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I have a lot of respect for the Austrian school, particularly Hayek. But, the tendency of its supporters to see Economics as a philosophy & to defer to things l
by netcan 17y ago
I have a lot of respect for the Austrian school, particularly Hayek. But, the tendency of its supporters to see Economics as a philosophy & to defer to things like 'the law of unintended consequences' is insufferable.
- camccann 17y agoI have a hard time taking seriously any school of thought that's explicitly anti-empirical. This is the 21st century, have we learned nothing from the scientific revolution?
- netcan 17y agoI wouldn't call Austrians anti empirical. Many modern Austrian schoolers are scholars of economic history. Also, economics, specifically macro is very hard to study empirically. I would call them hard headed Personally, I would argue that economists see themselves too much as scientists, not too little. I would prefer they place themselves closer to sociology, political science & farther from biology & chemistry. Less deference to abstract first principles.
- bokonist 17y agoIt's not anti-empirical at all. It's just anti-numerology and against using induction when induction cannot be done. Compare Rothbard's history of the Great Depression ( http://mises.org/rothbard/agd.pdf http://mises.org/rothbard/agd.pdf ) to the typical paper by a Harvard economist ( http://www.economics.harvard.edu/faculty http://www.economics.harvard.edu/faculty ). Frankly, if you consider the Harvard papers to be more empirical, please inform me what form of crack you smoke, as it must be very high grade.