经济学应该更接地气

经济学应该更接地气

今天的经济学太强调抽象的数学模型，而与现实世界结合不够，FT社论认为，经济学教育应当更注重经济史，要了解非正统的经济学家，并且与心理学和考古学等其他学科结合起来。毕竟，这是一门关于人的行为的科学。

测试中可能遇到的词汇和知识：

dismal science “阴郁的科学”，一度是经济学的绰号，语出英国历史学家托马斯·卡莱尔

in the dock 在受审

heterodox 异端的，非正统的

bank run 银行挤兑，是经济危机和经济信心丧失的危险信号

wrinkles and perversities 字面意思是褶皱与邪恶

Luddite 卢德主义的，指反对新科技的民粹主义思潮

anodyne ['ænədaɪn] 止痛剂

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Economics needs to reflect a post-crisis world

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FT Editorial: The dismal science should be grounded in reality to stay relevant

When the global economy crashed in 2008, the list of culprits was long, including dozy regulators, greedy bankers and feckless subprime borrowers. Now the dismal science itself is in the dock, with much soul-searching over why economists failed to predict the financial crisis. One of the outcomes of this debate is that economics students are demanding the reform of a curriculum they think sustains a selfish strain of capitalism and is dominated by abstract mathematics. It looks like the students will get their way. A new curriculum, designed at the University of Oxford, is being tried out. This is good news.

Defenders of the status quo have pushed back, pointing to a rich hinterland of heterodox economics thinkers. Dig deep and you can find plenty of academic treatises on bank runs, unstable credit cycles and irrational markets. That people are selfish and that businesses pursue profit is not the fault of economics but of human nature. Accurately predicting the future is an unrealistic test of any academic discipline, particularly one that encompasses limitless human interactions.

But the fundamental point made by the critics is right. For a subject so engaged with studying worldly behaviour, there is too much timeless abstraction and too little scrutiny of real-world events. The typical economics course starts with the study of how rational agents interact in frictionless markets, producing an outcome that is best for everyone. Only later does it cover those wrinkles and perversities that characterise real economic behaviour, such as anti-competitive practices or unstable financial markets. As students advance, there is a growing bias towards mathematical elegance. When the uglier real world intrudes, it only prompts the question: this is all very well in practice but how does it work in theory?

This theoretical bias left the discipline resistant to challenge at a crucial time. When in 2005 Raghuram Rajan, now governor of the Reserve Bank of India, warned that financial innovation had become a source of instability, his paper was dismissed as “slightly Luddite”. His call for greater prudential supervision of banks was ignored.

Fortunately, the steps needed to bring economics teaching into the real world do not require the invention of anything new or exotic. The curriculum should embrace economic history and pay more attention to unorthodox thinkers such as Joseph Schumpeter, Friedrich Hayek and – yes – evenKarl Marx. Faculties need to restore links with other fields such as psychology and anthropology, whose insights can explain phenomena that economics cannot. Economics professors should make the study of imperfect competition – and of how people act in conditions of uncertainty – the starting point of courses, not an afterthought.

Mathematical models ought to keep their place, so long as their results are not taken too literally. But many of those used in central banks have hitherto ignored the financial sector as a source of instability. Remedying this will add even more complexity. The maths will get harder.

In the aftermath of the financial crisis the popularity of economics courses has surged. Having watched the global economy fall off a cliff, new students will not tolerate anodyne lectures on the wisdom of markets. They demand more pluralism and humility in a subject that has hitherto overvalued purism and certainty. Economics should not be taught as if it were about the discovery of timeless laws. Those who champion the discipline must remember that, at its core, it is about human behaviour, with all the messiness and disorder that this implies.

请根据你所读到的文章内容，完成以下自测题目：

1. What is correct about economics after the 2008 financial crisis?

a. Students were dissatisfied, demanding curriculum reform.

b. Many universities revamped their economic courses.

c. Economists couldn't provide any explantion.

d. Fewer people were interested in it.

2. According to the writer, orthodox economics has failed to_____.

a. Pay enough attention to real life human behavior.

b. Explain bank runs and irrational markets.

c. Establish a disciplinary system based on frictionless markets.

3. Why telling us the story about Indian central bank governor Rajan?

a. To explain that he is an heterodox economist.

b. To illustrate the bias of mainstream economics.

c. To criticise Rajan's Luddite view of financial innovation.

4. What does the writer think about maths in economics?

a. More maths is needed in order to make it more accurate.

b. Economics should be reestablished with new maths methods.

c. Mathematics should be abolished from this study of humanity.

d. Maths results should not be taken too literally.

[1] 答案a. Students were dissatisfied, demanding curriculum reform.

解释：金融危机后，英美国家的一些经济学学生表达了对目前的正统经济学教育的不满，作为回应，牛津大学尝试了一些改革。最后一段开头写道：In the aftermath of the financial crisis the popularity of economics courses has surged.事实上，经济危机也是经济学的危机，引发了一轮对经济学本身的反思。

[2] 答案a. Pay enough attention to real life human behavior.

解释：文中多次出现worldly behaviour, reality, real world, human interactions等词汇，强调的就是体系精密的经济学与不那么可预测的现实世界之间的距离。

[3] 答案b. To illustrate the bias of mainstream economics.

解释：金融危机前，2005年，拉詹写论文警告说金融创新可能带来不稳定，但他的观点不仅未被重视，还被批评。事实证明他的对的，我们可以看到，主流经济学界的偏见还是很严重的。

[4] 答案d. Maths results should not be taken too literally.

解释：倒数第三段中写道，幸运的是，将经济学变得更接地气，并不需要什么新发明。需要的是经济史的教育、对非正统经济学家的关注、与心理学和考古学的联系，等等，应当把数学作为一种研究方法而不是神明。