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[MetalSlimeHunt]

It hardly matters. Wealth of Nations is just a talking point for politicos because the schools cite it as the birth of capitalism. I've never met anybody who actually read it, and it probably has little relevance to modern economics by now anyway.

[Helgoland]

probably has little relevance to modern economics by now

Economics is, despite all its shortcomings, still a science: Past theories are not discarded, but become special cases of more general ones. That's why every Economics 101 course mentions Marx: The fellow had some interesting ideas. The book may not reflect the most recent research, but it is just as relevant as Newton's classical mechanics.

[mainiac]

It hardly matters. Wealth of Nations is just a talking point for politicos because the schools cite it as the birth of capitalism. I've never met anybody who actually read it, and it probably has little relevance to modern economics by now anyway.

I would disagree, while later writers have covered the territory better but Smith's approach is basically all of micro-economics.  Personally I think micro needs to get with the times but that's a different argument.

[Owlbread]

It hardly matters. Wealth of Nations is just a talking point for politicos because the schools cite it as the birth of capitalism. I've never met anybody who actually read it, and it probably has little relevance to modern economics by now anyway.

Stringer Bell read it. Don't you want to be as cool as Stringer Bell?

It's always worth taking a look at these books though if you start to get the sense people are talking about them and never reading them. You might find stuff that most people miss. I'm just trying to work out whether that Republican senator was Newt Gingrich. He's a senator, right?

[Yannanth]

Yeah, it was more of a polemic against mercantilism rather than a detailing of what a new economic system would be like and how it would work.

His time was just before industry and mass production became really prominent, which is why many of his ideas don't seem to jive with later capitalism or capitalism today.

[mainiac]

He's a senator, right?

No.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

probably has little relevance to modern economics by now

Economics is, despite all its shortcomings, still a science: Past theories are not discarded, but become special cases of more general ones. That's why every Economics 101 course mentions Marx: The fellow had some interesting ideas. The book may not reflect the most recent research, but it is just as relevant as Newton's classical mechanics.

I'm sorry, but I have no love of economics. It lacks virtually all rigor and is primarily based on feels and guesswork cross-applied to stock prices. I'll give you that economics exists, but I am not willing to presume any further with the maelstrom of insanity that I have experienced trying to comprehend the methods of economists.

Stringer Bell read it. Don't you want to be as cool as Stringer Bell?

I'm getting that this is a character from The Wire. I don't watch TV, also probably was young for The Wire when it aired. I do like Idris Elba, though.

It's always worth taking a look at these books though if you start to get the sense people are talking about them and never reading them. You might find stuff that most people miss. I'm just trying to work out whether that Republican senator was Newt Gingrich. He's a senator, right?

I suppose, but it's no high priority.

Gingrich was not a senator, he was the representative of Georgia's 6th District from 1979 to 1999. He also served as the minority whip from 1989 to 1995, and subsequently as the Speaker from 1995 to 1999.

[Owlbread]

He's a senator, right?

No.

I never knew. Forgive me, I just assumed presidential hopefuls tend to hold office as senators or governors. In that case we may never know who the fellow was.

[mainiac]

Well speaker of the house is the most prominent position in the house.  Get's you more media time then being junior Senator from Illinois for less then a term like Barack Obama was.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

And also, if you're a representative and both of your state's senators are crazy ancient fuckers who have held the seats for longer than anybody in living memory can recall, to the point that it's practically a tradition to vote for them, you really don't have much of an opportunity to move up.

[Helgoland]

probably has little relevance to modern economics by now

Economics is, despite all its shortcomings, still a science: Past theories are not discarded, but become special cases of more general ones. That's why every Economics 101 course mentions Marx: The fellow had some interesting ideas. The book may not reflect the most recent research, but it is just as relevant as Newton's classical mechanics.

I'm sorry, but I have no love of economics. It lacks virtually all rigor and is primarily based on feels and guesswork cross-applied to stock prices. I'll give you that economics exists, but I am not willing to presume
[/quote]
Then you've only seen the wrong kind of economics. There's much more to the field than guessing stock prices, believe me.
(And that 'no rigor' is a popular myth. It's basically the populist version of the more correct 'Their assumptions are too strong to yield acceptably accurate models'.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I'm exaggerating. My point is that for all the supply/demand sweet spot analysis and market elasticity claims, without providing us with any usable model and constantly operating under neoliberal fatalist assumptions I have no reason to give economists the time of day. If you can't tell me anything useful then I have no rational choice but to look at the numbers myself and try to rationally assess them outside of economist logic when making decisions.

Because when you listen to Economist World instead of reality, the consequences can be rather severe.

