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Timing of Principles and Das Kapital

"Untenable"? Just because Marx was writing Das Kapital at the same time that Menger was working on Principles, does NOT mean that Marx's economic theories were not already in circulation. He and Engels had already published numerous articles. --xzy —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.91.126.231 (talk • contribs) 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Deduction vs. induction

"...the paradigmatic assumption that economics should rest on induction from principles rather than deduction from observation has been largely rejected." It should be the other way around; you deduce from principles or induce from observation. I changed it. --Nebbons —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 213.64.101.17 (talk • contribs) 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Influence

The following qualification to Greenspan's comments seemed entirely out of place given it's detail and its leap of logic, hence I removed it.

(though Greenspan would later, in 2008, express “shocked disbelief” regarding the lack of protection of shareholders by lending institutions).[1]:

Miss people

Fritz Machlup and Walter Eucken and Schumpeter.

these are 3 persons we cannot miss in this article.

  • Thanks. Please be bold and add information about them. Thanks, -Willmcw 18:20, September 12, 2005 (UTC)

While Shumpeter was Austrian by nationality, he is not (usually?) considered to having been a supporter of the views of the Austrian school. I will remove his name from the list for now, until this can be resolved.

Utility theory

"The first primary area of contention between neoclassical theory and the Austrian school is over the possibility of consumer indifference — neoclassical theory says it is possible, whereas Mises rejected it as being “impossible to observe in practice”. The second major dispute arose when Mises and his students argued that utility functions are ordinal, and not cardinal; that is, the Austrians contend that one can only rank preferences and cannot measure their intensity, in direct opposition to the neoclassical view"

This is misrepresentation of the neoclassical view. Neoclassical economics does not belive in cardinal utility. While jeveons and marshal may have done post-pareto (1906) economics holds that there is no subjective measure of utility only an ordering of preferences. This is the heart of neoclasical economics and as such this paragraph is incorrect.

An automated Wikipedia link suggester has some possible wiki link suggestions for the Austrian_School article, and they have been placed on this page for your convenience.
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The Hebrew link is wrong. Can anyone fix it?--217.93.127.177 01:45, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

negative rather than positive definition

I believe the article should begin with the postive definition (role of the individual, Human action, expanding from there) rather than immediately defining Austrianism in opposition to other schools of thought.

> I have to concur. The introductory paragraph uses too many Austrian-isms and isn't especially coherent to a trained neo-classical let alone a member of the general public. It should be rewritten. I'll fix it when I get time. The morgawr 01:17, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

>> The introduction is also misleading. The opening statment, "The Austrian School is a school of economic thought that rejects economists' primary use of methods more common in natural science for the study of human action," is not a distinguishing aspect of the Austrian School. ALL major schools of economic though avoid the methods of natural science. The question is which method do you use. Most neo-classical economists hold to positivism/platonic idealism; most austrians hold to rationalism/Aristotlian realism; but that isn't hard and fast there are Austrians (Hayek) who follow positivism and there are neo-classicals who follow rationalism. The introductory paragraph should focus on distinguishing aspects (The actual way to distinguish the Austrian School is the strict adherence to methodological individualism). I'm working through how to clean the article up and render it much clearer to someone who is trying to learn about the Austrian School as opposed to refresh their memory. The morgawr 14:56, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree - this section is poor. For example: "While the praxeological method differs from the current method advocated by the majority of contemporary economists, the Austrian method is essentially identical to the traditional approach to economics used by the British classical economists, the early continental economists, and the Late Scholastics." is a very radical interpretation that should be referenced (to serious philosophers of economics) and then contrasted to alternative views. Most wouldn't consider Adam Smith to be a strict rationalist, and many 19th Century economists were more influenced methodologically by Kant than by Descartes.--Nmcmurdo 00:40, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm interested in this. What do you propose? Oh -- for what it's worth, von Mises was definitely influenced more by Kant than by Descartes. DavidCBryant 01:22, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Cite needed

Can anyone offer a citation for the quote from the article below?

"While the Austrian school itself is radically conservative, many of their specific problems with the neo-classical formulation have analogs in other parts of economics. Game theory is used to challenge probability, volatility argued for as a better measure of preference and risk assessment than price, and chaos theory argues for highly discrete rather than very smooth functions of utility and value."

Dick Clark 14:19, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

As no one has replied to this I have deleted this paragraph. Probability is foundational for game theory, and I have no idea what arguments the other claims are referring to. Bengalski 22:07, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

I can recall claims by experts in those fields to the effect of each of those points. Getting citations for each of them would be an astronomical task though. The morgawr 01:19, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Subjective Theory of Value

I created a stub for the Subjective Theory of Value. Have at it! Hogeye 18:20, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Austrian?

It is said in the article, under the "Analytical Framework" part that

"It is an Austrian assertion that everyone is better off in a mutually voluntary exchange, or they would not have carried it out."

I think that this sentence might be misleading, in the sense that it is not an "Austrian assertion". This idea has been developed earlier by Adam Smith and other Classical Economists.


Indeed, Austrian School inherits and advances the key classical idea of exchange as the subject of economics. Mises wished to popularize the term 'catallactics ==study of exchange' coined by Whately. Like classical economics Austrian economics is a science of exchange. The quoted assertion is definitely Austrian (Check Chapter 4 of Menger's Principles). If the quoted assertion does not sound original, one may be reminded of the fundamental difference between utility-based (subjective) explanation and cost-based (objective) explanation of gains from trade. The Ricardian idea that trade occurs because it gives benefits to everybody in terms of comparative cost is not exactly the same thing as Menger's assertion that trade occurs because all parties to it derive benefits in terms of utility. Adam Smith and other classical economists did not develop the subjectivist interpretation. Nor did they have the more complex idea that the demand for factors is derived from the demand for products, and hence the value of factors (to impute cost) gets its meaning from the prior assignment of value of products based on utility. In short, one can derive cost by imputation of value to factors from utility of products, but not vice-versa. This is one way to read the idea of round-about production. Gani 02:15, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

framework / methodology

actually praxeology only got attention within the Austian School with the 1940 publication of Nationalökonomie by von Mises. There should be a split in the lemma discussing the pre Second World War framework and the post-war framework. Intangible 16:35, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Analytical Framework?

Austrian economists do not reject observation at all. They reject a description of observations offered without causal explanation. Menger's long battle of methodenstreit is centered on the key idea that a historical narrative without the aid of theoretical explanation does not provide valid knowledge. Gani 01:59, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Is it proper to use the word make, as in force, in this context? "This means, in the Austrian context, the correct way to prevent imbalances in the economy is to make people want to buy the correct goods, rather than controlling when people buy goods." Either I've misunderstood or there is a better term.

Issue with "Vienna school" redirect to this page

Hi; just dropped by accidentally as I'd expected there to be a "Vienna school" article on music and musicians, i.e. Schoenberg, Webern, Berg et al. I'll check around the musicology pages to see what else they might be called, but it seems to me a disambig for "Vienna school" will (eventually) be in the offing.Skookum1 20:09, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Wow, there's also a "Vienna School" of physicians. I've created a disambiguation page. Please look it over, there may be more. Cheers, -Will Beback 05:39, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

"As a result Austrians hold that the only valid economic theory is one that is logically derived from basic principles of human action." Actually, this is just one branch of Austrian School economics that holds the a priorism of human action. Not all Austrian School economist hold this view... Intangible 23:06, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Nor is everyone who holds this opinion from the "Austrian school". Might I suggest changing the singe word Austrians to The Austrian School of thought? Carbonate 06:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Talk page cleanup

I added headers to some random comments that had caused the Table of Contents to slide down the Talk page, making it less convenient. Also removed wiki links in two headers. It is discouraged since it can cause trouble in tables of contents and elsewhere. The comments already contained the needed links. -- RayBirks 05:15, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Keynes Theory and Its Results

What results of Keynesian Theory is the Austrian School against? When Keynesian Theory is implemented, the result has not accorded with theory. - MSTCrow 02:21, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

The differences between Keynes' theories and Austrian Economics are so profound that one could write whole books about them. Some people have. Here's a quick overview.
In the first place, it's not so much that the Austrians are opposed to Keynes' theories; it's just that Austrian theory makes much different predictions than Keynes made. For instance, Austrian theory indicates that the Keynesian medicine of fiscal/monetary "stimulus" will do nothing to alleviate the ups and downs of the business cycle in the long run, but that inflation of the money supply and depreciation of the currency will inevitably result from such policies, eventually.
The basic question underlying different approaches to economic theory is "Who decides?" Who decides what is good for you? Who decides how much of each commodity should be produced? Who decides what somebody means when he says "outcome A is better than outcome B"? Ultimately, what is the meaning of the word economics? Is it a branch of the natural sciences that helps man understand the limits of his ability to act within the world? Or is it a form of technology that one class of people (the authorities, or rulers) can use to direct and control the activities of everyone else?
Broadly speaking, the Austrians come down on the side of individual liberty. Who decides? You decide. You decide what is best for you, and I decide what is best for me. The economic questions – how much of each commodity is produced, the level of prices, the balance between saving and investment – are all answered by individuals, each acting in his own best interest as he perceives it. So the market price of a particular good or service is determined by individual acts of exchange, which produce an "average" or "prevailing" price over short periods of time. There is no such thing as "economic equilibrium" – there is an "evenly rotating economy", instead, in which people are constantly looking for (ethical, honest) ways to improve their own situations. And so forth.
The Keynesian view is markedly different. It proceeds from the assumption that some patterns of economic activity are objectively better than other patterns, and that the high priests of economics understand that objective truth better than you do. In other words, Keynesian thought tends in the direction of central planning, and denigrates the value of individual liberty. Who decides? The authorities decide. They decide how much money to put into circulation, and what quantities of certain commodities should be produced / consumed. They decide what is best for everybody, and then they direct you to do your part. Ultimately, in Keynes' view, there are no individual wants and desires that each person strives to satisfy – there is only the economy, and you are just a disposable cog in the machine.
That's an oversimplification. But it's generally correct. And it's all I have time for right now.  ;^> DavidCBryant 12:15, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
Um, thanks, but that wasn't what I was asking, though. I asked what results the Austrian School was against, not which theories.  :-P - MSTCrow 16:13, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
We must not think alike. As I explained above, the Austrians reject all the "results" of Keynes' theory, because Keynes' theory is based on premises that are demonstrably false. If you make the wrong assumptions about reality you get invalid conclusions every time. DavidCBryant 01:09, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
I think the article doesn't make clear the difference between results, and "results." {This unsigned comment was added by MSTCrow at 20:51, 1 January, 2007.]
Can you be more specific? I see quite a few flaws in the article ... as I've noted above, I think the major one is in the section entitled "Analytical framework". What in particular do you think needs to be fixed up? Oh -- since you seem to be keen on making a distinction between "theory" and "results", are we both talking about the same book? When I hear "Keynesian" I automatically think of "The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money", by John Maynard Keynes (1936). That is in fact the Keynesian Theory you're talking about, right? I know that JMK wrote some other stuff, as well. For instance, he was pretty keen on Communism and the Bolsheviks until he actually visited Russia (ca 1925) – he was seriously disappointed by what he saw, and spoke out against the excesses of Lenin's government when he returned to England. That's one "result" Keynes obtained with which the Austrian economists would all agree. But I suppose you were really referring to his most famous book when you asked about Keynesian Theory in the first place. Or am I mistaken? DavidCBryant 23:37, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I was referring to "General Theory." My point is, the actual results of Keynesian theory aren't in line with Keynesian theory, and the article doesn't make that distinction.

Luis de Molina

Bucketsofg removed the link between this guy's name and the Wikipedia article Luis Molina. I'm going to take his name out of the list altogether, but I figure I ought to drop a message in here first, just in case one of the Defenders of Catholicism is watching this page.

I read Bucketofg's edit note. Unlike him, I'm sure the link was to the right person. I do understand how the theological dispute in which Molina became embroiled can be interpreted as bearing upon the Austrian theory of subjective value. But theology is not a science. Economics is a science.

In my opinion, even calling people like Thomas Mun, Sir Josiah Child, and Boisguillebert economists is something of a stretch, because the science of economics did not exist before Quesnay, Turgot, and the Physiocrats – maybe it didn't exist until Adam Smith.

The bottom line is that it is not NPOV to label Molina an economist, because the science of economics didn't even exist in his time. In fact, since Carl Menger's book came out in 1871, it's probably incorrect to label anyone born before say 1800 an Austrian economist. DavidCBryant 22:59, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Milton Friedman

The late economist and Nobel laurate Milton Friedman's theory is very similar to Austrian economics, why his name is not mentioned in the article? Wooyi 22:24, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Friedman was clearly of the Chicago School, not the Austrian School. He held some free-market ideas, but he differed greatly with the Austrians on issues such as monetary policy. DickClarkMises 00:00, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
Friedman was undoubtedly a monetarist. One of the most interesting things about his monetary views is that he never was able to give a definite answer to the question "how much inflation is enough inflation?" (where inflation is understood in the Austrian sense, as inflation of the money supply). Sometimes it was 6%, or so, and other times it was 3%, or so. (The Austrians generally support a free market in money (gold), with little governmental intervention; fiat currencies are anathema.) Interestingly, Hayek and Friedman were friends, and Friedman was one of the original members of the Mont Pelerin Society. I think Friedman was a little more pragmatic and less idealistic than Hayek was. Hayek never gained an appointment in the Econ department at the University of Chicago, and Friedman did. DavidCBryant 00:26, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

What does this mean?

This means, in the Austrian context, the correct way to prevent imbalances in the economy is to make people want to buy the correct goods, rather than controlling when people buy goods.

I found this quote under Analytical framework. I have only read Human Action and a couple other books, but I've never seen any recommendations to control what people want to buy (as if that could be done) or to controlling when they buy it. What I have seen is a statement that credit expansion will create the illusion that consumers want to buy more stuff, and will result in malinvestment, but the line above strikes me as nonsense. I refrained from "being bold", as I am hardly an expert on Austrian Economics. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.40.170.168 (talk) 21:39, 24 February 2007 (UTC).

I agree. The claim is dubious. I've removed it. DickClarkMises 20:50, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
I question the entire paragraph. The assertion that "goods will be as restricted by scarcity at a later point in time as they are now" isn't even true, so far as I can see. New sources of the good may be discovered, new manufacturing processes may be invented, etc. This whole paragraph was probably written by a neo-classicist or a monetarist who really doesn't understand the Austrian theory of the business cycle and the role of knowledge in the economy. I've been meaning to rewrite the whole paragraph for a while, but can't seem to find exactly the right words. DavidCBryant 23:24, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Maintaining line of thought since the 15th century

But how about a citation for or qualification of this 'part of a long line of thought' claim? As is this just sounds like aristocratic boasting.

Criticism?

I am no economist, but it seems to me that there is likely more than one prominent economist that is in favor of laissez-faire capitalism. Right? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by ArmyOfFluoride (talk • contribs) 07:52, 17 March 2007 (UTC).

Why is the 'Criticism' section so small and when I clicked the link for 'other criticisms' it took me to an extremely pro-libertarian website? Seems biased to me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Morgan gibson87 (talk • contribs) 15:12, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

It may seem biased but upon closer examination this is not in fact bias but a product of several factors...
1) The Austrian school is heterodox and so likely to be more familiar to libertarians then other schools of thought as it is popular among libertarians as opposed to the mainstream. So it is no surprise that most of the criticism :comes from libertarians.In classes focusing on the History of Economic Thought, whilst the Austrian School might be included in the syllabus, attention likely to be minimal or none at all (simply because focus is given to the :Classical, Keynsian, Monetarist, Neo-Classical, and to a lesser extent Marxist schools of thought).
2) The lack of criticism to could be due to the shared theories between Austrian and Neo-Classical e.g theory of marginal utility. In fact a criticism has been that Austrian Economics does not actually differ enough from :Neo-:Classical economics (and so has not actually be a significant contribution into the field of economics), however this has been disputed. Perhaps they share similar criticisms with Neo-Classical (if indeed the claimed :similarities are true)?
3) Also it would be most difficult in trying to nitpick at their logic (it is an integral part of their methodology after all!), however, even if the logic is valid, the premises may still be flawed, hence the criticism is towards the :individualist methodology.

Examination of the "Critical" links should be summarized into the "Criticism" section. I have added a link critiquing Libertarianism with a section specifically critiquing Austrian Economics. Thus we have a critical link written :from a non-libertarian perspective.
LoweLeif (talk) 05:48, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

David D. Friedman

Why is he listed as a critic of the Austrian school? According to his bio he is an anarcho-capitalist. What is his objection to Austrian Economics? Is he a Monetarist like his father? --Jayson Virissimo 05:58, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Chicago school, I believe. See his response to the 'Are You An Austrian' Mises quiz here:[1]–Skomorokh 09:00, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Cowen

Just wondering why Cowen is listed as a critic. I don't want to just delete him if he has criticized the school, but I am not aware of any such declarations. Redoy 16:03, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Heterodox status, cardinal utilities

Heterodox economics specifically lists Austrian economics. While it is indeed the case that certain aspects of Austrian economics have been integrated into the mainstream, many of the fundamental tenets such as the rejection of mathematics and empirical work as well as the unique treatment of utility are very firmly placed outside of the mainstream. Additionally, as the above commenter notes, cardinal utility functions are no longer a part of modern neoclassical economics. Utility functions are formally defined only up to monotonic scalings, which means they only indicate ordinal rankings; the use of specific numerical values is simply a notational shortcut to make the mathematics easier. taion 01:55, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, the Mainstream economics and Heterodox economics articles are in partial disagreement, then. From the Mainstream economics article:
Some fields may be described as being partly within mainstream economics, partly within heterodox economics. Some of them are Austrian economics, institutional economics, neuroeconomics and non-linear complexity theory. They may use neoclassical economics as a point of departure.
If these articles are in disagreement, it would be prudent to figure out how to resolve that contradiction before classing schools of economics under the two headings. Although not suitable as a source in this article, one representation of the conflict/confusion may be seen in this blog entry by Peter Boettke: [2] DickClarkMises 02:41, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
Eh, I think Boettke's assessment of the difference between “mainstream” and “mainline” is a fairly POV statement, and saying that an Austrian economist thinks his economic paradigm is in some sense more advanced than standard neoclassical economics isn't really saying much. Note that Lawrence White, who Boettke links to (here), explicitly notes that Austrian economics falls outside of the mainstream. I'll note also that Austrian papers aren't generally published in major mainstream economics journals. If anything, the language of the Mainstream economics page is just extremely imprecise. While certain ideas from Austrian economics have made their way to mainstream economics and theorems have been re-derived in that context, the methodology of Austrian economics as well as probably the majority of the conclusions reached (inasmuch as they are different from the ones reached by mainstream economics) are likely rejected. It's definitely beyond the scope of anybody to argue what future trends in economics be, and personally I think it's quite arrogant of him to insist that his school of economic thought is in some way the next, rational development of economic theory, but certainly that doesn't pertain to the discussion of whether or not Austrian economics should be classified as heterodox. Caplan's critiques of Austrian economics linked in the article are generally shared by a large majority of economists, and neuroeconomics seems to be gaining much more legitimacy as an economic microfoundation than praxeology. That aside, I believe that the best approach is to revise the mainstream economics page to clarify, if this is even worthwhile or possible, which heterodox economics disciplines are actually “partially mainstream” and which are better classified as having made contributions to the mainstream. This may not be that practical, though, in which case it might be better just to make the more conservative statement that those schools of thought have all made contributions to the economic mainstream. taion 16:11, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Operation Spooner: The main thing is that, in general, mainstream economists consider Austrians to be well outside of the mainstream, and this reflects in journal publication records and soforth. At least as described here, Austrian economics, with its completely different analytical framework and the rejection of mathematics and empiricism, in many ways stands directly counter to mainstream neo-classical economics. If you refer to DickClarkMises's link to Boettke's blog post, you'll note that Boettke himself says that Austrian economics was “rarely mainstream in the history of the school”. For better or for worse, Austrian economics is virtually unrepresented in top-tier econ journals like the AER, QJE, or JPE, and it contributes at most very peripherally to modern mainstream debate. Whatever disagreement exists simply isn't substantial – it's quite different for Austrian economists to consider themselves mainstream than for generally acknowledged mainstream economics to hold the same opinion. taion 04:29, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

It's not my personal opinion. I don't have one one way of the other. It's simply referenced information that I put there so it should stay. Operation Spooner 05:09, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
'k. You might want to rewrite that passage a bit so it flows a bit better, though. It sounds like a segment that was transplanted from another paragraph, probably because it is one =p The "some see Austrian economics as" sounds fairly inelegant as well anyway, and could probably stand to be rewritten. Maybe something like "Branches of the Austrian school are closer to the mainstream and accept certain neoclassical methods and tenets, while [...]" if it's consistent with the source. taion 04:22, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Here it is straigh from the source if you want to see it: [3] Operation Spooner 04:45, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
Cool, thanks. I'll do a little rewriting just for flow when I get a chance to. taion 06:15, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Heterodoxy

What Boettke meant to say was that certain incarnations of the Austrian school did in fact contribute to the mainstream; however, this is not currently the case. The HET notes "Mises's American offspring remained outside the economics mainstream and were coralled into a handful of universities, such as N.Y.U. and George Mason, where many of them are still concentrated today." Sources such as the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics implicitly note this separation by contrasting Austrian and mainstream approaches. Were Austrian economics currently accepted as mainstream, the Ludwig von Mises Institute would not have had to held an "Austrian Economics v. The Mainstream" seminar. The simple fact is that, regardless of how you view Austrian ideas, Austrian economics are themselves rejected from the mainstream. Austrian economists are excluded from the top journals and are marginalized at best at mainstream conferences and seminars. Regardless of how "some people" view Austrian economics, the economic mainstream itself rejects the Austrians. taion 17:14, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

