Big Brained Economists

I'm a bit busy with some things today (signal: lazy blogging), but commenting somewhat indirectly on some of the various econ "debates"* coming from people like Furman and Summers and hilariously stupid weridos like Wolfers:

I'm always amazed that the absolutely biggest brains in economics, particularly macroeconomics, instantly revert back to things I used to teach in hour one of what was, basically, a one day 'Macroeconmics For Wannabee Bankers' training course. And if you bring up stuff you would teach in hour 2 and beyond they talk about it as if it's Marxism or some other crazy radical 'nonsense.'

Economists always tell me "Eli, stop criticizing undergrad neoclassical econ we know its way more complicated than that" and yet Its stunning how often I see crucial policy debates being discussed by top, super-powerful economists with precisely the ec-101 graphs and assumptions! https://t.co/dSfkTtiS3k

— Eli Cook (@Eli_B_Cook) February 11, 2022

The knock on undergraduate economics has always been that it's a bit too simplistic and people get some wrong ideas from that, The defense of that is, well, sure, but it's a starting place and of course you get a more complex picture later on.

Jason Furman's been throwing up his "Econ 101" slides as if they're an argument against stuff you'd teach in "Econ 202."

What's a big brained economist for when they're all claiming a smart kid with 3 weeks of economics under her belt possesses the pinnacle of knowledge?

*In economics, "debates" usually means people at the top of the elite status ladder using their positions to try to stomp all over everybody who disagrees. It's funny! Especially funny when they're like, turn to page 37 of my Principles Of Macroeconomics (undergraduate) textbook! QED!