Difference between revisions of "Austrian school"

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Revision as of 00:47, 28 July 2010

Austrian economics is a school of economic thought that eschews mathematical modeling and empirical testing [1] in favor of a narrative approach termed 'praxeology'[2]. As the claims of Austrian economists are difficult to verify without empirical testing, it is widely considered a pseudoscience [3]. While Austrian arguments as to why statistical methods cannot adequately describe human behavior can seem intuitively compelling, they fail to provide the mathematical proof demonstrating why normally unbiased estimates suddenly become biased simply because they are dealing with people who make decisions. Perhaps one reason they are so uncomfortable with empirics is that Austrian economists are more interested in defending the political ideology of libertarianism than they are in advancing economic understanding [4], and rigorous testing can sometimes undermine deeply held political beliefs.

  1. http://mises.org/journals/rae/pdf/RAE10_2_4.pdf
  2. http://mises.org/etexts/austrian.asp
  3. Caplan, Bryan. "Why I Am Not an Austrian Economist". George Mason University
  4. http://mises.org/daily/4113