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Template:IEP assignment

Proposed added definition of 'economics' in the 1st sentence

The following words are appropriate for this section: "Modern economists do not subscribe to a homogeneous definition of their subject" and, given the wide range of subjects & methods used, "any concise definition of economics is likely to be inadequate."•

• Roger E. Backhouse & Steven Medema. (Winter 2009). "Retrospectives: On the Definition of Economics". Journal of Economic Perspectives. 23 (1): Abstract. doi:10.1257/jep.23.1.221.

I propose adding another definition to the 1st sentence of Economics (with the earlier new, part italicized):

Economics … is "the study of how societies use scarce resources in the production of valuable commodities for distribution among different people. A complementary definition of economics is "the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services."

(1) The 2nd definition is fine. Still, it may be questionable for those who have taken Principles of Economics. They might say, "Why is there mention of consumption but no mention of investment spending & government spending. The 1st definition avoids this problem.

(2) The 1st def. uses the term "scarce resources". There is no mention of it in the 2nd def., but 3 pp. later in that same textbook is a 6-para. section titled "Resources Are Scarce" under the larger heading of "Individual Choice: The Core of Economics." So, "scarce resources" in the 1st definition is important. Those subscribing to heterodox economics might agree about including the 1st definition to represent (mainstream) economics more faithfully.

(3) The 1st def. includes “distribution among different people", suggesting that different people (not just a particular class, ethnicity, and so on) are important.

So, the 2 definitions are complementary, not competitive.

Thomasmeeks (talk) 18:11, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose The lead is not the place for a pick-and-choose definition. The current text represents a widely accepted and uncontroversial definition. talk 19:40, 24 January 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose for same reason. The proposed is fine but is excessive for the lead, which is required to be no more than terse summary of the body content, per WP:LEAD. Can you find a suitable home for it in the body? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 20:05, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

• Thank you for your comments, SPECIFICO & JMK. The 1st def. is more representative of how econ. textbooks define the subject, & better in that sense. Still, the 2nd def. is brilliantly reductive and worthy of the top spot. Samuelson's textbook (now in it's 20th ed.) was a template for later textbooks, as Krugman noted about his own textbook. And I'll follow your suggestion, JM. — Thomasmeeks (talk) 17:47, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

Pnyeg (talk) 13:34, 22 May 2022 (UTC) May a simple solution to the discussion be to add something along the lines of "More broadly, economics is the scientific study of all kinds of economic phenomena within society, and the behaviour and interactions of all agents engaged in economic activity." This encaptures a variety of approaches to its definition; both concise and non-exclusive. (talk) 11:41, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

The definition of a recession is and has always been two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth Economics Professor (talk) 01:32, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

Recession Definition

The definition of a recession is and has always been two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. Economics Professor (talk) 01:39, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

See Talk:Recession/Archive 3#A recession is 2 negative quarters of GDP growth, where this question is explained. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 13:06, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Request for suggestions - Feminist Economics Critique

Hi all,

I'd like to change the Feminist Economics overview which is currently contained within the "Criticism" section of the article. Currently, part of this section states: "Primary criticisms focus on alleged failures to account for: the selfish nature of actors (homo economicus); exogenous tastes; the impossibility of utility comparisons; the exclusion of unpaid work; and the exclusion of class and gender considerations."

I'm not well versed in Feminst Economics and as such, dont feel comfortable implementing the changes myself. To anyone who's familiar with the literature could you please suggest a good change that addresses the following issues (discussed below) contained in the quoted part above:

• 1. "failure to account for: the selfish nature of actors". - Issues: Their criticism is not a failure in economics to account for "the selfish nature of actors", but rather the very assumptions of selfish actors.

• 2. "the impossibility of utility comparisons". - Issues: Utility is ordinal, so more is better and as such can be compared in the sense that 'bigger is better'. Utility can be translated into expenditure ($$) via the duality between Marshallian and Hicksian demand. If they are talking about comparing between individuals, then it's impossible in the sense that utility functions are specific to an individuals tastes. So mathematically, they're different functions. If they are instead referring to comparisons for an individual for different levels of utiliy, then the criticism is about the inability to compare the magnitude between two utility levels. E.g. A utility value of 4 vs a utility value of 2, although 4 is double 2, it does not mean the individual is twice as 'better-off'. What do they mean?

Hopefully this doesnt read like some forum post, I just wanted to check if anyone out there who is familiar with these critiques could shed some light on and/or suggest a suitable edit.

I agree that the current "failure to account for" wording is confusing.Dsp13 (talk) 13:50, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

Is Economics an academic discipline?

From recent events, we know one thing for sure. Economists have not yet settled on a definition for "recession." Given that the most basic things about this so called "subject" have not been settled, can economics be treated as an academic discipline like the article makes it appear? Or is it better to describe economics as a pseudo-science along with alchemy and voodoo? 162.17.130.220 (talk) 12:27, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

please refer back to Talk:Recession/Archive 3#A recession is 2 negative quarters of GDP growth, where this question has been explained. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 13:06, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 28 August 2022

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Change (1) reference link (broken) to new reference link Vrouilhac (talk) 13:00, 28 August 2022 (UTC) The old link is broken and the new link has been placed to the following URL https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/economics

 Partly done: The learner's dictionary def is not the same one as in the archived Oxford def, so I'm marking the link as dead and just referring the reader to the archive instead. It wouldn't substantially change things either way, and Oxford and Merriam dictionaries honestly don't gaf how "precisely" they define the term or whether it conforms to some scholarly usage, so they should be removed anyway, and only OED (rigorously tracks common usage over time) and maybe SEP (source on hist & philosophy of science) should be used. SamuelRiv (talk) 16:01, 28 August 2022 (UTC)

Women in economics

Loosely following French WP page for Economics, I added some brief material on women in economics as a subsection of the Profession section. SPECIFICO removed some of it, and suggested talk page discussion.

1. (removed as "gratuitous OR") "Though men have historically dominated the economics profession, some women economists achieved early prominence. For example, ..." .

I'm unsure whether by WP:OR is meant the claim (a) that men have historically dominated the economics profession or (b) that some women economists achieved early prominence. Neither are something I made up, and both are easily verifiable. As for "gratuitous", perhaps the difference between SPECIFICO and me is stylistic: I intended this as brief scaffolding (admittedly involving some redundancy!), but also to make clear that the women economists listed were exceptionally prominent examples, rather than (on the one hand) a complete list of early women economists or (on the other) reflecting historical female dominance of the economic profession. I'd be interested to know consensus here. Perhaps it could be phrased more simply: "Though men predominated in the early economics profession, some women economists achieved prominence. For example, ..."

2. (removed as "UNDUE content based on unpublished undergraduate paper about a chat room") "A 2017 study found widespread gender stereotyping on a job market rumor forum for United States academic economics positions, amounting to a 'toxic environment' for women in the profession."

I was initially happy to agree, until I noticed that a Google Books search shows Wu's paper has been cited in over 20 books. So I thought this would be good to air also.

Best wishes, Dsp13 (talk) 14:44, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

(1) is telling the reader how to interpret the subsequent factual content. The factual content can be greatly expanded and would benefit the article. The unsourced lead-in is not NPOV and fails WP:V. It's opinion, and even if a source or two can be found that share such an opinion, it is not the WEIGHT of mainstream thinking.

(2) Is silly stuff and give the tens of millions of books indexed with google, the fact that 20 cite such a non-RS paper is patently unremarkable and does not invalidate core WP policy.

Thanks for your contribution of the sourced factual part of that section. SPECIFICO talk 14:50, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

I don't understand your reference to 'the WEIGHT of mainstream thinking'. Do you know of any ('mainstream' or not!) sources that suggest that either (a) men did not predominate in the early economics profession, or (b) the women I mentioned did not achieve prominence? Your suggestion that the material could be expanded is interesting. I was actually trying to avoid unbalancing the Profession section by giving too many examples. But clearly there are many more (see e.g. Edith Kuiper's A Herstory of Economics).I disagree with you here about what is 'silly stuff'. Misogynist talk is silly, sure, but it's not thereby inconsequential - and so measuring its prominence within a profession isn't silly at all. Dsp13 (talk) 15:20, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

It's silly because it's an undergraduate with a statistics software package who thinks some jobs chatroom is an important indicator of "a profession", society, or world culture. If you are interested in improving our coverage of women in economics, I suggest you start with Janet Yellen Juanita M. Kreps Elinor Ostrom, Christina Romer, and others who have made front page news and then delve into notable academics and business leaders and other civic figures who happened to be economists. SPECIFICO talk 17:42, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

Don't disagree about Yellen etc., but whether or not women face weird hostility from men in the economic job market seems relevant to the state of the profession. I realise I didn't address your point about the Wu paper not being a RS. I was actually thinking of the Justin Wolfers NYT piece as the RS, and provided the link to the Wu paper for convenience. Would taking that ref out assuage your concerns? Dsp13 (talk) 20:33, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

No, NYT is chit-chat. UNDUE and not encyclopedic, just a day's copy. It's not as if they are reporting a news event and it is basically just conveying a single narrow view. There could be a WP article about the status of women in various professions or academic specializations, but this page is about Economics, not even about economists, and this content is marginal even if fleshed-out and well-sourced. It's kind of WP:COATRACK. SPECIFICO talk 20:58, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

Stephanie Kelton comes to mind, but Category:Women economists contains at least 50 people, another 200 or so in Category:American women economists. I think the main question, which we can't answer in the article because as SPECIFICO says it would be OR, is, do women have trouble being economists, or did women basically have trouble being any high-powered profession prior to whenever the women's liberation movement picked up some steam. Probably the case, so focusing on this in the article is undue weight. Andre🚐 21:51, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

References

1. Wu, Alice H. (2018). "Gendered Language on the Economics Job Market Rumors Forum" (PDF). AEA Papers and Proceedings. 108: 175–179. doi:10.1257/pandp.20181101. Earlier version at "Gender Stereotyping in Academia: Evidence from Economics Job Market Rumors Forum" (PDF). Retrieved August 30, 2022.
2. Wolfers, Justin (August 18, 2017). "Evidence of a Toxic Environment for Women in Economics". The New York Times. Retrieved August 30, 2022.

Semi-protected edit request on 27 December 2022

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Change "Economic analysis can be applied throughout society, including business, finance, health care, engineering and government."

To

"Economic analysis can be applied throughout society, including business, finance, cybersecurity, health care, engineering, and government. " Mazaherkianpour (talk) 13:23, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

1. Kianpour, Mazaher; Kowalski,, Stewart; Øverby, Harald (2021). "Systematically Understanding Cybersecurity Economics: A Survey". Sustainability. 13. doi:10.3390/su132413677.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link) CS1 maint: unflagged free DOI (link)

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