The Bias of Economists

3min Snip

00:00

Play full episode

Summary

Transcript

Episode notes

How do we know if economists are right in the public or wrong? I have a whole nested series of answers that will give you probably the best answer, which comes later in my book. If that's what you think, go read the econ one textbook. Come back and tell me what you think after that. And again, maybe you won't be completely convinced. There's plenty of parts where you may say, I doubt this point or that point. But to read a basic economics textbook and come away from this other than that the people in this field are morons would be a hard reaction for a person to honestly take.

Bryan Caplan, of George Mason University and blogger at EconLog, talks about his book, The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies. Caplan argues that democracies work well in giving voters what they want but unfortunately, what voters want isn't particularly wise, especially when it comes to economic policy. He outlines a series of systematic biases we often have on economic topics and explains why we have little or no incentive to improve our understanding of the world and vote wisely. So, it's not special interests that are messing things up but the very incentives that lie at the heart of a vote-based system. This is a disturbing and provocative lens for viewing political outcomes.