If you want another Boettke quote, look here. Austrian economics in the earlier half of the century (like 1920s and 1930s) did contribute to the neoclassical mainstream. Austrian economics as it stands presently is distinctly separate from mainstream neoclassical economics. See also here, noting "Breaking into mainstream professional journals is a major problem for all heterodox views in economics, and the Austrian variant was no exception". It simply is not relevant that some people hold the belief that Austrian economics is mainstream; the profession of economics excludes Austrian economics from the mainstream, and Austrian economists in general accept this as well. taion 00:34, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

I gave you a direct quote from Boettke. He said "There are, for example, those who think of Austrian economics as a branch of mainstream neoclassical economics, there are those who see the school as representative of a radical alternative to the mainstream, and there are those who see the school mainly within a broader program of social theory." Now that is a model neutral point of view statement. Boettke himself might hold the opinion that it is heterodox, but he still notes that not everyone agrees with that view. This article should be that same neutral statement, which is that some think it's heterodox and some think it's not. Until you can find a source that says that the consensus view is that it is heterodox then you are unjustified in stating as a matter of fact that it is heterodox. Operation Spooner 01:06, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
NPOV requires representing all significant views, not all views period. The article on the Earth does not include any disclaimer stating that some people think the Earth is flat, because this view is entirely marginal. Austrian economics is generally simply classified as heterodox as a matter of fact. For example, see this paper. Among other quotes, "Amongst the very few that have questioned the nature of heterodox economics it is recognised that heterodoxy as an umbrella term to cover the coming together of, sometimes long-standing, separate heterodox projects or traditions. The latter include post Keynesianism, (old) institutionalism, feminist, social, Marxian and Austrian economics, among others." Most publications that discuss this (including Boettke's book, if you look past that section of the introduction), simply implicitly do this classification -- Austrian publications are filed with other heterodox ones, and, for example, the Blackwell Companion to the History of Economic Thought very simply just puts the section on "The Austrian School of Economics, 1950-2000" under the chapter on Postwar Heterodox Economics. This classification is simply accepted as a matter of fact. taion 01:25, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Taion: It is obviously controversial to marginalize (ahem) any significant school of thought as not "orthodox" (lit., "right/correct/straight thinking") but rather "heterodox" (lit. "other thinking"). The term is almost always used as a smug pejorative term. The encyclopedia ought not assert controversial, POV claims in the encyclopedic voice. DickClarkMises 14:42, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Apologies if it seemed like I was trying to portray the Austrian school as not being significant; my point is that the view that the Austrian school is not heterodox is in fact not a significant view, and the classification of Austrian economics as being heterodox simply is not controversial. The references I've linked to above, in addition to many others, simply classify Austrian economics as being heterodox without further reservations. Whether or not you feel that the classification of an approach as being heterodox is pejorative (I don't agree here, FWIW), the classification of "heterodox economics" has a quite specific meaning at the moment that is in fact encyclopedic. taion 03:36, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Selective Citation

Most of this article is not properly cited. Try to keep an NPV attitude when inserting 'citation needed' tags. Please do not make selective demands for citation about statements that you disagree with. lk 22:00, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Politicians

Can we include a list of politicians who subscribe to the Austrian School, but maybe aren't economists first and foremost? For example, Ron Paul subscribes to the Austrian School[2], but while he isn't an economist, policies he goes by as politician have a huge effect on everyone in the USA.--DerRichter (talk) 17:22, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Write For The Layman?

The first sentence of this article is currently:

The Austrian School, also known as the “Vienna School” or the “Psychological School”, is a heterodox school of economic thought that advocates adherence to strict methodological individualism.

It goes on in this direction for several paragraphs.

While I appreciate the apparently-rigorous definitions involved, honestly I have no idea what most of this means. I'm not an economist, just a layperson with an interest in laissez-faire economics. Is there any we could make the first part of the article a gentle introduction and set of definitions appropriate for the interested layman, and save the twenty-dollar words like "heterodox", "praexology", and "methodological individualism" for five or six paragraphs in? I feel like the world would be a better place if more people had at least a basic grounding in economics, but this isn't helping. --Larry Hastings (talk) 14:24, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I sympathize, but can't think of how to reformulate the lede without losing clarity and conciseness. I've added a tag to the top of the page requesting that it be translated into less technical terminology though. Skomorokh incite 15:03, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Discuss your edits

I request that any editors who make edits or reverts discuss them here.

If the WP:BRD is thwarted by people who refuse to follow the D part, then that cycle ends up being Bold-->Revert-->Bold-->Revert. If you do not discuss your changes, you are disrupting Wikipedia by making contentious edits without seeking consensus. Zenwhat (talk) 03:41, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Are you seriously trying to claim that making any undiscussed edit to this article is contentious? Skomorokh incite 03:47, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

No, I arguing that several users all making edits without discussing them overturns WP:BRD, forcing me to edit-war, since you won't discuss your edits. Zenwhat (talk) 03:57, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

There are hundreds of essays out there, what is so special about this one? And why have you just started editing the article without discussing your changes first? This does not seem like the behaviour of someone approaching this article in good faith. I urge you to self-revert and make your proposals here for the community to decide on, as you yourself have proposed.Skomorokh incite 04:05, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I didn't. I'm discussing the matter right now. Look, if you oppose WP:BRD, you seem to oppose Wikipedia policy since it is a summary of policy -- not "just an essay." Zenwhat (talk) 04:33, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Skomorokh: Bold Revert Discuss is (just) a special case of Wikipedia:Consensus, which is a policy. You are supposed to be bold (a guideline) and edit a page upfront. Talk pages are only intended to discuss how things are going. Assume good faith (also a guideline), states that you must assume good faith, especially when people are following wikipedia guidence correctly. It is typically unwise to announce upfront that you will be assuming bad faith.

One of the few times the talk page does become essential is when the basic consensus process is confounded (like when someone reverts). In that case it's pretty essential.

Please stick to the wikipedia consensus process! :-)

--Kim Bruning (talk) 21:57, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Interpretation of the time value of a good

In the Analytical Framework section, the last paragraph, one of the sentences says "A factory making goods next year is worth as much less as the goods it is making next year are worth." I have a pretty good grasp on the English language, but this sounds like you are saying the same thing twice ie: a = a. Maybe this is economics jargon that I have not heard of. If I am wrong, can someone explain?75.84.203.26 (talk) 06:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Weasel Words

This article doesn't have a [NPOV], I call attention to the following phrases:

While often controversial, , One criticism of the Austrian school is its rejection of the scientific method and empirical testing in favor of supposedly self-evident axioms and logical reasoning and others. The article would be better served with either gratuitous citations of the people that use the 'weasel words' originally, or the words should be taken out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.68.16.40 (talk) 14:38, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Important People

Does anyone agree that this section is maybe getting a little overdone? We can't go listing every single Austrian here, and some of these guys are pretty marginal. Teaching in the State of Virginia doesn't automatically qualify you as being an important Austrian. Maybe we should limit this to Austrians who are actually important in a stricter sense... or remove it all together, although I think there are important economists that deserve inclusion here. 213.37.192.62 (talk) 16:10, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Rollback of SturmTiger42's edits

ST made a number of edits which compromised NPOV in the article, and were largely or entirely spurious in relation to the subject. I am new to editing Wikipedia, please let me know if I could have done a better job with this. His/her changes were too long to edit, and I found very little of substantive value in them. For example, he greatly lengthened the introduction with information about the Austrian school that does not distinguish it in any way from other mainstream schools of economics. It seemed the purpose of most of these edits was to attribute reasonable conclusions that all economists agree upon to the Austrian school. To the extent that these conclusions oringinated with Austrian economists, they should be included. However, on their own, they distract from the article. Mark Borgschulte (talk) 20:53, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Help...please

Please show me which school of thought has provided the longest term of the broadest success for its people. Success being defined as freedom from excessive government activity in a person's daily life along with opportunities to use personal resources (skills, talents, possessions, etc.) to create personal "wealth" (which will be defined differently by each person). Notice, I said "show" not "tell". I'm looking for texts, historical examples, primary sources, etc.

Thank you for your consideration. Lora M White, MS (and homeschooling mom) Lorajane (talk) 17:07, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is a productive topic for inclusion in the article. As far as I can tell, judicious selection of metrics could be used to arrive at any answer. Aprock (talk) 18:27, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Hopefully, someone else will disagree with you. I tried to present my "selection of metrics" in order to facilitate the discussion. Lorajane (talk) 03:28, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

In response to your plea for help, I suggest Six Kinds of United States Paper Currency, a philosophical essay that mentions the Austrian School, agrees with the premises but disputes the conclusion. The essay disputes a number of conclusions as to who was at fault in what "Panic," and recommends remedies. The essayist states that he is not a "gold bug," and favors fiat currency IF it is properly regulated. The home page states its purpose as:

Taking up again the tradition of the Friesian School, this is a non-peer-reviewed electronic journal and archive of philosophy, inaugurated on line July 6, 1996, four years before the end of the 20th Century, just as the brilliant, courageous, prolific, and little appreciated German philosopher Leonard Nelson (1882-1927) started his Abhandlungen der Fries'schen Schule, Neue Folge, attempting a "Reformation of Philosophy," four years after the beginning of the 20th Century.

Pawyilee (talk) 08:26, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

History section

Hi!

I just made some stylistic revisions to the "History" section of this article. Most of these just involved proper English idiom, or breaking a horribly run-on sentence into two shorter sentences that convey the same meaning. I also straightened out a few flaws with the references to Karel Engliś an anonymous contributor recently added. Does anyone here have a problem with what I did?

I should also mention that I made one substantive change -- I changed "... without monetary prices or private property, meaningful economic calculation was impossible" to "... without monetary prices and private property, meaningful economic calculation is impossible", which, in my opinion, more accurately reflects the Austrians' view of the matter.

As long as I'm talking about this, I'd like to point out a major flaw in the next section, "Analytical framework". The last paragraph of that section reads as follows.

This focus on opportunity cost alone means that their interpretation of the time value of a good has a strict relationship: since goods will be as restricted by scarcity at a later point in time as they are now, the strict relationship between investment and time must also hold. A factory making goods next year is worth as much less as the goods it is making next year are worth. This means that the business cycle is driven by miscoordination between sectors of the same economy, caused by money not carrying incentive information correct about present choices, rather than within a single economy where money causes people to make bad decisions about how to spend their time. This means, in the Austrian context, the correct way to prevent imbalances in the economy is to make people want to buy the correct goods, rather than controlling when people buy goods.

This paragraph is not only execrable prose – it is also a gross misrepresentation of the Austrian theory of the business cycle. The Austrians don't propose to "make" anybody buy the correct goods. In Austrian theory, the consumer always makes his own decisions.

Does anybody want to explain this paragraph, and why it's in here, before I rip its guts out? DavidCBryant 01:14, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

I've come a year late and several dollars short to this debate on the history section; I assume David already did "rip its guts out," as I can't find the line, "...rather than controlling when people buy goods." Regardless of whether it has been re-worded or ripped out, I want to comment on "when people buy goods," with regard to this quote from the present text:

The second primary area of contention between neoclassical theory and the Austrian school is over the possibility of consumer indifference – neoclassical theory says it is possible, whereas Mises rejected it as being “impossible to observe in practice.”

Mises's objection is false. Direct, quantifiable measurement of consumer decisions and "consumer indifference" is already being done with RFIDs, though these data may very well be secreted from economists of all schools. Urban archaeology is a school that also has techniques that may be employed on modern middens at landfills to see what consumers bought, and when, from the packing material thrown out, along with "goods" no longer perceived as "good." This has already been done in the context of teaching archaeology methodology to student archaeologists, but was swiftly stopped due to perceived privacy issues—so swiftly that I cannot find any references to it on Google. Landfill layers, properly dated and analyzed, reveal exactly what consumers wanted, and when, and what they thought no longer worth the keeping—precise information for validating or falsifying, not only economic theories, but also effectiveness of political and other advertising campaigns, as well as their aftermath. For background on how urban archaeology would work in this context, see systems theory in archaeology and processual archaeology. Also, contrast logical positivism with praxeology. Pawyilee (talk) 08:48, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Opening paragraph is too complex

The opening paragraph is overly complex. Anyone using this article to introduce themselves to the subject would be little the wiser after reading the Lead. All subjects on Economics, are horrible tangled webs, but surely the Lead here, could be condensed down to something tangible. Now Keynesian is "spent out", I think Austrian economics is the future, it is important to make sure any introduction is understandable and welcoming, at least until the world wakes up! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.121.186.28 (talk) 08:16, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. How about this:
The Austrian School is a school of economics which emphasizes the spontaneous organizing power of the price mechanism, believes the complexity of subjective human choices makes mathematical modelling of the evolving market extremely difficult (or impossible) and therefore advocates a "laissez faire" approach to the economy, with the smallest possible imposition of "non-consensual" (especially government-imposed) commercial transactions and the maximum openness to individual choice (including free choice as to the voluntary means of exchange).
Although its contemporary status is somewhat obscure and despite the fact that few academic economists are followers of the Austrian School, it does have a long unbroken tradition dating back to the late 19th century and has a number of prominent supporters (including U.S. Congressman and former Presidential cadidate Ron Paul).
The Austrian School takes its name from the nationality of a number of its initial founders and supporters, including Friedrich Hayek. Another key figure in the Austrian School, Ludwig von Mises, grew up in an area which was part of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire but which is now part of the Ukraine. Supporters and proponents of the Austrian School can come from any part of the world, and, ironically, there are now few Austrian economists actually living in Austria.
In strict technical terms, the Austrian School (also known as the “Vienna School” or the “Psychological School”), is a heterodox school of economics that advocates adherence to strict methodological individualism. Proponents of the Austrian School hold that the only valid economic theory is logically derived from basic principles of human action. Alongside the formal approach to theory, often called praxeology, the school has traditionally advocated an interpretive approach to history. Proponents of praxeological method hold that it allows for the discovery of economic laws valid for all human action, while the interpretive approach addresses specific historical events. Critics of the Austrian school contend that its methods consist of post-hoc analysis, do not generate testable implications and, so, fail falsifiability.
Agreed (CurtD). That is a much better introduction and should be posted.
I would suggest this last line revision:
"Critics of the Austrian school contend that its methods consist of post-hoc analysis, do not generate testable implications and, so, fail falsifiability, while Austrians would counter that reliance on the falsification of economic concepts is falling into the error of Positivism. This underlying conflict between methodological philosophies separates Austrians and Mainstream economists."

Discussion

Oh dear. Another anti-Austrian. (They breed like rabbits!) ELs that are "fringe" on mainstream pages (and have been deleted from inflation, fractional reserve banking and many other pages), but that are DIRECTLY relevant for Austrian economics should (must) stay. Blitzkriegs are always ugly and uncivilized. This one especially so given it was mainly deletions of essential material. And without discussion here. - Ron Paul...Ron Paul... (talk) 05:19, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
Excuse me, I am not an anti-Austrian, I am anti-linkfarm. Mainstreamness has nothing to do with it; this is common practice. I will ask the External links WikiProject for their estimation. the skomorokh 05:34, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
I await the WP guardians' ruling with interest. Let's stop editing until we get their ruling. - Ron Paul...Ron Paul... (talk) 06:19, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
I asked the Economics project too, but neither seem very active so let us not hold our breath; I have a proposal below to move forward with this. the skomorokh 06:22, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Moved from User talk:Skomorokh Let's talk on my talk page or yours. Please let's not get into an edit war over this. What is your specific reason for each deletion of each EL? - Ron Paul...Ron Paul... (talk) 06:09, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for stopping by; I think it's best that we talk it out on the article talk page, so that others can contribute. Regards, the skomorokh 06:10, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
From Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is Not: "There is nothing wrong with adding one or more useful content-relevant links to an article; however, excessive lists can dwarf articles and detract from the purpose of Wikipedia." Per Wikipedia's policy on external links, "Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article" should be avoided. The only links that seem to me to meet that criterion are the LvMI intro , [4] and [5]. The others are debatable, and the WP:BURDEN is on the editor seeking inclusion to justify it according to policy. Many of the links I moved here are reliable sources and should be cited inline as references rather than bloating the External links section.
Would you mind if we kept all the links but restored my other changes? I really feel this article needs a lot of work, and had thought I made a decent start at it. Sincerely, the skomorokh 06:22, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

OK. I've left your penultimate version on display. I'll look at it in more detail later. - Ron Paul...Ron Paul... (talk) 06:42, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I appreciate it, and I'm open to reintroducing some of the links if we can agree that they meet the policy. Regards, the skomorokh 06:44, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
  • That is not a valid reason for having lots of external links. It might be a valid reason for fixing NPOV problems in the article, but NPOV problems elsewhere in the article ought to have nothing to do with how many external links it contains. This reminds me a bit of the situation that used to obtain in Chiropractic, an article that used to be strongly POV in favor of chiropractic, with most of the critical material banished to the External links section (see this version). That is a sign of a weak article, and it should get fixed (as it was, at least to some extent, with Chiropractic) not merely by trimming down the links section, but also by fixing the POV problems elsewhere. Eubulides (talk) 21:52, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

As the original objector to removing the links has been banned as an abusive sockpuppet, and as there seems to be consensus for removal here, I am going to be bold and re-remove them. the skomorokh

Lede section

Minor point - first section was dramatically changed. Don't know who did it or why. The first paragraph doesn't need referencing as it simply summarizes the key elements from the explanations in the latter part of the article. It's all fully explained in the article below and no one who has read Austrianism (I hope) would dispute this encapsulation of the theory. We need to keep the intro as punchy as possible and my edits have been very limited but also very careful and confined mainly to the first paragraph. Nevertheless we can discuss this in futher detail later... - Ron Paul...Ron Paul... (talk) 07:07, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

It hasn't dramatically changed, you've just switched the paragraphs around so the punchy one comes last. Lead sections are supposed to clearly identify the subject: "The x is a y that z". The current version of the article starts of talking about the qualities of the Austrian School without explaining what it is - a heterodox school of economic thought. In any case, is there anything you object to in these edits? the skomorokh 07:24, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
I'm OK with the ones you've listed. Most are stylistic rather than substantive. I'm happy for you to edit these in when you have the time and there'll be no risk of an edit war. On the bigger issue, I agree the lead should contextualize (note I kept the turgid stuff in the latter part of the para), but we have to balance this against the repeated criticism that the "old" lede was too complex, dry, academic, brain-dead. And please remember this was NOT me who prompted this. I had the same view, but was sitting on the sidelines until I couldn't stand it anymore when another contributor made the same comment. There's a clear "consensus" to have a punchy lead. Just look at the previous comments. Please take these comments into account when you're diluting the text. I don't want to loose the "punch" if we can avoid it. Please also note that I haven't even tried to clean up the rest of the article (which is admittedly somewhat jumbled - your help here would be greatly appreciated!). But I do want to preserve the "punch" in the first paragraph, if we can. -
No worries, I agree that the previous lede was far too arcane for an average reader to grasp. The "punch" version does run on for clause after clause, however, and focuses overmuch on politics rathr than econ. But I'll try to work on it incrementally. Thanks again for your consideration, the skomorokh 09:06, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
I can see where you're going. It's a little dry (neutered?), but I understand that's what the style of an encyclopedia is supposed to be. You seem to know how to keep the essence whilst taking out the fluff. I'd really encourage you to clean up the body of the article. For example: There's more ABCT in inflation than inflation. I've never known why. - Ron Paul...Ron Paul... (talk) 10:26, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, the lead section is supposed to be a little conservative, unambiguously defining the topic and then covering the most important points in the article. The ABCT deserves at least a section of its own; the history section jumps back and forth between time periods and theory in a haphazard manner, barely anything is referenced properly and there's a ghettoized criticism section; so much to work on. the skomorokh 10:34, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
It's becoming clear where you're going, and your style is elegant and you appear genuine in your edits (there's been so much POV criticism on Austrianism I admit I had become trigger-happy). Your style is probably better than my sledgehammer approach, which is rough around the edges. There's quite a lot to shave off in the body, and you're right, the history section and criticisms sections are particularly poorly written. Enjoy. - Ron Paul...Ron Paul... (talk) 10:54, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

"the role of the state"

No Austrian would advocate the state having a role as broad as "the provision of public goods and the regulation of common goods". In fact, such a function would fit nicely in a socialist or even communist constitution. JLMadrigal (talk) 15:11, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

It's a minor issue and the sentence has already been deleted, but no, I disagree. You are assuming that the definition of public and common goods is agreed, stable and fairly wide. Austrians contend that the range of truly public and common goods is extremely narrow (possibly, in the case of public goods, vanishingly small) but if they exist Austrians would admit that they should be provided by a central authority (defense is an arguable case for example). The sentence was intended to prompt some thought on the nature of public and common goods, but that may be too subtle in this context. Governments currently go far beyond the provision of public and common goods. The central bank is a good example of an entity that has no clear justification under either Austrian or neo-classical rationales. It has only ever been explicitly advocated and endorsed by Marxists, and even then only in the context of advocating government control over the whole banking system (not just central banking). Perhaps some Keynesians would qualify as defenders of the current system, but even then they rarely seem to explicitly explain the role of a central bank in the context of the provision of a public good. It would be difficult to do so, given that the public good is being produced by private banks for profit. Ironically, recently Greenspan tried to defend central banking but his defense was surprisingly weak. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.168.191.198 (talk) 02:34, 12 January 2009 (UTC)
"The central bank ... has only ever been explicitly advocated and endorsed by Marxists". This is pretty much the opposite of the truth. It's true that mainstream economists don't spend a lot of time justifying the existence of central banks, but only because agreement on their desirability/necessity is near-universal. And Marxists hardly ever talk favorably about institutions of capitalist economic management, of which central banks are one. On the main point of the section, it seems to me that Austrians are divided, with hardliners following the position stated by JLMadrigal, and others agreeing with 124.168.191.198.JQ (talk) 04:38, 12 January 2009 (UTC)
Interesting comments. Please provide a simple, clear, referenced justification for the existence of central banks from a pro-free market perspective. I'd love to hear it. I'm astonished that you live with the fantasy that a government-supported central bank is not supported by Marxists. Have you ever read Marx's Communist Manifesto? To quote directly from Point 5 from the famous (infamous?) 10 planks of Communism: "Centralisation of credit in the hands of the State, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly." I rest my case. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.105.45.1 (talk) 19:16, 12 January 2009 (UTC)
The citation refers to comprehensive bank nationalisation, not a central bank. As regards mainstream justifications for a central bank, here's Alan Greenspan, who as far as I know is not a Marxist. [6]. Or you could go to your local university library and read any of the dozens of books on monetary policy, nearly all of which take the existence and desirability of a central bank for granted.JQ (talk) 07:40, 14 January 2009 (UTC)
They don't take them for granted exactly, but most of the books that I own give short 'mainstream' justifications in the introduction or early stages of the book. One doesn't have to be a Marxian to think that there should be a central bank - even if I don't think you'd be right to do so. Bastin 07:55, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

This ties in with my earlier point. What is Austrian economics? Are we trying to describe the views of Hayek and Schumpeter? If so there is a role for the government. But if Lew Rockwell and the anarcho-capitalists at the von Mises Institute represent Austrian economics, then JLMadrigal is correct - no 'true Austrian' would support the role of the government in the provision of public goods and the regulation of common goods. LK (talk) 14:49, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

See minarchism vs anarcho-capitalism. There are austrians in both camps. Hayek's in the first, Rothbard's in the second. --Childhood's End (talk) 15:51, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

To help with the confusion above... mainstream economics, both keynesian neo-classical, are on the side of both central banking and the financial bailouts (bank nationalizations). Marx, according to his manifesto, would be on the side of the financial bailouts but not necessarily of central banking. This excellent paper [7] explains this important issue, clarifies why chicagoites and keynesians support the same policies nowadays, and explains the unique austrian position. --Childhood's End (talk) 15:51, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Austrian vs. Misesian

This account of the "Austrian School" isn't an account of Austrian economics, its an account of a particular interpretation of Misesian economics.