[mainiac]

If you can't tell me anything useful then I have no rational choice but to look at the numbers myself and try to rationally assess them outside of economist logic when making decisions.

Oh gee you mean those numbers you get from Economists?  You think they just come from a computer all neat and dandy?  It's like you are saying you dont need a physicist, you'll just run your own Large Hadron Collider.

Or hey, stable currency.  It is vastly more stable now that we have economists managing the supply instead of monetizing gold.  But who really cares if we have a depression every 15 years on average?  That can't be important.

Or how about the studies that have shown downward stickiness in individual employment situations leading to slight upward trends in prices even in a deflationary situation?  I suppose you just as an average joe just intuitively knew what we economists just assumed due to political bias?  I mean it's freaking obvious to any layman that tells us that core inflation metrics trending less then a percentage point below target probably indicate a larger output gap then Okun's law would typically indicate when long term interest rates are low.  I mean, that's just common sense, right?  I'm sure you know what that indicates about the opportunity cost of borrowing compared to a situation where wage deflation outweighs individual downward stickiness.  Don't worry, it's only a question of three or four trillion dollars in importance.

Goddamn amateurs coming into my field and telling me I don't know anything.

[Reelya]

probably has little relevance to modern economics by now

Economics is, despite all its shortcomings, still a science: Past theories are not discarded, but become special cases of more general ones. That's why every Economics 101 course mentions Marx: The fellow had some interesting ideas. The book may not reflect the most recent research, but it is just as relevant as Newton's classical mechanics.

Most commentators are quite clear that economics is not a science. This includes most economists. Science is a pretty serious label to apply to something. There are also some pretty good set of rules for scriptwriting, and they are equally timeless. However, I wouldn't go so far as to call scriptwriting a science.

Testable predictions: economics has very few of these. Let's not water down the definition of science. Tables of numbers and piles of charts doesn't make something "scientific", nor do timeless general observations: even the bible can claim that.

Economics is also terrible at detecting bullshit from it's own practitioners. The thing about high debt countries and growth rates in the Kenneth Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart study proves that. Which other "science" blindly trusts researchers making such gross calculation errors for so many years?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Oh gee you mean those numbers you get from Economists?  You think they just come from a computer all neat and dandy?  It's like you are saying you dont need a physicist, you'll just run your own Large Hadron Collider.

At least the physicists deliver and don't base the standard model off of a nationalistic, growth demanding, politically charged school of thought that has been mired deep in at least one reign of tyranny (and ironically killed off one of the more interesting developments in economic management).

Or hey, stable currency.  It is vastly more stable now that we have economists managing the supply instead of monetizing gold.  But who really cares if we have a depression every 15 years on average?  That can't be important.

Oh please. Economic fluctuation is a reality of our system and it will never cease. All the postulating over gold or fiat didn't mean shit when Wall Street realized they could issue a million NINA loans, trade them in packages, and not suffer the fallout. Call me when economic management isn't just a functionary of generating dividends.

Oh, and fiat currency is madness. I understand it has benefits and that keeping with gold wasn't going to work, but fiat makes slinging debt around inevitable, and as the values continue to get more extreme the shell game is going to break down and we will all suffer the consequences. Value is arbitrary, sure, but as long as it's arbitrarily tied to something physical it can't exponentially expand as we've seen with fiat. Fiat currency is a time bomb.

Or how about the studies that have shown downward stickiness in individual employment situations leading to slight upward trends in prices even in a deflationary situation?  I suppose you just as an average joe just intuitively knew what we economists just assumed due to political bias?  I mean it's freaking obvious to any layman that tells us that core inflation metrics trending less then a percentage point below target probably indicate a larger output gap then Okun's law would typically indicate when long term interest rates are low.  I mean, that's just common sense, right?  I'm sure you know what that indicates about the opportunity cost of borrowing compared to a situation where wage deflation outweighs individual downward stickiness.  Don't worry, it's only a question of three or four trillion dollars in importance.

Goddamn amateurs coming into my field and telling me I don't know anything.

I'm glad you're confident in your subject, but trying to smash me with out-of-field terminology isn't going to deter the very clear observation that economists are divorced from reality. Tell you what, I'll believe in economists when they aren't Reagan or Marx hot potato but actually impartial science that focuses on inquiry and progress independent of politics. And that's functionally, I'm sure there are dissidents to the Sacred Truth that I got a facefull of in my interdisciplinary work, but such dissidents rarely get their say in any field where this relationship exists. I'm not exactly holding my breath though, because the interplay of money and politics strangled all integrity out of this field long before I was around.