Data mining by the woke
15 Mar 2021 Leave a comment
in econometerics Tags: data mining, methodology of economics
Spot on Bryan Caplan
15 Sep 2020 Leave a comment
in discrimination, econometerics, economics of education, economics of information, gender, health and safety, human capital, labour economics, labour supply, law and economics, occupational choice, occupational regulation, politics - Australia, politics - New Zealand, politics - USA, poverty and inequality Tags: methodology of economics, philosophy of science, racial discrimination, sex discrimination
David Levine on psychology and economics
17 Nov 2019 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, behavioural economics, economics of information Tags: methodology of economics
David Levine on homo economicus
28 Jul 2019 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, behavioural economics, economics of information, history of economic thought Tags: methodology of economics
Marshall on evidenced based policy
27 Feb 2019 Leave a comment
in Alfred Marshall, applied price theory, applied welfare economics, economics of regulation, history of economic thought, Public Choice, public economics Tags: methodology of economics
The impact of economic theory on political belief
28 Sep 2015 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, comparative institutional analysis, economics of education, Marxist economics Tags: conjecture and refutation, evidence-based policy, methodology of economics, overweening conceit of view, philosophy of the social sciences
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Stigler on economics as a big tent @RusselNorman @NZGreens @GreenpeaceNZ @Mark_J_Perry
21 Sep 2015 1 Comment
Applied welfare economics was never value free, but applied price theory is @TimothyTTaylor
11 Sep 2015 Leave a comment
in applied welfare economics, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, history of economic thought, liberalism, Murray Rothbard Tags: David Colander, Henry Hazlitt, Joan Robinson, methodology of economics
The first words uttered in my first lecture in applied welfare economics by Bob Rutherford were ‘this course starts with an explicit political position – that of liberalism’. I never forgot that.
Source: CONVERSABLE ECONOMIST: Crossing the Ravine from Economic Theory to Policy Advice.
This leads us to Robert and Zeckhauser’s taxonomy of disagreement:
Positive disagreements can be over questions of:
1. Scope: what elements of the world one is trying to understand?
2. Model: what mechanisms explain the behaviour of the world?
3. Estimate: what estimates of the model’s parameters are thought to obtain in particular contexts?
Values disagreements can be over questions of:
1. Standing: who counts?
2. Criteria: what counts?
3. Weights: how much different individuals and criteria count?
Any positive analysis tends to include elements of scope, model, and estimation, though often these elements intertwine; they frequently feature in debates in an implicit or undifferentiated manner. Likewise, normative analysis will also include elements of standing, criteria, and weights, whether or not these distinctions are recognised.
The origin of political disagreement is a broad church indeed in a liberal democracy. Those you disagree with are not evil, they just disagree with you. As Karl Popper observed:
There are many difficulties impeding the rapid spread of reasonableness. One of the main difficulties is that it always takes two to make a discussion reasonable. Each of the parties must be ready to learn from the other.
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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