5 ms·
> but macroeconomics is a bastardized combination of sociology and capitalist political theory mashed into an unfalsifiable 'science' and taught as such. It al
by CharlesColeman 7y ago
> but macroeconomics is a bastardized combination of sociology and capitalist political theory mashed into an unfalsifiable 'science' and taught as such.
It also serves as highly effective propaganda for its embedded political ideas. It's a lot harder to question the politics if you've been indoctrinated into believing they have the truth of a natural science.
- dredmorbius 7y agoThat's the principle reason for teaching economics as an objective truth, "positive" rather than "normative" (a set of distinctions I always have to look up). If what you're teaching is simply "natural law", then "it is what it is". If it's a moral discipline (which was what Adam Smith rooted his study in), it's ... rather something else. There are some useful bits to economics. There's a lot of cruft in it as well. A huge part of the value of studying the field isn't the knowledge you gain about the world, but of the delusions of many of those who claim to understand it, or know what should be done for it.
- nlfwhulsdhouv 7y agoI take a "Manufacturing Consent"-style approach to reading economics :)
- QuesnayJr 7y ago"Propaganda" is always a convenient label to throw around about ideas that you don't agree with. Economics isn't perfect (economists are human), but it is engaged with the empirical evidence. The empirical evidence is that capitalism is pretty good at delivering goods and services, that it suffers from a business cycle, and that markets by themselves are not good at correcting externalities (such as pollution). Economics engages with this empirical reality. The people who are quickest to call economics "propaganda" are the ones who want to deny this reality.