In other words, this simply isn't honest as an account of Austrian economics. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.5.113.238 (talk • contribs) 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I hope our anonymous commenter will come back some time and amplify on this remark a little bit.
I've read quite a bit of Austrian stuff by various authors (Menger, Böhm-Bawerk, Mises, Hayek, Rothbard, Kirzner, Ebeling, Hoppe, Raico, de Soto, Hazlitt ... maybe a few others) and I can't think of one who had a material disagreement with the positions L. von Mises stakes out in "Human Action". So I think it's categorically wrong to pretend that there's a real distinction between "Misesian" and "Austrian" economics. They are, for all intents and purposes, exactly the same thing. DavidCBryant 23:10, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

It is categorially wrong to name the Miseians to be Austrians. One is the name of a institute follower, and the other is a member of a country or type of american. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.227.237.140 (talk) 18:08, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Linkdump

The following links have been removed from the article per WP:EL and are listed here in case they may be used in inline citations as reliable sources:

Articles

Critical

the skomorokh 04:52, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Cannot varify source

I cannot find any reference to the source (citation number 16) listed as "Samuelson, Paul (1964). Economics, 6th, New York: McGraw-Hill, 736." The WP page on Paul Samuelson doesn't list it, and googling doesn't result in anything. There is however a book titled "Economics: An Introductory Analysis" apparently published in 1948 by the same publisher, is this what is intended? Perhaps an ISBN can be provided by whoever added the source. —Memotype::T 18:59, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

In fact, thinking this is the likely what is meant, I'll go ahead and list ISBN 0-07-074741-5. —Memotype::T 19:02, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Source needed (and wanted)

"Austrians also claim that econometrics is fundamentally based on mathematically and logically invalid summation and averaging of demonstrably non-additive personal utility functions, and therefore is subjective."

I'd like to see a citation for this claim (esp. the "demonstrably non-additive personal utility functions" part) because it sounds like something Austrians would claim, and I think I've heard it before, but can't find any references myself. Anyone? Thanks. —Memotype::T 19:34, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Related article by Murphy here. Caplan's "Why Am I Not An Austrian" paper referenced in the article contains the comment "More than anything else, what prevents Austrian economists from getting more publications in mainstream journals is that their papers rarely use mathematics or econometrics, research tools that Austrians reject on principle. They reject mathematical economics on principle because of the assumptions of continuity and differentiability. … Similarly, Austrians reject econometrics on principle because economic theory is true a priori, so statistics or historical study cannot "test" theory." Hope this helps, the skomorokh 19:49, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, I've added the citation. I'm still trying to figure out how to integrate the section into the article per the tag, but it's going to be a lot of work. —Memotype::T 23:43, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Lede needs sources?

Recently, someone added [citation needed] tags at the end of each paragraph in the lede. I personally am not a big fan of a lot of inline sources in the lede of an article, I find it distracting and makes it look like an article with a lot of edit-warring (see Anarchism). I prefer that an article touch on major issues in the lede, and then discuss each in detail in later sections with sources. However, if someone really wants to dig into it, here are some good sources:

—Memotype::T 14:41, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

The lede is supposed to summarize content that is cited elsewhere in the article, so for most high-quality articles, inline citations are not recommended. However, in the case of this article, most of the text is unverified, so it's not entirely unjustified to tag disputed claims. the skomorokh 14:53, 17 November 2008 (UTC)
So maybe the solution is to trim down the lede and move most of the details down into sections with references. —Memotype::T 14:57, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Trimming lede

This paragraph seems to be a little to in-depth:

In technical terms, Austrian School economists advocate strict adherence to methodological individualism – analysing human action from the perspective of individual agents. Proponents of the School hold that the only method of arriving at a valid economic theory is to derive it logically from basic principles of human action. Proponents of this method, praxeology, hold that it allows for the discovery of economic laws valid for all human action. Alongside praxeology, the school has traditionally advocated an interpretive approach to history, which addresses specific historical events. Critics of the Austrian school contend that its methods consist of post-hoc analysis, do not generate testable implications and, so are unfalsifiable.

I believe all of this is covered in either the History or Analytical Framework sections. —Memotype::T 15:14, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

I just realized that this paragraph mentions criticisms. I don't want anyone to think I'm trying to remove criticisms for POV reasons. With that said, I generally don't like to see a point-counterpoint style in the lede; I think mentioning that the AS is heterodox covers this for the purposes of an intro. —Memotype::T 15:16, 17 November 2008 (UTC)
I agree. It's almost as if the topic "God" said early in the lede: "Madalyn Murray O'Hair always claimed the concept of 'God' was specious, so don't bother reading anything here." --RayBirks (talk) 22:41, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

What should be in the lead?

I propose that when thinking about what should be in the lead, we should assume that the person reading the article does not have any strong political views, has just heard of the Austrian school, and has very little knowledge of both libertarianism and economics.

Here's a list of what I think such a person would be interested to know, and should therefore be in the lead (with proper citation):

  1. 'Austrian school' economists are not from Austria
  2. They advocate strict laissez-faire, and oppose almost all government functions.
  3. They reject mathematical modeling, statistical inference and the scientific method (observe-hypothesize-test) for social sciences, and prefer theorizing from first principles.
  4. Although they have a strong following (especially among libertarians, and almost entirely in the US), there are very few 'Austrian school' economists among academics, and they are almost never published in academic journals (mainly because of 3).

LK (talk) 18:47, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

I think that numbers one and two are pretty good for the lede. Number three seems controversial in that wording. Number four is simply untrue. Define "almost never." There are hundreds of Austrians teaching in reputable universities all over the world, and many of them publish. Can you cite a source for this controversial claim, or is it original research? DickClarkMises (talk) 20:39, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
I agree with DickClarkMises on the fourth point. I know a number of Austrian academics in the UK, many of them economists, all of them published in journals. The third point could do with a lot of reworking. I think it would be better to say that Austrians' prefer to find positive and universal statements, that apply regardless of circumstances, and thus find limited utility in statistical methods. Bastin 22:15, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

We're looking at this the wrong way I think - the WP:LEDE ought to be a summary of the article; each paragraph of the article should be represented by a line or two in the lead section. Simple as. Skomorokh 23:12, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Skomorokh, you're right of course. If it's in the article, it should be in the lead. There should be more in the article about where Austrian economists are found. I think documenting the absence of Austrians from university faculties would be difficult, however, much work has been put into wikipedia documenting their presence, and from that it appears that they only have a sizable presence at GMU.
Bastin, to my knowledge, there are have only been a handful (ie. less than 10) recent publications by Austrian economists that are in university based peer-reviewed journals. You seem to believe that there are many, can I have some names and citations?
LK (talk) 03:02, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
I don't know how many would be enough to satisfy you, but there are many. Walter Block, Steve Horwitz, Anthony Evans, Peter Boettke, Chris Coyne, Pete Klein, Huerta de Soto, David Prychitko, Frederic Sautet, Peter Leeson, Mark Thornton, Jeffrey Herbener, etc. All of them have been published in university-published reviewed journals.
But, of course, you're asking it the wrong way. I don't want it in the article that there are loads and loads and loads of us. I simply don't think it ought to said that there are very few - which seems to be WP:OR to me. Bastin 10:16, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
I stand corrected. I'm familiar with some of the names on the list, but didn't know that they self-identified as Austrians. I have just googled the names you gave, and I fully admit that I was wrong, and that there are more than 10 Austrian school economists with recent publications in non-austrian school journals. LK (talk) 16:12, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
Here is a list (compiled by Walter Block) of Austrians (past and present) who are/were tenured at their respective institutions. Many of the older names were publishing before there were Austrian journals. DickClarkMises (talk) 19:40, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the list, but I just want to point out that some of the people on the list are not academics, and some may have Austrian sympathies, but do not self-identify as Austrian. This is probably best described as a list of people interested in Austrian economics. For example, I happen to know that Fred Foldvary is better described as a georgist (a viewpoint I am sympathetic to myself), Bryan Caplan has been an emphatic critic of Austrian methodology, and Joseph Schumpeter is, well, a Schumpeterian. LK (talk) 02:29, 17 December 2008 (UTC)
I should also point out that the list below was gleaned by from an email from Walter Block, and was never published by him. I appended the list below as a good starting point for our work. As to Caplan, he considered himself an Austrian before he changed his views.[8] Which people on the list are not academics? My understanding is that all of them have or had tenure at an institution of higher learning. DickClarkMises (talk) 19:26, 18 December 2008 (UTC)
Anyone with publications and tenure will show up immediately on a google search. I've just googled about a quarter of the list. Few of the people below are both Austrian economists and have tenure in an economics department at a tertiary institution. LK (talk) 15:38, 2 January 2009 (UTC)
Bill Anderson, Frostburg State
Dom Armentano, Univesity of Hartford
Roger Arnold, Cal State San Marcos
Howard Baetjer, Towson University
Chuck Baird, Cal State, Northridge
William Barnett II, Loyola University New Orleans
Marco Bassani, University of Milan
Robert Batemarco
Bruce Benson, Florida State U, Tallahassee
Walter Block Loyola University New Orleans
Pete Boettke, GMU
Sam Bostaph, University of Dallas
Don Boudrouex, GMU
William Breit, Trinity University, Texas
Barry Brownstein, some university in New York, New Jersey?
Bill Butos, Trinity College, Connecticut
Bruce Caldwell, North Carolina State
Peter Calcagno, College of Charleston
Steven T. Call – Metropolitan State College of Denver
Gabriel Calzada
Bryan Caplan, GMU
Tony Carilli, Hampden Sydney
Art Carol,
Paul Cantor, University of Virginia 
Jean-Pierre Centi, France
Emily Chamlee-Wright, Beloit University
John Cochran Metropolitan State College, Denver
Erich Colombatto
Tyler Cowen, GMU
Raimondo Cubeddu, University of Pisa
Greg Dempster Hampden Sydney
Tom DiLorenzo, Loyola University Baltimore
Pierre Desrochers, University of Toronto
Richard Ebeling, Hillsdale College
John Egger, Towson University
Fred Foldvary, Santa Clara University
Nicolai Foss, Copenhagen Business School
Roger Garrison, Auburn University
Pierre Garrouste
Fred Glahe, University of Colorado 
Rodolfo Gonzalez, California State University, San Jose
Gerald Gunderson, Trinity University Connecticut
Ron Hamowy, University of Alberta
Steve Hanke, Johns Hopkins
David Harper, NYU
Jeff Herbener, Grove City College
Paul Heyne, U of Washington
Bob Higgs, Lafayette University
Jack High, GMU
Randy Holcombe, Florida State University, Tallahassee
Guido Hulsmann, Angers, France
Hans Hoppe, UNLV
Steve Horwitz, St. Lawrence University
Jeff Hummel, California State University, San Jose
Sanford Ikeda, SUNY, Purchase College
Edward Kaplan, Western Washington University  
Israel Kirzner, NYU
Roger Koppl, Fairleigh Dickinson University
Dan Klein, GMU
Peter Klein, University of Missouri
Elizabeth Krecke. University of Law; Economics; and Science of Aix-Marseille 
Peter Kurrild-Klitgaard, University of Southern Denmark 
Ludwig Lachmann, University of Witwatersrand
Richard N. Langlois University of Connecticut 
Don Lavoie, GMU
Peter Lewin, University of Texas, at Dallas
Paul Lewis
Christopher Lingle
Steven Littlechild, University of Birmingham; England 
Roderick Long, Auburn
William Luckey, Christendom College 
Frank Machovec, Wofford College
Yuri Maltsev, Carthage College
Margaret Maxey, University of Texas, Austin
Bob McGee, Seton Hall University
Roberta Adelaide Modugno, Italy
Naomi Moldofsky, University of Melbourne; Australia 
Michael Montgomery
Larry Moss, Babson College
Antony Mueller, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina 
Robert Mulligan Western Carolina.
Jerry O’Driscoll?
David O’Mahoney, Cork University
Lydia Ortega, California State University, San Jose
E. C. Pasour, North Carolina State University 
Ivan Pongracic, Hillsdale College
Dave Prychitko U. of Northern Michigan
Gerard Radnitzky
Ralph Raico, Buffalo State College
Salim Rashid, University of Illinois 
Duncan Reekie, University of Witwatersrand 
George Reisman, Pepperdine University
Morgan Reynolds, Texas A&M
Shawn Ritenour, Grove City College
Mario Rizzo, NYU
Murray Rothbard, UNLV
Murray Sabrin, Ramapo College
Joe Salerno, Pace University
Mike Saliba, Loyola University New Orleans
Pascal Salin, University of Paris 
Larry Secrest, Sul Ross University 
George Selgin, University of Georgia
Hans F. Sennholz, Grove City College
Butler D. Shaffer, Southwestern University School of Law 
Milton Sharpiro, Claremont Graduate School 
Jeremy Shearmur, Australian National University 
Sudha Shenoy, University of Newcastle; Australia 
Josef Sima, Prague University of Economics
Gene Smiley, Marquette University 
Barry Smith, State University of New York; Buffalo 
Vernon Smith, Chapman College
Jesus Huerta de Soto, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos 
Ed Stringham, California State University, San Jose
Daniel Sutter, University of Texas - Pan American
Alex Tabarrok, GMU
Thomas Tacker
Thomas Taylor, Wake Forest University 
Tim Terrell, Wofford College 
Mark Thornton, Columbus University
Hunt Tooley, Austin College 
David Tuerck, Suffolk University
Victor Vanberg GMU
Karen Vaughn, GMU
David Versailles
Harry Veryser, University of Detroit, Mercy
Martti Vihanto
Richard Wagner, GMU
Doug Walker, Georgia College and State University
Deborah Walker, Loyola University New Orleans
Allan Walstad, University of Pittsburgh
Joseph Weglarz; University of Detroit, Mercy
Chris Westley Jacksonville State
Larry White, University of Missouri - St. Louis
Stuart Wood, Loyola University New Orleans
Thomas Woods, Suffolk County Community College 
Mark Yanochik, Georgia Southern
Leland Yeager, Auburn
Bong Joon Yoon, State University of New York; Binghamton 
Ed Younkins, Wheeling Jesuit University 
Tony Yu, University of New South Wales 
 
Austrian Oldies with tenure:
 
Eugen von Bohm Bawerk
Wein Claudi
Gottfried Haberler, Harvard
Friedrich Hayek, U of Chicago
Emil Kauder
Fritz Machlup, Princeton
Carl Menger
Hans Meyer
Oskar Morgenstern
Eric Streissler
Richard von Strigl
Wilhelm Roepke
Rosenstein Rodan
Joseph Schumpeter, Harvard
Friedrich von Weiser

Schumpeter and Hayek

why is Schumpeter not included,and why does the article not mention Hayek's sharp differences between Mises? I mean their are different factions within the school aren their? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hoffmanjohn (talk • contribs) 03:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Joseph Schumpeter is not considered an Austrian per se, IIRC. He recognizes that the Austrian school has made "important contributions" to the corpus of economics in "Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy" at least, but his heavy use of data (esp. things like the Kondratiev Long Waves) to build his model disqualifies him I believe. --Nurax (talk) 21:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Hoffmanjohn has a point. There were sharp differences between the three most prominent Austrian economists of the 20th century, Schumpeter, Hayek and Mises. The 'Austrian School' as it exists today is largely a Misesian school of economics. The article doesn't makes that clear at all. LK (talk) 18:25, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I personally think the article makes it abundantly clear, in fact. Schumpeter is only related to the "Austrian school" by his nationality (Austrian) and the fact that it can be argued that he supported free market principles (though he is by all means less radical in that sense than Mises or even Hayek). --Nurax (talk) 21:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd disagree with that - and say that that is to follow a no true Scotsman argument. Indeed, his 'support for free markets' is certainly questionable (by the standard of the time, he did, but he was no classical liberal).
There is some academic argument on the issue: chapters in standard books and peer-reviewed articles. It is the so-called 'second schism' in the school. In essence, the argument that Schumpeter was Austrian relies on four concentrations of his that are hallmarks of Austrianism: high value of subjectivism and individualism, a focus on entrepreneurship and innovation, and process analysis.
IMO, these (in conjunction with his social science bias) make him an Austrian. However, it would require many comments in parenthese, with asterisks and inverted commas galore. Here be dragons. Bastin 03:15, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
My personal read of the history is that there was a group of Austrian economists that had somewhat similar views on economics and methodology active from the middle of the 19th to the middle of the 20th century. Political turmoil and WWII forced most of them to move to London and the US. Of these, Schumpeter was the most influential. Hayek and Mises were largely sidelined after most economists became convinced by Keynes and later Samuelson's work on mathematical modeling. Interest in Hayek was revived by the the Nobel he shared with arch-rival Gunnar Myrdal. Interest in Mises was sustained by his following among libertarians attracted to his philosophy of free-market capitalism. The 'Austrian school' was we know it today are largely descended from followers of Mises, accepting the ideas of Hayek and Schumpeter only insofar as it does not conflict with Mises' ideas. As far as this reading of history is correct, I would hope that someday, it is made clear in the article. LK (talk) 15:59, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

nature of obscurity

A recent edit changed the line, "Although it is somewhat obscure in contemporary economics, and despite the fact that few academic economists are followers, the Austrian School has an unbroken tradition dating back to the late-19th century..." to "Although it is somewhat obscure in mainstream political discourse, the Austrian School has an unbroken tradition dating back to the late-19th century..."

I'm not really up on this, and such stuff has gotten a lot of discussion above. However, my impression is that currently the first is more accurate than the revision--that the Austrian school is more "obscure" among economists than in political discourse. I thought it should come for discussion. CRETOG8(t/c) 03:24, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Spelling of Böhm-Bawerk

Re: Revision 8: I think you're wrong about the spelling of his name. A google search showed about 400 instances of Boehm-Bawerk but about 1200 Bohm-Bawerk. The actual spelling, I believe is Böhm, thats an 'O' with two little dots over it. Unfortunately Wiki won't let you use special characters in links. I think Boehm is an anglization of the name, trying to get across the proper pronunciation without using special characters.
But a quick check shows that the Mises Institute spells it minus the 'e': |http://www.mises.org/bawerk.asp] It also appears Mises and Rothbard spelled it without the 'e' too. Is 'oe' and excepted translation of 'ö'? --MemoryHole.com 7 Sep 2001

You are right that Böhm is correct, but unfortunately not possible as a page name. So I applied the normal German substitution used when no umlaut is available (old typewriters/printers) ö -> oe. That is the nearest we can come here. The "correct" anglisation is probably just leaving the diaresis off (Bohm). Actually, it occured to me that we can use ö still in the text. See the change I'll commit next.

Finally, "von Böhm-Bawerk" seems to outmajor my "Böhm von Bawerk" so I'm changing that back. I guess both spellings were interchangable back when, but I'm no historian. --Robbe 25 Feb 2002

The name Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk has three parts. "Eugen" is a German forename, von is a preposition of Austrian nobility, and Böhm-Bawerk is the combination of two surnames. One of his male ancestors would have the family name Böhm and received permission to attach his wife's family name, Bawerk, to his own. Eugen Böhm von Bawerk is not a proper German name because it is not acceptable to use a family name, in this case Böhm as a forename. Skippyo (talk) 04:01, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Should Murray Rothbard be mentioned in the lede and elsewhere?

