Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Economics/Archive 7

History of investment banking in the United States
I would like to draw your attention to a new article that I have created: History of investment banking in the United States. I admit that much of this text was drawn from earlier drafts which were variously titled Jews and money (now deleted), User:Pseudo-Richard/Jews and banking and User:Pseudo-Richard/History of Jews in American banking. All of these drafts are "not ready for prime time". However, it occurred to me that there is an encyclopedic topic under the title "History of investment banking in the United States" so I decided to create it. even though the first version of this article is heavily canted towards the Jewish side of the story. I figure other editors can add information to balance it out with the "Yankee" side of the story. [NOTE: I have since added more information so that the article is no longer as heavily canted towards the 19th-century German-Jewish investment banks. More info on the "Yankee" banks is still needed.] Your contributions and suggestions for improvement are welcomed at Talk:History of investment banking in the United States. Thank you. --Pseudo-Richard (talk) 01:20, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

CfD related to this WikiProject
Feel free to participate in this CfD discussion, relating to all categories representing intersections between class and priority/importance of articles. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 09:12, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Utility-possibility frontier
Experts required; please help sort out the article. Cheers,  Chzz  ► 03:24, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Private Finance Initiative
Would somebody mind watchlisting or having a look over Private finance initiative, please? It's a controversial subject touching on politics, privatisation, and many public infrastructure projects, hence easy to find negative quotes in the newspapers. My personal impression is that the overall tone is rather polemic - particularly the previous version which I expect will be restored sooner or later - but, of course, since it's a controversial subject I could easily be wrong. Any extra attention from this wikiproject could be very helpful. bobrayner (talk) 11:57, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Request for expert review of Friedrich von Wieser article
Hi, there was a request to have the Spanish WP article on Friedrich von Wieser translated into English. I have completed the translation of the body of the article, preserving the original English language article as a lede.

Could someone trained in economics give this article a going-over? Some of the content was quite technical and, while I tried to do my due diligence, I am no economist.

Also, I would appreciate some feedback as to what to do with the lede. Should I condense it, or translate the (short) lede from the Spanish page, or just leave it as is?

Muchas Gracias,

Dave You can help! 17:47, 10 May 2011 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Djkernen (talk • contribs)

Fractional-reserve banking
There's been a lot of activity recently on the Fractional-reserve banking page, especially on the talk page. Strong views are being expressed (sometimes quite voluminously!). I'ld appreciate it if the people here could help keep an eye on the article to make sure that no egregious policy violations occur. Much thanks, LK (talk) 11:13, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

There is something very strange going on at this page. After enormous efforts by editors a section was created to allow an alternative view of FRB to be presented. Three editors are ensuring that page can never fairly represent the view that editors wish to develop ie a bank credit version of FRB. The relending model is very inadequate as the following simple exercise shows

The relending model as as follows

For this model, if a bank has 100 reserves and 100 customer deposits the bank can only create 90 in new loans with a single loan. According to this model, if a customer wanted a loan of 171 credited to their current account, then two loans would have to be done as follows for a bank using a fractional reserve of 10%.

Note: At stage a) The bank is required to retain 10 reserves to back 100 newly created deposit money and at stage b) it is required to retain another 9 reserves, and then at stage c) it needs to retain another 8.1 reserves

The bank now has 27.1 "required reserves" and 72.9 "excess reserves"

The credit money model is as follows

Note: at stage a) (as for the relending model) The bank is required to retain 10 reserves to back 100 newly created deposit money and at stage b) it is required to retain another 17.1 reserves

The bank now has 27.1 "required reserves" and 72.9 "excess reserves"

The results are the same and there is no requirement for stage c)

The relending model mainly focuses on cash/Gold loans rather than bank credit. The relending model is, as BOE deputy Governor Paul Tucker put it, archaic in the context of modern banking systems and practices.

Further quality references are available to show just how inadequate the relending model is.

Charles Goodhart, an economist and formerly an advisor at the Bank of England and a former monetary policy committee member, worked for many years to encourage a different approach to money supply analysis and said the base money multiplier model was 'such an incomplete way of describing the process of the determination of the stock of money that it amounts to misinstruction' Ten years later he said ‘Almost all those who have worked in a [central bank] believe that this view is totally mistaken; in particular, it ignores the implications of several of the crucial institutional features of a modern commercial banking system....’

What exactly is so misleading about the money multiplier approach?


 * Firstly the base money multiplier contains a number of assumptions that are very easy to make which is of course why it is still embedded in macroeconomics.
 * Secondly, the monetary policy instruments used by central banks for some years now, are based on short term interest rates set by the central bank, not the quantity of base money.  The base multiplier model requires it to set the quantity of money, but in the real world we know it sets the price.
 * Thirdly if the central bank sets the interest rates it must then supply the reserves the banks require and this will depend on the demand for loans at the going rate of interest. Therefore the money supply is determined by the economy rather than the central bank.


 * It's not particularly surprising to me. The basic undergraduate model discussed is a quick simplification that gives some of the flavor of how it works, and for editors who haven't learned more than basic undergrad economics it's all they know. No surprise that a central banker knows more than typical Wikipedia editors. CRGreathouse (t | c) 16:15, 14 April 2011 (UTC)


 * I don't know if this has been suggested, but a way to resolve this might be to make these additions to the Endogenous money article (in a manner which conforms with the WP:MOS), and make a more visible link to that article in the Fractional-reserve banking article. WP:UNDUE clearly states that, in articles on general topics, minority views should not be described in as much detail as the majority view. The detail with which a viewpoint is described should be proportional to how accepted the viewpoint is within the relevant field.TheFreeloader (talk) 17:46, 14 April 2011 (UTC)


 * As I've tried to explain to Andrewedwardjudd, I actually think the endogenous money view (although a minority view) is a better description of reality than the 'textbook view', especially after the mid-1980s when central banks started to target interest rates. What I object to is not the incorporation of endogenous money views, but the way he is going about it. His edits are usually not properly formatted, are in the wrong place, improperly drops long quotes (frequantly out of context) into inappropriate places in the article, and frequantly criticise other parts of the article as wrong. Frankly, they just make the article uglier and harder to read. I've tried to work with him to properly incorporate endogenous money views into the article. However, I've only been met with grandstanding walls of text, and personal attacks. I'ld be happy if someone else can work with him to better the article, but I'm afraid he's got a serious case of battleground mentality. LK (talk) 03:17, 15 April 2011 (UTC)
 * There's still quite a bit of back-and-forth editing on the article, and I think it could benefit from a little more attention (or watchlisting). bobrayner (talk) 09:21, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Value chain management capability
I found this page through new page patrol and I can't make any sense of it. I'm not actually sure if this is the best Wikiproject for this, but could someone give me an opinion on if the topic is notable? I deleted a few external links and a section that looked like spam.--Banana (talk) 05:16, 15 April 2011 (UTC)
 * It reads a bit like somebody wrote an essay for a class, then later posted it in here - the refs are very Harvard. Not a bad essay :-) but I think it would need some cleaning & wikifying to make it a decent encyclopædia article.
 * I think the subject passes the GNG, in that there should be multiple independent sources which describe "Value chain management capability" in depth (or something very similar in sightly different terms). It does overlap a little with Value chain but I think this is an area where wikipedia needs better coverage (our articles on pokemon are twice as numerous and twice as detailed as our articles on business concepts).
 * I put WikiProject Business on the talkpage; it's more on their side than the economic side. Might say hello to the creator and welcome them to the community. It's far better than most of the articles created by first-time editors... bobrayner (talk) 08:59, 15 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for looking it over.--Banana (talk) 00:42, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Nice work bobrayner (talk) 01:39, 17 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Eh. I don't think it's really an appropriate article for Wikipedia, but oh well. Seems like it should be a section in a wishy-washy business textbook instead. II  | (t - c) 03:00, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
 * The text could be improved, but it's a notable enough subject. What is a "wishy-washy" business textbook, and why would it belong there instead of wikipedia? Some of my business textbooks do touch on it, although I'm not sure whether they count as wishy-washy - they have a bunch of other things in them which would be perfectly good encyclopædia articles too. bobrayner (talk) 03:50, 12 May 2011 (UTC)


 * A wishy-washy textbook would be one that spends a lot of time discussing things like the importance of a "global mindset", "technological capability", "teamwork", etc in general terms. I don't mean to offend you if you've got an MBA or worked as a management consultant, but I have a low opinion of that sort of stuff. I also say this as someone who truly enjoyed Michael Porter's classic Competitive Strategy. II  | (t - c) 23:13, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Request for input regarding Alan Greenspan
An editor has expressed concerns over Matt Taibbi's criticism on Alan Greenspan (see here). Additional comments are much appreciated. Thanks. --Artoasis (talk) 03:23, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

How to describe the status of full reserve banking
Over at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Full-reserve_banking#ignored_or_dismissed_by_the_mainstream there is a dispute as to how wiki should describe the current state of full reserve banking in the eyes of academia. I would suggest that there are three possible groups that an economist could fall into:

A: I've never really thought about full reserve banking B: I think full reserve banking is a bad idea C: I think full reserve banking is a good idea

FWIW, my guess is that the proportion in each camp is of the order of A: 98%, B: 1%, C: 1% - but I could be wrong - I'd like to hear other people's estimates. I am posting here to see if we can get some consensus on the proportions in each category, and once this is agreed, choose some wording for the main article that clearly reflects our consensus.

