How Economics Should Be Done: Essays on the Art and Craft of Economics

David Colander has been writing about economic methodology for over 30 years. His pragmatic approach sees applied policy methodology as rooted in what economists actually do, not in what methodologists say they should do. It sees applied policy methodology as constantly evolving as analytic and computational technology changes, evolving far too fast to be subject to any rigid scientific methodology. That problem is that economists generally think of applied policy analysis as applied science. Colander argues that using a scientific methodology to guide applied policy undermines good policy analysis. Instead, he contends that economists should use a much looser engineering methodology that blends science, heuristics, inescapable moral judgments, and creativity into what he calls the art and craft of economics. Here, Huei-chun Su has selected seventeen of Colander's articles that spell out and capture his arguments at various levels - some formal academic articles dealing with cutting edge methodology, and some more popular articles making the case for his approach. An original introduction and annotated bibliography serve as excellent resources for further exploring his arguments. Clear, well-structured, and written in plain English with little jargon, the book is approachable and suitable for anyone interested in the current and future state of economics and the economics profession. This includes students at any level as well as methodologists, applied economists, historians and critics of modern economics.

Table of Contents:
Contents: Preface Introduction Part I Methodological Framework and Methodology For Economic Policy As Art 1. “Why Aren’t Economists as Important as Garbagemen?” 2. ‘Vision, Judgment, and Disagreement among Economists’ 3. ‘Retrospectives: The Lost Art of Economics’ 4. ‘The Systemic Failure of Economic Methodologists’ 5. ‘The Death of Neoclassical Economics’ Part II Methodology for Microeconomics 6. ‘Applied Policy, Welfare Economics, and Mill’s Half-truths’ 7. ‘A Failure to Communicate: The Fact-Value Divide and the Putnam-Dasgupta Debate’ 8. ‘Framing the Economic Policy Debate’ 9. ‘Complexity economics and workaday economic policy’ Part III Methodology For Macroeconomics 10. ‘The Macrofoundations of Micro’ 11. ‘Post Walrasian Macro Policy and the Economics of Muddling Through’ 12. ‘How Economists Got It Wrong: A Nuanced Account’ 13. ‘Economists, Incentives, Judgment, and the European CVAR Approach to Macroeconometrics’ 14. ‘Beyond DSGE Models: Toward an Empirically Based Macroeconomics’ Part IV Pragmatic Methods For Doing Economics As A Profession 15. ‘Written Testimony of David Colander, Submitted to the Congress of the United States, House Science and Technology Committee, July 20th, 2010’ 16. ‘Moving Beyond the Rhetoric of Pluralism: Suggestions for an “Inside-the-Mainstream” Heterodoxy’ 17. ‘Creating Humble Economists: A Code of Ethics for Economists’ Annotated Bibliography of Colander’s Methodological Work List of Book Reviews