Self-identified liberals & Democrats fail Econ101 questions

[Aeronos]

Let me ask you this: Do YOU get paid what you're worth?

Yes in a free-market Laisse-faire capitalism everyone is getting paid EXACTLY for what they are worth

Yep. And in Communism, inequality is unheard of. Oh wai--.

It's pretty much exactly the same: the absolute free-market capitalism is a nice idea, but poor in concept. If corporations could only compete by doing better than another, then it's a perfect world. But that's certainly not the case, as predatory business moves and other such scandalous corporate activities (I'm looking at you, Enron) which result from hyper-deregulation proves.

Although, when it comes to economics, neither left nor right is objectively best. If you admire the left and regulate too heavily, your economy stagnates due to all the bureaucratic overhead. This caused the Soviet economy to collapse hard in the 1980s, and is currently chaining North Korea down as we speak. If, on the other hand, you admire the right and regulate too little, economic bubbles proliferate and the entire economy comes tumbling down when it pops anyway. This caused the 1929 Wall Street Crash and caused the Sub-Prime Mortgage Crisis which we're all s----ing about at the moment >_>

[Meroivinge]

I agree. The economics courses in schools today are set up to glorify the free-market and its 'near-magical restoration abilities', not to provide objective criticism of its failures, short-comings, and its successes.

I have no word

The entire academia setting is screwed toward the hard-far-left

english classes,sociology,psychology,climatology etc etc are so far to the left and an odd with the real world outside their fucking ivory tower that basically they are more a train center for young Marxists than any else

AND ARE YOU SAYING ME WITH YOUR STRAIGHT FACE "ECON(one of the few BALANCED course) GLORIFY THE FREE-MARKET"

OHOHOH

sorry but this is fucking ridiculous

English classes are far to the left? I'm certain you could make that claim about sociology. But literature? The canon is dominated by dead white guys, most of whom had views modern readers might find repugnant. Shakespeare's The Tempest is pretty much a love ode to slavery. T.S. Eliot was a anti-semitic anglophile. Ezra Pound supported Mussolini. Milton was a religious loon. Alexander Pope was vicious, miserable, mean little troll. But the text speaks for itself, and all of these men contributed to Western Culture and are still being studies in lit classes.

When was the last time you were in a literature class?

When I graduated with my Bachelor's degree in English Lit and Comparative Literary studies in 2003?

[NotnotgnimmiJymmiJ]

Actually, it doesn't increase demand, because the money is in the same company-employee relationship. Transferring the money from, let us say, buying a new window for the store to buying a new window for the employee's house is hardly increasing demand.

But going down to the furniture store and buying a chair will increase aggregate demand versus going down to the bank and buying a certificate of deposit.

[Kamsaki]

When I graduated with my Bachelor's degree in English Lit and Comparative Literary studies in 2003?

I suspect the core of his ire is directed at Critical Theory, rather than the study of literature per se. That such tends to be rather dominant in academic liberal arts departments right now probably is responsible for the broad brush.

[New Limacon]

From what I can tell, George Mason University is trying to re-invent itself as a slightly crazier version of the Chicago School. I don't know why this is, or how it started, but the article seems to confirm it. I can think of a fair number of Nobel laureates in economics who would "fail" this quiz.

[Les Drapeaux Brulants]

"7) Minimum wage laws raise unemployment (unenlightened answer: disagree)." - Wut.

Of the EU countries, Germany has quite bad unemployment and zero minimum wage laws. Also, consider most of Africa. Now that's potentially more correlation than causation, but still.

IT IS SIMPLY LOGIC.

No, it isn't.

So are you saying that we can raise the standard of living for everyone by simply raising the minimum wage?

[Les Drapeaux Brulants]

When I graduated with my Bachelor's degree in English Lit and Comparative Literary studies in 2003?

Out of curiosity, what are you doing now?

[Allbeama]

Huh, I guess this disproves everything liberals and democrats have ever said or done.

Hmm, that's certainly one obtuse way to look at it.

Of course, you could also interpret it to mean that Democrats and Progressives, more than other ideological groups, find that their moral views impede their casual understanding of simple economic concepts.

There is one thing I doubt this "study" attempted to cover. The fact that "simple economic concepts" taught in an economics class don't translate into what the power players in the economy are doing. For instance, the fact that the two parites overwhelmingly supported the bailout of huge failinf financial institution does not mesh with what I learned about the "free market" theory" from my economics teacher. Who was a Democrat himself, and a Catholic, many of whom are in favor of socially progressive reform movements. The level of reductive thinking involved in the "polling mentality" I have seen is absurd. So because the average x doesn't know much about y, then there is no legitimate validity to y? Is that the central theme of this? On both sides of the Evolution debate, for example, but hey, talk to the leaders of each side and compare their knowledge. Polling/testing the lay people will skew the results, and the poll/test itself might actually skew the results one way or another.

[Lunatic Goofballs]

Let me ask you this: Do YOU get paid what you're worth?

