Economists and Historians Have a Hard Time Talking to One Another

Economists grow exasperated by the tendency of historians to say about virtually any question that's complicated or it depends on what you mean. Historians, and again, this is a bit of a caricature, but you'll recognize it, i think they sometimes get impatient with the way in which economists seem to think all intentional human behavior can be modelled through quantitative analysis. Economics values simplicity and universality, os what makes an economic argument powerful. And historians value complexity and institution specific so i talked recently to claudia golden, who's an eminent economic historian, and we talked about some of the same issues about why economists and historians don't get along so well.