Fatuous sagacity~I

Experiments of economic theories conducted in the social laboratory’ more often than not prove to be wrong giving varying results. About a hundred top economists including dozens of Nobel Prize winners living in the USA and their models could not predict the 2008-meltdown, the worst economic crisis in human history. This puts a question mark on the true utility of economic predictions for social good. Random and large-scale induction of mathematical and statistical tools, equations and formulae along with elements of psychology and sociology has made economics a hybrid and overrated discipline

- PARIMAL BRAHMA

In today’s world, next to the politicians, the most powerful men and women have been the group of people who call themselves ‘economists’. Raised in the citadels of universities and premium institutions they emerge in the open world occupying key positions, making themselves indispensable and invincible. They are everywhere and in every sector ~ advising sovereign governments, international institutions, corporates, academic and financial institutions, NGOs, miscellaneous organizations and individuals. Nothing moves in this world without the advice of economic and financial experts. Economists in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have appointed themselves as guardians of the world economy. They determine the principles of economic policies (like Millennium Development Goals ~ MDGs ~ to be completed by 2015), which member-States are expected to follow, also monitoring their economic trajectories. Their advice, even if they go wrong, is never challenged.

While my own life has largely been shaped by the discipline of economics as a student, teacher and researcher, I must confess I could never fall in love with the subject. Why I could not align myself with the community of economists could be attributed to two main reasons. First, I could not reconcile myself with the effort of elevating the discipline of economics to the level of pure science breaking away from the tag of a social science and the discipline of political science prompting universities to award Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees to students taking economics as the main subject. My second concern has been that economists (not all but a great number of them) have done more harm to the world than good. This may be construed by many as an anti-academic tirade and I may be accused of making an unprofessional, irresponsible statement amounting to character assassination.