P.S. I had a personal email from Ronnie Phillips in which he said of full reserve banking: "there are more advocates than not". Reissgo (talk) 11:10, 13 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I could believe 98%/1%/1% in the general public. For professional economists I expect it's more like 9%/1%/90%. CRGreathouse (t | c) 17:42, 13 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Wow! I wasn't expecting that!... Ok, anyone else? The more opinions the better. If you're a professional economist and you've scarcely even come across full-reserve banking, then please say so here, its all part of the evidence. Reissgo (talk) 10:00, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry, misunderstood the question. CRGreathouse (t | c) 02:41, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
 * lol .... I was wondering about those percentage estimates. BigK HeX (talk) 03:43, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Articles on the history of banking
In the last couple of weeks, I've been working on a set of articles related to the history of banking. Frankly, I was shocked at the weakness of our article on Banking in the United States as well as the lack of an article on the History of investment banking. I have worked on improving Banking in the United States. In addition, I created History of banking in the United States and History of investment banking in the United States. There are several stub sections in History of investment banking in the United States and I would appreciate help in fleshing those out. I would also appreciate comments on how to improve these articles. --Pseudo-Richard (talk) 05:23, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

An educated perspective could be useful...
...on Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Gr8opinionater/Userboxes/Strasserist. Bear in mind that this is a userbox, not an article - if my characterization of Strasserism is off-base, I would appreciate being made aware. Thanks in advance - Badger Drink (talk) 17:36, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Which viewpoints are notable enough for inclusion
I recently removed an argument by a "David Gordon", fellow at Mises Institute, following a critique expressed by Paul Krugman. I was reverted by Byelf2007, who asked 'by what standard of notability' is Gordon's argument not notable enough for inclusion. I find it laughable that someone should argue that the opinion of Gordon, who is essentially a staff writer at a partisan think tank, should be included in a debate where multiple Nobel laureates and other prominent economists have expressed their views. Per WP:PARITY anbd WP:GEVAL, I believe that viewpoints included in an article should follow a rough parity of sources and notability. Since Byelf2007 has been reverting to my removal, I would invite an outside view on this matter. LK (talk) 10:59, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I think that the response by Gordon is, generally appropriate, with this reasoning: The "Austrian view" deserves to get a response to Krugman's criticism. That might not be the case for most articles, but is appropriate on the Austrian school article. I don't know that Gordon's response is the best available response, but it comes from a recognized current thinker of the Austrian school via the most prominent institution representing the Austrian school views. Maybe think of it this way: The Mises Institute probably deserves a response to Krugman's critique, and it seems like Gordon is their chosen representative to make the response. C RETOG 8(t/c) 01:25, 4 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Cretog, since I asked for another opinion, I'll abide by it. But, I would disagree with your arguments.
 * First, wikipedia is built on the principle of balance according to weight in reliable sources, not 'be balanced by giving both sides of the argument' view often found in the press. Jimbo has stated as much (but I can't seem to find the quote right now).
 * Second, I disagree that Mises Institute is the proper institution to represent Austrian school views, I would hope that there are actually some real Austrian school academics out there. It is their views we should present.
 * Third, the Gordon article is for Mises Inst's in-house daily, which is neither a refereed journal nor a publication noted for it's fact-checking. It is essentially self-published, and is not a reliable source. I realise that self-published sources are 'reliable about themselves', but in this case, Gordon is disparaging Krugman, and this is not allowed for an unreliable source.
 * --LK (talk) 08:03, 8 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I agree with the second, the biggest problem with Gordon's statement is probably that it is hard to certify that is actually an accepted view within the Austrian school. I doubt a bit that even the Austrian school would like to be represented as saying that recessions create inflation, which is essentially what Gordon's argument builds on.TheFreeloader (talk) 08:40, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

History of macroeconomic thought
I'm currently reviewing the FAC of History of macroeconomic thought. The article is well-written, but as a non-expert I cannot judge a few questions that I'm feeling kind of uneasy about. Therefore I'm inviting anyone who has insight into this to weigh in at the FAC page. The question is this: the article is mostly based on a handful of sources, the most prominent being Snowdon, Brian; Vane, Howard (2005). Modern Macroeconomics. I'm not contesting the reliability of this source or other sources used, but I'm concerned that because of the restriction to few sources (for most of the article), there might be topics that these authors just did not care about etc. However, to be comprehensive (maybe the most challenging FA criterion), the article needs to cover everything. Can someone please check whether the article does indeed cover all possible (including tangential) aspects of the topic? Thank you, Jakob.scholbach (talk) 21:12, 5 June 2011 (UTC)


 * It seems good at the beginning. There are a few aspects that seem troublesome to me.
 * Later sections make many statements that "somebody showed x", which seems vague to me. Also, as a statistician and econometrician, I am troubled by the finality of such "showed" statements. The model assumptions used in tests of theories are believed by nobody, so the tests have only heuristic value. (See Summers in Scandinavian Journal of Economics on the irrelevance of much of econometrics to macroeconomic theory).
 * There are statements that DSGE models are based on Arrow-Debreu theory, which seem like salesmanship to me, although this claim is often repeated. To be computable, these models make very strong assumptions (forms of supply and demand) which are far from the topological and convex-set generality from Arrow-Debreu. (My friends who work with DSGE models think that they work better than their predecessors, both for providing insight/policy evaluation and for predictive ability.)
 * About the so-called "microfoundations" of new classical models, this is not even a bad joke. Frank Hahn has spent decades demolishing such claims. There should be some discussion of Hahn & Solow's critical book from the 1990s.
 * There is undue weight about the "Austrian school" and " Neo POST-Keynesian"  economics, which are labeled fringe economics by e.g. Solow.
 * There is no mention of disequilibrium general equilibrium theories, e.g. of Edmond Malinvaud and Jacques Drèze, which have been endorsed as interesting and policy-relevant by e.g. Hahn, and by Layard, Nickel and Bean (the latter includes a disequilibrium model in their book on Unemployment). These guys have been leaders in mathematical and macroeconomic debates in Europe for decades, and it is weird for the Macro article to be as USA/British centric as even our statistics articles!
 * Those are my thoughts. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 17:31, 8 June 2011 (UTC)


 * In the above, instead of "Neo-Keynesian economics", I believe you mean "Post-Keynesian economics". LK (talk) 06:46, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for catching that error!
 * More eyes are needed, although progress has been made. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 21:12, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

GA reviewer needed for Economic globalization
Economic globalization is a subject of an educational assignment, that culminates in a Good Article review. The students will stop working on the article around June 20th, but so far no reviewer has volunteered to do a review. Perhaps a member of your project would be interested? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; talk 17:40, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Quantitative easing
I just reverted Libertarian POV terminology over at Quantitative easing. Input would be appreciated. Thanks, LK (talk) 04:13, 16 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Looks good. CRGreathouse (t | c) 04:27, 16 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Active edit warring about this issue continues at Quantitative easing. More eyes would be appreciated. Admin intervention may be required. LK (talk) 06:22, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Peace Administrative attention requested
I agree with LK. There seems to be intense abusive personal attacks getting worse. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 21:28, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Peace has seemed to have been restored. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 22:40, 20 June 2011 (UTC) 18:34, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Economy of Japan article
This article seems to haave no mention of the Japanese version of Quantitative Easing. Japan's QE-like efforts, their explanations and their results are all mentioned in the QE article. Is any update to the Economy of Japan article (or the Bank of Japan article) needed? Thanks -- Jo3sampl (talk) 22:29, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Infoboxes on articles about economists (a suggestion for inclusion)
What I suggest is that the Infoboxes in those articles should include a category pertaining to the economist's school of economic thought. Shotguntony (talk) 15:21, 25 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Oppose. In many (and I believe in most) cases, this is hopelessly subjective and therefore conflicts with WP:NPOV and WP:V. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 18:34, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * And on a more pragmatic point, likely to provoke the same kind of wideranging strife & edit-wars that we get with music genres. bobrayner (talk) 22:08, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Weak Weak Weak Support It seems to me that genres are incredibly important in music even though problematic - similarly one could attribute schools of economic thought if there is a source that confirms it, with the reference footnoted in the infobox. I guess the question is - how useful are economic schools of thought in defining economists?--Kiyarr lls- talk 15:47, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Markov perfect equilibrium
After a lengthy struggle, I've drafted Markov perfect equilibrium. Improvements welcome. It's a model of tacit collusion, e.g. many airlines setting the same price on each route. Are there other interesting examples? -- Econterms (talk • contribs) 23:39, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Your definition is much too specific. It should instead be treated as an example of a possible application of the concept. Rinconsoleao (talk) 12:27, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

proposal regarding journal abbreviations
Colleagues -- Articles on academic journals often show a kind of official abbreviation like ''Am. Econ. Rev. and J. Econ. Hist.'' in the infobox. I've proposed that there also be space for the abbreviations commonly used in the social sciences like AER and JEH. There is opposition to adding space for such acronyms, partly on the basis that they are not official and not informative. Your views are welcome at the proposal. -- Econterms (talk) 09:11, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Shapley-Folkman lemma
The Shapley-Folkman lemma is an important result in mathematical economics.

After 3 months and 8 days, there were no comments on the A-class review at the mathematics project. Given the positive statements following a peer reviews after the GA review, I closed the A-class review 3 months late (!). Please check whether the article meets your A-class criteria; there are only two such articles now. Thanks! Kiefer .Wolfowitz 23:11, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Where is the Logic?
There is no doubt that this subject of economics is complex and it has many aspects. Yet here there seems to be no serious attempt to organize the material. The basic divisions might be for microeconomics, macroeconomics, econometrics (statisticas and the associated methods), mathematical economics other than statistics, and the history and development of economic thought including a proper division into the many schools of thought.

Within each of these main subjects some sub headings are needed. For macroeconomics (and possibly for others too) the theory should be presented first and explained, but this requires definitions (a subject that is difficult to express without showing the way the various terms are used and hence the need for their somewhet strange definitions), then modelling and a discussion of the choice of models. This should be followed by performance of the models and some discussion of the resulting policy after making various forecasts.

Without the researcher knowing where he/she is within the full picture of this big subject there is a strong tendency to flit from matter to matter without finding out what is being sought.

