Economists vs Politicians

Mark Thoma posts excerpts from Chris Dillow's post on Economists vs Politicians.

Dillow posits three (3) reasons for the growing distance between economists and politicians:

1. Academic idealism and isolation
2. Public self-absorption
3. Media complicity

4. …Political journalists have been complicit in creating a hyperreal bubble of mediamacro which perpetuates witless ideas (such as conflating the economy with the deficit) to the exclusion of such good ones as might exist.

Or, the fourth reason could be that economics is currently not useful in maintaining the status quo. The economists are failing in their ideological duty in creating plausible reasons for the current economic and political regime.

Instead, they are looking at the facts and finding reasons to criticise neo-liberalism. How dare they? Next thing, you know, they will be quoting Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin.