As an experiment, over the past six months we have been tracking the use of the term Austrian economics in the news and in the blogosphere. Less systematically, we have also been listening carefully to the use of the term among fellow professional economists and what they think the label means. The results do not fit our intention. Google alert, for example, inevitably points to financial advice or libertarian politicsIn an effort to help them cleanse themselves from bad perceptions, I have done a quick review of recent students who have studied under the term "economics." I have discovered a coke snorting rock musician, a leading terrorist and a woman known for the blow jobs she gives.
If the use of the term "Austrian economics" is a problem at GMU when it is adopted by those who give financial advice or favor libertarian politics, then certainly the realization that the following have actively studied what is known as economics should result in the GMU group adopting a new name for what they are doing at GMU. They certainly can't be associated with:
Mick Jagger who studied economics at the London School of Economics.
Osma bin Laden who studied economics at King Abdul Aziz University.
And Monica Lewinsky who earned a masters degree in social psychology but did so at the London School of Economics. And get a load of this:
the audience of students and parents erupted in spontaneous applause [when she received her diploma]. ... It was a very emotional moment for herThis non-scholarly cheering must have most assuredly included those who were economics students and professors, and it was all done at the London School of Economics.
Clearly, the GMU people to be consistent must ditch the word economics. As Dali might have said, If you are going to go with absurdity, go all the way.
Wenzel,
ReplyDeleteThey should abandon language altogether, if they really want to be consistent.