Abstract: There exists a long-standing debate about the influence of ideology in economics. Surprisingly, however, there is no concrete empirical evidence to examine this critical issue. Using an online randomized controlled experiment involving economists in 19 countries, we examine the effect of ideological bias on views among economists. Participants were asked to evaluate statements from prominent economists on different topics, while source attribution for each statement was randomized without participants’ knowledge. For each statement, participants either received a mainstream source, an ideologically different less-/non-mainstream source, or no source. We find that changing source attributions from mainstream to less-/non-mainstream, or removing them, significantly reduces economists’ reported agreement with statements. This contradicts the image economists have of themselves, with 82% of participants reporting that in evaluating a statement one should only pay attention to its content. Using a framework of Bayesian updating we examine two competing hypotheses as potential explanations for these results: unbiased Bayesian updating versus ideologically-/authority-biased Bayesian updating. While we find no evidence in support of unbiased updating, our results are consistent with biased Bayesian updating. More specifically, we find that changing/removing sources (1) has no impact on economists’ reported confidence with their evaluations; (2) similarly affects experts/non-experts in relevant areas; and (3) has substantially different impacts on economists with different political orientations. Finally, we find significant heterogeneity in our results by gender, country, PhD completion country, research area, and undergraduate major, with patterns consistent with the existence of ideological bias.
Keywords: ideology, ideological bias, authority bias, Bayesian updating, views among economists
JEL Classification: A11, A14
---
5.4.2. Heterogeneity by Gender
[...]. In addition, we find that the estimated ideological bias is 44% larger among male economists as compared to their female counterparts (24% of a standard deviation reduction in agreement level versus 14%, respectively), a difference that is statistically significant at 0.1%. These results are consistent with studies from psychology which suggest that women exhibit less confirmation bias than men (Meyers-Levy 1986, Bar-Tal and Jarymowicz 2010). Gordon and Dahl (2013) also find evidence that suggests that male economists are less cautious in expressing an opinion. This seems to be consistent with stronger ideological bias among male economists found in our results, since ideological bias and assigning higher levels of certainly to our own views usually work hand in hand. Finally, these results are consistent with van Dalen (2019) who finds that female economists are more likely to believe that economic research is not affected by one’s political views, perhaps because they more strongly aspire to be less ideologically biased.
Just a few quick low-quality comments/reminders:
0 First of all, Lee C Bollinger: The Idea of a University. The Wall Street Journal, October 15, 2003, http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB106617939829836100,00.html
[...] universities at their best have nurtured a distinctive intellectual atmosphere in which one is forced to live in a world of seemingly infinite complexity, while holding onto the natural but quixotic hope that someday it all will be resolved. If the pursuit of understanding is your mission, you simply cannot avoid confronting the immense variety of perspectives out there and, ultimately, how much we don't know, our sheer ignorance. You cannot rely on the comforts of common sense and of having a point of view. Learning to live comfortably in this very uncomfortable mental environment, with all its confusions and disorder and possibilities, defines the intellectual character of the modern university.
And this has great significance for shaping the intellectual and emotional character of open, democratic societies. Just as instilling an entrepreneurial spirit is difficult and takes time, so does the creation of a democratic personality. The instinctive impulse in the marketplace of ideas is to stick with what we think we know, to find others who think similarly so we can mutually reassure ourselves of the correctness of our beliefs, to avoid situations where we might have to justify our ideas and to resort more and more to certitude as the best defense when under attack. These impulses, natural as they may be, are of course devastating to society. With all the pressures toward the closing of our minds that come with conflict in the public arena, it's not a bad idea to have special communities like universities distinctly dedicated to the open intellect.
1 Care must be taken with some of the writing... We see at the beginning "We find that the estimated ideological bias among female economists is around 40 percent less than their male counterparts" and later the different formulation and figures "the estimated ideological bias is 44% larger among male economists as compared to their female counterparts." Several times they make two uses of some comments, and there are substantial, IMHO, differences among those invocations.
As Tyler Cowen says, "It is a wordy and poorly written paper, and they don't consider the possibility that deference to authority perhaps is the rational Bayesian move, not the contrary. Still, it has numerous results of interest." (Sep 5 2019, https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/09/ideological-bias-and-argument-from-authority-among-economists.html).
2 It says that "there already exists strong evidence that, compared to various other disciplines, students in economics stand out in terms of views associated with greed, corruption, selfishness, and willingness to free-ride," and a note adds to this that "Even if this relationship is not strictly casual, it suggests that there exists something about economic education that leads to a disproportionate self-selection of such students into economics."
All this goes mainly for the boys (see section 3 below). It adds nothing about possible (or lack of) better insights, better theories, more economic geniuses among the greedy, corrupt, selfish, or free-riders, and many other possible ideas to be explored. We are left with the doubt that maybe they are as they say, but that makes them better economists, maybe this makes them better at computing while modeling, maybe they see better the economic agents' motivations, aspirations, etc. But they are not interested in going deeper, only in correcting the bad traits, bad habits, etc.
3 If anyone thinks it is a good thing to believe "that economic research is not affected by one’s political views," they are wrong; and that belief and that wish do not make the girls better economists.
4 I think that it transmits biased information, besides its being hilarious, to make mention of Dani Rodrik saying this:
"there are powerful forces having to do with the sociology of the profession and the socialization process that tend to push economists to think alike. Most economists start graduate school not having spent much time thinking about social problems or having studied much else besides math and economics. The incentive and hierarchy systems tend to reward those with the technical skills rather than interesting questions or research agendas. An in-group versus out-group mentality develops rather early on that pits economists against other social scientists."or Joseph Stiglitz's pearl:
"[economics as taught] in America’s graduate schools … bears testimony to a triumph of ideology over science.", as if they were less biased than the others, or were not part of powerful forces of good intentions, or we could ask them to re-organize economics teaching in America, or biases and group think are worse now than when they were students, or ideology trumping science were now a bigger problem than time ago.
They are as bad as we all, and it is likely that worse than many, since they succumb to the feeling-good double pressure in greater degree than the truly modest learners: the pressure of having a good image outside themselves (reputation of being compassionate, economists with a heart) and the pressure of having a good internal reputation, so to speak (good image of oneself).
The pontifex himself, P Krugman, author of The Conscience of a Liberal, said:
On election night 2016, I gave in temporarily to a temptation I warn others about: I let my political feelings distort my economic judgment. A very bad man had just won the Electoral College; and my first thought was that this would translate quickly into a bad economy. I quickly retracted the claim, and issued a mea culpa. (Being an old-fashioned guy, I try to admit and learn from my mistakes.) [Can the Economy Keep Calm and Carry On? Paul Krugman. The New York Times, Jan 01 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/01/opinion/can-the-economy-keep-calm-and-carry-on.html]
Being he, it happened only that day and it was temporary. But we the great unwashed sin frequently and, being not old-fashioned guys, we do not "try to admit and learn from" our mistakes, and are "testimony to a triumph of ideology over science."
Fortunately for us, Messrs. Javdani & Chang mentioned those three economists, three that are less of a role model than others much more modest and conscious of their human limitations.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment