After calamity, economics leaders rethink strategy

[n2doc]

Tom Abate, Chronicle Staff Writer

Monday, December 20,

Following the worst financial panic since Herbert Hoover's presidency, the mathematically minded professors who dominate economics face a renewed challenge from their historically inclined peers who think studying the booms and busts of the past offers a better guide to the future than today's predictive algorithms.

Normally a tiff among the tenured set would be little more than academic, but economics is the science that empties pockets or fills purses; its nostrums influence debate over everything from tax cuts to unemployment benefits.

UC Berkeley, already a leader in economic history, recently solidified its position in the vanguard of this rebellion when it won a $1.25 million grant from the Institute for New Economic Thinking - a group created by billionaire George Soros to overthrow the math-based, free-market economics associated with the late Milton Friedman and his former stronghold at the University of Chicago.

"Free market fundamentalism has been confronted rather violently," Soros lieutenant Robert Johnson told Berkeley graduate students when he visited the campus last month to announce the grant.

"We are rebooting society," added Johnson, who will disburse another $50 million or so to encourage economists to revise their tools and theories. "We have to reinvigorate our social contract and redefine what we mean by civil society."



Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/12/19/BU1J1GNV09.DTL

[jwirr]

1. Hopefully when they reboot they include eco-economic thinking. We

cannot plan for the future without looking at oil depletion and climate change and its effects on the economy. If we do we are just fooling ourselves.

[fascisthunter]

3. heck, it would create so many jobs too

[bemildred]

2. I am a big fan of empirical economics rather than simple-minded dogmatic bullshit.

We need to be "reality based" in economic theory as well as foreign policy.

[IDemo]

4. Here's a great lecture at UC Berkeley for starters-

http://www.uctv.tv/search-details.aspx?showID=9521

[xchrom]

5. i find this sentence interesting

'UC Berkeley, already a leader in economic history, recently solidified its position in the vanguard of this rebellion when it won a $1.25 million grant from the Institute for New Economic Thinking - a group created by billionaire George Soros to overthrow the math-based, free-market economics associated with the late Milton Friedman and his former stronghold at the University of Chicago.'

[BrklynLiberal]

6. Duh..from the "No Shit Sherlock" file.