3 ms·

>"the allocation of scarce resources to greatest effect" I'd say this is the goal of macroeconomics, not the entire discipline. And the application of economic

>"the allocation of scarce resources to greatest effect" I'd say this is the goal of macroeconomics, not the entire discipline. And the application of economic public policy tends to be as psuedoscientific and bias-laden as sociology. I say this as someone who is strongly educated in economics and worked as a private economist; I have a lot of love for the field in general. EDIT: The goal of economics, broadly, I think is simply analyzing the allocation of scarce resources across a wide variety of market methods and conditions. Ascribing prescriptive behavior is not something at least half of the discipline is interested in.

dredmorbius 10y ago
The "scarce resources" definition is typical of Samuelson. I find John Marshall's "ordinary business of life" distressingly vague. Krugman and Wells (2008) give: "economics is the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services." I'll argue you've confused macro with micro: macro deals, generally, with inflation, money supply, and foreign exchange. Micro with market allocations and behaviour (under various degrees of competition, monpoly/monopsony, or oligopoly/oligopsony).