoric, any econ student will tell you isn’t the case.
lanfeust6|6 months ago
Fringe activist asks "why does this not focus on fringe heterodox notions and topics completely irrelevant to the subject?" If you already know the answer, don't ask.
Even for STEM they ask to corrupt the pursuit of truth and scientific rigor in service of a worldview.
disambiguation|6 months ago
It's interesting to observe that highly opinionated topics (such as economics) tend to follow a "team sports" pattern. More than day to day utility, people argue passionately for their "home team". It becomes a point of pride and identity.
Of further note is the role of education - generally considered a form of training to improve your personal wellbeing - yet it has a secondary function. It can convince you to "change teams."
rethinkeconomics.org says:
> The problem we face is the total dominance of one way of teaching, which promotes the marketisation of society, leading to increased inequality, injustice and significant harm to the natural world.
A cohesive society is one with "team support" parity between the people and government. It begs the question - what happens when society reverses parity?
dismalaf|6 months ago
The problem with economics is that people and politicians either don't listen or want specific outcomes that aren't good for the economy as a whole.
Voters will always vote for handouts, not for a robust and sustainable economy for everyone. Rich people will always vote for things that increase inequality, because they're the beneficiaries. Homeowners will always vote to simply increase the value of their assets, after they bought them of course. And so on...
The only place anyone listens to economists is in banks and hedge funds. But then you're probably not creating the change that led you to consider economics in the first place...
jondwillis|6 months ago
Maybe this is pedantic hair-splitting, but cultures and material conditions change… even human nature can change on long enough time scales. Maybe Humans will evolve into Bonobos.
abdullahkhalids|6 months ago
Debt-based economics is one of the biggest subversion of democracy. Decisions are being made for people who can't vote.
zokier|6 months ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Boys
I'm not sure if economics education ever was very fit for any century.
littlestymaar|6 months ago
daedrdev|6 months ago
hacker_yacker|6 months ago
belter|6 months ago
[1] " "We've cut drug prices by 1200, 1300, 1400, 1500 percent. I don't mean 50 percent. I mean 14-, 1500 percent,"
[1] - https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-doubles-down-impossibl...
DiggyJohnson|6 months ago
ryandv|6 months ago
mason_mpls|6 months ago
unknown|6 months ago
[deleted]
huitzitziltzin|6 months ago
- “The climate crisis and socio-ecological issues are broadly absent from economic curricula.”
-> I don’t believe that for a second. Externalities are taught in every Econ 101 class I’ve ever heard of.
“75% of universities do not teach any ecological economics”
-> as a whole class maybe not but that doesn’t mean the material doesn’t get covered.
“ instead, when issues of ecological sustainability are taught, environmental damage is considered as something that needs to be priced into market mechanisms.”
-> which is a completely normal, standard idea among economists for good reason!
“Economics education does not address historical and contemporary power imbalances”
-> that’s not our job? Wtf - that’s not part of economics at all. Does it get covered in statistics? In history? I don’t know who’s responsible but it’s not us.
“55% of universities do not provide meaningful teaching on questions of historical slavery, colonialism, or neocolonialism at all. History and ethics are absent from these discussions.”
-> economics departments are not being held responsible for this supposed omissions but I really doubt this supposed fact is true. Does an American history class count or not ? It’s just not possible that slavery is not taught.
“Mainstream neoclassical economics dominates the economic theories taught.”
-> also a good sign as that’s the standard. We don’t teach Marxist thought anymore. That’s progress.
“Of the 480 theory modules we graded, 88.3% of them included mainstream neoclassical economic thinking focusing on rational, self-interested individuals.”
-> Show me any alternative that’s credible. Also: behavioral methods are widely taught. We are plenty criticism of our own models. That’s also Econ 101 material.
“They are almost entirely taught through quantitative technical skills.”
->. Good. Also: as opposed to…? What exactly?
“Economics is taught in isolation from other social sciences. The discipline of economics should be embedded within the social sciences, and students should be encouraged to learn across other disciplines such as politics, sociology, geography, and history, but for the most part, it remains siloed”
-> that’s true of what happens in every other department too. Leave it up to universities to set distribution requirements.
“There are two programmes that are critical, climate-conscious, and provide an economics education fit for the 21st century. SOAS and the University of Greenwich introduce students to a range of intellectual and methodological perspectives within the economics discipline. They put a learning focus on climate, power, and inequality throughout the course.”
-> eye roll.