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0 pointsahartmetz1y ago0 comments

It seems to me that something similar to Adam Smith happened to the Austrians: their ideas have been cherry-picked. According to German Wikipedia, their main things were / are a focus on individual preferences, marginal utility, and a rejection of mathematical modeling(!)

There was also something about lower state expenditures (...taxes...) giving better results for the people - that's the one that seems to be very popular with rich people for some reason. Go figure.

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jampekka1y ago· 2 in thread

Austrian economics also rejects empirical assesment of its claims. Instead, universal thruths are derived "logically" (formal logic banned though) from "obviously true" axioms using a method called praxeology.

It seems a lot like Scientology: the more you learn about it, the more bizarre it gets. And of course it's used to extract a lot of money for few benefactors.

naasking1y ago

Unlike scientology, Austrian economics made some important contributions to mainstream economic understanding.

triceratops1y ago

To be fair, Scientology never claimed to make any predictions about economics. (AFAIK, I don't know any Scientology)

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