Beware economists bearing policy paradigms
Dani Rodrik highlights that a key advantage of the CORE approach is its move to replace the standard benchmarks of economics with alternatives that are more realistic and useful.
Dani Rodrik highlights that a key advantage of the CORE approach is its move to replace the standard benchmarks of economics with alternatives that are more realistic and useful.
A report of the American Economic Association urges teachers to avoid using “trivial or sexist” examples such as sports cars or beers, in favour of weightier applications, for example climate change and inequality. The Economist singles out CORE for starting “with inequality, rather than presenting it as an afterthought”. You can read the full article as a PDF.
In the Spring 2021 issue of IMF’s Finance & Development, Wendy Carlin and Samuel Bowles argue that the pandemic has intensified doubts about the current economic paradigm taught to undergrads. They further stress the need for a lens that can focus on the exercise of private power as well as concerns about fairness and other social norms.
Martin Sandbu, in his Free Lunch column in the Financial Times on economics and its identity crisis, notes how racism and misogyny feeds disenchantment with economics, as did inequality and financial instability a decade ago, and mentions CORE’s work as a way to redesign undergraduate curricula for the better. The full article is also available as a PDF copy.
