Why would they talk about data? Data collection in economics is often very much outside the scope of economics departments. Not only because it's beyond the bu

Why would they talk about data? Data collection in economics is often very much outside the scope of economics departments. Not only because it's beyond the budgets of individual departments to maintain the necessary personnel, but because it's hard to get people to disclose that sort of information. That task falls mostly on the lap of government and international organizations, who have the sort of legitimacy to pull that off. Besides that, there's experimental data, surveys sent out to private organizations and private (closed) databases. But the majority of the data used in econ deparments was produced elsewhere. If what you wanted to hear someone talk about "measuring the flow of money", you'd probably be better off in some Federal Reserve bank.