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> As a European, this article is the degree of pretentious, market-driven, and stupid, that fits perfectly with the Economist. Almost every time I read an arti

by pera 6y ago

> As a European, this article is the degree of pretentious, market-driven, and stupid, that fits perfectly with the Economist. Almost every time I read an article from The Economist I see that many of their arguments are founded on false premises which are (usually) trivial to fact-check. I really don't get why this publication gets posted here on HN so often.

varispeed 6y ago
The seem to be publishing what most people want to hear and as such it is pleasing to many people, regardless whether it is true or not. They just want to feel good for a moment and escape the reality.
jimnotgym 6y ago
The Economist has a variety of types of article. It has a World news round up. It has short opinion pieces (like the ones that get shared here) and longer form in depth analysis sections. It finishes with Arts and culture science and obituaries. I have only ever seen the short (1/2 to 1 page in the printed version) opinion pieces shared here. I think most publications could be judged unfairly by reading the only those parts. Usually the magazine is themed on one subject for the week and publishes a range of angles on the same thing. Again sharing one part of it rather destroys the beauty of it. I think that is why I can't get on with the digital editions. I was a subscriber to the paper edition, but it is supposed to arrive Saturday morning in the mail, but often didn't. I found thay if it arrived on Monday I was only finding time to flick through it.
- willyt 6y ago
  This happens with other papers as well. It's always the opinion pieces that get shared because they press people's buttons. Then everyone piles on with 'Oh this isn't journalism' obviously! of course it's not, it's usually not written by a journalist and it's not meant to be journalism. I can understand how people that didn't grow up with the print editions can get confused though as I've noticed that Apple News puts lots of opinion pieces in my 'news' feed and because of the diversity of sources it's not always easy to tell as there are no strong visual clues and each outlet's conventions for opinion pieces are different and I think they call them something different in America, I forget the word, (editorial?).
ketzo 6y ago
From my limited experience, their finance writing (as the publication's name might suggest) is actually pretty good; I appreciate the skill it takes to write about financial markets in a way that's understandable to someone with very little financial knowledge. Almost every other thing I've read from them is 1) total horseshit or, worse, 2) deeply right-wing conservative propaganda veiled behind a thin veneer of "we have a study that we cite!"
- schnevets 6y ago
  Yeah, when I had a commute I would devour Economist magazine, and I still consider it an even-keeled international news source for English-speaking readers. I can tell it has a neoliberal, "we have everything under control" underpinning, but I'm curious what people suggest as an alternative. That said, their culture section can be sloppy. After noticing numerous errors in topics I care about and being disappointed in multiple book recommendations, I think I'd sooner try a cooking recipe from PC Gamer than accept their entertainment opinions at face value.
mycologos 6y ago
I'm curious, can you cite some examples? In my experience The Economist has a definite bias toward "market reforms" (which some people might instead describe as "gutting the state" or something), but "trivially false" seems a lot more extreme.
- blululu 6y ago
  I realize that this ask is standard on HN but it’s a bit of a pain to comb through a publication to produce the imputed litany of minor inaccuracies. I share the OP’s sentiment that the economist is a lousy source for opinions (it is however great for total coverage of world events, but you take this with an ideological spin that free trade and deregulation will make everything good). In general the economist is written as a series of anonymous op-eds. Articles will bring up specious comparisons ‘the amount of natural gas reserves in Bolivia is greater than the oil sands of Alberta’ and use these to support opinions that are unrelated. They will make bold forecasts from scanty data ‘more subsidies for domestic industry will reduce GDP growth’, ‘restricting access to Qualcomm chips will cripple Chinese Mobile Manufacturers’ and never validate their success rate. In general it requires a lot of critical reading to not get sucked into believing that they know what they’re talking about.
  - astrange 6y ago
    > They will make bold forecasts from scanty data ‘more subsidies for domestic industry will reduce GDP growth’, ‘restricting access to Qualcomm chips will cripple Chinese Mobile Manufacturers’ and never validate their success rate. In general it requires a lot of critical reading to not get sucked into believing that they know what they’re talking about. The Economist actually interestingly runs a forecasting competition that does just that. I expect you have to pay more for those intelligence reports. https://www.gjopen.com/challenges https://www.gjopen.com/challenges
- libraryatnight 6y ago
  They won't be able to supply any examples beyond the opinion pieces, which are like most opinion pieces in all publications: click bait OPINIONS. The Economist does a decent job of reporting when reporting.
systemvoltage 6y ago
I've been reading the Economist for more than 15 years. I couldn't disagree with you more. This publication gets posted here so often because it is excellent IMO. It has a great balance of humor and rigor, they have great insights based on data, common trends, public opinion, government stance, etc. Weekly, I read a hard copy of it usually on Sunday mornings. Perhaps, I am biased of off habit. They admit their mistakes openly: https://medium.economist.com/mistakes-weve-drawn-a-few-8cdd8a42d368 https://medium.economist.com/mistakes-weve-drawn-a-few-8cdd8...
- hencq 6y ago
  I completely agree with you. I've been a subscriber for over 12 years, so maybe similarly biased. A good test case for me is whenever there's an article about something I have in-depth knowledge about it's rare to find grievous errors. A reverse Gell-Mann amnesia if you will. The articles that are posted here are usually from the Leaders section, which are in effect opinion pieces. For every Leader article there's also a more in-depth article. If your only experience with the Economist is through their Leaders I can see how you would come away with the idea that all their articles are biased and lack detail.
- mbrodersen 6y ago
  All that shows is that your values/political views/understanding of the world align with The Economist. It doesn’t say anything about whether that world view is true or not. I am not making any claims as to the rightness/wrongness of The Economist. Just pointing out that what you are experiencing is not an objective evaluation.
sprash 6y ago
The Economist is nothing but a mouthpiece for propaganda pushed by IMF, Brookings (a.k.a Rockefeller), Rothschilds, Goldman Sachs and further globalist swamp organizations. They get posted here as often as any other shoddy trash. But their crap seems to "stick" more at the frontpage than the others (probably because of better writing skills).

