r/TrueReddit • u/Maxwellsdemon17 • 6d ago

Business + Economics Economics teaching has become the Aeroflot of ideas. The discipline is failing students by ignoring the biggest social, political and ecological challenges facing the world today

https://www.ft.com/content/9aabb4a9-d896-4b4c-a40a-1c4477a47a29
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u/TheShipEliza 6d ago

hi. econn grad here. contemporary academic econ does some good work. there are teachers/scholars who are using the discipline to explain what is going on. but a HUGE part of the academy is dedicated, more or less, to magical thinking about capitalism. and their sole devotion is effectively creating a secular framework for a kind of recursive prosperity gospel where, if you have the money you understand the system and the system works. and if you don't have the money it is because you don't understand the system and cannot make it work.

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u/klone_free 2d ago

Im taking an econ 101 course and it seems like while they bring up opportunity cost, its rarely about poisoning ourselves, the planet, and the social systems pursuit of growth and profit push or keep in place. 

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u/TheShipEliza 2d ago

Oh yeah later on those become “externalities” and dont get baked in to the serious calculations which of course they should.