I'm new to WP (how do you create a user name?), but I am knowledgeable about AS and have been fascinated by the apparent toing and froing over whether to mention Murray Rothbard in the lede. I suggest he should be mentioned. AS "bifurcates" from Hayek and Mises. Rothbard represents the "hardcore" branch of AS and derives DIRECTLY from Mises (Rothbard was a student of Mises). He should therefore be mentioned in the lede. His extensive contributions are listed here and show just what a brilliant thinker he was, but also how his economic commentaries (1) derive directly from Mises (2) are clearly part of AS (3) represent the unbroken lineage of AS from the late 19 century until today and (4) illustrate what applied AS is capable of in Rothbard's unequalled America's Great Depression. It's funny this debate is occurring because both Mises and Rothbard were excommunicated from the mainstream because of their attacks on central banking. Rothbard ended up in Las Vegas and Mises never obtained tenure in the US. Ironic that Rothbard's name still generates such hate, even on WP.

However, the simple reality is that he represents the "purist" (most extreme?) form of Austrianism and the logical culmination of Mises's ideas, and therefore should be mentioned in the lede. Please discuss here if you have different ideas. Thanks! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.206.178.15 (talk) 07:20, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Autoarchiver - any objections?

I will establish an autoarchiver here in the next little while. Any objections are welcome, but is seems to me that this page is far too long and with posts going back a very long time indeed.--Gregalton (talk) 15:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Mises predicted the Great Depression ?

The sources proposed for this claim don't support it. Obviously a claim in a biography written by his wife decades after the event is of no value as support for a claim of accurate prophecy. There's a good source for Mises predicting, in 1924. the failure of CreditAnstalt, which took place in 1931, and it seems that the later quote was in the context of refusing a job there. So, if you want to say "predicted the CreditAnstalt failure" I don't have a problem. [9]. JQ (talk) 22:05, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Hayek did predict the October 1929 crash in an article published in February of that same year, against all academia and based on his analysis of the monetary policies of the Fed and of the business cycle theory. Frankly, I never really understood the Austrians' insistence on Mises' wife allegations while ignoring a much better sourced prediction by Hayek himself. --Childhood's End (talk) 04:17, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I've restored this, only so that other editors can reach a clear consensus on how to handle it. Gwen Gale (talk) 10:10, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't think there is any possibility of salvaging the Mises "prediction" which relies on recollections of conversations long after the event, and is in any case ambiguous. The Hayek prediction sounds more promising, but all the web sources seem to cite each other, and I suspect may be out of context. Is it possible to locate the original source (presumably in German)? JQ (talk) 10:53, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Google books has it, but doesn't allow a preview. Gwen Gale (talk) 11:14, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Few academics

Where is claim about "few academics" cited? -- Vision Thing -- 12:40, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Peter Boettke himself admits as much in his write up of Austrian economics. (Peter J. Boettke & Peter T. Leeson, 2003, "The Austrian School of Economics 1950-200". in Warren Samuels, Jeff E. Biddle, and John B. Davis. A Companion to the History of Economic Thought.) And it is also clear from the list of Austrian economists posted above 'gleaned from an email from Walter Block'. The list holds about 50 names, many of whom either do not self-identify as Austrian school, or are not academic economists. According to the Association of American Colleges and Universities, there are about two thousand six hundred accredited four-year colleges and universities. Assuming that an economics department has 10 faculty members (a low estimate), that gives 26,000 academic economists. The American Economics Association also boosts about 25,000 members. Of these, Walter Block could not make a list of more than 50 Austrian school economists.
Now, care to cite the assertions in these sentences? "Supporters include U.S. Congressman and former Presidential candidate Ron Paul, Czech President Vaclav Klaus, French academic Pascal Salin, and President of EuroPacific Capital Peter Schiff. Prior to this, the most prominent Austrians were Murray Rothbard and Henry Hazlitt."
I've tried, and cannot find any source where Czech President Vaclav Klaus states that he is an Austrian school economist.
LK (talk) 15:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
Do you know a number of the page where Boettke says that? -- Vision Thing -- 21:37, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
I checked and Boettke doesn't say that there are few Austrian academics. -- Vision Thing -- 20:02, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
LK, I also checked your ref and cant find the "few academics" mention. Can you help? I would have no problem stating that AE are outside the mainstream even without a source, but the few academics segment seems to me more problematic. --Childhood's End (talk) 14:56, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Gwen Gale

Please think logically and consistently. Either allow the information contributed by the editor and tag it as appropriate, or, if you're deleting it on the grounds that it's better to delete untagged statements, delete them all. An ad hoc change of reasoning to "this is controversial" won't save you, because the same could be said of half the article -- that's why we have the fact tag.

Now, may I rv you without this snowballing into a chest-puffing exercise? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.105.228.24 (talk) 06:06, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Any unsourced content can be removed if challenged. I most strongly suggest you do nothing until other editors have brought their input to this, thanks. Gwen Gale (talk) 06:13, 20 January 2009 (UTC)
Then delete them all. I believe I covered that option, above. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.105.228.24 (talk) 07:06, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

See WP:POINT: If you begin deleting uncited content which most editors would take as wholly verifiable and noncontroversial, only because you haven't had your way on this, you could be blocked. The pith is, this edit looks like it might be a go at stealthy vandalism. If you want to add content which is this controversial, you'll need to source it. If it is unsourced, it will be removed from the article as vandalism. I'm sorry to be so harsh about it, I asked you to wait for input from other editors. Gwen Gale (talk) 09:59, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I didn't add it, I restored it, because you deleted it -- because it makes your religion ideology look bad.
The thing is, you can't support deletionism for additions that stick in your craw, while supporting inclusionism and the fact-tagging policy for all the rest. That is, you can, but you'll be (transparently) gaming the system every time you cite policy to defend your actions.
And what is it with the passive-aggressive ban-threats from you self-described libertarian-types? I've noted a definite pattern among you guys. Don't threaten, just act. Think praxeology. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.105.228.24 (talk) 12:23, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, so you were vandalizing the article. Yawn. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:27, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
Say what? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.105.228.24 (talk) 12:50, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
Please don't put that back in without a source, is all. Gwen Gale (talk) 13:57, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
I love how nothing is ever resolved when an admin is involved. They simply waltz in and make (self-contradictory) declarations, and that's that. They feel no need to explain their inconsistencies; they simply let their admin bit do the talking. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.105.228.24 (talk) 03:17, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm going to explicitly explain a point that Ms Gale has already made implicitly: Not all claims that are questionable or controversial are equally questionable or equally controversial. And, in that context, some claims are not allowed to stand for even seconds without supporting reference to a “reliable source”, some stand for days after being {{fact}}-tagged, while others might stand {{fact}}-tagged for many months. Hence Ms Gale's remark “The pith is, this edit looks like it might be a go at stealthy vandalism.”
No one is engaged in passive-aggressive threats; the protocol at Wikipedia is generally to give lots of warning and to provide lots of forgiveness. Even those who don't agree with that protocol are supposed to abide by it. And it isn't simply “self-described libertarian-types” upon whom this requirement is imposed, but your illiberal PoV-push is naturally bringing you into conflict with them more often and with greater intensity than with others. (BTW, since Wikipedia isn't your property and isn't public property, don't expect classical liberals to think that you have an open-ended right to express yourself here.)
It would be best if you stopped trying to find ways to force a compromise on various articles by wiki-lawyering; and, if you won't stop that, at least not engage in claims to the effect that it's the other party that's gaming the system. —SlamDiego←T 18:16, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Fact-tags in lede (redux)

My undo ([10]) of LK's last edit was not a complete undo. I kept out some statements that he deleted. They could be reinserted if someone finds a source. I reinserted others that, imo, do not need a source. I modified another so that it becomes less controversial. --Childhood's End (talk) 21:00, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I've added some cite tags on statements that I think need to be cited. This includes: "Austrian School economists advocate strict adherence to methodological individualism – analyzing human action from the perspective of individual agents." The 'Austrian school' is more than just Mises and his followers, and that describes the Austrian school as just a Misesian school of economics. I've also added sourced observations of the position of Austrian school vis-a-vis the mainstream. VT, read the sources, they back up the statements. LK (talk) 03:11, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
To continue, is the Austrian school Carl Menger, Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, and Joseph Schumpeter, a group of economists who share a common heritage but have different ideas on what constitutes methodology? Or is the the Austrian school Mises and his followers, as typified by Lew Rockwell and the fellows of his von Mises Institute? Or is the Austrian school the loose group of academics with laissez faire leanings who self-style as pro-Austrian? What is or isn't the Austrian school's beliefs and core feature change drastically depending on the answer to that question. LK (talk) 12:08, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
Yes, that is a relevant point and that is why I agree with removing unsourced statements about what describes the AS. What we should focus on is a description that fits a large range of AS thinkers rather than just a group here and another there. Mises, Hayek and Shum all agreed on some points and disagreed on others. Imo, common grounds can be found in the rejection of the "natural science/mathematical" approach to economics, general opposition to keynesianism, monetarism and all forms of central planning/collectivism, focus on individualism, spontaneous order, and the creative function of the free market mechanism.
On the other hand, some statements in the lede do not warrant a fact-tag. For instance, that Ron Paul, Peter Schiff and the others mentioned are supporters of the AS, in a way or the other, seems hardly questionable. Also, we cannot deny that the AS has historically been influential. Proponents of the AS have gravitated around Thatcher and Reagan, and Hayek was widely known as Keynes' main ideological opponent before he chose to pursue larger ends. --Childhood's End (talk) 16:36, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

LK, the article does not need a self-made declaration of adherence to the AS in order to include a person's name as a supporter. I even wonder if Hayek ever made such a precise statement. I'll re-insert Vernon Smith and Buchanan because they are so obvious (see [11] or [12] for VS and [13] for JB - it took me about 2 minutes to find these). --Childhood's End (talk) 16:46, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
Hmm, sitting on the board of an Austrian economics organization doesn't make one an Austrian economist, nor does writing a paper about Mises, but I will accept Vernon Smith for now if you insist. However, as for James Buchanan, being interviewed by the Mises Institute in not evidence of being Austrian. Also, my knowledge of his work tells me that he is not an Austrian economist (at least not a Misesian one), and I know that he has on occasion criticized the current Austrian framework. Also, what about Czech President Vaclav Klaus? I have seen zero evidence that he considers himself an Austrian economist. I have also reintroduced the sourced statements about the place of Austrian school vis-a-vis the mainstream. Read the source - its right there. LK (talk) 17:06, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
Please read Buchanan's interview, it makes things pretty clear.
Also, again, I would not say that AS = Mises. Most Mises followers end up supporting anarcho-capitalism, while most Hayek supporters are minarchists. A valuable description of the AS will encompass both philosophies. Despite the differences, there are many common grounds. --Childhood's End (talk) 17:20, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
Hmm again. He gives a very ambiguous answer "I have no objections to being called one, Hayek and Mises might consider me one, but some of the others surely would not." OK, again, I won't object to this. But we should work on the confusion in the page now between AS and Mises, as JB certainly does not adhere to praxeology as his methodology. LK (talk) 17:42, 6 February 2009 (UTC)


Imo, we dont even need a source to support that AS lies outside the maintream. I would let that statement clear of any footnote. However, I would disagree with using a Bryan Caplan quote to support a positive statement that the AS contributes little to maintream theory. Caplan might actually be in the minority position at GMU about this...! I have read many mainstream econs who have stated that AS contributed a fair deal to econ theory. Surely there are many to say otherwise. We should just avoid cherry-picking one source for such a statement, or at least the statement should be reformulated to "Some argue that...". --Childhood's End (talk) 18:41, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

How about 'currently contributes relatively little' to mainstream theory. I'm not sure about your background, but I can tell you from personal experience that 'Austrian' papers are almost never read or discussed in the universities I've been at (fyi, salt-water ivy league). As you probably know Greg Mankiw has stated the same on his blog, that he's confident that he was never assigned an Austrian economics paper in all his years of graduate study. LK (talk) 03:55, 7 February 2009 (UTC)
Mankiw (whom I really respect) also acknowledges that that judgment about AE might well be unfair, and found Hayek's Road to Serfdom terrific.
I think this is a very good piece about AE influence and orthodoxy/heterodoxy : [14]
More to the point, it all depends on how you define "contribute". If you define it strictly as papers submitted in colleges and reviewed by mainstream teachers/faculties, then you're likely going to find little contribution (although I checked the current PhD projects currently underway at GMU, for instance, and found a few fielded in austrian economics). Whereas if you define "contribution" as a broadening of the economic debate spectrum, or as a different angle of analysis which, from time to time, sparked off significant changes in mainstream positions, or even as a source of influence over maintream academia or public policy, then you might find a "contribution". --Childhood's End (talk) 15:40, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
An interesting read, thanks. A few observations. Pete Boettke is perhaps currently the foremost scholar in the Austrian tradition; hence he will write eloquently in defense of the Austrian school – but he's not a neutral source. He's pulling into the 'Austrian' group scholars who perhaps would not self-identify as Austrian school (e.g. Tyler Cowen). Even he describes the Austrian school practitioners as "constantly knocking on the door to be let in the mainstream economic conversation, a few have been let in, others get frustrated and either quit knocking or start knocking harder or unfortunately start screaming." This is not something microeconomic theorists, neo-classical economists, Chicago school scholars or Keynesians (old or new) would write (or for that matter experimental economists, behavioral economists, econometricians, game theorists, etc.) LK (talk) 17:22, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
Yep, that's why I'd agree that AE is not mainstream, but would abstain from making a statement about the AE contribution since this seems harder to define :-) --Childhood's End (talk) 18:27, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
The lead should summarize and inform the reader about the Austrian school. IMO, leaving out the fact that the Austrian school currently contributes little to mainstream economic theory would almost be a lie by omission. LK (talk) 19:18, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
I really cannot see how you came at such a strongly opinionated conclusion on this obviously debatable statement. --Childhood's End (talk) 21:59, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Policy on edits by sockpuppets

  • What is the Wikipedia policy--if any--on quoting from a post or other insertion from a deleted item by a suspected sock puppet? I saw some points of view in a now-deleted item that are extremely worthwhile in the context of this topic. If I edit out any of the remarks that might be deemed petulant, I generally assume that quoting them here or elsewhere should be acceptable. Anybody? --RayBirks (talk) 20:12, 7 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Wikipolicy is to ignore and revert as much as possible any actions by banned editors; the theory being that if they see that they make no impact, they'll go away. (They're persona non grata) However, people are free to reintroduce any edits made by banned editors, with the understanding that you take full responsibility for the edits – it's now essentially yours. LK (talk) 04:22, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Citations in Lede?

I'm new to WP (how do you create a username?) but I'm well aware of Austrian School theory and note that all the comments in the lede simply summarize stuff that is clearly expressed and referenced in the latter part of the page. I thought there was a policy to avoid having citations in the lede? It's both annoying and unnecessary if this is dealt with in the body of the article. Nothing expressed in the lede is controversial or needs citations. I note that this has gone back and forth for months. I must be cautious here because I know it's WP policy not to engage in personal attacks in any way, but the editor who repeatedly wants citations in the lede appears to have denigrated Austrianism on his own talk page here.

What is the policy on people who openly ridicule a school of thought, and then seek to edit the page? This is not a personal attack at all. I'm just asking what the policy is regarding people editing a page they openly ridicule. Is there such a policy? Should there be? I mean the editor could hardly be called objective. Could they? I note the following comments in particular by "LK" on his own talk page:

"In answer to your questions:
No, Austrian School writers are almost never published anywhere except in their own journals.
As far as I know, there is not a single self-identified Austrian who is a tenured faculty member in the Economics dept of an accredited university.
Ron Paul is their most visible supporter. They are not taken seriously by any major political party.
You are correct in observing that the Austrian school is very localised to the US, mainly among some economic Libertarians there. They have no following in Austria.
They made some important contributions about 100 years ago, that have long since been incorporated into mainstream economics. However, they still claim that they are the only ones with those insights (eg. ordinal vs cardinal utility).
The most striking aspect about 'Austrians' is that they cling to messy verbal arguments, and reject real world observation, methods long ago rejected by real economists. In my mind, this identifies them as pseudoscience."

"Ron Paul is not taken seriously by any major political party". Ron Paul is not taken seriously...hmmmmmm. Is this correct? Is Austrianism a "pseudoscience"? Can somebody please comment because I'm confused both about perceived lack of neutrality and whether these comments are accurate. Thanks! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.105.41.201 (talk) 08:59, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi Karmaisking, welcome back. LK (talk) 09:53, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Whether Ron Paul is taken seriously or not is, of course, irrelevant to the legitimacy of Austrian Economists. Most of the economists at the Mises Institute (Like Walter Block and Thomas Dilorenzo are also economists at accredited national universities, and hundreds of self-identified (and many others de-facto) Austrians exist across the country.

It is clearly a distinctly minority position and you are entitled to disagree passionately with it. However, that doesn't mean you can call a school of thought that has garnered three Nobel prizes psuedoscience.

Amandalindsay021 (talk) 07:48, 10 February 2009 (UTC) Amandalindsay021 (talk) 07:46, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Presenting Contributions in prose?

It has been suggested to present the Contributions part of the article in prose. For the less educated that may be a good idea, but removing the list will IMO be a fatal error, which will decrease the quality of the "hard facts". Use both list and prose or leave it as is. 190.4.245.251 (talk) 05:24, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Vernon Smith and James Buchanan

I'm troubled about the inclusion of these figures in the lead, together with the description of praexology as the main methodology of the Austrian school. Vernon Smith's main field of research is in Experimental Economics, James Buchanan's work makes heavy use of mathematical models; these are methodologies that praexology explicitly rejects. Either these figures are not Austrian school, or praexology is not. Right now, the lead is just contradictory. LK (talk) 19:30, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm not so sure either that praxeology should be identified as the main methodology of the AE, although I know it's an important concept for the Mises followers. We should edit this part of the lead I guess.
VS and JB are only identified as supporting AE, not as AE economists or supportive of every AE concept, so I dont see much of a problem there (even Hayek could hardly be associated with praxeology imo). Besides, I see VS as mostly involved in behavioral and psychological research. He clearly was strongly influenced by Hayek (as many other Nobel awardees).
I believe his Nobel nomination cited Vernon Smith for establishing the field of experimental economics. It might not be what he has spent most of his adult life on, but it is the work he is best known for. LK (talk) 10:32, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
You do raise an important issue over your last talk page edits, which I would summarize like this : how Misean should this article be when we know that within AE, Mises is one important "branch" but certainly not the whole thing? Should it be more hayekian (more notable) than misean? --Childhood's End (talk) 22:34, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I think we are agreed that this page should take a more inclusive view of what is and is not 'Austrian school'. However, others may not agree with us. Does anyone else want to contribute to this discussion? Should this page make clear that the term 'Austrian school' encompasses people who do experimental economics and mathematical modeling, use econometrics and believe in some government interventions? i.e. Austrian School is not only von Mises Institute? LK (talk) 10:32, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Yep, that's the core issue with this article imo. More people should get involved in the discussion and we should not rush things. For one, I am convinced that AS is not only Mises and encompasses people with some openness towards "some government interventions" (minarchism). I am not so convinced about mathematical modeling and economectrics though. I suppose there are people who might support AS and nonetheless make some use of economectrics and modeling in their work, but that may not be significant enough to make it an AS methodology.
Right now, I see notability (both outside and inside the AS) as our best guidance. --Childhood's End (talk) 15:50, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
I think Pete Boettke is a good source on what is and is not good Austrian methodology. The email that you linked to above about who are good Austrian economists today can be mined for sources. BTW, on math modelling, have you read any of James Buchanan's papers? Like other papers on microeconomic issues, the math in them can get quite extreme. I also believe that Boettke's take on this is that methodologically, good Austrian economists today are virtually indistinguishable from those in the mainstream (I believe this quote is from an article of his on Austrian economists, I'll try to track it down sometime). LK (talk) 10:59, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Of course that Austrian school encompasses people who support "some government interventions". Hayek is one of them. However, he was against use of mathematical methods in economics. -- Vision Thing -- 17:29, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, either Austrian school encompasses economists who make heavy use of mathematical modeling, or James Buchanan is not an Austrian School economist. LK (talk) 04:38, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Why do you look to determine whether JB is or is not an AS economist? The point seems to me that he can be said to support the AS, just like Ron Paul for instance. And JB may use maths, but that's not his maths work he is most known for, but rather for his work on public choice theory, which is closely associated with GMU's econ fac, which is closely associated with AS... --Childhood's End (talk) 17:48, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm just concerned that this page gives a wrong impression about what constitutes Nobel caliber research. My point is, either make clear that AS methodology includes JB's methodology, or stop claiming JB as an AS Nobel laureate. You can't have it both ways. BTW, have you read Public Choice theory papers? The math in them is hard. LK (talk) 18:39, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree that public choice theory involves maths, only to me it's more about philosophy than anything else. This brings me to mind that Nobel caliber research has involved psychology (Kahneman), politics (Stigler) and development (Sen) for instance. Anyway... JB supports the AS as it appears from sources; this does not mean that he's an AS economist or that he won the Nobel because of AS work.
Now, whether AS can include maths or not isnt related to whether JB supports AS or not imo. Perhaps there are maths in works that some consider to be AS. I am right now uncertain of whether this is right or wrong or comes from notable enough sources, if we find any, and if this would be significant enough to be included in the lede or in the body.
I know that Hayek also wrote about the AS (“Economic Thought VI: The Austrian School.” In International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan, 1968). I'd be curious to have a look at it. --Childhood's End (talk) 13:11, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
Here's a good source for what is or isn't Austrian Economics: The Elgar companion to austrian economics PETER J BOETTKE (ed). LK (talk) 04:51, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Supporters in the lead

After some consideration, I've removed the list of supporters from the lead. My reasoning is twofold. Firstly, it constitutes trivia, as the lead is supposed to summarize the article, and there is no section in the article talking about who does or does not support the Austrian School. As such, I feel that it's inclusion is mere puffery. Secondly, as indicated in the discussion above, there is dispute about whether these people actually support the Austrian School (how do you define support? have any of them ever literally said 'I support AS'?). For comparison, I would like to point out that the articles on Keynesians, New Keynesians, Post Keynesians, Chicago School, and Marxian economics do not have a list of supporters in the lead. LK (talk) 10:03, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Rationality

Someone should change the Contributions section as the word rational in the second to last bullet item is used incorrectly. :

  • The economic calculation debate between Austrian and Marxist economists, with the Austrians claiming that Marxism is flawed because prices could not be set to recognize opportunity costs of factors of production, and so socialism could not make rational decisions.