Yes in a free-market Laisse-faire capitalism everyone is getting paid EXACTLY for what they are worth

Wrong; in free-market Laisse-faire capitalism, everyone is getting paid exactly what the employer will offer, because there's always someone else who will do the job cheaper.

[Allbeama]

"7) Minimum wage laws raise unemployment (unenlightened answer: disagree)." - Wut.

Of the EU countries, Germany has quite bad unemployment and zero minimum wage laws. Also, consider most of Africa. Now that's potentially more correlation than causation, but still.

IT IS SIMPLY LOGIC.

No, it isn't.

So are you saying that we can raise the standard of living for everyone by simply raising the minimum wage?

No, I believe he is saying there are a multitude of reasons for unemployment. It seems to me that most opponents of the minimum wage law have legitimate concerns regarding small businesses, but when it come to multinationals that pull insane profits, ostensibly from a certain orifice, I have a problem with the argument that increased minimum wage makes it harder to cover the cost of staying in business and making a profit., therefore people are laidoff/fired. Also, how many jobs were taken from this country by the same multinationals. They were not content to make a living and having an economy that was robust and amenable for all classes, no they wanted to return to the slavery of the Industrial Revolution. And they did where they could, at home and abroad. They are keeping the standard of living down, reducing our nation to the same level as a third world nation. ( I suppose that's not politically correct, but what I am supposed to say?)

[Gthanp]

"7) Minimum wage laws raise unemployment (unenlightened answer: disagree)." - Wut.

Of the EU countries, Germany has quite bad unemployment and zero minimum wage laws. Also, consider most of Africa. Now that's potentially more correlation than causation, but still.

Its a test to test you agreement with laissez-faire economic ideology. I does not test knowledge of facts. Much of laissez-faire ideology is not backed by facts. It's based on economic models involving rational actors with perfect information in a perfectly competitive environment. Where are these individuals who always make rational decisions with complete information? Where are these perfectly competitive environments where no firm can dominate market share? Easy answer--they don't exist, they never have and never will. Laissez-faire economics is a utopian fantasy.

[Gthanp]

there is a reason why economics professors tend to be free-market laisse-faire fanatics

There is a reason why economics isn't really a science.

[Allbeama]

Let me ask you this: Do YOU get paid what you're worth?

Yes in a free-market Laisse-faire capitalism everyone is getting paid EXACTLY for what they are worth

Wrong; in free-market Laisse-faire capitalism, everyone is getting paid exactly what the employer will offer, because there's always someone else who will do the job cheaper.

^This. The free market Laissez-fair capitalist ideology is one that promotes poverty and slavery. It is what we are facing now, a class war that will reduce the middle and working class to nothing more than peasants.

[UnhealthyTruthseeker]

So in Abury's mind, those who agree with him automatically possess high IQ's and are therefore automatically correct (because apparently not only doesn't IQ DIRECTLY measure intelligence, but being intelligent automatically means being correct), and those that disagree with him are automatically biased and indoctrinated and therefore wrong (because, as we all know, having a bias means that you can never, ever be correct about anything). Is this a fairly accurate summary?

[Hydesland]

Its a test to test you agreement with laissez-faire economic ideology. I does not test knowledge of facts. Much of laissez-faire ideology is not backed by facts. It's based on economic models involving rational actors with perfect information in a perfectly competitive environment. Where are these individuals who always make rational decisions with complete information? Where are these perfectly competitive environments where no firm can dominate market share? Easy answer--they don't exist, they never have and never will. Laissez-faire economics is a utopian fantasy.

Any model that shows increased unemployment from increased minimum wages does not require perfectly competitive markets.

/nitpick

[Carls-land]

obviously because the ''correct'' answers are biased

Obviously because if there could be a completely correct answer, congress can retire.

you could say it that way.

[Allbeama]

Let me ask you this: Do YOU get paid what you're worth?

Yes in a free-market Laisse-faire capitalism everyone is getting paid EXACTLY for what they are worth

Yep. And in Communism, inequality is unheard of. Oh wai--.

It's pretty much exactly the same: the absolute free-market capitalism is a nice idea, but poor in concept. If corporations could only compete by doing better than another, then it's a perfect world. But that's certainly not the case, as predatory business moves and other such scandalous corporate activities (I'm looking at you, Enron) which result from hyper-deregulation proves.

Although, when it comes to economics, neither left nor right is objectively best. If you admire the left and regulate too heavily, your economy stagnates due to all the bureaucratic overhead. This caused the Soviet economy to collapse hard in the 1980s, and is currently chaining North Korea down as we speak. If, on the other hand, you admire the right and regulate too little, economic bubbles proliferate and the entire economy comes tumbling down when it pops anyway. This caused the 1929 Wall Street Crash and caused the Sub-Prime Mortgage Crisis which we're all s----ing about at the moment >_>

^10000 times this.^ I may come off as a raging commie, but I prefer to lean left, not go off the deep end. It just frustrates me to no end that if one questions the free market economy, they are labeled as a raging commie. The inherent flaw in communism is the same as in capitalism: The "true and pure" form cannot exist successfully due to human nature. They tried to implement the true free market system in the Industrial Revolution, and the results were disastrous. It happened again in the 1920's. And now, ever since Reagan, we have been making the same insane mistakes. They tried to implement true communism in Russia, China and North Korea. What they got was a nightmare that Marx would have railed against. We need a government that represents all the people, not the wealthiest, not the party system faithful, and not the huge corporations, or the military industrial complex.

