Much of what I find fascinating about economics are all the so-called irrelevant topics. I have never cared for macroeconomics. I chose to pursue economics because I love the modeling techniques that the economics discipline had to offer as it applies to solving the many puzzles of human behavior. So, I chose to be an economist based on the fact that I was going to be able to explore so-called irrelevant topics. If such a trend in research topics did not exist, I might not have pursued that discipline.

For an economic historian to refer to a “post-WWII boom” shows a surprising amount of data smoothing. That period contained several recessions and Carter’s stagflation.

Early on, Greg switches targets from financiers to economists, as if most quants in finance were economists. Actually, most were quant jocks with additional training in finance. So this is classic misdirection.

Then there’s aggregation. Apparently “economists” are all the same for the purposes of this article. Theoretical econometricians like Whitney Newey are as culpable as Paul Krugman or Bob Barro. More legerdemain.

So, what’s the story? It reads as “economists make too much money, have too much power, and it’s all undeserved.”

Criticizing Wash U’s hire of David Levine for their non-stellar department, Greg makes a rookie mistake. They hire a star precisely because it’s not a stellar department: To turn the department around. Greg’s error is a “ceteris paribus fallacy” — assuming nothing else changes.

If you’re David, living happily in California, working in a nice department, with plenty of local consulting opportunities, Wash U can’t just offer to match your salary and expect you to join their troubled department, in Missouri, and with few local consulting opportunities. They have to offer you a large amount of money.

As for trotting out Nobelists at half-time for fund-raising… Huh, Greg, why do you think they have a football team to begin with? For which part of a liberal education is the football team necessary? The fact is that many of the activities of Universities are just fund-raising, sometimes to the detriment of knowledge creation and diffusion.

Let’s not go over the old tired argument against mathematical economics. The same argument regarding mathematical engineering was probably raised every time a building collapsed in olden days, but we’re able to build skyscrapers and place satellites in orbit because calculus-based physics triumphed over intuition-based physics.

As for crashes, there is this field in mathematics, chaos theory, that explains how simple and reasonable actions by independent agents can lead to system-wide volatility. As a corollary, it is very difficult to predict crashes.

“If you got a A in college in Econ 1 you are an expert in this debate: fully an equal of Summers and Geithner.” Ok, Greg lost it! Somewhere in his mind he knows this is nonsense; but in his haste to devalue economists, he enters Bizarro territory.

And then resorts to name-calling, via Brad Delong. Why the ad hominem by interposed agent? What was the alleged freshman mistake? This is rabble-rousing without substance.

That fabled debate Greg couldn’t organize, blogged to exhaustion? Greg Mankiw has already explained this: The gist is that “All I know…” is just a quick way to refuse.

And the whole thing about what economists choose to research? Krugman once wrote you can’t do serious economics if you’re unwilling to be playful. Granted, online dating seems to be on the frivolous side. Until you realize it provides a test of the search models at the foundation of labor economics.

Creative economists use new data and new institutions to advance knowledge and may appear frivolous. But, like Krugman’s hot-dog-and-bun economy, the frivolity is only apparent; the depth is there for those who care to think about it.

But that reality would get in the way of Greg’s story.

Entertaining nonetheless…