Evaluating Economists

Economists generally agree on basic tenets of economics. These have to do with the long-term effect of deficits, and the Inevitability of inflation as a result. They usually also agree on incentives for business and, to some extent, on tax cuts for small business, in efforts to increase jobs. Other than for basics, their opinions differ.

I’m not impressed by their awards, especially Nobel prizes.

Economics involve many complex variables and facts, unknown and the unknowable, and can be difficult to understand. It definitely is not a science.

Economists can see what has worked well in the past and what has not, but there is no predictability. Modeling and planning did not worked properly in the past, and will not in the future. 
 

As one observer has said, “economics is history trying to be physics.”

Politics plays a big role in the thinking of many. It produces the variations we are accustomed to, as an accommodation by economists tuned to the political interests they may favor.

There are a handful in which I have more confidence. Examples: Milton Friedman, Friedrich von Hayek, among others, whose work I follow. (See the Earl J. Weinreb NewsHole® comments and @BusinessNewshole tweets.)