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>Economics makes no claims about what items, experiences or feelings should be demanded. You are simply incorrect about this. The author of this piece, Richard
by Sangermaine 9y ago
>Economics makes no claims about what items, experiences or feelings should be demanded.
You are simply incorrect about this. The author of this piece, Richard Thaler, just won the Nobel Prize in Economics (let me cut the pedants off: yes, I know it's the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences) for his decades of work addressing the implicit and explicit assumptions of traditional economic theory, which largely presumed perfectly rational "Homo economicus" actors, as the article notes.
That idea of rationality, and rationality over all other concerns, still holds a lot of sway in economic discussions. You'll see it come up a lot here on HN, for that matter.
You might take a look at Thaler's work before presuming to lecture him on economics.
- 1123581321 9y agoI know who the author is. Any time that you have an opinion about a controversy in a field, you are going to agree with and disagree with some famous people. We can respect that we know less than the lead voices in controversies and still participate in them. I can certainly agree that there are economists who stick to simple models when they shouldn't, but there is simply too much written that addresses the problems in the op-ed to discount the field of economics as too simple or focused on too few variables.
- cirgue 9y ago> That idea of rationality, and rationality over all other concerns, still holds a lot of sway in economic discussions. Rationality in economics is typically assumed to mean that an actor can unambiguously rank order preferences. It typically does not make judgements about what those preferences should be.