As a person devoted to macroeconomics I find the diagrams very unsatisfactory and the failure to draw them logically and to present them consistantly is unhelpful. Having seen so many unsucessful theories all of whicgh are partial representations of the big picture, surely it should be possible to draw the 'big picture' first and then to show on it where each different theory applies (which may then give a clue as to why it does not succeed). Macrocompassion (talk) 12:32, 17 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Perhaps you could lend a hand and help the other volunteers with these reforms? Kiefer .Wolfowitz 12:43, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Undue weight disagreement
We still haven't achieved clear consensus on several issues on History of macroeconomic thought. I would at least like to resolve the issue of the amount of weight given to heterodox economic thought, namely Post Keynesian and Austrian economics. Both sections have been trimmed down to single paragraphys, but User:Kiefer.Wolfowitz still contends this is undue weight. Please provide feedback on this issue on the article's talk page.--Bkwillwm (talk) 00:41, 7 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Response here. Rinconsoleao (talk) 10:16, 7 July 2011 (UTC)


 * I thought the debate was dealt with or is reasonably being dealt with. And with rather remarkably responsible wikpedian etiquette.--Kiyarr lls- talk 19:12, 19 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you! I shall remember this comment in an upcoming RfC/U about yours truly.  Kiefer .Wolfowitz 18:24, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

2000s European sovereign debt crisis timeline assessment.
Heelo. I am an improver of 2000s European sovereign debt crisis timeline from WikiProject: European Union. I would like to ask for an re-assessment of 2000s European sovereign debt crisis timeline from your project. I hope to hear from you, – Plarem (User &#124; talk &#124; contribs) 20:58, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Mises Institute as fringe?
'''(Note: what follows is a a copy and paste from a usertalk page. It started off with a comment to the user (by me, S. Rich), and is now presented as the first paragraph.  The username I was addressing has been replaced with "XxxX" as his/her name was not relevant to the discussion. (Subsequent mention of the username is "XxxX'd" as well. In any event, user XxxX is more than welcome to put in her/his actual username.) Since the discussion was interesting enough to post to the general community, I have followed the suggestion of LK to move it here. (I will notify the various contributors about this copy & paste.) As user XxxX did make a comment at the very end of the discussion, I have added a pseudonym signature.)--S. Rich (talk) 21:12, 22 August 2011 (UTC)'''

Please, XxxX, you are entirely off the mark when you say (or intimate) that mises.org or the Mises Institute is a "fringe site" or that it posts "crap". Consider this write up from the editor of the WSJ Business Europe column:. Specifically, he describes the Mises Institute as "a world class think tank . . .." They do have a community blog page -- http://community.mises.org/ -- but I don't think anything from that page is being used (nor should it be) in WP. (The other blog page -- http://blog.mises.org/ -- has posts by its editors and should qualify as acceptable under the criteria of WP:USERG.) But I think you have a fundamental disapproval of the Mises Institute because you see it as "fringe" and that disapproval is adversely impacting your POV when reviewing edits. I hope you will WP:COOL when contributing. Regards, --S. Rich (talk) 21:10, 20 August 2011 (UTC)21:28, 20 August 2011 (UTC) 02:09, 21 August 2011 (UTC)
 * agreed, mises.org has met and surpassed all standards for inclusion to wp. Darkstar1st (talk) 21:31, 20 August 2011 (UTC)


 * It is fringe, which is why it was set up in the first place, to publish theories that cannot be published in the mainstream. BTW they have their own wiki, designed to present their own view of reality.  User:Karmaisking and User:Marknutley are star contributors and I am sure they would welcome Darkstar1st contributions.  TFD (talk) 02:03, 21 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I am so sorry. My comment simply asked XxxX to reflect upon the observation of a Wall Street Journal editor about mises.org -- not to engender a discussion about the institute itself. (Such a discussion would be better handled on the Talk:Ludwig von Mises Institute page.) I hope XxxX will avail him/herself of the WP:OWNTALK policy and consider deleting this line of discussion. (But thank you TFD for the heads-up on the mises wiki.) --S. Rich (talk) 17:38, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

Even the Mises Institute makes a distinction between Austrian economics and mainstream economics, just google "Mises Institute mainstream". You'll find dozens of articles listing distinctions, most on mises.org. WP:FRINGE says "[w]e use the term fringe theory in a very broad sense to describe ideas that depart significantly from the prevailing or mainstream view in its particular field." It doesn't matter if the Mises Institute has a lot of fans. What makes the Mises Institute fringe is that they're not mainstream economics. However, mises.org isn't fringe for Austrian school opinion, so their website is a good source for that.-- Dark Charles  (talk) 21:54, 21 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Please read more re the fringe theory criteria: "Scholarly opinion is generally the most authoritative for identifying the mainstream view, . . .." In the case of mises.org, Mises Institute, and Austrian economics there is lots of scholarly opinion supporting the field, and because there is such support, it does not significantly depart from mainstream economics. "Fringe" is a derogatory term, used by POV editors to criticize the people in Alabama simply because they disagree with them. Heterodoxy is the much more appropriate and more NPOV term and is used in the articles themselves. Finally, I note that none of the comments above address the "world class" description given by a WSJ editor. Instead the editors bring their observations (and lack of support thereof) to this talk page and not the appropriate topic discussion pages where a wider audience could read and respond. They have gone off-topic from the point I was bringing up with XxxX. (XxxX, I hope you are enjoying this!  If not, please hit "delete".) --S. Rich (talk) 02:12, 22 August 2011 (UTC)


 * This is a funny place to be having this conversation. I suggest moving it over to WT:ECON. However, since it's here, I agree with the other economists here. Mises Institute is definitely fringe. Austrian economics is not, it's a small 'minority' position. But Mises Institute was specifically set up by billionaire supporters to promote fringe views. S. Rich, you claim that "mises.org, Mises Institute, and Austrian economics there is lots of scholarly opinion supporting the field,". This is conflating two things, and is incorrect. Austrian economics is discussed by, and has contributed to the mainstream. Mises Institute, and mises.org, have not. It is currently popular only among internet enthusiasts, but no academic economist takes their publications seriously. Even academic Austrian economists wish to distance themselves from that institute (have a look at Peter Boetkke's blog "coordination failure"). These are fringe institutions. LK (talk) 03:28, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
 * How interesting -- mises.org and Mises Institute gets a "Fringe science" label, but Austrian economics does not? Really, then, the complaint is that mises.org and Mises Institute are not notable. (Particularly because billionaires contribute to it! (Yes, billionaires frequently contribute to non-WP:notable institutions and causes, which automatically makes such causes and institutions fringe and non-notable.)) Still, I see no addressing of the WSJ observation that it is a "world class" think tank. Nor do I see any discussion about the various academics who work there. (Thank you again, XxxX, for hosting this discussion!!)--S. Rich (talk) 04:09, 22 August 2011 (UTC) And I looked at Peter Boettke April 21, 2009 at 09:36 AM.  He says "The Mises Institute Does Amazing Work".04:22, 22 August 2011 (UTC)05:23, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I think I'm going to have to disagree with LK a bit on this one. In my opinion, Austrian economics "departs significantly" from mainstream economics. I think most Austrian economists would even agree with that point. In particular, Austrians generally don't publish in mainstream academic journals or formulate their theories in terms of mathematics. So I don't see support for Austrian economics as non-fringe. As far as Srich's article, it's pretty clear that it's an opinion piece, and it even touches on the scholarliness of Austrian economics when it says: "Auburn University had one of the few Austrian-tolerant economics departments."-- Dark Charles  (talk) 04:44, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Since Austrians reject empiricism, and thus reject standard application of scientific method, I would qualify them as departing "significantly" from the mainstream. BigK HeX (talk) 22:32, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Edits removing glosses of "fringe"
Please review the recent edits by User:Srich32977. In general recent edits, he seems to be promoting heterodox economics and removing glosses to fringe science. In particular, he has been removing the gloss of fringe science from Robert Solow's criticism of the 1987 New Palgrave.

The user essay on single-purpose accounts merits consideration (insofar as recent editing displays a consistent POV 17:19, 23 August 2011 (UTC)). Kiefer .Wolfowitz 10:11, 23 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Quite true -- Solow used the word "fringe" when he said heterodox economics was within the fringe of economics academia. But certain editors picked up on that word and used it to say the heterodox economics was "fringe science".  My edits put Solow's words into proper context, and I used quotes (e.g., "dissenting fringes within academic economics") to do so. (Also see Talk:The_New_Palgrave_Dictionary_of_Economics for some of my justification.)  But to add a subsection here and to use it to cite my 17,000+ edit history and use innuendo saying I was a SPA is beyond me. (Indeed, I wonder if it proper for me to respond to this WP:PA either here or somewhere else.) Kiefer's remarks are simply ad hominem.  They do not address the logic, evidence, reasoning stated above or elsewhere.--S. Rich (talk) 13:29, 23 August 2011 (UTC)


 * A little bit more on the top Edit.
 * The above subheading might be more accurately be rendered as:
 * Edits removing "fringe economics" as a gloss of "Heterodox economics"
 * OR
 * Edits removing "fringe science" as a gloss of "Heterodox economics".
 * I don't think most economists would consider that as "promoting heterodox economics and removing glosses to fringe science." More likely they might say it was an attempt to remove a violation of WP:NPOV. A relevant Edit by S. of a New-Palgrave section has a reasonable request. S.'s objection was to the phrase "fringe economics" as a non-WP:VER & non-WP:NPOV gloss of 'heterodox economics'. That's not an advocacy of HE. To suggest otherwise is IMO a misrepresentation of his Edits.§
 * A Google Scholar search of "heterodox economics" yields 2450 hits, most in specifically 'economics'-titled sources for the 100 hits I sampled.
 * Compare that with the meager number of hits, none of them in economics journals and apparently all in passing:
 * heterodox economics "fringe science" heterodox economics "fringe science" 10 hits
 * "fringe economics" "heterodox economics" 0 hits.
 * "heterodox economics" "fringe science" 0 hits.
 * The above attempts to characterize Srich32977's edits as promoting "Heterodox economics" is also problematic.* So, which is S. allegedly promoting, say Austrian economics or Marxian economics?  One can't of course be promoting both, b/c Austrians have not had kind things to say about ME. Of course S. in theory could be editing in one non-WP:NPOV direction only. But he could also also be abiding strictly to WP:NPOV policy.  Indeed, in the 2 instances I have studied elsewhere (New Palgrave & Het. econ), I think most informed readers would conclude that he was appropriately trying to remove non-WP:NPOV, the opposite of what top Edit here suggests.
 * § The associated link at the top of the recent edits by Srich32977 is also problematic. The mere link is not evidence of the suggested accusation.
 * P.S. The length of my response is IMO one evidence that innuendo against another's edits may be a very efficient way to change the subject. Relatively speaking, it takes a lot of effort to counter effectively the layers of what may turn out to be misleading suggestions.
 * P.P.S. Full disclosure: top editor KW & I have commented at what is currently the top section Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Economics) & extendedly at Template talk:Economics sidebar, and recently at Template talk:Economics sidebar. We have also done recent Edits at New Palgrave. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 16:57, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Quite right. On the other hand, I believed and affirm that a short "heads up" was warranted, particularly given this project's experience with Austrian economics. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 17:22, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
 * If "Quite right" means Thomas' observations are valid, the entire remark should be stricken. Even more to the point, the comments about SPA, which imply non-GFE, should be stricken. Giving a heads-up about the activity of any particular editor does nothing to improve any article.--S. Rich (talk) 18:10, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, here I would take a slight exception to the immediately preceding, though I understand and sympathize. If this were a legal proceeding, I'd agree. But comments are already on record.  I think that here transparency is paramount, so others can draw  lessons on mistakes to be avoided.
 * I do think that great harm could accrue on Talk pp. to condone or perpetuate Edits such as the top one. Appropriate longer-term remedies (other than transparency) might include better WP policies and guidelines.
 * There may well be some enthusiasts of a particular persuasion that are way out of line. I just don't think that the suggestion of guilt by association is in any way warranted. Rather, IMO that's a polarizing and poisonous device that may inhibit consideration of substantive points by otherwise fair-minded editors.   --Thomasmeeks (talk) 19:35, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Donation of three months' access to Feminist Economics
Routledge has kindly offered three months' free online access to Feminist Economics, a peer-reviewed academic journal, for up to 15 Wikimedians. The sign-up sheet is here, and will open at 22:00 UTC, Monday, August 29.

Please pass the word along to anyone you know who might be interested, particularly people on projects other than the English Wikipedia. Cheers, SlimVirgin  TALK |  CONTRIBS 18:17, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Feminist Economics
Just a reminder that the sign-up sheet has opened for anyone interested in three months' free access to Feminist Economics. All members of the project are welcome. Cheers, SlimVirgin  TALK |  CONTRIBS 22:19, 29 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Before signing up for it, it's a good idea to check if you don't already have electronic access through your university site or university library. LK (talk) 10:02, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Economic statistics
Please see Talk:Economic statistics for discussion of the future of the Economic statistics article. Melcombe (talk) 08:46, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Technology economics
Another editor just started the new article Technology economics. I did some tagging and cleanup and tagged it with the Economics project tag, but it definitely needs LOTS of work. Thanks. Safiel (talk) 15:00, 9 September 2011 (UTC)


 * There's quite a bit of information in the literature about the prospects and perils of technology, but I can't find any scholarly references to "Technology economics". CRGreathouse (t | c) 19:06, 9 September 2011 (UTC)


 * It is currently under AfD and probably will be deleted as original research. And I have to concur about the lack of scholarly references to the subject. Safiel (talk) 03:17, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Indirect job creation
I can't seem to find an article on indirect job creation. (Please note that this is not intended to precipitate a political discussion!  :)  What I am looking for are figures on what happens when a company or government creates a "plant" in an established area with N new employees, averaging $X annually. This creates a new demand for housing, construction, plumbers, auto repair, auto sales, retail clerks, etc. (It may also reduce them somewhere else, but that is not the problem here).

The only articles I can find (never mind Wikipedia!) are political which I don't quite trust. (Not a matter of parties! :) Can anyone direct me to an site with reliable (scholarly) presentation on indirect job creation? Thanks. Student7 (talk) 21:21, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Economic history of China before 1911
Please see Economic history of China before 1911, where there is a discussion on the economy of China over the last 2 millennia, and the accuracy of the description used in this article, China and Asia. See also Talk:China and Talk:Asia for related discussions.

70.24.244.20 (talk) 15:02, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Henry C.K. Liu
There are a surprising number of references to the statements by Henry C.K. Liu in sundry articles. As near as I have been able to tell, he has a few articles in Asia Times Online, and his own site with his writings. I think it's clear that his private site isn't a reliable source, but I'm wondering whether his views are worth noting at all. Is Liu prominent in some way I'm not aware of, or have his limited contributions been played up on Wikipedia, and should be removed? (There is an entire article Dollar hegemony which appears to be based on a notion Liu presented in those Asia Times articles.) C RETOG 8(t/c) 17:02, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Shapley–Folkman lemma at FAC
The article, initiated by David Eppstein, has received many helpful reviews from this project already. The FA project would benefit from economists' insights, from simple support/oppose judgments, to short copy-editing volunteering, to more ambitious commenting/editing.

Best regards, Kiefer .Wolfowitz 22:59, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Nobel Prize Awarded Monday, 10 October 2011
If this is promoted in the next week, it could possibly appear on the main page the day the Nobel Prize is awarded. (Otherwise, we should probably wait another year.)

Kiefer .Wolfowitz 05:50, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Underinvestment employment relationship


The article Underinvestment employment relationship has been proposed for deletion&#32; because of the following concern:
 * Unreferenced for 4 years, seems judgmental about employers profiting from employees

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, the speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. -- Beland (talk) 23:21, 2 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete it. It's an article about a non-concept. Rinconsoleao (talk) 10:05, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

partial equilibrium / supply and demand
I brought something similar up previously, but it's come to my mind again in a slightly different form. Are there any objections to merging partial equilibrium into supply and demand? (I did so recently, and they were just de-merged again. I will direct the de-mergerers to this discussion, but thoughts from other project members are also very welcome.) C RETOG 8(t/c) 16:51, 5 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I don't see why you would merge them. Would you explain your reasoning?  Perhaps I'm missing something. CRGreathouse (t | c) 17:39, 5 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I should have described my reasoning up front. The phrase "Supply and demand" when used as a phrase almost always means partial equilibrium in a single-product market where supply and demand cross. That's how the supply and demand article treats it. In my experience, "partial equilibrium" means the same thing, to distinguish it from general equilibrium. In principle, it's completely possible to have different kinds of "partial equilibrium" models where different things are included and excluded, but that's not how the partial equilibrium article is handling it, and if the expression is used that way, I've missed it. So, I think they're the same thing unless one wants to get really technical. Another possible technical objection is that "supply and demand" doesn't necessarily imply equilibrium. I'd argue when used as a phrase like that it does imply equilibrium, but I'm not as sure about that argument. C RETOG 8(t/c) 17:49, 5 October 2011 (UTC)
 * A common exception to what you're describing that I can think of off the top of my head is textbook treatment of Substitute and Complementary goods, where often they will do "two partial equilibriums" with a supply demand in each market - then change, say, demand, in one and show how that affects demand in the other. This is still essentially partial equilibrium though, although sort of moving "towards" general equilibrium (it's definitely still PE in the sense that there are no income effects from the price changes) so I think you're still right here.  Volunteer Marek   18:34, 5 October 2011 (UTC)
 * With a simple two-graph treatment of (say) complements, I guess I'd argue (maybe against what I've argued above?) that it's one partial equilibrium shown on two supply-and-demand graphs. Hm, does that change things? C RETOG 8(t/c) 18:39, 5 October 2011 (UTC)
 * If the crucial difference between partial and general equlibrium analysis is the absence of wealth effects resulting from price changes in the former, then yes, you're right. If someone by "general equilibrium" means just "interaction between markets" (while still holding distribution of wealth constant) then I guess adding in that second "complements" market would be making it more "general". I'm more ... partial, to the first definition so I tend to agree with you. I was just pointing out a *possible* objection.  Volunteer Marek   18:43, 5 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I oppose a merge. Supply and demand are also relevant in general equilibrium models. Merging the two falsely implies that supply and demand and partial equilibrium are synonymous.--Bkwillwm (talk) 02:19, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Bkwillwm, Supply is relevant in general equilibrium and demand is, but is "supply and demand"? And would an article on "supply and demand" get into the general equilibrium stuff? Looking at the current state of the supply and demand article (granting it's changed a bit recently), the only thing which doesn't fit as partial equilibrium is a small section on macroeconomics. I guess there's two things I'm thinking which are very related. The first is that "supply and demand" is the lay shorthand for "partial equilibrium". The second is that it seems if the two articles both exist, they'll be mostly redundant. C RETOG 8(t/c) 03:29, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * In my defence regarding de-merging Partial equilibrium from supply and demand I would say that Supply and demand is already a well written but over crowded with information. According to me giving a brief introduction on Partial equilibrium on that page is sufficient, which would make the very fact clear that this is an essential topic under Supply and demand.


 * But for the readers who want to know more on the same topic, which is actually a vast and important topic under microeconomics requires a separate page.


