There was a time when being an economist was the holy grail. Politicians who were economists won votes for their wisdom in managing, what else, the economy.
This article captures the public’s disillusion in the institution (although some of the content is a stretch).
“The central cause of the profession’s failure was the desire for an all-encompassing, intellectually elegant approach that also gave economists a chance to show off their mathematical prowess.
“Unfortunately, this romanticized and sanitized vision of the economy led most economists to ignore all the things that can go wrong. They turned a blind eye to the limitations of human rationality that often lead to bubbles and busts; to the problems of institutions that run amok; to the imperfections of markets — especially financial markets — that can cause the economy’s operating system to undergo sudden, unpredictable crashes; and to the dangers created when regulators don’t believe in regulation.”
The good news is that economists are growing a bit more humble, the days of Greenspan preaching to everyone what’s good for them are coming to an end. The bad news is we’re headed for period of economic experimentation and that makes the playing field in markets a bit less predictable.
