As part of a general blog conversation, Noah Smith writes,
Scott Sumner expresses incredible confidence that NGDP targeting is best. Paul Krugman expresses incredible confidence that fiscal stimulus is effective and that austerity is counterproductive. John Cochrane expresses incredible confidence that structural form – removing “sand in the gears” – is the best medicine for an economy in recession. Robert Lucas said that the “central problem of depression prevention has been solved.” And so on, and so forth.
I think normal people realize that that certitude is basically never warranted. Yes, those economists often (but not always) have some evidence to back up their claims. But not the kind of evidence that people have in disciplines where data is more abundant, controlled, and replicable.
Pointer from Mark Thoma. I disagree that this is how normal people think. I believe that the main problem with non-expert opinion in macroeconomics is that normal people can be just as dogmatic in their macro views as self-proclaimed experts.
I would amend the last paragraph to substitute “thoughtful economists” for “normal people.” With that amendment, the quoted passage would have my vote.
I agree. In fact, I think the certitude is highly damaging to the discourse we “normal people” engage in, as it allows people with a particular preconceived point-of-view or policy preference to cherry pick a particular expert as a way to “prove” that theirs is the correct view.
After all, Krugman has a Nobel Prize, so he must be right. Or so I’ve been told repeatedly.
I don’t teach in the field of economics, but I see a similar reality in my own fields. “Normal people” commonly assume certainty is the norm (though some have come to frame their certainty as in terms of absolute relativism).
>> Robert Lucas said that the “central problem of depression prevention has been solved.”
It’s hard to take expert opinion seriously in macro when experts make statements like this. It has been a few years but If memory serves Lucas had no more than 20 years of data to back the claims of the great moderation but was comfortable presenting said claims as a strong theory. That seems equivalent to the current social science trend of making population wide projections based on surveys of one classroom of students.
Back on the science discussion I withheld comment that science resembles a confidence game where each paper often makes outsized claims. So I don’t think economics is unique except in how long claims can stay unchallenged and how big the claims are (economy-wide and policy relevant as opposed to some gene or protein that probably only affects other research groups). So when people revere “science” or experts I think they are romanticizing.
Btw, he actually says the Austrians and heterodox people (implying they aren’t experts invited to the discussion) are tendentious. Wow.
“Yes, those economists often (but not always) have some evidence to back up their claims. But not the kind of evidence that people have in disciplines where data is more abundant, controlled, and replicable. ”
This isn’t it. Here is what it is. Economists are fairly unique in that each researcher has some plausibility to claim that his theory is a theory of everything for the economy. So, you have economists venturing out of their actual expertise into the real world and that is when “non-experts” in the map start retorting with their view of the terrain.