Rationality in economics is the assumption that agents have a complete and transitive preference ordering or ranking over all possible states of the world, and that all decisions are made with the objective to achieve higher ranked expected outcomea, and if you assume cardinality, this is simply maximizing expected utility. The word here "rationality" should be replace with the word "efficient", or better replace the phrase "... so socialism could not make rational decisions" with "... so socialist planners could not make decisions which would result in allocatively efficient outcomes." —Preceding unsigned comment added by JoePomykala (talk • contribs) 20:12, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Schumpeter

Schumpeter ISN'T an Austrian Economist!! He was born in Austria but was a member of the Neo-Classical School. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 157.100.171.102 (talk) 03:55, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Hayek and "Major role" of Austrian ec

In the History section:

  • "The Austrian School, especially through the works of Friedrich Hayek, was influential in the revival of laissez-faire thought in the 20th century,[9] during which it played a major role in the development of economic theory."

Does anyone know what pages of the citation that this conclusion is drawn from? When the sentence mentions "economic theory" .... is it referencing theories that were/are held in the mainstream?

Also, the reference to "the 20th Century" in the second halfof the sentence (by the phrase "during which") seems somewhat vague and puffy. It can likely be made more specific. Anyone agree/disagree? BigK HeX (talk) 03:53, 13 March 2009 (UTC)


I don't know if Austrian Economics played a "Major role in the development of economic theory," considering the emergence of primarily interventionist ideals and Keynseanism... But it is legitimate to say that Austrian theory was influential in the revival of laissez-faire thought. 14:35, 2 April 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.170.244.174 (talk)

Ron Paul included in list of People associated with Austrians?

I understand his popularity with the online community, but listing politicians that go along with various economic theories seems ludicrous to me. Ron Paul (and Peter Schiff) for that matter, are NOT economists and should not be included in the list of people (I'm talking about the expandable list in the sidebox at the top of the article).

Can someone give me a reason why these two should stay, other than their current popularity? --Sideshowmel0329 (talk) 04:42, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't think there's much argument there. They should go. But try enforcing that against the tide of 'internet Austrians' that visit the page. --LK (talk) 08:02, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
Why should only career economists be listed in a drop down box called People? Gwen Gale (talk) 08:08, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
Ron Paul and Peter Schiff are both "associated" with the Austrian School. They have both written and spoken extensively about the Austrian School. Few people are more popularly associated with Austrian economics than Schiff and Paul. DickClarkMises (talk) 16:18, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
The question is, is the Austrian school a school of economics, or a social movement? If the former, then, the important people listed should be actively doing publishable research. If the later, then Ron Paul should be included. I think it does a disservice to the serious economists in the Austrian tradition to include Ron Paul and Peter Schiff. However, if the Austrian school is a social movement, it makes sense to leave them in. LK (talk) 07:55, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
Lawrence, I am afraid I have to call your "choice" a false choice. You offer no argument as to why lay people who are popularly associated and self-associated with the promotion of a school of thought ought not be mentioned. It is true that folks like Peter Boettke have criticized Paul's command of Austrian principles (although to my knowledge he has never disclaimed Paul's being an Austrian), but if anything I would argue that such comments reinforce the idea that Paul is indeed popularly associated with the school. I think it is rather disingenuous to try to make hay for your own economic agenda by introducing a false choice in hopes of getting someone interested in the Austrian School to deny that it is a school of economic thought. Contributions by the many influential Austrians in the academy, like Frank Fetter, clearly show it to be long-recognized as a school of economic thought. DickClarkMises (talk) 14:52, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
I should add that there are of course many notable Austrian Economists, and it isn't obviously clear that people like Ron Paul and Peter Schiff are more essentially related to Austrianism than all of them. My point is the narrow one that there need be no arbitrary rule that only Ph.D. economists who teach are reasonably to be considered in picking the names that would give our readers the best overview of the Austrian School's impact. DickClarkMises (talk) 15:05, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
Dear DickClark, you are not assuming good faith here. I am actually getting more sympathetic to economists of the Austrian tradition, as I learn more about the academics involved, which is quite different from the face of the 'Austrian school' I see on the internet. These academics face a two edged sword with their popularity. All I can say is that, as an economist myself (of the new Keynesian school that currently dominates mainstream macroeconomics), I would not like to see politicians, journalists, TV personalities and hedge fund managers listed as luminairies of Keynesian economic thought. LK (talk) 10:33, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
This wouldn't be the same, since most of them aren't noted as Keynesians. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:40, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

vagueness in contribution section

I found the last item in the "contributions" section to be extremely vague, to the point that it could be misleading or wrong. However, I don't know much about this so I'm not going to change it myself. Here's the quote:

The economic calculation debate between Austrian and Marxist economists, with the Austrians claiming that Marxism is flawed because prices could not be set to recognise opportunity costs of factors of production, and so socialism could not calculate best uses in the same way capitalism does.

My problem is that it seems to be using socialism as equivalent to centrally planned economy while equating capitalism to free market economy. Most socialists would object to these definitions, arguing that some models of socialism involve market exchanges, while capitalism generally involves extensive state intervention in the economy. So the idea of "central planning" vs. "free market" could be more precise, but it may be better to just describe the relationship between the decision maker and ther person whose interests are supposedly being served (an authority making decisions for others, vs everyone making decisions for themselves). AdamRetchless 16:26, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Fair enough, but the first sentence specifically identifies Marxist economists, and most Austrians feel that this debate is actually between themselves and everyone else (except maybe some members of the Chicago school). Austrians often accuse other economists of wanting to plan the economy, and that other economists (unlike themselves) are self-confident enough to think that they can solve the "calculation" problem more efficiently than the market.
This contribution should probably be broadened rather than made narrower. Socialists believe in some central planning role for the state, so do many others, and most of these would fall foul of the "calculation problem" in the Austrian view, wouldn't they? Wragge 16:51, 2005 May 23 (UTC)
I would say not, since most modern economies that self-apply some variety of the word "socialist" have free-market underpinnings that provide plenty of price information, so it would seem that this wording is out of date unless "socialist" is clearly defined herein to mean a completely centrally planned system that has no price mechanism. Since the meaning of the word "socialist" has changed (and greatly broadened!) since the formulation of this criticism, a less ambiguous term should probably be used. 207.108.75.130 (talk) 20:49, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
This confusion results from the change of the meaning of the word socialism. If you read literature contemporary to the debate in question you will find the word "socialism" to mean a centrally planned economy. Here is a link to the article that started the economic calculation debate: Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth. I would argue using the term "central planning" is equally, if not more, confusing because it does not appear once in the original article. Skippyo (talk) 04:28, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

I think there is some confusion here in terms of Marx's positive analysis of market capiatlism and is nomative espousal of socialism. the sentance in question, in my reading, is in refference to the former

Scholarly papers on the role of the Austrian School

Some interesting papers on the role of the Austrian School in the history of economics. These will make a good resource for anyone wanting to clean up the article:

LK (talk) 09:19, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

After much reading on this issue (which I really did not expect to do), I've come to the conclusion that different people really have different conceptions in mind when they refer to the Austrian school. That there are really three different groups that share the name 'Austrian school'. There's the diverse group of economists, including Hayek, Mises and Shumpeter, and the people who work in that tradition (Boetkke etc.). Then, there's Mises, Rothbard and the libertarians (these include Lew Rockwell and many people at the von Mises institute). Lastly there's Ron Paul, and the gold standard advocates who truly believe that business cycles are caused by fractional reserve banking and central banks. There's a lot of overlap between them, but on the other hand, there are many issues on which they disagree. (For instance, most Austrian school academics do not hold that fractional reserve banking causes business cycles.) Exactly what should be done in such a situation? LK (talk) 18:31, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Where do you get the idea that "most Austrian school academics do not hold that fractional reserve banking causes business cycles" ? Central banks underwrite fractional reserve banking, and credit expansion by central banks would not be possible without fractional reserve banking. What do you imagine that most Austrian school academics believe is the cause of business cycles? --Ben Best (talk) 18:45, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
And where, pray tell, is your source that states that economists of the Austrian tradition universally oppose fractional reserve banking? I personally know a few who do not. LK (talk) 03:47, 1 May 2009 (UTC)
Yes, there are Austrian economists who favor fractional reserve banking (White, Selgin -- although Rothbard did not call them Austrians, despite the fact that they label themselves as such). But my basic point is the credit expansion/contraction behind the Austrian business cycle boom/bust cannot be implemented without fractional reserve banking backed by central banks. --Ben Best (talk) 04:10, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Criticism

This criticism is sourced to two unreliable sources. One is an article by a physics student Joe D. and other is an online FAQ. I'm surprised I need to explain that both are unreliable sources. -- Vision Thing -- 19:31, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree. They're not valid sources for an encyclopedia. Tparameter (talk) 03:06, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
Sources are almost always good sources about themselves. These two sources are two of the foremost sources of criticism of the Austrian school on the internet. If we are removing self-published sources, all the citations from the Mises Institute can be considered self-published and should removed as well.
Anyway, regardless, the arguments should not be moved even if those two sources are, as the same arguments are also made by Caplan; I'm reinstating with a tag to Caplan.
LK (talk) 04:19, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

On another note, I'm curious about the proper use of Criticism in a Wikipedia article. I've noticed there is a criticism section, but then criticisms and counter-points are sprinkled throughout the article in a format similar to: Austrian Point. Mainstream Criticism. Austrian Point. Mainstream Criticism. etc. Which is the proper format? If the Criticism section is correct, then the sprinkled comments need to be consolodated there. If the Sprinkled format is correct, then the criticism section needs to be redistributed.Bozimmerman (talk) 17:06, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I've read sundry takes on this, but I've found that on controversial topics edit warring slows way down when sourced criticism is put in its own section. Moreover, if there's enough sourced criticism, there's nothing untowards about making the criticism section a summary with a link to a new article called Criticism of x. This way, readers still see helpfully weighted and widely gathered sourcing without having to wade through the twisted wordings left in the wake of edit/PoV bickering editors. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:26, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Irrefutable proof of the business cycle

There is an absurd statement regarding the empirical evidence being against the existence of a business cycle. This also goes to reinforce the idea that the scientific method and mathematics are misused by people that don't know how to interpret the evidence and don't know what premises to start with in deductive reasoning (which mathematics is a form of).

Consider the physical - What is absolute rock bottom for America even to the point of ridiculousness that could result from economic failure? Every company out of business, every person without a job. But what do we still have that an undeveloped country may not? Capital. And what happened to all the money? Did it evaporate? No. Someone is sitting on it. What do we know of the people with said money? They were somehow smart enough to obtain that money. So what are they going to do? Buy the cheap unused capital, and use it to start businesses.

Ans to IP - In Austrian economics, the notion of a business cycle has to do with credit cycles brought about by fractional reserve banking, which distorts credit, the money supply and hence the free market, this distortion in the market being observed as business cycles. The cited sources cover this but perhaps the article could deal with it more straightforwardly. Gwen Gale (talk) 16:12, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
Answer to Gwen - Exactly. What this means is that they create the exaggeration of what would be an already existing micro cycle that wouldn't be as visible. The amplitude is increased by government interference to the point of visibility by artificially preventing the downturn. Then the government claims that there is no business cycle... as evidenced by the lack of an observed natural minimum. But this is because they always interfere before the minimum is reached... which further increases the depth of the next minimum. What the above argument shows is that the minimum is there for absolute certain. If you are having trouble relating this to the above argument, the credit sources above are the people with the money. They fund new business, etc. By establishing this absolute minimum, we can see that there is no logical choice but to make credit available or for the people with funds to utilize them themselves - there is no where to go but up from there.

Made an edit

Because of their correct prediction (while almost no other economists saw it coming) of the current economic downfall, I have replaced the outdated Caplan link with an extensive New York Times story from 2008 that discusses the school in depth. If anyone has a problem with my edit, let me know. If the consensus is that the edit should be reverted, I completely disagree, but will not engage in an "editing war."

96.42.69.147 (talk) 21:28, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Heterodox but exaggerated

I think that the school is heterodox, and that this fact should be established. But I don't think it's necessarily fair to go on and on about how fringe it is. There is no question that it is a distinctly minority position, but there is also no question that there are many academic economists, aware or not, that could be considered to be or bordering on Austrian Economics, which is not overwhelmingly different from Chicago-style monetarism in some of its more moderate forms. Also, the school does boast three Bank of Sweden (Nobel) prizes.

Amandalindsay021 (talk) 07:40, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

The problem with the heterodox label is the implication that an orthodox school of economics exists. Even your own answer above shows this is a fallacy because you felt the need to prefix your view with "I think . . ." Is it a certainty or is it an opinion? Shouldn't we stick to facts instead of opinion? Cluckk2 (talk) 16:52, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Actually, it's a bit more complicated than that. As far as economics proper is concerned, AmandaLindsay is right - there's no great distance between GMU Austrians and the Chicago School (despite the name, not a separate school of economic thought, but a tendency within the mainstream. The fringe aspects of the Austrian school are its methodological doctrines and the extreme right political positions of people associated with the Mises Institute.JQ (talk) 11:33, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

The "heterodox" economics section is sketchy; it seems unfair to place the Austrians in here. I would consider the Austrians a very small minority within mainstream economics. It's not fair to compare such a historically influential school of thought that has garnered three Nobel Prizes to "Marxian" or "feminist" economics. Moreover, many "non-Austrians" are sympathizers.

96.42.69.147 (talk) 21:16, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Reinstating edits of banned user

Gwen Gale, given that the IP 123.3.175.141 has reintroduced almost exactly the same edits as the banned user Karmaisking, it is likely a sock puppet of Karmaisking. Either that or a self-admitted meatpuppet of Karmaisking. Reference the comment:

This is bullsh*t. I know this editor, but it's definitely NOT ME. "Larry the Loser" clearly wants to kill AS and promote "pretty boy" Keynes. Do NOT revert these good edits. They were NOT mine.

Note that KiK has tried this exact tactic before, using multiple socks, pretending to be new and playing mindgames with established editors. I want to remind you of policy. If reinstate edits introduced by a sockpuppet/meatpuppet of a banned user, you take full responsibility for them. Since you wish to reinstate the edits of IP 123.3.175.141 I accept them as your edits. LK (talk) 13:44, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

That's what I had in mind. Seeing a steady back and forth between what I take as two very strong PoVs (and maybe more than two editors), I restored the edits mostly because, as I said, I think they need more input, let's wait and see how other editors might want to deal with this content. As an editor I don't care much for either wording, I'm here mostly as an admin but acknowledge our PoVs on this content are not the same, so I'll tread softly. If more neutrally-put wording comes up and they still revert it, that's likely going to be a worry. Also, you've reminded me about that edit summary, I'll warn the new account about PAs and civility. Meanwhile sourced criticism is welcome in the criticism section. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:14, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Frankly, edits from KiK usually start off positive. However, I felt it was more important to enforce community policy on a banned user. I have experienced this from KiK before, if his socks are ignored, he will gradually revert to more and more extreme POV edits, spicing them with insulting comments, eventually reverting to the edit warring, vulgar personal attacks and threats that he is known for. LK (talk) 14:25, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Ok. The article has been on my watchlist but I hadn't given it much heed until I saw all the undos and reverts. I'll try to watch more closely, at least. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:47, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Update: User:PersecutedAustrians has already been blocked as a sockpuppet, which is understandable and ok by me. Let's see if someone else is willing to have a go at those edits. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:20, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Gwen, this edit on LK's talk page by me before yours may be relevant. Nja247 14:31, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
I'd seen it, I'm ok with all of it, along with LK's latest edit. The pith of my speaking up is that I think this content needs input from more editors, hopefully neutral ones, but they're so hard to find: Folks who know about the topic at all tend to have strong outlooks. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:40, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

He's made another edit, which looks ok to me as to content and sourcing (given the edit summary is untowards), but I've asked him to stop and will likely block him if he does it again, if someone else doesn't do it first. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:18, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Content of the Lead

The lead is currently filled with clutter. Policy is that the lead should summarize the article. I suggest editing the lead so that it does that. If it's not in the body, content should be removed from the lead, and moved to the relevant section. Any objections? LK (talk) 05:20, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Rewriting the lead

Here is the new version [15]

Start - The Austrian School (also known as the “Vienna School” or the “Psychological School”) emphasizes the spontaneous organizing power of the price mechanism. It holds that the complexity of subjective human choices makes mathematical modelling of the evolving market extremely difficult (or undecideable) and advocates a laissez faire approach to the economy. Austrian School economists advocate the strict enforcement of voluntary contractual agreements between economic agents, and advocate the smallest possible imposition of coercive force (especially government-imposed coercive force) on voluntary commercial transactions.

The Austrian School was influential in the early 20th century and was for a time considered by many to be part of mainstream economics. It currently lies somewhat outside mainstream economics.[3][4] However, Austrian School economists' forewarnings about the global financial crisis has led to renewed interest in the School's theories.[5]

The Austrian School derives its name from its predominantly Austrian founders and early supporters, including Carl Menger, Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk and Ludwig von Mises. Though called 'Austrian', supporters and proponents of the Austrian School can come from any part of the world. Prominent Austrian School economists of the 20th century include Henry Hazlitt, Murray Rothbard, and Nobel Laureate Friedrich Hayek.[6]

Austrian School economists advocate strict adherence to methodological individualism, which they describe as analyzing human action from the perspective of individual agents.[7] Austrian School economists argue that the only means of arriving at a valid economic theory is to derive it logically from basic principles of human action, a method called praxeology. This method holds that it allows for the discovery of fundamental economic laws valid for all human action. Alongside praxeology, these theories traditionally advocated an interpretive approach to history to address specific historical events.[8]Austrian economists contend that testability in economics is virtually impossible since it relies on human actors who cannot be placed in a lab setting without altering their would-be actions. One criticism of modern Austrian economics given by mainstream economists is that it lacks scientific precision. Austrian theories make use of verbal logic in drawing conclusions and formulating ideas. - End.