by pera 6y ago

varispeed 6y ago

The seem to be publishing what most people want to hear and as such it is pleasing to many people, regardless whether it is true or not. They just want to feel good for a moment and escape the reality.

jimnotgym 6y ago

The Economist has a variety of types of article. It has a World news round up. It has short opinion pieces (like the ones that get shared here) and longer form in depth analysis sections. It finishes with Arts and culture science and obituaries. I have only ever seen the short (1/2 to 1 page in the printed version) opinion pieces shared here. I think most publications could be judged unfairly by reading the only those parts. Usually the magazine is themed on one subject for the week and publishes a range of angles on the same thing. Again sharing one part of it rather destroys the beauty of it. I think that is why I can't get on with the digital editions. I was a subscriber to the paper edition, but it is supposed to arrive Saturday morning in the mail, but often didn't. I found thay if it arrived on Monday I was only finding time to flick through it.

willyt 6y ago
This happens with other papers as well. It's always the opinion pieces that get shared because they press people's buttons. Then everyone piles on with 'Oh this isn't journalism' obviously! of course it's not, it's usually not written by a journalist and it's not meant to be journalism. I can understand how people that didn't grow up with the print editions can get confused though as I've noticed that Apple News puts lots of opinion pieces in my 'news' feed and because of the diversity of sources it's not always easy to tell as there are no strong visual clues and each outlet's conventions for opinion pieces are different and I think they call them something different in America, I forget the word, (editorial?).

ketzo 6y ago

From my limited experience, their finance writing (as the publication's name might suggest) is actually pretty good; I appreciate the skill it takes to write about financial markets in a way that's understandable to someone with very little financial knowledge. Almost every other thing I've read from them is 1) total horseshit or, worse, 2) deeply right-wing conservative propaganda veiled behind a thin veneer of "we have a study that we cite!"