 * Hence I would conclude that I have not de-merged the topic completely but have just extended and elaborated the topic in a separate page, just as I as a reader would have wanted to have. Anu2033 (talk) 07:27, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Macroeconomics
An editor is trying to improve the prose and coverage of the macroeconomics article. I reverted their additions because they read to me like an essay, with some vagueness and POV and need of references, but the sentiment is sound. If anyone would like to help that editor make improvements, they've started at the article's talk page. C RETOG 8(t/c) 17:06, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Example showing why the Allais Pardox is a paradox
I always use the following example. Suppose the choices in the first case are between 1A and 1B, where

1A: $1 million w/ prob. 1

2A: $4 million w/ prob. 98/99, 0 otherwise

In the second case the choices are:

2A: $1 million w/ prob. 99/100, 0 otherwise

2B: $4 million w/ prob. 98/100, 0 otherwise

The paradox arises when people choose 1A over 1B, but also say they would choose 2B ove 2A if that is the choice. To see why this is rather odd, implement the second choice as follows. I put 100 balls in an urn. 98 are black, 1 is red, and 1 is blue. I give you the choice between 2A and 2B. I will draw a ball at random. If you choose 2A you "win" if the ball is black or red. If you choose 2B you "win" if the ball is black. Suppose you choose 2B. I draw a ball, but before telling you which color it is I tell you whether it is or is not blue and then offer a chance to change you mind. If I tell you it is blue, it doesn't matter, you get zero either way. If I tell you it is not blue, you would want to switch if you prefer 1A to 1B because once blue is ruled out, that is the choice. Ceberw (talk) 19:46, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * The example would be improved if there were actually a choice labelled 1B. I assume the first one labelled 2A is really 1B.-- SPhilbrick  T  14:43, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Blaug on methodological individualism
My addition of Mark Blaug's comments about methodological individualism yesterday to the Austrian school article, was quickly reverted by User:Byelf2007, who proceeded to revert myself and Cretog several times about this issue. From what I can gather, Byelf2007 agrees that Blaug's comments are notable, but objects that the criticism is unclear, or isn't a criticism or some such (see his comments here). The passage in question: "Mark Blaug, known for his work on the history of economic thought, has criticized over-reliance on methodological individualism, "it is helpful to note what methodological individualism strictly interpreted ... would imply for economics. In effect, it would rule out all macroeconomic propositions that cannot be reduced to microeconomic ones, ... this amounts to saying goodbye to almost the whole of received macroeconomics. There must be something wrong with a methodological principle that has such devastating implications.""

Since Byelf2007 refuses to stop removing this obviously notable comment by Blaug, I would like to seek further comment about this issue. Thanks, --LK (talk) 07:30, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Blaug has published a lot. However, it is not clear that he be a leader in the philosophy of economics or in macroeconomics (or in the relation between macroeconomics and microeconomics). This means I share a concern about whether Blaug is a high-quality reliable source for this topic.
 * I do not deny that Blaug meets the (lower) thresh-hold for inclusion. However, it would be better to have an expert cited (e.g. Frank Hahn or Jon Elster).  Kiefer .Wolfowitz 10:12, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Elster is perhaps comparable, but afaik, Hahn is not prominent in the field of the history of economic thought. Blaug though is a first class academic in that field. This is from Robert Heilbroner's review of Blaug's Economic Theory in Retrospect: "It is said there is only one Mark Blaug, the doyen of the history of economic thought. There are, in fact, five, each more remarkable than his predecessor. This last edition of his magnum opus-witty, serious; iconoclastic, devout; in its core unchanged, full of new insights-is the best yet. I cannot imagine a scholar's library-or for that matter a student's-without it." LK (talk) 14:42, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Hi LK!
 * Had Heilbroner ever achieved anything in economics, rather than journalism, his blurb might be valuable. Since his expertise in contemporary (or even post 1960s) economics seems to be negligible and his output seems to consist of hortatory to read the classics, why should we care about his opinion of a fellow worker (Blaug) in a barren vinyard?
 * Elster at least is a competent philosopher who has written research publications on methodological individualism. Has Heilbroner? Has Blaug's writings been reviewed favorably by philosophers (competent in basic logic)?
 * Hahn has contributed influential research publications on general equilibrium theory and macroeconomics, while Blaug has not. Hahn has written on the fallacious assumption that microeconomic agents be indifferent to macroeconomic variables, which makes him somewhat relevant.
 * I recognize that my thoughts have been outside of WP's (wrong headed!) consensus about the so-called history of economic verbosity. ;)
 * Resigned to my fate, Kiefer .Wolfowitz 14:58, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * LK-is there any accessible version of Blaug's writing online? If I could get at the source material, I could see if I can rephrase to satisfy both you and Byelf2007. (Something which might be accessible from a university with subscriptions to JSTOR, etc. could work for me also.) C RETOG 8(t/c) 16:23, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I have Blaug's book from the library. AFAIK, books aren't available online through agencies like JSTOR. I'ld just note that Blaug is not just a lone voice shouting in the wind here. In this AER paper, Kenneth Arrow argues that economists don't stick to methodological individualism, and in fact they can't and they shouldn't..
 * In any case, we're getting off-topic. Byelf2007 agrees that Blaug's comment is notable. His rationale for removal is: "we are not told why this guy thinks AS is anti-macroeconomics *OR* why macroeconomics is good. In short, we aren't told what his opinion is." The question before WP:ECON is this: Is Byelf2007's objection reasonable, or, is it clear to people here what Blaug's objection is? LK (talk) 08:52, 7 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Arrow would be a highest quality, most reliable source, unlike Blaug. Arrow is one of the founders of modern economics and Arrow is philosophically competent (having been thanked by Alfred Tarski for his assistance on a book on logic). Kiefer .Wolfowitz 10:53, 7 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I have said on the article's talk page that I don't think those objections are reasonable, so should not keep the material out of the article. Regardless, I would hope that it's possible to rephrase things so as to satisfy Byelf2007. I have no opinion about the notability of Blaug, and so don't feel one way or another about whether including it is WP:UNDUE. C RETOG 8(t/c) 16:17, 7 October 2011 (UTC)


 * No one has responded to my last contribution. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Austrian_School#Blaug_and_macro Byelf2007 (talk) 9 October 2011


 * The issue has been discussed. Consensus is that you don't have a reasonable argument. Stop edit warring against consensus just because you don't like it.(here & here) It's not the responsibility of other editors to address every unreasonable argument raised. LK (talk) 04:58, 10 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Where's the relevant WP:RULE that "criticisms" sections can have assertions without any reasoning whatsoever? Byelf2007 (talk) 9 October 2011

Taxation
Is it possible that there is no article Economics of taxation? All I could find was a short section in the general article Tax.

CRGreathouse (t | c) 04:18, 19 September 2011 (UTC)


 * It does look as though the stuff which would go in an Economics of taxation article is scattered around in various other articles, and sorta summarized in the tax article. Hm, is that good enough? C RETOG 8(t/c) 16:34, 19 September 2011 (UTC)


 * It seems important to me -- probably more important than most articles under this WikiProject. Unfortunately it's not my field of study, so I don't think I'm up to the task of creating the article (if I did I don't think I could get it past stub status).
 * Salanié, Kaplow, and Hoppe each have monographs/textbooks covering just this topic, and of course it's covered in every Public Finance text you could find. I also see books from Cordes, Slemrod, Schenk, and Steuerle. So I think it shouldn't be too hard to source (and clearly meets WP:N).
 * CRGreathouse (t | c) 17:31, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * You're probably right. C RETOG 8(t/c) 17:58, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

I read over the article on economic inequality and saw that there is little information on the role of tax policy and rising economic inequality. The section discusses progressivity as a characteristic of tax policy that attempts to reduce economic inequality but it does not not discuss why tax policy may, or may not, add to economic inequality by easing capital accumulation for the richer while not providing equal relief for the poor. There are numerous articles and literature on the impact of income, estate, inheritance, and cap gains taxes on economic inequality and top economic figures such as Peter Orszag are carrying on this debate in Washington and the business community. Perhaps we should add to that section so Wikipedia readers can have a better understanding of tax policy and economic inequality. This is especially important because of the controversial nature of the Bush Tax Cuts which some have argued (i.e. Orszag and others) that they have contributed to rising income inequality. Other scholars such as Timothy Noah present differing views. What do y'all think? DanSCohen (User talk:DanSCohen) —Preceding undated comment added 01:25, 13 October 2011 (UTC).

infobox economist
I notice that the infobox for economists has fields for influenced and influences. Those fields are occasionally used, but rarely supported in the text. This appears to be contrary to policy. Am I missing something?

Following is the text I've used to support a couple of edits:

Per MOS Infoboxes, the purpose of an infobox is "to summarize key facts about the article in which it appears". Not explicitly stated here, but well understood in practice is the notion that material in an infobox is deliberately redundant; any item in an infobox should be found, almost always with supporting references, in the main text of the article.

The infobox for an economist mirrors that purpose, but is more explicit: "Entries in influences, opposed, influenced, and contributions should be explained in the main text of one of the articles. Those that are not mentioned in the main text may be deleted." -- SPhilbrick  T  14:48, 10 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Right. It would be courteous to ask on the page's Talk, or at least leave a note when deleting, though. CRGreathouse (t | c) 14:49, 10 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I've only done three; in each case I've left a note on the talk page. However, I've yet to find an example where it is covered in the text(other than one marginal example) so I was starting to wonder if there was a convention I had missed.-- SPhilbrick  T


 * Those 'influenced' and 'influenced by' boxes have always bothered me. They appear to be mainly used by supporters and detractors to imply negative or positive influence not supported by the text. IMO, unless clearly cited and supported by the text, all 'influenced' and 'influenced by' boxes should be removed from economists' infoboxes. As a courtesy, a note can be left on the talk page, or a link back to this discussion left in the edit summary. LK (talk) 02:33, 11 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Aside: I wasn't accusing you, Sphilbrick, of uncourtesy&mdash;just suggesting that although removing unsupported material in the infobox is fine it should include giving notice, as you have indeed already done. CRGreathouse (t | c) 13:31, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

RFC regarding Paul Krugman article
I'd like to request eyes on an | RFC at Paul Krugman regarding how to reflect criticism in the lead. As noted in the RFC request, some thorny issues complicate this question and I don't think a resolution is feasible without a some input from editors having a specific familiarity with the field of economics. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS)  (talk)  (contribs) 04:28, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Perspectives on the Economic Art
It seems as if an overview article might be in order to show the changes in approach fostered over time by significant participants. Also, the emergence of "behavioral Economics" as opposed to Econometrics is a significant trend.

