Entries by Matt Nolan

Discussion Tuesday

From Noah Smith on Twitter: There are models economists make to describe what they think is really going on, and there are models they make to explore neat ideas. — Noah Smith (@Noahpinion) October 9, 2014 My question to you fine folk, are both types of models useful?  If so how?

Discussion Tuesday

Via Ryan Decker on Twitter: Pundits want equal status to econs, hence the argument MT @ModeledBehavior enough w/ claims that econ unscientific http://t.co/2rDxQOKyRj … — Ryan Decker (@UpdatedPriors) September 28, 2014

Discussion Tuesday

Today, let us discuss the conclusion from this post about language and Piketty: The language of economics often treats people as commodities: the phrases “representative agent” and “human capital” are examples of this.   Sometimes these phrases are useful abstractions, but they also contribute to the sometimes pernicious indifference of mainstream economics to issues of […]

QOTD: On politics and economics

I was chatting about some policy recently with another economist, when they came out with this great line about how some policy was being reported (overseas): Every political editor loves it and all the economics editors are unimpressed. What does this mean?  What does this imply about politics and economics?  I’ll leave it up to […]

Living below the line

Hey all.  Instead of writing about anything you might be interested in, I’m going to use this forum to ask for donations for the living below the line challenge next week – with the funds going to Aoteraroa Development Cooperative.  The justification I’ve been using when asking people is below. I just received an email […]