schnevets 6y ago
Yeah, when I had a commute I would devour Economist magazine, and I still consider it an even-keeled international news source for English-speaking readers. I can tell it has a neoliberal, "we have everything under control" underpinning, but I'm curious what people suggest as an alternative. That said, their culture section can be sloppy. After noticing numerous errors in topics I care about and being disappointed in multiple book recommendations, I think I'd sooner try a cooking recipe from PC Gamer than accept their entertainment opinions at face value.

mycologos 6y ago

I'm curious, can you cite some examples? In my experience The Economist has a definite bias toward "market reforms" (which some people might instead describe as "gutting the state" or something), but "trivially false" seems a lot more extreme.

blululu 6y ago
I realize that this ask is standard on HN but it’s a bit of a pain to comb through a publication to produce the imputed litany of minor inaccuracies. I share the OP’s sentiment that the economist is a lousy source for opinions (it is however great for total coverage of world events, but you take this with an ideological spin that free trade and deregulation will make everything good). In general the economist is written as a series of anonymous op-eds. Articles will bring up specious comparisons ‘the amount of natural gas reserves in Bolivia is greater than the oil sands of Alberta’ and use these to support opinions that are unrelated. They will make bold forecasts from scanty data ‘more subsidies for domestic industry will reduce GDP growth’, ‘restricting access to Qualcomm chips will cripple Chinese Mobile Manufacturers’ and never validate their success rate. In general it requires a lot of critical reading to not get sucked into believing that they know what they’re talking about.
- astrange 6y ago
  > They will make bold forecasts from scanty data ‘more subsidies for domestic industry will reduce GDP growth’, ‘restricting access to Qualcomm chips will cripple Chinese Mobile Manufacturers’ and never validate their success rate. In general it requires a lot of critical reading to not get sucked into believing that they know what they’re talking about. The Economist actually interestingly runs a forecasting competition that does just that. I expect you have to pay more for those intelligence reports. https://www.gjopen.com/challenges https://www.gjopen.com/challenges
libraryatnight 6y ago
They won't be able to supply any examples beyond the opinion pieces, which are like most opinion pieces in all publications: click bait OPINIONS. The Economist does a decent job of reporting when reporting.

systemvoltage 6y ago

I've been reading the Economist for more than 15 years. I couldn't disagree with you more. This publication gets posted here so often because it is excellent IMO. It has a great balance of humor and rigor, they have great insights based on data, common trends, public opinion, government stance, etc. Weekly, I read a hard copy of it usually on Sunday mornings. Perhaps, I am biased of off habit. They admit their mistakes openly: https://medium.economist.com/mistakes-weve-drawn-a-few-8cdd8a42d368 https://medium.economist.com/mistakes-weve-drawn-a-few-8cdd8...

hencq 6y ago
I completely agree with you. I've been a subscriber for over 12 years, so maybe similarly biased. A good test case for me is whenever there's an article about something I have in-depth knowledge about it's rare to find grievous errors. A reverse Gell-Mann amnesia if you will. The articles that are posted here are usually from the Leaders section, which are in effect opinion pieces. For every Leader article there's also a more in-depth article. If your only experience with the Economist is through their Leaders I can see how you would come away with the idea that all their articles are biased and lack detail.
mbrodersen 6y ago
All that shows is that your values/political views/understanding of the world align with The Economist. It doesn’t say anything about whether that world view is true or not. I am not making any claims as to the rightness/wrongness of The Economist. Just pointing out that what you are experiencing is not an objective evaluation.

sprash 6y ago

The Economist is nothing but a mouthpiece for propaganda pushed by IMF, Brookings (a.k.a Rockefeller), Rothschilds, Goldman Sachs and further globalist swamp organizations. They get posted here as often as any other shoddy trash. But their crap seems to "stick" more at the frontpage than the others (probably because of better writing skills).