Anti-NeoClassical books...

[RadioRaheem84]

Debunking Economics by Steve Keen

Not So Free to Choose by Elton Rayack

Myths of the Free Market by Kenneth Friedman

...buy or not?

What am I missing? Gimme som good books that demolish Neo-Classical, Free market ideology. Thanks.

[ComradeRed]

Look up the books and articles that these books refer to, and you have a treasure trove of reading material.

And if that's not enough, use the references in the referred books and papers...and so on ad infinitum.

[RadioRaheem84]

Would you guys major in economics in this day and age? It seems like the field is dominated by economic liberalists. The theories seem far fetched and the students in my class seem more geared toward joining investment banks than disputing the ideology that infects modern day econ classes.

What would you guys major in if you had to do college all over again? What is a good major in college that doesn't have the corporate stench but can still land me a decent job? Government? International Relations? Social Science?

[ComradeRed]

Would you guys major in economics in this day and age? It seems like the field is dominated by economic liberalists. The field of economics is basically Neoclassical economics.

The only time it changes is if you are going to one of the few schools that teach heterodox schools of thought (the New School, UMass Amherst, Cambridge, etc.).


What would you guys major in if you had to do college all over again? What is a good major in college that doesn't have the corporate stench but can still land me a decent job? Government? International Relations? Social Science? Depends what you want to do...programming? Math? Engineering?

It depends what you wanna do...

[Die Neue Zeit]

^^^ Ironically, business school. Since they all expect students there to be "hegemonized," the economics courses are limited in scope (at least from my experience).

ComradeRed, did you read my stuff regarding studies of management accounting practices ("cost plus" approach) debunking marginalist BS?

[RadioRaheem84]

You know, nothing has ever improved my analytical skills quite like the few philosophy courses Ive taken have. Economics really is a dismal mess and the natural sciences seem like glorified technical work. Business or Management in my eyes is the most worthless degree in reality. It doesn't seem to provide any meaningful sense of worth to the arts and sciences. Heck, they keep changing their methods every five years or so. One day they're reading X professor, the next he's outdated and they're on to professor Y.

I know philosophers change with the times too but they still keep the basics. What I am referring to is the Classics, not the post modern garbage they're pumping out in the schools now.

But what one logic course did for me was better than a semester of Economics. Moral reasoning, ethics, logic, etc. These classes are really good if one wants to impove their analytical skills. I am surprised that this major isnt taken as serious.

[bezdomni]

1) marxism
2) game theory
3) ...???
4) coherent theory of economic and social behavior, based on the principles of rational action and marxist materialism.

I don't know anything about the books you listed, but one of the most damning aspects of neoclassical economics is how it deals with the question of utility (i.e. "marginal utility"). I recommend looking at how the bourgeois economists talk about utility and handle it mathematically, and then look at how game theory talks about utility and handles it mathematically. Compare both of these to Marx's study of utility in Capital, and see what you come up with.

Obviously, the neoclassical economists answer lots of things shoddily that aren't matters of utility...but that's what I've been thinking about lately so it's on my mind. I'd also note that the notion of utility (in neoclassical economics) directly relates to theories of supply and demand, which is basically the entire range of study for bourgeois economists - how exchange occurs and under what conditions does it change. Because of their limited scope, their answers will be crude approximations at best.

If you train a monkey to draw incoherent lines on a plane, and label one "price" the other "quantity"...you've essentially trained an economist.

[ComradeRed]

ComradeRed, did you read my stuff regarding studies of management accounting practices ("cost plus" approach) debunking marginalist BS? Yeah, criticisms of marginalist predictions of a rational manager are fairly old though...dating back to 1926 :ohmy: