Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Preface: Doctor Bob's Third Law
- Introduction: Economic Ignorance
- Chapter 1 Fakeconomics and Economics
- Chapter 2 Market Worship
- Chapter 3 Finance and Criminality
- Chapter 4 Selling Market Myths
- Chapter 5 Riches, “Sovereignty” and “Free Trade”
- Chapter 6 Lies about Government
- Chapter 7 Deficit Disorders and Debt Delirium
- Chapter 8 Governments Cause Inflation?
- Chapter 9 Institutionalized Misery: Austerity in Practice
- Chapter 10 Economics of the 99%
- Notes
- Index
Introduction: Economic Ignorance
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 April 2014
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Preface: Doctor Bob's Third Law
- Introduction: Economic Ignorance
- Chapter 1 Fakeconomics and Economics
- Chapter 2 Market Worship
- Chapter 3 Finance and Criminality
- Chapter 4 Selling Market Myths
- Chapter 5 Riches, “Sovereignty” and “Free Trade”
- Chapter 6 Lies about Government
- Chapter 7 Deficit Disorders and Debt Delirium
- Chapter 8 Governments Cause Inflation?
- Chapter 9 Institutionalized Misery: Austerity in Practice
- Chapter 10 Economics of the 99%
- Notes
- Index
Summary
Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex… It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.
(Albert Einstein)Critics complain that economists arrogantly pretend to understand far more than they actually do. This criticism is too weak. The mainstream claims profound knowledge of the economy, understands almost nothing and obscures almost everything. This assertion may strike the reader as either shocking or slanderous (or both), rather like accusing engineers of knowing nothing about mechanical devices.
Nonetheless, it is true and not difficult to demonstrate.
What is difficult is to explain why so many people in so many countries of the world revere economists as gurus. In part it may come from the econfaker practice of using in-group terminology whose meaning to the layperson remains obscurely impenetrable. I treat this misplaced reverence at some length, because it reflects a stronger version of the hypothesis attributed to Abraham Lincoln, that most of the people can be fooled not just some of the time, but most of the time (especially if the media are in the hands of those who benefit from the mainstream economic ideology). Perhaps more appropriate to describe the broad acceptance of the reactionary banalities of economists is “a sucker is born every minute” (origin highly disputed).
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Economics of the 1%How Mainstream Economics Serves the Rich, Obscures Reality and Distorts Policy, pp. xiii - xviiiPublisher: Anthem PressPrint publication year: 2014