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You don't have to be an austrian to acknowledge that some of what they say is sensible. Discarding a theory in toto because it's adherents are odious is exactl

You don't have to be an austrian to acknowledge that some of what they say is sensible. Discarding a theory in toto because it's adherents are odious is exactly the sort of hubristic political bullshit that results in you fucking everyone over.

notahacker 6y ago
Sure, but you don't have to take any notice whatsoever of Austrian economics to critique the biases encoded in an economic model (indeed not being overtly hostile to the concept of economic modelling per se leads to much more parsimonious critiques of models and explicit identification of second order effects). I'm not really sure that Austrian economics has much to say that is sensible beyond illustrating basic microeconomic concepts and noting that inflation can [sometimes] be bad, business cycles are a thing and the predictive power of equilibrium models is limited, and you get all that in a mainstream undergrad textbook. Not being an Austrian helps you conclude that their arguments that economics isn't quantitative, positivism isn't useful and reducing income inequality is actually a goal a government might wish to consider wrong though. :)
- dnautics 6y ago
  I'm not austrian (for example, I believe that the velocity theory of monetary value is partially true). You're the one that boxed me into that category. Only about 20% of what they say is any good, but those parts are definitely not being said by anyone else.
  - notahacker 6y ago
    I didn't say you were an Austrian, though I must admit I'm intrigued by what you think they are saying that is useful and nobody else says (even arguments favouring gold standards are not unique to Austrians; a priori praxeology, perhaps, but I would have difficulty concluding their a priori praxeology was "any good"). At a stretch, maybe Hayek's free banking, but then others have described natural experiments with free banking but just reached somewhat different conclusions...
    - dnautics 6y ago
      s/nobody else/the major economic schools/ So like chicago, keynes, socialism, mmt (which admittedly is niche) Better?

notahacker 6y ago

Sure, but you don't have to take any notice whatsoever of Austrian economics to critique the biases encoded in an economic model (indeed not being overtly hostile to the concept of economic modelling per se leads to much more parsimonious critiques of models and explicit identification of second order effects). I'm not really sure that Austrian economics has much to say that is sensible beyond illustrating basic microeconomic concepts and noting that inflation can [sometimes] be bad, business cycles are a thing and the predictive power of equilibrium models is limited, and you get all that in a mainstream undergrad textbook. Not being an Austrian helps you conclude that their arguments that economics isn't quantitative, positivism isn't useful and reducing income inequality is actually a goal a government might wish to consider wrong though. :)

dnautics 6y ago
I'm not austrian (for example, I believe that the velocity theory of monetary value is partially true). You're the one that boxed me into that category. Only about 20% of what they say is any good, but those parts are definitely not being said by anyone else.
- notahacker 6y ago
  I didn't say you were an Austrian, though I must admit I'm intrigued by what you think they are saying that is useful and nobody else says (even arguments favouring gold standards are not unique to Austrians; a priori praxeology, perhaps, but I would have difficulty concluding their a priori praxeology was "any good"). At a stretch, maybe Hayek's free banking, but then others have described natural experiments with free banking but just reached somewhat different conclusions...
  - dnautics 6y ago
    s/nobody else/the major economic schools/ So like chicago, keynes, socialism, mmt (which admittedly is niche) Better?