This is no end all or be all and can be talked about now and debated. I have only tried to make the lead less pov and more about the subject. I have no real personal interest in the Austrians ... pro or con. It does look like the rest of the article teeters back and forth pawing the same ground in a competitive way of pros and cons about the subject. I think it was a mistake to over do, over kill the aspect of hitting people over the head with this being a heterodox concept in the lead. That can be subtly done without making it seem like a shoot out at the o.k. corral between the mainstream and people that drift toward being advocates of the school. Thoughts and opinions? Lots of really redundant material through out this article in my opinion. skip sievert (talk) 16:01, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

L.K., please do not make a mass revert of this edit. You reverted it and also called the previous edit... mine included a general term.. a sock [16] - It looks to me that you are way too involved with a pov here as to your editing that last edit. You completely reverted what was done. Not good. No discussion. Too much overt mainstream pov as in telling and leading as opposed to making an explanation in a creative way without an overt p.o.v. - skip sievert (talk) 16:16, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
Skip, I was in the middle of mass reverting a whole bunch of edits by the newest KiK sock. In case you don't know who user:karmaisking is, please have a look at the edit histories of his extensive socks. The edits are sometimes extreme, I thought it was prudent to do a mass revert first, and go back and clean up later. I'm sorry but it takes a bit of time to sort things out. I was in the middle of checking on the edits when you reverted my revert. LK (talk) 16:59, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
Ok. I am not really into this article so much except that noticing how there is a lot of tug of warring going on, it seems like the whole thing needs reformulating as to just an information presentation. I did not really look at the The Mystery of Banking, Murray Rothbard edit. In general (Rothbard) seems like a really good writer, and as he is considered mainstream Austrian???,, it seems like the article could probably use more of him??? minus the overly long block quoting. skip sievert (talk) 17:16, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
It's part of the problem with this topic. There's actually two schools of thought here, sharing the same name.
  • There are the academic Austrian school economists, working along the traditions of the early 20th century Austrian economists. They are represented by Peter Boettke, William Easterly, etc, and are not that different from Chicago school economists. They hold essentially the same position as Chicago school people, except that they distrust mathematical models and statistics, and prefer digging through historical documents to make their case. Here are two good articles about what these academic Austrian school economists are about: Austrian economics and the mainstream: View from the boundary", and AS entry in Econlib.
  • Then, there are the libertarian Austrian school intellectuals in the tradition of Murray Rothbard and Mises, who believe in praexology and anarcho-capitalism, and are represented by Lew Rockwell, Peter Schiff, and Ron Paul, people who are not involved in academia. They are backed by the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and although they claim the academic Austrians as intellectual credentials, (ie Hayek won a Nobel, etc.), they essentially distrust the entire corpus of modern economic thought, and practice the No true Scotsman argument on these issues (ie. Schumpeter was not a true Austrian, no true Austrian disbelieves the Austrian business cycle theory, etc).
Unfortunately this article doesn't make that situation clear at all, and what's worse, it's marginalizing the ideas and concepts of the academic Austrians, in favor of the ideas from the libertarian Austrians. As you may guess, my sympathies lie with the academic Austrians, and I've been meaning to fix this article so that it better represents their viewpoint. If you're up to it, it would be great if we can commit to this project, to fix up this article. --LK (talk) 04:59, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
It should be noted that Boettke's differences with Austrians who tend to identify with Rothbard more than, say, Hayek, are partly (but not entirely) strategic and aesthetic ones--Boettke has headed up the very Austrian/Public Choice GMU graduate program in years past, concentrating many Austrian students there, while many LvMI folks like Salerno (who has criticized Boettke for other reasons (Boettke response here)) have promoted a more distributed effort to grow the school's influence in the academy. Quick searches for "peter boettke murray rothbard" reveal that Boettke frequently cites Rothbard's work, although he is by no means dogmatic about it. (See, for example, Boettke, Peter J. and Christopher J. Coyne. "The Forgotten Contribution: Murray Rothbard on Socialism in Theory and in Practice." Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. Auburn, Alabama: Ludwig von Mises Institute, Summer 2004. Vol. 7 No. 2. [17].) Now, to be sure, there has been some bad blood, real or perceived, between Boettke/GMU folks and LvMI. However, many students (including legions who studied under Walter Block, an LvMI senior faculty member, at Loyola) have spent one or more summers as summer fellows at the Mises Institute before then going on to matriculate in the GMU Ph.D. econ program under Boettke. Boettke, aware of the tension between what many view as competing factions, praises the Mises Institute in this blog post. It is also incorrect to say that Boettke is not a libertarian. According to this Mercatus Center event announcement, he argues that "Rather than libertarian ideology serving as a block to creative research... it can provide the raw material for bold and original analysis into fundamental questions in the social sciences." In a comment to his response to Salerno, Boettke said, Let me be clear, I am still enthusiastic about the vision that inspired me to be an economist: Austrian economics, radical libertarianism, and revisionist history. This vision is fundamentally Rothbardian, and my entire career has been spent attempting to figure out how to advance that vision in an academic world that is hostile on almost every margin to that vision. Also I am still extremely competitive. I want Austrian economics to WIN, to control the AER, JPE, QJE, to teach at Harvard, Chicago, Stanford, even MIT. I cannot believe we haven't achieved that, and I refuse to put the blame on others. Because as any competitive person will tell you, if you want to get better you have to look in the mirror and take responsibility for failures on yourself. Taking that responsibility is a first step toward the improvements required. (Naturally, I am not arguing that blog sources should be used in this article, but I hope they provide some guidance in our further development of the article.) DickClarkMises (talk) 06:16, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

WP Econ importance

Until recently, this article was categorized as "mid" importance for WikiProject Economics. Then an IP editor began to change it without comment and I guess it's becoming an issue. If so, I'd request those who think it deserves "top" ranking go discuss it at the project page. (Not being a member of WikiProject Libertarianism, I make no judgment about the changes in that project's ranking.) CRETOG8(t/c) 02:03, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

New section 'Philosophical differences and similarities among Austrians'

Or something like that.

L.K. makes these points.

  • There are the academic Austrian school economists, working along the traditions of the early 20th century Austrian economists. They are represented by Peter Boettke, William Easterly, etc, and are not that different from Chicago school economists. They hold essentially the same position as Chicago school people, except that they distrust mathematical models and statistics, and prefer digging through historical documents to make their case. Here are two good articles about what these academic Austrian school economists are about: Austrian economics and the mainstream: View from the boundary", and AS entry in Econlib.
  • Then, there are the libertarian Austrian school intellectuals in the tradition of Murray Rothbard and Mises, who believe in praexology and anarcho-capitalism, and are represented by Lew Rockwell, Peter Schiff, and Ron Paul, people who are not involved in academia. They are backed by the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and although they claim the academic Austrians as intellectual credentials, (ie Hayek won a Nobel, etc.), they essentially distrust the entire corpus of modern economic thought, and practice the No true Scotsman argument on these issues (ie. Schumpeter was not a true Austrian, no true Austrian disbelieves the Austrian business cycle theory, etc).

Could these point be included into the article to break down the current disconnect, and maybe eliminate some other area of the article in order to make this whole economic school easier to understand and make these fine distinctions? Also, could the above by L.K. be combined with some of the finer distinctions made by D.C.M. into a couple of paragraphs?... all worded as to not advocate or point the finger toward any of these branches of this idea being better or worse.?.. or more mainstream or more heterodox? Could we use L.K.'s version above, with an over view edit by D.C.M. to it ??? for starters? and would it be possible to eliminate some length in the article also by including more things to link or click on? skip sievert (talk) 14:38, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, my version is way too POV in language and tone. There is actually some mention in the article about this issue already, in the section titled 1920–. However, in many parts of the article, the beliefs of the libertarian Austrian school are presented as the Austrian school. For instance, not all Austrian school economists subscribe to praexology, only the Misean-Rothbardians use the term. We should try to fix some of these issues. Perhaps DickClark could take a stab at it first? LK (talk) 15:23, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Or one of you could make a mock up, which both can edit here on the talk page before transfering to the main page. skip sievert (talk) 16:31, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
I apologize for not being more active here, folks. I would love to be more involved, but I am pretty busy preparing for my 25 July wedding, so I am afraid I just can't devote tons of time to this until after that. Cheers, DickClarkMises (talk) 05:16, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Lead change

L.K. this edit you made seems severe [18] as to pov in the lead. This amounts to ax grinding for mainstream and is unwarranted for accurate information presentation. The article should not be heavy handed with pov judgment..., also the ref/note you put in is not accessible unless what ever party signs up to some website. Lets not make the article a contest between points of view, the actual information is more interesting than that. skip sievert (talk) 16:00, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

It's not up to us to judge whether something is extreme or not. That is POV. We're supposed to judge whether a statement accurately reflects the source, and whether the source is reliable. In this case, the statement accurately reflects the source, and the source is reliable. Therefore, the statement should stay in. Also, I can read the link fine. You need to go in from a university account. I'll email you a copy of the paper if you like. Note that it's not up to me to provide you with a link that you can read, as long as the paper is properly cited. Please do not contest a statement sourced to a paper that you have not read. LK (talk) 17:03, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
LK, surely you don't believe that every editor must read every source cited in order to say anything about an article's language conforming or not conforming to the NPOV. Some language, if offered in the encyclopedic voice, would be unacceptable regardless of the source. DickClarkMises (talk) 20:28, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
Following up on the statement as it stands. It's made up of two sentences.
  1. The main criticism of modern Austrian economics given by mainstream economists is that it lacks scientific rigor.
  2. Austrian School theorists reject the use of mathematical models, and use verbal arguments in drawing conclusions and formulating ideas.
Both are neutral statements of facts, the truth of which can easily checked be with many reliable sources. I fail to see how either of these statements are POV. Just as in articles about evolution, global warming, and the big bang, the viewpoint of the majority of scientists should be adequately represented. As an encyclopedia, we should represent the mainstream viewpoint, and not try to censor it.
LK (talk) 17:18, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
Sorry but I cannot agree here. The first statement is unsupported and is too contentious to be left without solid sources. The second statement is a truism; it accurately describes AE in accordance with the source provided, but the source does not claim that this is a negativeness about AE. --Childhood's End (talk) 20:02, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
I agree, and that part of the edit can be taken out. As written by L.K. it is original research stitched together as criticism as to pov. Really it is ax grinding and building a case against.

The main criticism of modern Austrian economics given by mainstream economists is that it lacks scientific rigor. End

This is a false dichotomy of argument, and especially too overtly negative a statement for the lead. In fact it sounds ridiculous. Mainstream economics is not science based. It is made up of abstract concepts tied together in a format for social control. Data is used to make sense of it all... and that is the science involved. It makes no intrinsic sense in and of itself. As with anything science can be used to format ideology, as to data manipulation. Therefore the sentence seems like a needless attack that could also be made on neo classical synthesis just as well. It should not be in the article... or should be somewhere else with a lot of framing and explanation. This is science [19] No Economics is based on science. Economics uses data scientifically applied. That is different.

Austrian School theorists reject the use of mathematical models, and use verbal arguments in drawing conclusions and formulating ideas. End

It sounds like this edit is trying to make out the Austrians as a bunch of unsophisticated people. This is over the top as to condemning the subject in the lead of the article. This is not in any kind of context and is sourced to an opinion in a paper. This edit can be removed because it is like the other... not really illustrating anything except a supposed negative that is probably not supported by the majority of Austrians. Its like saying neo classic econo people endorsed credit default swaps because of their math models, in a lead article on them and arguing that as criticism. The source used sounds like a conjecturing opinion.
The differences between the mainstream and Austrian is really minuscule... and to try to find people that bring out trumpeting hectoring pov aspects is particularly bad for the lead here. Revert again... and reject the so called source... not because it may not reflect what it is saying, but because it may be a mis character that does not come up to the level of neutral presentation. Something like that if explained very carefully and creatively in the body of the article could be used ... maybe, but as it is placed in the lead, it is placing a ground ax with a shiny surface pov to hector against something, rather than inform as to subject. skip sievert (talk) 22:56, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
ARGGH! Forgive my little personal outburst. I'm really not trying to criticize Austrian school economists with the statement "Austrian School theorists reject the use of mathematical models, and use verbal arguments in drawing conclusions and formulating ideas." It is, for me, a descriptive statement. At first, I too suffered from the mainstream bias and found it outrageous that economists could reject modeling. But after reading Boettke's writings and some of his work, I see the point. Economists tend to believe their models too much. Some simplifications are necessary to make models tractable, and after the models are done, they tend to believe the simplifications even though there was no reason to choose them other than that they made the models tractable. In this, I too am 'Austrian'.
But enough of this niggling around small edits. The lead currently does not summarize the article. The article it self has serious issues along the lines outlined in the last section. We should work to first fix the article issues I've raised repeatedly over the last few months, and second, rewrite the lead so that it actually reflects what the article says.
I've been meaning to make time to do a rewrite and cleanup, and it looks like I may actually have to make time to do it soon. I know many of you don't trust me to be unbiased in this, but I swear on a stack of encyclopedias that I hold no malice towards Austrian school economists, and in fact am sympathetic to some of their arguments. However, someone else will need to check the parts on Austrian school libertarians, as I cannot make a similar pronouncement there. LK (talk) 05:12, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
As someone that is not personally interested in this subject beyond accurate presentation I will make one comment on the above, 'L.K... "Austrian School theorists reject the use of mathematical models, and use verbal arguments in drawing conclusions and formulating ideas." It is, for me, a descriptive statement. end L.K. -
This still just sounds like playground put-down as to the sentence statement sourced or not to something or other, and as such without a lot of explaining around it, probably is not good information. What does it actually mean? Does it mean that Austrians reject addition and subtraction when it comes to figuring out economies? It sounds like they reject basic math which models are a part of. The idea of debt is a math model... and as nearly as I can tell Austrians in general have a howling rejection of it. Right? This subject is interesting in its own way, but keeping different sides of pov out of the article is the best course, and just presenting the most interesting ideas in a creative way is best.
L.K., if rewriting this article is at issue then maybe doing it in conjunction with a lot of others by making mock ups on the talk page, and then asking opinions, and editing together with others may be a good approach. Do a section and ask for opinions and ideas, may be a good approach. skip sievert (talk) 13:57, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
I was thinking as a page in my userspace, with an invite to everyone here to come and edit. About distrusting the use of math models, it' an accurate statement about Austrian school methodology. The point is, in economics, the most important thing to be able to do is to understand what actually happens in the real world, and have a good 'feel' for it. Math cannot substitute for that. One of the most important skills for a mainstream economist to have is to be able to relate the math models to the real world, to ask the right questions, and 'tell the right stories'. It's what makes Krugman a great economist, even though his math skills are not particularly good, as he himself admits. Austrian school methodology just takes this to an extreme (compared to the mainstream), they reject the use of mathematical modelling as a useful technique, and concentrate on trying to tell the right stories about what's going on. In case you still don't know what I mean, have a look through the latest issue of the Quarterly Journal of Economics, and the latest issue of the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. The difference should be readily apparent. Also, read the Roger E. Backhouse article, he makes the same points. LK (talk) 15:18, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
Maybe, but it still seems like a sweeping generalization that is open to a lot of interpretation, as said... debt is a mathematical model, which they do not reject, so the argument seems selective. Mock ups on the actual talk discussion page may be better as to rewriting things. Otherwise things may get confusing, and if any and all can find this discussion page from the article it would be easier for new editors to figure out what is going on. skip sievert (talk) 15:30, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
Austrian school economists don't reject math, they reject the use of math models as a useful method for economic investigation. Which IMHO is a perfectly valid position (albeit a bit extreme). Since you don't have easy access to journals, have a quick look at these publicly accessible papers from Health Economics and from Industrial Economics. They are pretty typical economics papers. Now, compare them to papers from the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics, here's one I recently read Product Differentiation And Economic Progress. The difference should be obvious. LK (talk) 16:31, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
Austrian school economists don't reject math, they reject the use of math models as a useful method for economic investigation. I seriously doubt that L.K. and even if it were partly true the way it was expressed was not good in the lead. So the mainstream went for credit default swaps, and the Austrians think that going into debt is bad and having government involved so much is bad news. Really trying to make dramatic conflict between these groups as to thinking probably does not make a lot of sense. They are so akin that if anything it makes more sense to emphasize that..., as opposed to supposed big differences. They are just as tangled up in Adam Smith and abstracted glorification of money, labor, and debt concepts as most groups including the Marx people. The Pdf.. you gave on Industrial economics looked like dreary, and if there ever was a case tat the mainstream makes all kinds of artificial constructs about economics that would be a good one to use as an example, so it really does not make your point. That subject is more a science related subject Industrial ecology at least as to trying to make actual sense of it instead of normal economic sense. - skip sievert (talk) 20:44, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
'I seriously doubt that LK' You doubt something that multiple reliable sources (Austrian school and otherwise) attest to. This is not a valid reason to revert a sourced contribution. Please read the sources. LK (talk) 09:48, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
I did and they do not make the extreme point that you are trying to make in context of the lead. Both schools revolved around the same issues, almost identically. Debt, labor, value, etc. - Math is intrinsic to both. Both revolve around abstracted debt concepts and moral issues. Both are political economy made up by moral philosophy, that track back to [20] and others from that era. Instead of framing things so caustically in regard to other philosophies... lets just try to make the information available without spin or overt pov toward judgment of right or wrong or good and bad. That is the way the two former things looked. There is no point in leading people to conclusions like that in the lead. The conclusions are not really accurate anyway, and framed as generalizations without pov is less stridently terse, as the former looked. skip sievert (talk) 14:59, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Enough of this. I leave you with these quotes:

  • Bryan Caplan: "More than anything else, what prevents Austrian economists from getting more publications in mainstream journals is that their papers rarely use mathematics or econometrics, research tools that Austrians reject on principle." [21]
  • Roger Backhouse: "Mainstream economics is about modelling in a way that Austrian economics is not." "by the 1950s, ... Hayek was no longer regarded as doing serious economics. His work on knowledge, the market, and competition, which could have found a place in the 1930s mainstream, did not fit in. [22]
  • Robert P. Murphy of the Mises Institute: "The Austrian School of economics is known for its aversion to mathematical modeling of human behavior." [23]
  • Murray Rothbard: Complains that mainstream economics looks like a “third-rate subbranch of mathematics”, asks, "If mathematics and statistics do not provide the proper method for the political economist, what method is appropriate?" He answers, praxeology, "examine the immediate elements of the proposed problem, and after having ascertained them with certainty.. . will approximately value their mutual influences with the intuitive quickness of an enlightened understanding. In short, the laws of the political economist are certain, but their blending and application to any given historical event is accomplished, not by pseudoquantitative or mathematical methods, which distort and oversimplify, but only by the use of Verstehen, “the intuitive quickness of an enlightened understanding.” [24]
  • Lew Rockwell: "give a gypsy seer a PhD in economics, and arm her with statistics and mathematical models, and people suddenly start taking her seriously ... but what she does is no different from what she did as Sister Sarah at a roadside stand."[25]

If you view negatively the statement that 'the Austrian school economists reject mathematical modeling as useful for economic investigation', it is because you have a bias, not because the statement is not correct, sourced and verifiable. LK (talk) 16:02, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Not so much. Maybe they might reject credit default swaps... but so what? They still use a math based economy that is based on money, with budgets, and value associated with that. The way it was phrased before was framed in more of a put down like aspect,
Austrian School theorists reject the use of mathematical models, and use verbal arguments in drawing conclusions and formulating ideas. End
Reject the use? Not a good way to explain something probably. Is that really a good way to explain an idea? As to bias... again, not so much. I find mainstream economics very uninteresting except historically. Neutral presentation of it can be interesting though. skip sievert (talk) 22:14, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps the word "reject" is just a bit too strong (and maybe not), but I would agree that we do not need a source to state that AS theorists are very suspicious towards mathematical models.
As to "use verbal arguments in drawing conclusions and formulating ideas", it also sounds to me as a criticism built out of apparently innocuous words. To state that they use observation and logical inferences instead of math models to draw conclusions would seem to me more accurate/neutral. The sentence would also need to be taken out of a criticism section or paragraph.
L.K., if you're interested in investigating further about math models in economics, I suggest you take a look at David Orrell's book Apollo's Arrow. Not only is it very entertaining, it's been an eye-opener for me, especially because Orrell is completely outside the economics world and he's of course in a position to teach maths to any economist. --Childhood's End (talk) 13:57, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Phrasing and Grammar

This sentence,

"Austrian School economists advocate the enforcement of voluntary contractual agreements between economic agents, but otherwise the smallest imposition of coercive force (especially government-imposed) on commercial transactions." in paragraph one, needs work.

The latter part of the sentence appears to be grammatically incomplete. Can some one cast this into given English? I can see what it implies, but it needs to be made explicit, IMO

Rodonn (talk) 19:40, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

This portion,

"A factory making goods next year is worth as much less as the goods it is making next year are worth. This means that the business cycle is driven by mis-coordination between sectors of the same economy, caused by money not carrying incentive information correct about present choices, rather than within a single economy where money causes people to make bad decisions about how to spend their time." could probably use a bit of a clean-up.

If I understood it I would correct it. Snjmom (talk) 21:02, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Marginalization of Austrian Economics

I find the statement “It currently lies somewhat outside mainstream economics, and contributes relatively little to mainstream economic thought.“ in the main article to be misleading and based on flimsy personal opinion articles. The history of Austrian economics includes several Nobel Laureates in economic theory that are frequently referenced in mainstream economic papers.

Of the two articles used to support this claim, one is a blog post and the other is an article written on a personal website. On top of that, in Caplan’s article he clearly states “Austrian scholars have made important contributions to economics in recent years.” Of course this is a qualified statement; however it directly contradicts the statement I am protesting in the main article.

This statement should be struck from the main article under Wiki’s rules of neutrality. The statement is the same as saying “most economists believe Austrian economics contributes relatively little to mainstream economic thought” – which is in direct conflict with the rules of neutrality found on this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_words

At best, the statement should be changed to say “Bryan Caplan, an economics professor at George Mason, feels Austrian economics has made important contributions to economic theory in recent years, but rather an providing theoretical mathematical models, it is based more on philosophical thought and logical thinking."

Michael.suede (talk) 16:04, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

We've been through this many times before. i) Weasel is a guideline , and I don't see how it applies here anyway. ii) Even Austrian school economists agree that Austrian school is somewhat out of the mainstream and currently contributes little to mainstream economics - leaving that out unbalances the article violating WP:POV, which is policy. LK (talk) 00:25, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
Leaving it in is what unbalances the article. It is an opinion, not a fact. It has no bearing on informing people as to what the school represents. Are you a Keynesian economist? Your user page says you are a professional economist. If you are a Keynesian, I find it difficult to believe you could speak on the Austrian school in an unbiased manner. If you work for a university as an economist, I further question the conflicts of interest in your writing here since Austrian economics could be viewed as a direct threat to your paycheck. --Michael.suede (talk) 08:08, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Please read the above paragraph replacing 'Evolutionary biologist' for 'Keynesian economist' and you will see the fallacy of your argument. LK (talk) 08:48, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

empirical evidence

There's a bit in the lead which says/said, "Mainstream schools ... adopt mathematical and statistical methods, and focus on induction and empirical observation to construct and test theories; while Austrian economists reject this approach in favor of deduction and logically deduced inferences." Childhoodsend has made a small but substantive change by pulling out the "and empirical observation" part.

