How Can Economics Mislead Students?

It can and does in several ways, unfortunately

I love economics! I think it helps to explain the world and a good working knowledge of it is crucial to make informed decisions in all walks of life.

I’m also passionate about economics education, which is part of why I started a series on ways that economics misleads. Often it’s not intentional, but there is a theme you’ll see: economics often misleads students into thinking there should be more government intervention than what is optimal.

Here’s the introductory video. It lays out the case for why this is a major - literally life and death - issue.

My other videos examine exactly how economics is misleading. This next video discusses the problem of principles of economics courses spending a lot of time on market failures while assuming governments run perfectly. I cite this paper by Hugo Eyzaguirre, Tawni Hunt Ferrarini, and Brian O’Roark that analyzes textbooks.

https://commons.nmu.edu/facwork_journalarticles/117/

Sadly, the reporting on income inequality is also misleading - which I address in my third video of the series.

The equation for GDP that we teach in principles of economics classes is that GDP=Consumption + Investment + Government Spending + Net Exports. That means that the Government spending is perceived to be as beneficial as consumption spending. I discuss why that is misleading in video 4:

I have more videos that will be released in this series - subscribe here or on my YouTube channel to get updates.

I’ve done a couple related videos that aren’t about misleading economics, but about a bad take and a bad question. This video discusses why asking “why are there poor people?” is the wrong framing and isn’t helpful for those who want to alleviate poverty.

In the final video I’ll share here, I tackle the myth that inflation is caused by greed.

There is a LOT that economics does well. But there is always room to get better, and I’m hopeful our profession can correct itself on these issues.