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The collapse of the econ PhD job market

chrisbrunet.com

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Re: The collapse of the econ PhD job market

#381

Post by eli_gottlieb »

monkeyelite wrote: post #337
searine wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Difficulty is not value. Extremely talented people are doing arbitrary waste work. Grants are hard, not because of admin/paperwork, but because coming up with a novel idea is hard and convincing others to fund it is harder. The people leading the grants are the ones creating and guiding the ideas. They set the agenda. A tech CEO doesn't spend their days coding minor bug fixes, in the same way a PI doesn't spend thei…

> convincing others to fund it is harder. Yes, we are in agreement. That's why promoters are so valuable. > in the same way a PI doesn't spend their days doing lab work. This large workforce of Phd's protecting the time of the PI also represents a massive allocation of young intelligent talent, and that's part of my concern. > an excess of PhDs is not a collapse, it is a boon. It's difficult to talk about demand for…

>I am aware of researchers who use a technique where they get funding for a project that is basically finished, and use the funds for more speculative research. TTheir sources of funding expect more predictability than they can realistically provide. Wouldn't you say that represents a gap in the public's visibility?

Yes, I would say that represents a gap between a public who want to see a science factory in which not one single blueberry muffin is ever wasted on an unworthy grad-student's wasteful seminar, and the actual reality of how science works. The problem is that going, "aha, gotcha, you were HIDING these ILLICIT SEMINARS on SPECULATIVE WORK!" doesn't educate the public on how science really works and also doesn't make the seminars unnecessary. If you eliminate all the scientific processes that don't conform to an uninformed popular image of white-collar "efficiency" (eg: Office Space), you won't have any good scientists left, because they'll fuck off to private-sector jobs where you don't have to justify a blueberry muffin to a hostile Senate subcommittee.

(For anyone wondering if I'm hungry or something, in January 2025 my lab's parent university forbade us from providing lunch during lab meetings because they were informed that the incoming Administration was going to start looking for efficiencies in scientific grant funding.)

Re: The collapse of the econ PhD job market

#382

Post by eli_gottlieb »

monkeyelite wrote: post #358
searine wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think our impasse is for some reason you have this idea that PI's hate their work / are gaming the system. I just don't understand where you are coming from. Maybe that's true sometimes, but most all PIs I have worked with are not gaming the system. They are just working on a decades-long line of inquiry. >I am aware of researchers who use a technique where they get funding for a project that is basically finished,…

> you have this idea that PI's hate their work / are gaming the system. That’s actually not what I said. > If the PI chooses use some funds from a grant to carry out speculative research. Good. GOOD. That is what scientific inquiry is meant for. My claim is not about good or bad. My claim is that there is a gap between how science is done and how it is presented to the public. > This is grants 101 You seem to agree s…

>Yes American science as a family of organizations deserves scrutiny and critiques. Funding these organizations is not an absolute public good.

They deserve scrutiny and critique from an informed point of view on what science can accomplish for the public, that is, what science can do for the absolute public good. "This doesn't work like I thought it did!" is not necessarily, in and of itself, an absolute public bad. It is, unfortunately, a cost of doing business in employing specialized labor to do specialized work.

Driving a truck doesn't work how the broad public thinks it does, either.

Re: The collapse of the econ PhD job market

#383

Post by array_key_first »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #283
array_key_first wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Economic theory in western nations is so hilariously skewed towards free market capitalist think that obvious models are just straight up missed, or sometimes obviously wrong conclusions are drawn. Most economics start with the understanding that the answer or cause is something about free market forces, and then work backwards. For example, when talking about the economics of healthcare (or anything else, but lets s…

> the conversation is approached from the get-go under the assumption that: 1. Healthcare is already a free market. 2. It is possible for healthcare to be a free market Nobody does this.

Literally almost everyone does this.

If you start talking about competition or consumer choice, surprise! You have made an extremely bold assumption: that healthcare is currently operating as a free market.

That assumption is actually, like, 1000 assumptions. Do people prove even one of those? No. They just move on and hope nobody notices.

And, well, we don't. We're so used to these economy falacies that they're practically invisible.

Re: The collapse of the econ PhD job market

#384

Post by quantumgarbage »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #352
quantumgarbage wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, that does not mean all models are equal. Economics both describe and prescribe, so those models should be evaluated on their predictive power and on whether they have actually done any good.

> that does not mean all models are equal Sure. Nobody claimed that. I’m just pointing out that being upset that a model makes assumptions is nonsense.

We are questioning the assumptions themselves, not the act of making them.

(I don't feel like anyone is upset?)

Re: The collapse of the econ PhD job market

#385

Post by juleiie »

Economists are “scientists” as much as parapsychologists.

There are several conflicting market theories and no one knows how it precisely works or they would be insanely rich from the stock market.

When were economists right once before some event? They always claim they have seen it coming after the dust settles. Virtually useless job akin to future tellers

Re: The collapse of the econ PhD job market

#386

Post by keeganpoppen »

hluska wrote: post #150
keeganpoppen wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i don’t expect the fed to fix everyone’s problems… let them hire the best of the best, and let us internalize the benefits… i’m sure i don’t fully understand the significance of this, but from where i sit, in my fancy office chair in front of a very fancy home office setup (not to brag ;P), i see absolutely no compelling reason as to why hiring the best is a bad thing. is the accusation that the FED is trying to lowb…

I could prove you wrong, but you don’t seem very open to it and I can’t under why you had to brag about how fancy your office is, so I’m not going to get started. But I don’t think you know what you’re talking about.

uhhh my office is fancy because i spend more money than i can afford on techno-gadgets-- a common nerd affliction that has nothing to do with conspicuous consumption, as you seem to feel the need to imply with essentially no justification. and if the proof were so goddamn easy, you'd think you'd just go ahead and just type it out, because then we could all go home after i give you my rubber QED stamp of approval... for someone as pedantic as you seem to be, you really seem to have an abusive relationship with the english language. apparently someone having a bunch of the computers in their office because they are a hoarder nerd makes them bourgeois.
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