I'm far from an expert in this regard, but the version saying Austrians reject "empirical observation to construct and test theories" (note the entire clause) does match what I understand as the core Austrian approach. As I understand, the essential philosophy is that theories can't/shouldn't be tested. CRETOG8(t/c) 05:39, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Greenspan's shocked disbelief

There's a bit in the "influence" section that goes: "The former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman, Alan Greenspan, speaking of the originators of the School, said in 2000, “the Austrian school have reached far into the future from when most of them practiced and have had a profound and, in my judgment, probably an irreversible effect on how most mainstream economists think in this country”,[24] although he would later express “shocked disbelief” at the lack of protection for shareholders by major lending institutions.[25]"

A sock of a banned user removed the "although he would later express “shocked disbelief” at the lack of protection for shareholders by major lending institutions" clause, and it's been reinserted. I have to agree in this instance that the clause doesn't belong. It's a pretty serious bit of synthesis, since there's a lot of missing connective tissue in identifying why the shocked disbelief deserves an "although", and the cited article doesn't provide the connection to Austrian economics. I think it should be re-removed. CRETOG8(t/c) 09:41, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Done. Gwen Gale (talk) 10:00, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

James M. Buchanan

I noticed that NYT article talks about James M. Buchanan as a member of the Austrian School. This isn't first time that I have encountered this claim. For example, according to this site he belongs to the fourth generation of Austrian theorists. Should Buchanan be mentioned in this article? -- Vision Thing -- 19:52, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Seems he's classified in the Chicago School to me. BigK HeX (talk) 23:10, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
There's a quote from Buchanan on this issue in the talk archives somewhere, where in an interview for Mises Inst., he says something like he doesn't object to being called one, but some Austrians may object to calling him one. Anyways, he's not a Misean praxeologist for sure. His papers are filled with math modelling. Also, his entry at the Library of Economics and Liberty, a libertarian leaning website, does not mention Austrian school. LK (talk) 02:47, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
Here is the relevant quote from the interview: "I certainly have a great deal of affinity with Austrian economics and I have no objections to being called an Austrian. Hayek and Mises might consider me an Austrian but, surely some of the others would not." [26] He should probably be mentioned in the 'Influence' section but nothing more. -- Vision Thing -- 07:49, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
In Cost and Choice, Buchanan presented himself as a student of a tradition whose lineage he saw as running through the Austrian School, but then being developed by thinkers at LSE in the era of Robbins and by Frank Knight at UChicago. Of course, that was Buchanan then, and his sense of his affinities has probably evolved and may still be evolving. —SlamDiego←T 06:26, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

renewed interest

In the lead is the sentence, "However, some assertions of Austrian School economists have been interpreted by some as warnings about the 2007-2009 financial crisis, which has in turn led to renewed interest in the School's theories.". This is referenced to this NYT article. BigK HeX has argued the source doesn't the support the sentence, and it looks to me as if they're right.

In the NYT article, it says that "some Austrian School devotees", including Ron Paul, have claimed to have predicted the crisis. And one economic historian, David Colander says the Austrians should get more attention (particularly in contrast to Kondratieff). Neither of these really says the crisis has led to renewed interest in the school's theories.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if the sentence is correct, but the source doesn't support it, so another one would need to be found.

Complicating things further, shouldn't the sentence from the lead be referring to something in the main article? It's not clear it does. Unfortunately, the closest thing in the main article is the sentence, "The global economic crisis of 2008 represents, according to some pundits, an example of the Austrian business cycle theory's dependability." This sentence is ref'd by a link to a no-longer-available article, which I've only found mirrored at this blog ("Paulson's scheme"). So that's not a good ref either. Ick. CRETOG8(t/c) 06:58, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for re-verifying the contested portion. BigK HeX (talk) 07:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
Agree with Cretog's observation. Unfortunately, many seem to think that it's valid to add to the lead without working on the article. I would like to reiterate the principle that the lead should summarize the body of the article, in proportion to the weight of the ideas therein. LK (talk) 13:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

This edit removed the reference, but left the material it supposedly supported. The sentence is "However, some assertions of Austrian School economists have been interpreted by some as warnings about the 2007-2009 financial crisis,[9] which has in turn led to renewed interest in the School's theories and a questioning of the usefulness and efficacy of mainstream economics, even by those within the mainstream itself." The underlined clause is now unsupported by the ref, but is ref'd to this Krugman piece, which doesn't mention the Austrians. Without mentioning the Austrians, I think it's too tangential for inclusion there, and so the underlined clause should be removed as partly unref'd and otherwise irrelevant. CRETOG8(t/c) 03:46, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Probably not. Besides that can be written differently rather than ditching the ref/note if needed. Krugman is saying mainstream questions what is happening. It does not have to refer specifically to any group whether Libertarians or Other. It is saying that mainstream is questioned, and that is enough. Obviously Krugman is 'mainstream'. And mainstream is questioning itself currently. skip sievert (talk) 03:50, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
I don't follow the reasoning of "probably not". Feel free to re-word it, and maybe that will resolve my issues. I'm not going to pull the Krugman ref, but it really seems out of place in the lead of an article when his piece doesn't talk about the subject of this article. CRETOG8(t/c) 04:01, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Probably not means the next most probable is probably not going to be what you were thinking in regard to the reference not being good anymore, because as said it is a descriptor of mainstream questioning itself and does not need to be a part of libertarian or Austrian or what ever, as to connecting with the sentiment of questioning itself. skip sievert (talk) 04:08, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Problems with reversions

I notice that one editor with a couple of others has done much reverting on this article of sourced material and referred to socks very often as a catchall to reverting sourced information. Whether or not socks are involved is an issue, but they may be or may not be. Before getting revert happy in a pov sort of way as this self described expert editor is doing, I suggest that if a sock is suspected then it be brought to an investigation, because it could well be just another editor that does not endorse or consider themselves a proponent of mainstream as Lawrence Khwoo does according to his user page as to wanting to present mainstream views. This is just pointing about editing issues here in a Wikipedia:Call a spade a spade way, though recently L.K. has accused me of making personal attacks on him which I have not done. There is a difference as to pointing something out.

WP:Wikilawyering about socks can quickly get caught in meaningless loops of muddle which only slow things down (whatever the hoped for outcome). With editors still fixated on notions of "mainstream," as ever, there is nothing in Wikipedia policy that says articles are meant or need to put forth a "mainstream" outlook. What some editors don't understand is that readers (often the kind who check out what WP has to say on a topic) aren't fooled for long by articles with oddly narrow outlooks and sourcing but rather, more often than not, it only stirs them up to look elsewhere. If there is an ax grinding and limiting aspect in articles that is not good, and if people removed good sourced information because they disagree with it, that is not good either. Crusading aspects of truth giving is not good. skip sievert (talk) 16:09, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I assume Skip is talking about this reversion by LK. Skip and I then went back and forth on reversions ourselves and, as of this writing, it's back to the version by the suspected sock. There is a particular banned user who makes a habit of creating socks and editing these articles. LK has, as near as I can tell, been very good about recognizing and reverting those socks. He placed a tag on the talk page of the suspected sock puppet. He explained the reversion in the edit summary. All of this seems in order to me, and has nothing to do with the POV of LK or the suspected sock.
Skip also nearly accused me of being a meat puppet.
Skip, if you like the changes, you can certainly restore them, and then they are your edits rather than the suspected sock's. If LK's suspicions turn out to be wrong, the accused sock can certainly complain. If you think LK is abusing the sock identification, you can ask an admin for help.
So, there are various courses of action: You can claim an edit as your own, or you can formally request someone stop LK's use of sock identification. I think reverting a banned user's contributions makes perfect sense, and I've been impressed with LK's ability to identify this particular banned editor so far.
What you shouldn't do is accuse LK and myself of editing in bad faith. CRETOG8(t/c) 21:14, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
I don't really care about your faith, good or bad. Skip and I then went back and forth on reversions ourselves and, as of this writing, it's back to the version by the suspected sock. No it is my version. There is a particular banned user who makes a habit of creating socks and editing these articles. LK has, as near as I can tell, been very good about recognizing and reverting those socks. He placed a tag on the talk page of the suspected sock puppet. He explained the reversion in the edit summary. All of this seems in order to me, and has nothing to do with the POV of LK or the suspected sock.... that may be.. but when I reverted I did claim the edit. So your argument does not really make sense. Also if a supporter of mainstream is constantly getting rid of criticism of mainstream it is bound to bring up questions. Also, if L.K. suspects socks, then it is probably a good idea to start an investigation, instead of depending on whether you think he is good at identifying socks or not. Also when two editors work together in a pattern of reverts it seems logical that conclusions may be drawn as to acting together pov wise. skip sievert (talk) 01:08, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Regarding the version. here's the diff from before LK's revert to after your revert. There is no difference, so what I wrote is correct. Now, if in your edit summary, you had written "I like these edits, restoring them" or something like that to claim them as your own, I would not have gotten involved. Instead you wrote "Tossing around sock too much. If so prove please. Otherwise stop reverting." in reverting LK and "No more tandem editing please by mainstream proponents. That is a no no." in reverting me. These edit summaries read very clearly as not being about the content of the article, but rather about what you characterize as misbehavior on our parts. CRETOG8(t/c) 01:47, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Let's just accept those edits as Skip's edits, and leave it at that, since he likes them so much that he is willing to essentially edit war over them. That's not to say that they will stay up forever. As I noted before, the lead is in serious need of trimming. LK (talk) 02:39, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
I trimmed a large section of lead that did not really go anywhere or do anything in particular, and also got rid of a disputed citation/ref, and also copy edited the lead for clarity. Lets not use the term edit war. That is not good. skip sievert (talk) 03:44, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Lead

The lead/was should/not be so long and rambling as to critical perspective of mainstream as regards Austrian. I removed a mainstream critique which is a pov from the lead as not pertinent here. Putting in the weight of mainstream is not called for in the lead. This article is about Austrian economics and the focus can be about the subject in the lead and not a view about critical points so prominent right up front. It was almost like putting a disclaimer in the lead about the whole subject. skip sievert (talk) 16:29, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

I note that your recent edit did not properly balance the lead. According to the Manual of Style, the lead should summarize the body. Please include in the lead the main themes from the body according to the weight they have in the body. Please remove from the lead anything not mentioned with enough weight in the body. LK (talk) 05:10, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
There is no point in making the lead into a critique of the subject from the view point of so called mainstream, except by a sentence maybe. Also you wholesale revert editors, with no authority recently and in the past on this article. A topic ban of editing economic articles may be in order. If you are serious about investigating socks then do it but do NOT use this as an editing tool. Wikipedia is NOT a battleground.skip sievert (talk) 13:36, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
The article is about the Austrian School, not Austrian school (criticism), it shouldn't be a WP:Coatrack for criticisms of the Austrian school, nor should the MoS be used as a means to make that happen. Morever, there is nothing in en.Wikipedia policy that says articles should carry a "mainstream outlook": The only way I've seen the fuzzy, overwrought, almost meaningless word mainstream brought up in policy is at Wikipedia:RS, which only talks about a topic being notable if it has been noted in "mainstream academic discourse" along with "mainstream sources" as being reliable, which are not at all the same things. Gwen Gale (talk) 13:55, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
NPV demands that the majority viewpoint and all reasonable sourced criticisms of the minority viewpoint appear on the page. See the 'Undue weight' and 'Giving equal validity' sections in the WP:NPV policy page. A relevant paragraph is:
In articles specifically about a minority viewpoint, the views may receive more attention and space. However, such pages should make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint wherever relevant, and must not reflect an attempt to rewrite content strictly from the perspective of the minority view. Specifically, it should always be clear which parts of the text describe the minority view, and that it is in fact a minority view. The majority view should be explained in sufficient detail that the reader may understand how the minority view differs from it, and controversies regarding parts of the minority view should be clearly identified and explained.
Additionally, the MOS specifies that the lead reflects the body. Currently, it does not. There are things that appear in the lead that are not in the body, those should be moved to the body. And there are issues raised in the article that are not summarized in the lead. These need to be included. This includes the mainstream majority viewpoint about Austrian school theories.
LK (talk) 14:10, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Try putting any sourced criticisms in their own section, summarizing that with a sentence or two in the lead. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:41, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I gave it one sentence with a ref/note and citation as to that now in the lead. Since you are a proponent (L.K.) according to your user page of mainstream economics and its portrayal, and seem to edit with a pov that affirms that conflict of interest on articles that relate to or are related to economics, and also use editing tools in my view wrongly, and make false edit summaries such as socks for an excuse to maintain certain pov edits (without knowing if that is the case) on certain pages such as this one, I do believe that a topic ban on editing economics related articles may be in order, at least for a time, as you show no slow up in that regard. It is noted that mainstream carries no weight. R.s. carry weight as does neutral pov. Trying to make articles into other topics is not called for. Making an article about Austrian economics into a review and critique to a pov about mainstream or Keynes versions of economics with that large section in the lead is disruptive, it has been pointed out as such, and continuing to call other edits socks is not suggested unless under investigation, they turn out to be. skip sievert (talk) 14:48, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
The above is a personal attack. You have just accused me of placing my own interests above that of Wikipedia, of abusing my rollback privileges, of knowingly mis-identifying as a sock an innocent user, of lying in my edit summaries, of pushing a POV and of disruptive editing. I ask again that you stop your personal attacks. Note that the username of User:KeynesianLeninistCensors gives him away as a KiK sock. Also note this, his second edit on Wikipedia. It is implausible that a new editor will leave as an edit comment, an insult about another editor that he has purportedly never interacted with. That this is a KiK sock should be obvious to anyone who makes a cursory review. I would like an apology Skip, or at least an admission that you were wrong. LK (talk) 15:37, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, but I do see a pattern and Wikipedia:Call a spade a spade is allowed. Users often cite policies, like our policy against personal attacks and our policy against incivility, not to protect themselves from personal attacks, but to protect their edits from review. I am now trying to kindly inform you of that. skip sievert (talk) 15:43, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Good faith assertions that an editor has gone beyond the bounds of policy and guidelines are not personal attacks. Please don't call them personal attacks.
As for the socking, there is no need to put up with it at all and LK is within policy when he reverts straightforward socks, but editors should be aware, a) they can restore the edits if they themselves are willing to stand by them and b) single purpose socking like that is so disruptive, it can and often does come from the other side of the PoV towards which it edits, as a sneaky way to "discredit" that very PoV. I've seen this happen time and again on controversial/contested topics.
Try a criticims section, put them all there and summarize that in the lead. There's nothing untowards about doing this and it skirts a lot of muddle. Again, the article is about the Austrian school, the article is not about its critics. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:53, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Now that he is presented with evidence, I would like an admission from Skip that he was wrong about the accusation he made against me. LK (talk) 15:57, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Evidence of what? I suggest you go to the sock review area and ask them what they think Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations. I did not make an accusation, I tried to point out behavior according to my opinion. Would it not be appropriate to report people you believe are socks instead of just thinking they are or using that as an editing tool as in reverting? skip sievert (talk) 16:13, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
I do think a CU on all these socks would be fitting. Gwen Gale (talk) 16:16, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Given the obviousness in this case, I doubt if they would humor us. LK (talk) 18:05, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
What do you mean? Gwen Gale (talk) 18:46, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
I mean that, because check user takes time and effort, it's only supposed to be used when there is some ambiguity over whether the accused in sock in question is actually a sock – usually when the accused sock protests that he/she is unrelated, and wants to continue editing. In this case, the evidence is already pretty overwhelming. LK (talk) 05:33, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

semi-protected

I've semi-protected this article owing to the ongoing sockpuppetry. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:53, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

This is insane. Could you at least correct the obvious typo? Comma at the end of the intro should (obviously) be a full stop. Such obvious corrections should (obviously) not be reverted. At least by those without OCD issues, robotically applying revert rules without actually understanding WP policy in such cases. But then again, this kind of robotic thinking is the very reason why we're in the current economic mess, so it's hardly surprising such robotic editing occurs by mainstreamers on the AS page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.104.54.141 (talk) 12:55, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Begone. Gwen Gale (talk) 13:02, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Happy to do so - if you correct the typo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.104.54.141 (talk) 13:05, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Spare me and begone now. Gwen Gale (talk) 13:12, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3→Archive 5

Analytical framework section

The following statements are obviously not part of the Austrian analytical framework, but usual opinion of members, reasonable policy consequences of the theory, comparisons to other schools, or even open criticism.

"However, Austrian economists often make policy recommendations that call for the elimination of government ... or laissez-faire liberal, fiscal conservative, and Objectivist groups for support."

"Mainstream economists hold that conclusions that can be reached by pure logical deduction are limited and weak.[32]"

"In this, their views do not differ far from those of the Chicago school."

"Mainstream economists point out that this does not mean that society as a whole benefits, as there may be externalities that affect third parties not directly involved in the original transaction."

"Critics of the Austrian school contend that by rejecting mathematics and econometrics, it has failed to contribute significantly to modern economics. Additionally, they contend that its methods currently consist of post-hoc analysis and do not generate testable implications; therefore, they fail the test of falsifiability.[5]" —Preceding unsigned comment added by Krisztián Pintér (talk • contribs) 23:04, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Unless the claims are faithfully sourced, they should come out. Any analysis that isn't explicitly furnished in the source doesn't belong.Professor marginalia (talk) 23:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
Unsourced controversial statements should be removed. However, remember the rule of Parity of Sources and NPV. When removing statements because they are unsourced or poorly sourced, make sure to remove all similarly unsourced statements, and not to bias the removal to favour any particular viewpoint. LK (talk) 15:16, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
i still believe that under the section describing the theory itself, criticism and comparisons are unwelcome. they have their own sections. it is like we said "hey, look, it is all crazy, but we must tell, so we do some funny faces while doing so". Krisztián Pintér (talk) 18:11, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps that depends on how editors interpret guidelines, like this one:
"In articles specifically about a minority viewpoint, the views may receive more attention and space. However, such pages should make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint wherever relevant, and must not reflect an attempt to rewrite content strictly from the perspective of the minority view....Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserved as much attention overall as the majority view."
BigK HeX (talk) 21:50, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
it is very true about articles, but i'm talkig about a section. this article has a criticism section. my point is not the amount of criticism, nor its quality, but merely its placement. in an article about the USA, one may include that USA is criticized, by some, on its ongoing military involvement. but surely not in the "early history" or "culture" section. Krisztián Pintér (talk) 22:34, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
one more point: we are now talking about criticism, but my original point was broader. the section also contains comparisons, policy recommendations that are "often made", and other unrelated issues. 80.98.110.243 (talk) 23:40, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
Sounds like your concerns could easily be alleviated by changing the Title of that section from "Analytical Framework" into something more appropriate, which encompasses the current content. BigK HeX (talk) 00:14, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
I've changed it now. BigK HeX (talk) 00:16, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
well, i believe the article would be clearer and more well organized if not the title was changed to fit to the mixed content, but the content was improved to match the title. Krisztián Pintér (talk) 19:53, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Inflation, sound money

I believe it would be good to add the definition of a sound money, as put by Murray Rothbard:

generally marketable (non-monetary value), divisible, high value per unit weight, fairly stable value, durable, recognizable and homogenous.

Gold satisfies all of these, and that is why Austrians usually prefer it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Krisztián Pintér (talk • contribs) 23:23, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't think that it's the most salient example of the Austrian school's push for "sound money"-these qualities gold has as a medium of exchange aren't as significant as the Austrian school's distrust of government and the risks it sees posed by government control over money supply. In other words, "sound money" in the Austrian school is concerned about government's power to print money, fractional reserve banking, etc than it is about the advantages of gold over other commodities like beads, shells, or copper. Professor marginalia (talk) 00:55, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
there are two things about gold standard: why not paper, and why gold. why not paper is what you are saying here. it is not satisfying the "fairly stable" requirement. but it leaves open the question why gold, and not something more modern. here i feel the need to clarify that Austrians do not have Gold Fetish, but actually have a rationale. More to that, they are open to other sound moneys, or the competition of currencies, as proposed by Ron Paul for example. Krisztián Pintér (talk) 22:25, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
Well currencies often can be more stable than gold prices, can't they? It depends - in any event, as the article is currently written, and what you've mentioned, is about the Austrians advocating a gold standard, which still uses a paper currency, does it not? So I think the focus on gold's durability over paper is missing the key point, which is that the Austrians don't like tying the money supply to the govts and central banks credit/debt creation etc. Am I wrong? Professor marginalia (talk) 04:24, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
no, theoretically paper can be more stable than gold, but we never saw such a case. if gold price fluctuates, it is most likely the paper that fluctuates, and so the relative price of gold. and no, in gold standard, the papers are just represents the gold, which is the actual currency. and of course yes, the point is that gold can not be created upon govt demand, only slowly, with hard work. so inflation is almost impossible to create. durability is minor issue, i'm not talking about that. Krisztián Pintér (talk) 19:46, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
"the Austrian school's distrust of government" & "the Austrian school is concerned about...fractional reserve banking"
Well ... that concern is pretty contradictory. One of the ironies of Austrian thinking... BigK HeX (talk) 20:54, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Utility Gibberish

Having read the bit about utility, I suggest removing or replacing the link "Why I am not an Austrian Economics", as it is a disservice to the wikipedia reader. That link sounds like illogical gibberish:

"Rothbard [denies that] "...the ratio of the marginal utilities of the various goods equals the ratio of their prices..."... [he says] utilities are not quantities and therefore cannot be divided."[6] [Rothbard] does not understand the position he is attacking. The utility function approach is based ... squarely on ordinal utility"

Either utilities are cardinal quantities (1.0, 2.718, 3.14, etc.) and one can divide by them, or they are ordinal rankings (1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.) and one cannot divide by them. One cannot meaningfully divide by a number when it is freely subjected to arbitrary monotonic transformations. Doubledork (talk) 18:07, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Just because you fail to understand the utility function concept, doesn't make it gibberish. (Even if you have someone who comes in to agree with you.) Caplan does not claim that mainstream economists endeavor to produce cardinal utilities, as you seem to assume. BigK HeX (talk) 22:30, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
The problem with Caplan's position is that he thinks that something is purely ordinal that is not. About 50 years ago, it was proved that there are some orderings, of the same mathematical form as economic rationality (though the authors did not note as much), to which no quantification can be fitted; a bit more than 30 years ago, the application of this point to utility theory was identified, though this has gone largely unnoticed. When economically rational orderings to which a quantified proxy cannot be fitted are excluded, a distinct assumption resulting from quantification is imposed. Hence, what most economists have called “ordinal” is not. The term “ordinal” is then at best an oxymoron — a failed description that continues to serve as an unfortunate name.
There is little or no indication that the vast majority of Austrian School economists were (or are) aware of the relevant mathematical proofs (especially before 1977). It seems more that some of them were failing to grasp the idea of a quantified proxy for an ordering, and others were simply sure that the possibility of a proxy were a further assumption (beyond those of economic rationality), without their bothering to locate precisely a distinction. But Rothbard's objection is correct; results such a Gossen's Second Law may involve only a very weak cardinality, but it is a genuine cardinality none-the-less.
Weaker assumptions will often imply weaker results, but they won't mean no results at all. For example, Gossen's Second Law can be generalized, and its principal intuïtion preserved, without assuming that a quantification can be fitted to preferences. Further, assumptions of weak quantification can be made for purposes of conveying intuïtions, so long as the essence of the results is not dependent on the assumption, and so long as the audience is alerted to the assumption. Rothbard &alii have done pretty much everyone a disservice by their overly broad dismissal of the labors of neoclassical economists. —SlamDiego←T 21:36, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
It is inappropriate to edit the article based on our speculations about what is or is not gibberish. We should restrict ourselves to reporting views published by reliable sources. LK (talk) 13:00, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
I didn't see anyone proposing to edit the article based upon speculation. (And, for my part, I think that removing a link to incompetent criticism from the mainstream would do the reader a disservice.) —SlamDiego←T 18:05, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
In case it is unclear, I disagree with the sentiment, "Having read the bit about utility, I suggest removing or replacing the link "Why I am not an Austrian Economics", as it is a disservice to the wikipedia reader. That link sounds like illogical gibberish". LK (talk) 15:44, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
But, while I disagree the earlier assertion that the link should be removed if it were nonsensical, the claim that its content sounded like gibberish was not merely speculative. Doubledork may or may not have grasped the actual mathematical error in Caplan, but (as the rest of his remarks make clear) he wasn't simply saying that it didn't look right; he was averring that it certainly weren't right. —SlamDiego←T 19:41, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
Doubledork's assessment was clearly based on a failed understanding of utility functions. The tone seemed largely speculative, but, ultimately, whatever he "averred" based on that understanding was irrelevant. BigK HeX (talk) 20:59, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
Without further comment from Doubledork, I am disinclined to infer whether he understands utility functions. (He could be read as missing the point that non-quantitative orderngs can often be proxied by quantities, or he might be zeroing in on the point that there are some total orderings that cannot.) Once the issue of speculation was raised, a reply to the claim that someone was proposing to edit the article based upon speculation became relevant; I'd have been just as happy had it not been raised in the first place. —SlamDiego←T 22:24, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
I don't really see how his words can be construed to mean anything other than the former. Crediting the latter meaning would be quite generous --- especially so, since the use of the latter argument as a criticism might well be your own novel idea, as far as I can tell so far. (I touch on the subject in the earlier Criticism section above.) BigK HeX (talk) 22:39, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
Stop speculatively attacking me as having engaged in “original synthesis”. And, whether one regards the latter interpretation of Doubledork as generous or not, it is a possible interpretation; it is not clear that he has made an error, and you should cease insisting that he has. —SlamDiego←T 22:54, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
You haven't been attacked. If I recommended that you lay off of the caffeine ... that might be an attack.
As for Doubledork, whether you like it or not, I'll insist on what is blatantly obvious from his words. BigK HeX (talk) 23:04, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Boettke abandons "Austrian School"

This post [27] on what was the "Austrian economists' web site announces that Boettke and his co-bloggers including Peter Leeson and Steve Horwitz, have abandoned the "Austrian School" description, saying "The name Austrian economics has been lost as a focal point for a tradition of economic scholarship, and is now a focal point for something else. We have to let it go." That means there is now no significant academic presence of self-identified Austrian economists. For the moment, I've added a sentence to the lead, but this event will require a fairly substantial reorientation of the article. JQ (talk) 03:10, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Or it requires a more reliable source than a single blog post. Bastin 12:14, 3 January 2010 (UTC)
A blog post is a reliable source for the views of its author(s).JQ (talk) 11:34, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
But not for the claim above about "no significant academic presence of self-identified Austrian economists". I removed it from the lead-far too much weight for such an insignificant reference. Claim can be reworked if and when a WP:RS is produced to warrant discussing it in this article. Professor marginalia (talk) 17:41, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
The point about "no significant academic presence of self-identified Austrian economists" would need a WP:RS, which is why I didn't include it in the text I added to the article, but it is clearly true. GMU was the only economics department of any significance with a self-identified Austrian presence, and now it's gone. Deletion of the reliably sourced announcement by the GMU group that they've abandoned the term leaves the article (which relies heavily on them, and on their presence in the profession) in contradiction with the facts.JQ (talk) 18:44, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
This is false. Loyola, New Orleans has a very strong, exclusively Austrian School economics program with two of the most revered living Austrian Economists teaching there: Block and Barnett.Ikilled007 (talk) 18:29, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
This change in the name of the blog occurred just a few days ago. It isn't altogether clear that they've "abandoned the term" or whether they, in terms of their own academic work, have decided to "abandon the label". Most of these bloggers aren't on the GMU faculty-they're 5 of the more than 50 scholars associated with GMU affiliated Mercatus Center, a research center. Their views may signal the end of Austrian school economics in academia, but we are forced to wait for reliable sources to make such a pronouncement before we give it any weight here. It's an overstatement to say that this article makes any claims at all about the importance to give to the presence, influence, or self-identified affiliations of these bloggers to the overall status of Austrian school economics today. I will change the allusion to Boettke as an Austrian school economist-given the context of the statement, his affiliation isn't really relevant to the claim attributed to him there.Professor marginalia (talk) 19:53, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
Fair enough. I've also deleted references to GMU as a centre of Austrian economics until the situation is clearer. I added Auburn, which obviously is a significant centre for Austrians.JQ (talk) 06:13, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
It would be perfectly appropriate for the article to note that significant economists who explicitly associate themselves with “research paradigm of F. A. Hayek”, “the scholarship of Israel Kirzner”, “Mises the analytical economist”, &c have become uncomfortable with the name because of its invocation for other things.
It is not, however, perfectly appropriate to confuse a name with the thing named. Earlier, the Austrian School was most well known as the “Psychologische Schule”; Mises in fact denounced that name, but it would be ridiculous to claim on that basis that he had broken with the school or with the work of Menger.
Boettke &alii are explicit that they continue to associate with the intellectual framework that they used to label “Austrian School”. They have not broken with the school; they have walked away from the name.
Further, while their 'blog is a “reliable” source for a claim about their belief, it is not a “reliable” source for the believed proposition of what has happened to the name. Their claim is plausible, but I doubt that a “reliable” source can be found anytime soon. If and when a “reliable” source were found, the only appropriate rewriting would be a matter of disambiguation, separating what “Austrian School” once meant from what it had come to mean.
References to GMU need to be restored to the article, until-and-unless these economists do more than abandon the name. —SlamDiego←T 07:21, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
I agree that the most accurate statement is the one above 'significant economists who explicitly associate themselves with “research paradigm of F. A. Hayek”, “the scholarship of Israel Kirzner”, “Mises the analytical economist”, &c have become uncomfortable with the name (Austrian School) because of its invocation for other things.' That was what I put in first, but it was deleted because of the WP:RS problem. If we can fix that, putting something along those lines back in would be the best option. But until we clarify that point, it would be misleading to describe GMU as a centre of Austrian School thinking.JQ (talk) 10:30, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
The article defines “Austrian School” in terms other than those which disturb the economists in question, so no such misleading should occur. Meanwhile, it is far more misleading to dissociate GMU from the school of thought. And, again, we do not have a “reliable” source that says that these economists are actually right in what they think “Austrian School” is being taken to mean. Simply note that the GMU is a center of Austrian School thought, some or all of whose faculty members have grown uncomfortable with the name. —SlamDiego←T 10:46, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

More on criticisms section

Sachs and Economic Freedom Indexes In the criticisms section it says that "Economist Jeffrey Sachs states that when comparing developed free-market economies, those that have high rates of taxation and high social welfare spending perform better on most measures of economic performance compared to countries with low rates of taxation and low social outlays. He asserts that poverty rates are lower, median income is higher, the budget has larger surpluses, and the trade balance is stronger (although unemployment tends to be higher).". Considering the Heritage Foundation's Freedom Index as well as the Fraser Institutes Freedom Index, this statement would appear to be false... I mean Sachs may have said this, but the way it is stated here makes it appear as if Sachs is correct, which he is clearly not given the latest info from these two indeces. By these indeces we can see that lower taxes and lower social welfare spending are present in countries which perform BETTER on most measures of economic performance - quite the opposite of what Sachs contends. Being new to Wikipedia, I am cautious to edit this myself... maybe adding a sentence referring to the Indexes would be okay, but I feel that the article should either state the flaw in this criticism or not mention the criticism at all. As it stands, this is a criticism, but not a valid one (in my view) and the article thus creates the wrong impression by implying that it is. --StephenvJ (talk) 15:56, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

I'd guess that Heritage's "Freedom Index" carries little academic weight, being that their methodology is not made public (AFAIK). In any case, the "Freedom Index" rank doesn't seem to have much relevance to a longer view of a country's growth: BigK HeX (talk) 16:23, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
Okay, the Heritage Foundation one might not be 100%, but it's not 0% either and matches to a large extent the content of the more credible Fraser Institute index. In this case I guess doubt (in even a small degree) means it is out, so let's skip that one then... but the Fraser Institute one is good, right ? I also looked at the graph you linked to above, but find that to be questionable... there are not as many plots as there are countries in these indexes (suspect data manipulation). It also does not match what I get when plotting the countries in these indexes against a 25-year average of freedom:growth or when compared to per-capita-income (as proxy for long-term past growth). I get a strong correllation between GDP growth and economic freedom also in the long-run... as do the guys at the link FMF and Cato. In any event, I just read the criticisms section of this article again and the response of Easterly to Sach's is probably good enough... so if you want to leave it as it is now, I won't complain.

--StephenvJ (talk) 17:25, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

No, they're both BS. Do yourself a favor and go to the article on the "Freedom Index" and see the criticisms section. You have to treat everything that comes out of both Heritage and Fraser as suspect because they are so ideologically driven. There is absolutely no correlation between their "Freedom Index" and GDP: http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/FreedomIndex.html --I mean, I just have to wonder how these guys massage the data to get China or pre-collapse USSR to seem "Free". It just blows the mind: because these guys are so averse to taxation they let their ideology delude them into thinking that this is a major economic driver, and it's not even in the top 10 (Remember the "golden age of Capitalism" called the 50's? Any idea what he top marginal tax rate was?) (Or climate change can't be real, because that would infringe on liberty--I mean the fallacy books must be overwhelmed with examples from these guys.) These guys are going to have to publish in a peer-reviewed journal before I even CONSIDER reading their stuff again

--68.195.44.36 (talk) 09:15, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

NPoV presentation of criticism

There is, of course, a difference between identifying an actual feature and asserting that the feature is bad, and merely claiming that a bad feature is had. Consider these three claims:

  • One criticism was that Gerald Ford had pardoned Richard Nixon.
  • One criticism was that Pete Seeger was a communist agent.
  • One criticism was that Pete Seeger was ostensibly a communist agent.

The first is of course a plain fact; whether one agreed with Ford or not, he was criticized for something that he clearly did. The third is also a plain fact; whether Seeger was a communist stooge or not, he was criticized as if he were one. It's the second that's problematic. It looks like the a criticism of the first form, implying that Seeger were a stooge and were criticized for it.

Now the “Criticism” section once baldly declared “The main criticism of modern Austrian economics is that it lacks scientific rigor.” Some time ago, I made sure that this claim were made neutral by inserting an “ostensibly”. On Thursday, Lawrence Khoo reverted that. It's a pretty severe criticism of any school of economic thought that it lacks scientific rigor, and definitely not a neutral claim. Certainly, v. Mises and others claimed that his approach were more rigorous, in a manner perfectly appropriate not only to economics but to other sciences. The criticism is important, and should be presented, but it should not be endorsed. —SlamDiego←T 06:53, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

NPoV does not mean corrupting the verifiable claims found in reliable sources. Your #3 would mean attributing claims to critics (subtly) different from the ones they have actually made. You seem to have mistakenly concluded that #3 is "correct", but in actuality, both #2 and #3 could raise objections. BigK HeX (talk) 20:17, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
If you think that there is a better way to avoid (implausibly) leading the reader to think
that Joe Source claims that is ostensibly and that Joe thinks that being ostensibly is bad
without suggesting that
that truly is and that Joe Source thinks that this is bad
then by all means present it. As it is, you are seeking to preserve wording that lends the latter impression under a natural reading. —SlamDiego←T 21:06, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Your edits confused assertion with bald fact. I have corrected that major short-coming and provided a reference for the contrary assertion. It would help if editors here had more familiarity with the subject of the article. —SlamDiego←T 21:20, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
You cited Walker in support of the assertion that “Austrian economics does not rely on empirical underpinnings”. What passage or passages in her article make this claim? —SlamDiego←T 21:41, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
I have not confused "assertion" with "fact." I'm certainly open to the possibility that you may ultimately cite a reference that explains how "Austrian economics relies on empiricism," in contradiction to my edit. I don't feel the need to qualify my edit any more than the claim that the AS "emphasizes the spontaneous organizing power of the price mechanism or price system." But, as mentioned, I'm receptive on the point.
And, yes, I agree that it would help if the editors here had more familiarity with the subject, especially the self-styled Austrians that don't care to acknowledge the generally un-scientific approach that the Austrians decided to embrace. BigK HeX (talk) 22:28, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Whether you were aware of the difference between the assertion that Austrian economics does not rely on empirical underpinnings and a factual claim, you treated it as the latter when it is merely the former.
As noted, I provided the relevant contrary citation in my correction. Removing relevant material with proper citation from a “reliable” source is willful attempt to compromise Wikipedia, and would ultimate result in a block.
The passage that I cite explicitly asserts

Murray Rothbard comes closest to being a true Misesian, though he differs in his interpretation of the logical status of the categories of human action: for him they are broadly empirical.

Additionally, one could note that Menger's work on method made it plain his view. For example, from Bk 2 Ch 2 of Problems of Economics and Sociology:

For along with the historical, surely very valuable empirical basis for theoretical research, the experience of everyday life is indispensable. Or, what is the same thing, the observation of the singular phenomena of human economy, indeed, as must be added here, the most comprehensive possible orientation of that economy, is indispensable. It is so indispensable that we cannot imagine a highly developed theory of economic phenomena without the study of the history of economy

V. Mises thus complains

Menger was too much under the sway of John Stuart Mill's empiricism to carry his own point of view to its logical consequences.

Again, it would be good if the editors who worked on this article were far more familiar with its subject. —SlamDiego←T 00:02, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
It is irrelevant what was said or done in the past. It is well documented that the current Mises-Rothbard influenced school holds empirical work in contempt. Or would you care to show us a recent paper in an Austrian Journal here a major Austrian view has been challenged by empirical work? LK (talk) 03:52, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
First, the branches that derive from v. Mises are not the whole of the School.
Second, everything said or done by v. Mises and by Rothbard “was said or done in the past”. They are not simply retired; they are not just pining; they are dead.
Third, as Caldwell made plain, Rothbard did not hold all empirical work in contempt. Were you familiar with what Menger actually said about method, that might help you to understand what sort of empirical work Rothbard and others like him accepted, and what sort they rejected, and why. It isn't a matter of agreeing with their division (between acceptable and unacceptable empirical evidence) to recognize that there was and is an admitted empirical underpinning accepted in most of their work.
What is well-documented is not that there is no empirical underpinning, but that these underpinnings were not recognized by many critics. And the article can properly note claims by such critics; but it must also acknowledge the “reliable” sources (such as Caldwell) who assert the presence of empirical underpinnings. What's truly irrelevant is original synthesis based upon a reading confined to Austrian School journals. I can certainly identify Austrian School economists publishing empirical work in a mainstream journals (eg Machlup, who outlived v. Mises by about a decade), but deriving a conclusion from that would, again, be original synthesis. —SlamDiego←T 04:14, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Removing relevant material with proper citation from a “reliable” source is willful attempt to compromise Wikipedia, and would ultimate result in a block.
It's good then that the material I removed didn't actually have a proper citation, only another grand SlamDiego synthesis, that says absolutely NOTHING about the Austrian school relying on empiricism.
It would be good if the editors who worked on this article were far more familiar with what their sources actually say, as opposed to what the editor purports that they say. BigK HeX (talk) 06:21, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
It had a proper citation from Caldwell, and above I quoted the part where he reports Rothbard as imputing an empirical foundation. I cannot do much to compel you to acknowledge that, but ultimately no one needs you to make such acknowledgment; it would be evident to most admins. —SlamDiego←T 06:46, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
  • where he reports Rothbard as imputing an empirical foundation
Certainly, you cannot be referring to the nearly foreign conception of "empiricism" wherein Rothbard himself acknowledged that "it should be obvious that this type of 'empiricism' is so out of step with modern empiricism that I may just as well continue to call it a priori for present purposes."
It sure would be good if the editors who worked on this article were far more familiar with its subject. But as mentioned, I'll be interested to see if you are able to provide a source on this matter that actually says what you purport that it does. BigK HeX (talk) 07:55, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
The purposes that were present at the time that Rothbard wrote that remark were not the purposes of this article. A blanket claim that the Austrian School rejects empirical underpinnings is false, and even Rothbard (who was fairly faithful to v. Mises) illustrates this point, as established by the cited passage in Caldwell. (I could also in the article have cited the passage in Menger's book on method, and in various secondary treatments that discuss the Methodenstreit, but Caldwell established the point.) It really doesn't matter that you think that Rothbard's empiricism is impoverished; it's not absent. —SlamDiego←T 08:36, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
In case you somehow missed it, I'm pretty sure that I quoted what ROTHBARD thought of his "empiricism" in relation to the actual conception of empiricism that is relevant to the Wiki article. I guess maybe it's not quite as OBVIOUS as Rothbard might have thought ... for some readers, anyways. BigK HeX (talk) 08:45, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
What's relevant to an absolute claim that the Austrian School rejects empirical underpinnings is not whether Rothbard thought that his empiricism were practically apriorism, but whether it were truly a rejection of empirical underpinnings. Unlike v. Mises, Rothbard admitted (however grudgingly) an empirical foundation. Menger had openly said that an empirical foundation were indispensible. Treating the whole School as if it went or goes as far as v. Mises did (or at least tried) is simply inaccurate. —SlamDiego←T 09:02, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

(out) Saying that "the logical status of the categories of human action... are broadly empirical" (Rothbard) is not the same thing as saying one uses the empirical method. It is saying that we understand the concepts of means, ends, costs and proceeds because we have observed them. Menger uses the term to mean "the experience of everyday life". This is a common definition of empiricism, but not the one used in science or social sciences. The whole point of the Austrian school is their claim that the scientific method is ineffective in analyzing economic events because human behavior cannot be studied in the same way as natural phenomena. Saying that they rely on empirical underpinnings misrepresents their stated position. The Four Deuces (talk) 09:05, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Whatever you may mean by “the empirical method”, the edit to the article didn't use that phrase; nor did it use the term “empiricism”. What it said was “Austrian economics does not rely on empirical underpinnings”. And, again, I was using the case of Rothbard and of Menger to refute this very strong claim. Refutation of a weaker claim that the School en masse rejects the sort of thing that would more commonly be regarded as scientific method would involve digging up different citations, but the weaker claim would still be false. And using the phrase “Austrian economics relies on empirical underpinnings” might mislead an unwary reader, but no one was proposing that this phrase be used in the article. It was the false claim that they do not rely on empirical underpinnings that I sought to have reworded. —SlamDiego←T 09:18, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

A straight grammatical point here. The sentence "*One criticism was that Pete Seeger was ostensibly a communist agent." means that according to a critic, Pete Seeger purported to be a communist agent, and implies that he actually wasn't. In the current context, it seems reasonable to make the following points

  • Critics, such as X,Y assert that the Austrian School relies on a priori reasoning and disregards empirical evidence
  • (Some) Austrians reject this criticism
  • Others defend the a priori method JQ (talk) 10:08, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
As I said, I was (and am) fine with alternate wording that avoided any reading that had critics saying that the Austrian School were ostensibly and that being ostensibly were bad. However, your grammatical claim wouldn't be quite right; one might look to Seeger as the source of the representation, but for example “The ostensible purpose was to fund a park” doesn't mean that the purpose made representations about itself. Not that my word-choice were best. I was seeking to set the claim right with least modification.
Anyway, I agree that your suggested points ought to be made. I think that the first might be strengthened by saying that the apriori method is contrary to most economists' notions of the scientific method. —SlamDiego←T 10:16, 24 January 2010 (UTC)


@JQ. I'm not sure that it would be accurate to qualify the statement with just "critics," since the disregard for empirical evidence is specifically stated by prominent Austrians themselves. BigK HeX (talk) 16:12, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
  1. ^ "Greenspan Concedes Error on Regulation". The New York Times Company. Retrieved 2009-03-13.
  2. ^ Goodwyn, Wade (2007-10-07). "Paul Has Long Drawn Support from Unlikely Places". The '08 Candidates' First Campaign. National Public Radio. Retrieved 2007-10-23. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  3. ^ Caplan, Bryan. "Why I Am Not an Austrian Economist". George Mason University. Retrieved 2008-07-04.
  4. ^ Mankiw, Greg. "Mankiw: Austrian Economics". Retrieved 2009-02-08.
  5. ^ Economic Lessons from Lenin's Seer, Kyle Crichton, Feb 19, 2009, NYTimes
  6. ^ The Austrian School of Economics, Peter J. Boettke
  7. ^ Ludwig von Mises. "The Principle of Methodological Individualism". Human Action. Ludwig von Mises Institute. Retrieved 2009-04-24.
  8. ^ The interpretive turn, Don Lavoie
  9. ^ The Fed's modus operandi: Panic by Steve H. Hanke
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