3 ms·

Economics is not like physics at all. It's a social science, rooted in many social assumptions and compromises and power relationships between human beings and

by wazoox 6y ago

Economics is not like physics at all. It's a social science, rooted in many social assumptions and compromises and power relationships between human beings and groups. Most attempts to negate this are just tortuous ways to justify the current power structure.

imtringued 6y ago
There is a small nugget that is as hard as physics. Namely the tools can be analyzed in their theoretical performance. But economics is deeply tied to politics. What type of economy you have is entirely dependent on current leadership. It's the government that sets the basic foundation and rules upon which the economy is built. Some governments decided to go to either extreme. Communism or capitalism. There is a price equilibrium, assuming one is allowed to exist, which is dependent on your government, but where exactly it lies is also entirely dependent on the laws the government set. If the government bans garbage disposal in rivers then it would be completely unreasonable to insist that the equilibrium price should stay the same. By this same logic if there is an inherent injustice or imbalance it exists in the laws the government created. One prominent example would be the central bank flooding the market in a way that benefits existing asset holders, one could have done the exact opposite as well or maybe even done a little of both. It's not a question of which is the right action, the question is "What kind of economy do you want?" and the central bank has spoken.
- wazoox 6y ago
  Precisely. "What kind of economy do you want?" is a political question, that has no definite, scientific answer. And more restrictive economic questions, very often, also are political questions that should be democratically debated and decided, but are instead presented as "scientific" in nature, with the pretension that "we should do as our experts said" (whose experts exactly?).

by wazoox 6y ago

imtringued 6y ago

There is a small nugget that is as hard as physics. Namely the tools can be analyzed in their theoretical performance. But economics is deeply tied to politics. What type of economy you have is entirely dependent on current leadership. It's the government that sets the basic foundation and rules upon which the economy is built. Some governments decided to go to either extreme. Communism or capitalism. There is a price equilibrium, assuming one is allowed to exist, which is dependent on your government, but where exactly it lies is also entirely dependent on the laws the government set. If the government bans garbage disposal in rivers then it would be completely unreasonable to insist that the equilibrium price should stay the same. By this same logic if there is an inherent injustice or imbalance it exists in the laws the government created. One prominent example would be the central bank flooding the market in a way that benefits existing asset holders, one could have done the exact opposite as well or maybe even done a little of both. It's not a question of which is the right action, the question is "What kind of economy do you want?" and the central bank has spoken.

wazoox 6y ago
Precisely. "What kind of economy do you want?" is a political question, that has no definite, scientific answer. And more restrictive economic questions, very often, also are political questions that should be democratically debated and decided, but are instead presented as "scientific" in nature, with the pretension that "we should do as our experts said" (whose experts exactly?).