[UnhealthyTruthseeker]

One reason why complete free market capitalism fails. Economies. Of. Scale.

[Allbeama]

One reason why complete free market capitalism fails. Economies. Of. Scale.

I can't Resist...THIS.IS.NSG!

[NotnotgnimmiJymmiJ]

1) Mandatory licensing of professional services increases the prices of those services (unenlightened answer: disagree)

Mandatory licensing can decrease information asymmetry and actually lower prices.

5) Third World workers working for American companies overseas are being exploited (unenlightened answer: agree).

exploitation- use or utilization, esp. for profit.

Epic fucking fail.

6) Free trade leads to unemployment (unenlightened answer: agree).

Admittedly you might not really learn this until about junior year, but there are plenty of ways in which free trade can lead to unemployment. To get the author's desired results all we have to do here is ignore distributional effects, economies of scale, learning curves, market power, terms of trade, externalities, monetary policy, minimum wage and other labor standards, and unemployment.

You would literally have to sleep through your entire international econ course after about the first week in order to not have any awareness of this stuff.

7) Minimum wage laws raise unemployment (unenlightened answer: disagree).

As others have pointed out, there are plenty of theoretical reasons and empirical evidence as to why minimum wage laws don't necessarily raise unemployment. Not the least of which is that unemployment is defined as the number of unemployed persons (16+, and looking for work or laid off) as a percentage of the labor force. People not working or looking for work, like say those in school, are not part of the labor force. The author might have a leg to stand on if he were talking about another measure like the employment to population ratio. Even then it's shaky.

Why are there so many Tyler Cowen wannabe's at GMU?

[Gthanp]

Its a test to test you agreement with laissez-faire economic ideology. I does not test knowledge of facts. Much of laissez-faire ideology is not backed by facts. It's based on economic models involving rational actors with perfect information in a perfectly competitive environment. Where are these individuals who always make rational decisions with complete information? Where are these perfectly competitive environments where no firm can dominate market share? Easy answer--they don't exist, they never have and never will. Laissez-faire economics is a utopian fantasy.

Any model that shows increased unemployment from increased minimum wages does not require perfectly competitive markets.

/nitpick

Fair enough but I guess the real issue is that Laissez-Faire economic theory is not often evaluated with empirical facts. For example in the 90s when Clinton worked to raise the minimum wage the Republicans said it would increase unemployment. It didn't.

[Vittos Ordination]

Why are there so many Tyler Cowen wannabe's at GMU?

It is due to a confluence of Koch money and libertarian economics falling in the heterodoxy.

[Les Drapeaux Brulants]

Let me ask you this: Do YOU get paid what you're worth?

Yes in a free-market Laisse-faire capitalism everyone is getting paid EXACTLY for what they are worth

Wrong; in free-market Laisse-faire capitalism, everyone is getting paid exactly what the employer will offer, because there's always someone else who will do the job cheaper.

Why would you say that? Labor is just like any other commodity. Sometimes there isn't enough of the right type and the right type will cost more.

I would say that in a laisse-faire market, the contract is between the employer and the employee -- no help from the government is needed. That means the employee must be satisfied with his salary, if he takes the employer's offer. Right?

[Gthanp]

No, they get paid the minimum they can be paid.

and this because the great majority of people are good-at-nothing

only 18 % of the world have a IQ of 120 or superior and,frankly,I consider everyone with a IQ lower than 120 a fucking idiot



so if 82% of idiot people get paid the minimum to permict smarter person like me to flourish...well I consider this a natural form of Justice

The fact that you cite IQ tests as a measure of intelligence shows your ignorance.

[UNIverseVERSE]

You don't need experiments when you can argue with logic

I'm a fan of austrian economists because Austrian economists reject empirical, statistical methods

I am currently a Maths student. As such, I can quite happily inform you that this is flat out wrong.

Arguing with logical methods, from a set of axioms, only gives you correct answers when your axioms match reality. I can, for example, argue quite logically that the internal angles of a triangle add up to less than pi. If you draw a triangle, you will show that when it comes to the real world, this is rubbish.

This is why physicists do experiments. They are taking mathematical models of reality, and working out how applicable they are in the real world. Any self-respecting economist seeking to give the correct answer would do the same thing. And the rejection of it simply speaks for the worst type of masturbatory fantasy, for it is claimed to be applicable to reality when it is actually utterly unrealistic.