Comments on: Economic Expertise and Moral Mathematics

By: Swing Trading

Swing Trading — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 07:15:46 +0000

Interesting post. I have made a twitter post about this. My friends will enjoy reading it also.

By: 3 econo-smack downs « orgtheory.net

3 econo-smack downs « orgtheory.net — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 02:34:44 +0000

[...] a comment » 1. Will Wilkinson is upset about economists: I agree that it is impossible to think intelligently about policy without some minimum of economic [...]

By: Overcoming Bias : Defending Mankiw

Overcoming Bias : Defending Mankiw — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 12:29:43 +0000

[...] Will Wilkinson, I learn Ezra Klein heartily endorsed Matt Yglesias’s complaint on “the habit of [...]

By: Bjarne

Bjarne — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 06:46:23 +0000

I have not slept a lot so i might have missed something, but he seems to ignore Talebs assertion that past data is useless in predicting asset prices because the economy, altough it is a deterministic system in theory, is so complex that in practice we should treat it as random… but he does not quite because he uses fractals… wich I don't get…

anyway the fact that he does not disclose the results of all his funds are interesting

cheers

By: CatoTheYounger

CatoTheYounger — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 01:56:24 +0000

http://falkenblog.blogspot.com/2009/03/review-o...

It's a great review, in my opinion. Falkenstein's one of the best blogging nowadays, since he's not actually doing it for status yet has worked a long time with the topics he writes about it.

By: medelabackpack

medelabackpack — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 15:11:16 +0000

you are right uknowbetter!

Donna

By: Robin Hanson

Robin Hanson — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 13:24:45 +0000

I can't imagine what you are thinking in saying economists have no competence to say what is a cost or benefit. That seems to me to be one of the things we know best. And the market interest rate clearly gives the opportunity cost of resources spend in the future. You complain about cost-benefit analysis, but seem to have nothing to offer in its place.

By: Bjarne

Bjarne — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 19:51:04 +0000

@CatoTheYounger

I have read the black swan, and I'm very interested in a good critique. Link(s)? (please)

By: We Can Talk Environment, We Can Talk Economics, We Can Talk International Relations « Around The Sphere

Fri, 05 Jun 2009 14:57:22 +0000

[...] Will Wilkinson: I agree that it is impossible to think intelligently about policy without some minimum of economic literacy. But the economist has no competence whatsoever to tell us, say, the appropriate discount rate to apply to future costs and benefits, to take one important example. I’ve heard philosophical arguments to the effect that the discount rate for future welfare should be zero and that the discount rate should approach infinity as we consider the welfare of furture beings with whom there is no possibility of reciprocity. The funny thing is that I think people get the implications of discount rates wrong, and that both zero and infinity point to more or less maximizing growth. A zero discount rate plus a basic grasp of the relationship between technology and growth plus a reasonable projection of the current trend of technological progress implies an obligation to maximize economic growth rates with no concern whatsoever to avoid the incidence of future externalities of current activity. This is an economic argument, but it is also something rather more. Likewise, an infinite discount rate implies that we should do the best we can for our children and grandchildren, and leave it to our grandchildren to worry about their grandchildren. If we’re doing something now that might hurt people none of us will coexist with 100 years, then so what? Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Develop the design brief [...]

By: Pithlord

Pithlord — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 14:41:32 +0000

Will, have you seen this? It's a paper claiming that, in addition to the well-known correlations between openness and conscientiousness and political attitudes, the agreeable are likely to be leftist in economics (but not necessarily on social issues) and the emotionally stable are likelty to be libertarian in economics (without any correlation on social issues).

To shoehorn into the topic of the thread, public discourse is bound to become more quantitatively-oriented as we find stuff out, but that doesn't necessarily imply permanent domination by economists as other social sciences learn to use numbers.