In an article published recently in the Atlantic, “The Curse of Econ 101,” University of Connecticut law professor James Kwak argues against what he assumes to be the content, thrust, and effect of the basic principles course, Economics 101.
He thinks it’s too simplistic. And he’s sure that in its simplicity, it masks the complexities that must be accounted for when passing judgment on economic reality and especially on government policies.
According to Kwak, over the past few decades Econ 101 has devolved into “economism,” which he describes as “the belief that basic economics lessons can explain all social phenomena—that people, companies, and markets behave according to the abstract, two-dimensional illustrations of an Economics 101 textbook.” The two-dimensional illustrations to which Kwak refers are supply-and-demand graphs.