The current focus of the WikiEconomics project has some quite detailed discussions on rather arcane topics. Perhaps this is as it should be in WikiWorld. But it seems rather like describing the details of alchemical methods without mentioning that no one has actually seen them work in real life.robdashu (talk) 12:53, 12 October 2011 (UTC)


 * In principle, the history of economic thought article should be what you describe, "changes in approach fostered over time by significant participants". There is definitely stuff missing from there. There should be a section on game theory, and some mention of experimental and behavioral economics. Behavioral economics is still pretty cutting-edge, though, so it's hard to put it in historical perspective. As for arcane, a lot of economics is arcane, some of it isn't. Discussions of the history of economic thought are bound to be arcane though, possibly even to current practitioners of the art. C RETOG 8(t/c) 17:00, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Economics, Development, and Gender
In recent times, both GDP and GNP have come under a lot of scrutiny as measuring indices for the development of a given country. it has been generally suggested (and often accepted as fact) that as GDP and GNP increase, so does the relative well-being of the people living in the country. GDP and GNP however, are not distribution-sensitive measuring indices, and as such, they do not reflect or evaluate some important factors that greatly impact the well-being of the general population such as wealth gaps between rich and poor and gender inequality. Around 1995 the UN introduced some new indices such as the Human Development Index and later the Gender-related Development Index and the Gender Empowerment Measure to address these distribution-related concerns. Wikipedia as a whole has very little on the Gender-related Development Index, and the Gender Empowerment Measure, not only in terms of actual descriptions and uses of these indices, but also in terms of their relationship to GDP and GNP. I wonder if this project would think it a worthy endeavor to expand the pages on GDP and GNP as well as the HDI, GDI, and GEM in order to update the information available on economic and development measuring indices currently in use.FaithSara (talk) 17:07, 12 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I don't rally think either the GDI or the GEM has gained much use. The HDI has much more traction, though frankly I think it's at least as flawed as the measure it hopes to replace (which I suppose is really GDP per capita rather than GDP).  But go ahead and improve the articles, they could certainly use work. CRGreathouse (t | c) 18:34, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

RFC needs attention
This RfC is not getting any attention: Talk:National_debt_by_U.S._presidential_terms If anyone has time, could they drop a quick note? Thanks, LK (talk) 13:43, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

AfD
Please see: Articles for deletion/Culture of capitalism (2nd nomination). I am trying to notify interested editors, as AfD policy says to do. The people who contributed to the article are mostly inactive and it is not listed in any projects. It seems like it might be related somewhat to this project. Thanks if you want to take part in the discussion. BigJim707 (talk) 19:41, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Requests_for_comment/Kiefer.Wolfowitz
The community is invited to participate in a request for comment about my editing: WP:Requests_for_comment/Kiefer.Wolfowitz. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 20:54, 8 October 2011 (UTC)


 * It's over. Thanks to LK and others for helpful comments, both of support and of suggestions for improvements. Sincerely, Kiefer .Wolfowitz 19:41, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Private ordering
I see that there is no article for private ordering, and there doesn't appear to be a more general article that obviously subsumes that topic. Please consider this a request. (I'm not qualified to write one myself.) 18.26.0.5 (talk) 00:31, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Racial wage gap in the United States
Currently on the page Income inequality in the United States there is a section that treats both gender and race disparities together. However, the combining of these two topics represents them as being very similar or as not being worthy of their own sections, which is not true of them. Both topics have their own extensive amount of research to stand on and thus should be separated. The fact that there is very little treatment of the racial wage gap in the United States (a mere 5 sentences) is honestly a glaring hole in the treatment of the economy of the United States, as this is a pervasive phenomenon and impacts many different groups in the population. The racial wage gap impacts workers, their futures and economic mobility, and their families' futures, which in turn affects the nation as a whole. The extensive research that has been done on the racial wage gap warrants an article and the separation of race and gender disparities on the page Income inequality in the United States. KiaraDouds (talk) 02:28, 12 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I think the right thing to do is to separate out a section in that article and expand it. Once the material grows to more than a few paragraphs it would be worth splitting it out into its own article, but I wouldn't do it before that.  It's certainly notable, I just wouldn't want it to be a sub-stub. CRGreathouse (t | c) 13:22, 12 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Oh yes, I agree. The new article will not be a stub. I'm working on it for a sociology class, and my goal is to cover the topic as thoroughly as I can. I am planning on discussing the gaps for the largest minorities in America (to the extent that current research covers them), causes of racial wage gaps, the wage gaps across occupations, possible solutions, and some limitations of what the racial wage gap tells us.

KiaraDouds (talk) 19:30, 15 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Hi KiaraDouds!
 * I applaud your interest. I remember Ronnie J. Steinberg doing some early pay-equity studies in the 1980s, for example.
 * Now that I am older than 30, and therefore should not be trusted, and I have become a statistician, there are some methodological issues I want to raise, which will be familiar from your first course in statistics (if you had a competent book like Moore-McCabe or David A. Freedman) or econometrics (if you had e.g. Murray and not e.g. Woodford). That is, observational studies are less trustworthy than randomized experiments.
 * For your topics, there is little opportunity to study any wage-gap experimentally, although one can study part of the job search by randomizing the block-factors on resumes (e.g., sex and identified race and stereotypically racial covariates (e.g., for names, Geoffrey versus Jesus y Maria versus Jamal, etc.). In general, the term "wage gap" is POV and so a NPOV term should be sought.
 * I would recommend that you look at articles published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives, the Journal of the American Statistical Association, or Statistical Science.
 * Good luck! Kiefer .Wolfowitz 20:32, 15 October 2011 (UTC)


 * With regard to JEP, there was an issue dedicated to these issues once (there might have been more recent ones but I can't think of them off the top of my head). The articles by Loury, by Darity and Mason, as well as Arrow and Heckmann (though these are more general) are relevant here. If you can't access these through your school I can help out.
 * Also, there's more recent work from Economic History perspective by Gavin Wright on the economics of the Civil Rights Movement (for example here ). Wright credit direct legislation, particularly the Civil Rights Act of 1964) rather than "market forces" or other explanations for the progress that has been made.  Volunteer Marek   22:11, 15 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Procedural note: if you write a new article (good for you!), mark the section in Income inequality in the United States with and use summary style to keep the basics in that article.  I'll help out if I get a chance.
 * CRGreathouse (t | c) 01:47, 16 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks everyone for all of your input! I have almost completed my rough draft of my article and will be placing it in my sandbox soon. I would love some feedback once it's up if you have time! KiaraDouds (talk) 23:56, 18 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I have posted the first draft of my article in my sandbox here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:KiaraDouds/Sandbox. I would love some feedback! My graphics are not yet inserted, but they should be up soon! KiaraDouds (talk) 20:41, 22 October 2011 (UTC)


 * First of all, let me say that this is a terrific article. I was expecting much less information (and less well-sourced).  Good job!
 * I've made some changed, but I've limited myself to stylistic edits for the time being. I'd like to read it over more carefully before suggesting changes.  I'm not sure what should be done with the 'limitations and criticisms' section -- I like including contrary information when possible, but I'm not sure what "criticisms" really even means in this context.  Criticisms of inequality?  Of the usual (whatever that means!) methodology?  Etc.
 * The article is heavy on a small number of authors for most of its points, but I don't think this is any kind of barrier to moving this from userspace. It's arguably better than the median article under this WikiProject already.  Eventually it would be nice to have a broader view, though -- there are times that I'm reading the article and think, "what about the effect of ___?".  But I'm not an economist and certainly not specialized in this field so I have no references offhand (though they surely exist).
 * If there are no objections, I'll move this to the main namespace in a few days.
 * CRGreathouse (t | c) 21:29, 24 October 2011 (UTC)


 * For "criticisms", I was referring to the fact that some people criticize the measurement of the racial wage gap because most measures of it include only those who are employed, which ignore the large amounts of inequality in unemployment among various races. Thus, they believe the measurement gives a flawed sense of how economic conditions between groups really are. KiaraDouds (talk) 19:26, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Fringe political belief?
I added today that candidate Herman Cain does not think too big to fail is real. Is this a fringe belief? Or how prevalent is this view? I would appreciate a reliable source. Thanks. Jesanj (talk) 06:30, 5 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I guess I don't know what that actually means. If he meant that he thinks that even large businesses should be allowed to fail without being bailed out, that's not a fringe belief (though it's in the minority IMO).  On the other hand, if he meant that there isn't moral hazard from large businesses taking overly-large risks because they have a reasonable belief that they are likely to be bailed out, then yes that's a fringe belief.  CRGreathouse (t | c) 18:12, 5 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks that helps. Jesanj (talk) 21:43, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Fractal Economics, Anyone?
I'm tired of this left/right wrangling over wealth disparity. I wish a real mathematician (not an economist) would show that the economy is a dynamic fractal, and that the network interchange velocity between nodes becomes worse if you only have a few huge nodes and many tiny ones, with the middle-size nodes having been destroyed or shrunk to tiny.

If you look at a natural fractal, it is always pleasing to the eye, with a bell curve of sizes - such as a picture with mostly medium circles, a lesser number of small ones, and an even lesser number of enormous ones. What we have seen is all the medium circles have been shrunk to leave a few enormous ones and many tiny ones.

This is not only ugly, but doesn't work economically, IMHO. The most efficient economic exchange occurs due to the disparity of size in the network, but also due to a fair range of sizes. A size distribution of largely Tiny to Enormous means less economic activity. In my humble opinion, a median amount of middle-size circles leads to the greatest aggregate dynamic activity between nodes. My intuition says this can be shown mathematically, but that's beyond me at present. Any mathematicians want to step up to the plate?

Your work will remain on Wikipedia, because no one in Washington will understand it or promote it, but at least you will have tried. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cybervigilante (talk • contribs) 00:48, 18 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Original mathematical research is great but not suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia. CRGreathouse (t | c) 17:42, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Name of Racial wage gap in the United States Article
Hi all, Racial wage gap in the United States is currently under review for being a good article. There has been a question raised concerning the name. Male–female income disparity in the United States and Income inequality in the United States are current articles on Wikipedia; the reason I termed the wage differences among races as the "racial wage gap" in the title is due to the term's prevalence in the literature, at least from what I have seen. I am not extremely familiar with Wikipedia naming procedures, but based on these and economic conventions, do you think the name needs to be changed?KiaraDouds (talk) 16:13, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Request for Comment from peers, Inflation templates
Dear colleagues, I've just added an additional category to the Template:Inflation series covering Measuring Worth's Nominal GDP per capita series for the UK. I'd like advice before fully developing and updating the Inflation series of templates with current data, better footnotes, and non-CPI inflations. See the talk page for the template for the announcement. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:47, 6 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I would like to emphasise my need for assistance here, and note that I've produced a series for US Nominal GDP per capita. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:32, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Question on statement on Economics in "Dimensional analysis"
The section Finance, economics, and accounting has the following statement, which I find surprising as a non-economist.

Dimensional analysis is rarely used in (mainstream/neoclassical) economic modeling,[8] and economic models are often dimensionally inconsistent.[9] The equation of exchange is the most notable example of a dimensional equation in economic modeling,[8] while the widely-used Cobb–Douglas model does not use dimensions in a meaningful way.[10] This lack of dimensional consistency is criticized by heterodox economics, notably Austrian economics,[11] while dimensional consistency is not considered necessary or desirable by mainstream economists.[9][12]

All the references (8–12) are to —

The google scholar search "DIMENSIONS AND ECONOMICS" barnett gave 31 results of which this seemed to be relevant.

They reference

Does that para in Dimensional analysis need more nuance? RDBrown (talk) 01:49, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Most passages about so-called "Austrian economics" should just be cut from the articles.
 * Fred S. Roberts has softened a lot of his previous dogmatic assertions about meaningfulness; the Handbook of Operations Research volume on Public Sector OR has a review.
 * If you want to read about dimension analysis, read Garrett Birkhoff on fluid dynamics or textbooks in applied mathematics for mathematicians. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 02:09, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Fear the Boom and Bust
The article Fear the Boom and Bust survived a speedy deletion last month, and I think that's appropriate -- it's one of the most important popularizations of economics in recent years (at least in my opinion/experience). But I think there's an important point the article is missing: the whole piece (especially the second part) is an Austrian apologetic, not a neutral comparison. (This is clear from the films' backing (Russ Roberts and the Mercatus Center), but also evident from watching the videos with an eye toward perspective.)

I don't feel comfortable editing here, but if someone is willing I'd be obliged.

CRGreathouse (t | c) 15:59, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

The Neoclassical Growth Model - possible error in the graphs
I think the Neoclassical Growth model has a problem with the graphs. I think the labels for the axes should be k NOT K and y NOT Y. Whilst this might appear trivial since they mean different things it means I think our graphs are wrong and misleading and this is quite an important article (B-Class on the project's quality scale.  and High-importance on the project's importance scale.) I don't yet know how to edit the graphs or where to go to find out. I raised this on the article's page a while ago and on the talk page but as yet there has been no response. I might of course be wrong about this - feel free to let me know. Best wishes (Msrasnw (talk) 10:09, 29 November 2011 (UTC))


 * Given that there is a "n" in the graph, and assuming standard notations, you're right. The truth is probably that everyone's too lazy to change it.  Volunteer Marek   10:11, 29 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Could anyone help me by indicating how I might find out how to edit these graph files. I only seem able to edit them as "pictures" rather than as editable images. Does that make sense? And I can't seem to find out where to find out about this. Is it the case that these files are not editable but rather are based on another editable file that we cannot see? (Msrasnw (talk) 17:40, 1 December 2011 (UTC))
 * PS I will try to edit them as pictures but have already made a mess. I will tidy soon.
 * I think its tidied now. (Msrasnw (talk) 00:20, 2 December 2011 (UTC))

WP Economics in the Signpost
The WikiProject Report would like to focus on WikiProject Economics for a Signpost article. This is an excellent opportunity to draw attention to your efforts and attract new members to the project. Would you be willing to participate in an interview? If so, here are the questions for the interview. Just add your response below each question and feel free to skip any questions that you don't feel comfortable answering. Multiple editors will have an opportunity to respond to the interview questions. If you know anyone else who would like to participate in the interview, please share this with them. Have a great day. -Mabeenot (talk) 06:57, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Median voter theorem
A new editor has substantially expanded Median voter theorem but unfortunately much of the new material is inaccurate or irrelevant. I'm working on revising it, but more eyes would be appreciated.

CRGreathouse (t | c) 14:05, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Price controls
Could members please look at the article price controls. Both the sourcing and neutrality appear to be problems. TFD (talk) 22:44, 6 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Hmm. I think it's not too bad in neutrality terms although it could do with broadening a bit. (ie. Why do governments choose bad policies? In what circumstances is the impact mitigated?). The article also concentrates on price controls which force prices down; occasionally governments choose to force prices up instead, with different consequences. Nice to see the historical examples although I'd like to add something on price controls in the Ottoman empire (including a wartime rule that farmers must sell produce to the military at a fixed, low price; this eventually became a cash tax). bobrayner (talk) 23:44, 6 December 2011 (UTC)
 * FWIW, the all payer (or all payer-ish) system of health care prices in Japan controls prices, to some positive reception. (also at Health_care_system_in_Japan) Of course, health care expenditures as a %of GDP is far and away a large enough issue to warrant coverage in the article. Jesanj (talk) 00:39, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Hmm. It's a vexing area as price controls in healthcare are rarely very simple blunt tools, and they're usually part of a more complex regulatory landscape. I don't know what side-effects the Japanese price controls had (do they really count as price controls? That source hints at discussion/agreement), but IIRC when the UK government tried reducing fixed fees paid to dentists for certain kinds of NHS work (which is free at the point of consumption), it suddenly became very difficult for most people to get access to an NHS dentist - ie. dentists didn't accept the fixed state price and preferred to wait for customers who would copay, and sure enough some people who would have been eligible for free treatment chose to open their wallets in order to get their teeth fixed promptly. It would be nice to include a healthcare example, but it could be hard to find a clear example which isn't distorted (at least slightly) by other forces. bobrayner (talk) 01:32, 7 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Are we seriously citing Rothbard for Roman Economic history? "It was tried during the Roman Empire." => Rothbard, Murray. "Price Controls Are Back!". Making Economic Sense. http://freedomkeys.com/pricecontrols5.htm. Retrieved 2008-11-03.
 * And primary sources directly rather than economic historians?
 * And Capitalism "Magazine" an uncontrolled blog?
 * And another wikipedia article????
 * And a fucking Cato position paper for fact "Price controls fail to achieve their proximate aim, which is to reduce prices paid by retail consumers, but such controls do manage to reduce supply." of all things?
 * Friedman from a press conference for fact not opinion?
 * This standard of sourcing is specifically why I participate in the MILHIST project instead of social science of labour, business, socialism, economics and political economy. Half this article is either FRINGE positions in unreliable sources; or, reliable sources of a minor political economic position being cited for weight and fact. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:51, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Ugh. Honestly, the article is bad. And the sources are low quality. And the whole text of the article consists of a "Criticism" section and that's it. It does violate NPOV not to mention just common sense quality standards. The thing is, this is pretty much the average quality for a Economics-related articles, so I don't really see why we should get our panties in a twist over this particular one - most Economics articles (with some "exceptions that prove the rule") are at this level, they (almost) all suck. TFD is just objecting to this particular one for his own peculiar reasons. I dunno, do what you want with it, just don't POVit the other way. Reducing it to a one sentence stub so that at some point someone can actually write a decent article is fine with me.  Volunteer Marek  06:14, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Volunteer Marek, you might want to follow WP:NPA and not use the talk page as an opportunity to attack other editors, especially when you are arguing in favor of their comments. My particlar reason for objecting to this particular article is that I happened to read it recently.  What is your particular reason for responding to this particular discussion thread that I set up?  TFD (talk) 06:22, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * What in the world are you talking about? You want to go and change the article be my guest. My particular reason for responding here was to point out how bad economics articles on Wikipedia are in general. You have a disagreement with that?  Volunteer Marek   06:59, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * To elaborate just a little bit, at this point I've become pretty convinced that it's a lost cause. So yeah, go ahead and try to improve it. I will support you in that though my expectations are low. Especially since - here comes this supposed NPA thing again - I don't think you, or me for that matter, have the patience to carry through.  Volunteer Marek   07:01, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * You are being too pessimistic. However, I cannot find much written about the subject in general.  Here (pp. 218-219) is a link to a brief entry in an economics textbook.  I would not anticipate any objection to presenting the topic in a similar way, would you?  TFD (talk) 18:07, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Broadly speaking, I agree with the honourable Volunteer Marek's first post, but without such colourful words :-)
 * It's not a great article and we should aspire to higher standards, but to be honest it's better than a lot of other stuff out there. (Particularly when you go next door and look at articles on commercial & business concepts). Personally, I tend to work at the lower end of the quality ladder (why spend a week finessing an article from "Adequate" to "Superb" when the same effort would advance a dozen articles from "Crappy" to "Adequate"?). so other than better sourcing and a little broadening, there's not a great deal I'd want to do with this one before moving to the next article full of promotional fluff or POV or fiction.
 * Since MILHIST has been mentioned, I think MILHIST has an advantage - a larger pool of talented editors willing to spend their time on that area - so MILHIST articles tend to be further up the quality ladder by now. If that actually attracts editors from other areas where quality is poorer, then we would have a rather problematic feedback loop. Maybe, after every battleship and general has reached FA, editors might come over here and each fix up one social sciences article? :-)
 * Still, this project should count itself lucky. Have you seen what the Africa project has to deal with? Astrology? Colour? bobrayner (talk) 10:10, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

The Peter Kennedy textbook would fine for the Macro aspect of price controls. However, the current article is more about the Micro aspects. Ideally both should be included (and obviously they're related).  Volunteer Marek  13:38, 8 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Bob, I'm actually seeing a number of astrology topics at the moment. Their prose is good.  Their sourcing is even worse than this (interpretation of primary documents).  It is problematic that MILHIST poaches editors from other fields.  On the other hand, my chief willingness to work on wikipedia is in the review cycle (Why review an article's progress from crappy to adequate, when it is bleedingly obvious, and the difficulty of reviewing is distinguishing adequate and superb?).  I wish I was regularly reviewing A class items from business concepts, political economy, economics, labour and socialism.  But we don't have the combination of successes, interest, and community here.  (If anyone does get something to A / FAC, poke me to review :) Fifelfoo (talk) 22:14, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Yikes
I started to fix up some language problems in Economics, but I think subject-area expertise is needed. The page currently includes this:
 * Micro economics also examines various market structures such as perfect competition (where the market involves a minimum quantity of players and a sufficient quantity of product traded);imperfect competition which includes- monopoly (one dominant or sole supplier in a market) and the affect these kinds of markets have on economic efficiency] ; [[duopoly, which is comprised of two sellers of a product and oligopoly having a large number of buyers and sellers. Monopolistic competition is the most common and realistic from of market structure where there a large number of small producers competing to sell products which are close but not identical substitutes of each other. Here each producer enjoys a monopoly but also face competition.

Seems pretty garbled to me. -- Jo3sampl (talk) 04:10, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Economic and Environmental Studies
FYI: The article about the economical academic journal Articles for deletion/Economic and Environmental Studies is listed for deletion. Night of the Big Wind talk  01:21, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

GIABO
Hi all, GIABO is currently at AfD. All suggestions and !votes welcome... bobrayner (talk) 20:23, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Credit / Money Multiplier
Hi All. I've doing some digging to try to work out who was the first to formally explain how money supply is affected by the reserves that banks hold against their deposits. David Kinley appears to have been the first in this paper titled The Relation of the Credit System to the Value of Money. This is quite significant because this ratio is the basis of the money multiplier and is a significant variable governing monetary policy. If anyone has any better information, please advise - otherwise I may I suggest we update the relevant pages. Pkearney (talk) 02:54, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Please review Motivation crowding theory
A respondent to my request for peer review of Motivation crowding theory suggested that I ask for comments and article improvement ideas here. I am most interested in ideas for expansion. Please respond at Talk:Motivation crowding theory. Thank you! Selery (talk) 16:39, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Possible merger, some problems
Hi all, I suspect that there's a lot of overlap between these two, at least in principle: However, I think both have content issues (one less than the other). What's the best target? Is laborious merge preferable to slash-and-burn? What else needs to be fixed first? Why do birds suddenly appear every time you are near? bobrayner (talk) 00:46, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Unproductive labour in economic theory
 * Productive and unproductive labour


 * They're both nice essays that need to be rewritten as a single encyclopaedia article with better citation standards and a more "encyclopaedically synthetic" tone. I'd suggest merging to Productive and unproductive labour myself.  It is implicit that the topic is in "economic theory" to my mind. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:23, 13 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Unproductive labour in economic theory is a poorly-written POV essay. Productive and unproductive labour is an article that needs a lot of work.  I don't really see anything of value in the former to merge to the latter.  In case I'm wrong I just cleaned up some of the worst parts of that article, but my hopes are low. CRGreathouse (t | c) 21:12, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

WikiWomen's History Month
Hi everyone. March is Women's History Month and I'm hoping a few folks here at WP:Economics will have interest in putting on events (on and off wiki) related to women's roles in economics. We've created an event page on English Wikipedia (please translate!) and I hope you'll find the inspiration to participate. These events can take place off wiki, like edit-a-thons, or on wiki, such as themes and translations. Please visit the page here: WikiWomen's History Month. Thanks for your consideration and I look forward to seeing events take place! SarahStierch (talk) 20:53, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

POV check
Recent edits at Kemeny–Young method‎ should be reviewed for appropriateness. They're mostly by anon IP addresses, but they seem to have a common theme.

I'm not automatically opposed (else I would have undone them) but they look perhaps questionable. Thoughts?

CRGreathouse (t | c) 20:58, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

black economy
It's quite unbelievable that Wikipedia doesn't have an article on the black economy = underground economy. It is not at all the same thing as the black market and it should not be redirected to that article. --Espoo (talk) 20:18, 15 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I'm not clear on what topic you think it should be about. The scope of the black market article is quite broad.  Another possibility would be Informal sector. CRGreathouse (t | c) 21:42, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Added Workfare to the project
It seemed appropriate, given that welfare is already included. I've quickly added a new section to the former about the state of workfare in the UK - any corrections or contributions much appreciated. Jonathan Deamer (talk) 20:20, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

guys can you help me to moderate an article
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_past_and_future_GDP_(nominal)#cite_note-4

the article faces some conflicts, this article is obviously about nominal gdp numbers which means they are about internantional dollar numbers from today, but people posting HSBC numbers which count dollar numbers from 2000 counting inflation and other financial crysis https://www.research.hsbc.com/midas/Res/RDV?ao=20&key=hCmm8WiQC0&n=317638.PDF I will remove the HSBC data since they dont belong there, the people need to make an own article where they can count inflation and all the rest for future gdp numbers.--Shokioto22 (talk) 13:18, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Revision and Expansion of "Elderly Care"
I'm part of a class at Rice University, in the Poverty, Justice & Human Capabilities minor program, that focuses on issues of global inequality. One of note that has not received much traffic on Wikipedia (likely because it is largely ignored in the US and simply because the article is not done in-depth) is Elderly Care. I plan to spend the next several weeks expanding this article in relation to a few WikiProjects: WP:MED, WP:SOCIOLOGY and WP:Economics, of course. Elderly care certainly falls under the category of Economics. The way our parents and grandparents will ultimately be treated and cared for is at the very least a partial result of a nation's economic state. When nursing homes lose funding from the government, conditions in such facilities go down. When caretaker organizations can't afford to pay their in-home workers, the elderly are practically forced to move into a nursing home, often something they are reluctant to do. However, in societies where the elderly are placed at very high precedence, conditions may be different regardless of economic state.

My goal is to increase the web's awareness of global elderly care. Through my research, I want to show people how other nations, both developed and developing, treat their older members of society. I want to stress that because a country is developing does not mean it treats its elderly poorly.

Especially since this is my first contribution to Wikipedia, I would love any and all feedback from fellow WikiProject Economics members and any other members of the Wikipedia community. If you know anything about Geriatrics professionally or recreationally, I would love to hear from you. Also, if you can give me tips on how to stay consistent with writing format of Wikipedia entries, I would greatly accept!

Ellyhutch (talk) 18:40, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Feminist economics
I am planning to contribute to the existing page on feminist economics. Feminist economics is a vital field of economics and if Wikipedia is to be "an authoritative guide to economics" as the goals on this project page state then it must be accurately and fully represented. Currently, the feminist economic page is rated C class and requires substantial additions, revisions and deletions.

Although the current feminist economics page is a start, it would greatly benefit from substantive additions, reorganization and, perhaps most importantly, an increased focus on theory. Such changes would better represent the scholarly depth of feminist economics and would provide a better representation of the contributions of feminists to the field of economics. Feminist economics are highly concerned with areas that are central to all economic analysis from markets, to paid work, to development, to the informal economy. Indeed, as the project page states "various economic theories and viewpoints should be given due weight in proportion to their prominence in reliable sources." Feminist economic theories and ideas are rapidly gaining prominence in economic literature and theory as well as are finding application by economic organizations including the World Bank. As a result, the presence of feminist economics on Wikipedia should be proportional to the presence of feminist economics in the field of economics, which it currently is not.

Additionally, the page would greatly benefit from a shifted-focus to the true economic roots of feminist economics. Consequently, I plan to better connect the feminist economics page with existing economics pages and include more references to the basic ideas of economics as a field.

In order to achieve this I plan to draw heavily on the three volume feminist economics series edited by Benería, May and Strassmann, released in 2011. The volumes are broken into three parts 1) Feminism, Economics, and Well-Being 2) Households, Paid and Unpaid Work and the Economy and 3) Global Perspectives on gender. It seems that a presentation along these lines may be more fruitful in presenting a broader and more accurate illustration of the breadth of feminist economic inquiry. These works also provide a multitude of collected journal articles and book chapters that I plan to draw on as references (a lacking feature of the current article). I hope that through this work the feminist economics page can be raised to a standard more equivalent to the traditional "economics" page that is focused on theory, clearly presented and inclusive of many citations. I look forward to working on this project and would greatly appreciate any feedback, especially regarding feminist economics' relationship to broad economic interests, theories and insights and other WikiProjectEconomics pages to which the feminist economics page should link.

Virginiawhite09 (talk) 04:22, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Editing the International Monetary Fund Page
After reading through the current International Monetary Fund, I feel that the page portrays the IMF too narrowly and omits many of the main controversies. Not all of the perspectives on the IMF are included or even touched upon. Understanding the IMF’s lending in terms of the conditions and policy implications is crucial for developing awareness and education about this organization. I plan to add a section on Lending including the benefits and consequences of conditionality. The current article is dominated by criticisms of the IMF; there is not enough information on the IMF’s global economic role. Let me know your thoughts! QuincyC (talk) 05:17, 9 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Sounds good, be bold, go for it. I'm sure if there are objections, someone will bring them up. LK (talk) 09:51, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Inclusion of Malnutrition in WP:Economics
After extensive revision to the existing article, I am advocating the inclusion of the “Malnutrition” article to WP: Economics. Currently the article is in WP:MED, but this leaves out how economic issues affect the prevalence of malnutrition in the world. The addition of the article to the WikiProject would broaden the scope of the project, and demonstrate how integral economics is to many aspects of human life. Many fundamental aspects of the article need correction and clarification. For example, here is UNICEF's definition:

(http://www.unicef.org/progressforchildren/2006n4/malnutritiondefinition.html). The current article does not reflect this definition, focusing instead on nutrient deficiencies. Many aspects of malnutrition (though not thoroughly discussed in the current article) relate to economics, especially food distribution, poor food security, and poverty. Economic growth can help to alleviate malnutrition, but other obstacles stand in the way of eradicating it completely. Amartya Sen’s work on poverty and famines is cited in the article, and I feel that more discussions on the economic causes of malnutrition would greatly improve the current article. People, especially women, with low socioeconomic standing are disproportionately affected by malnutrition. As my contribution is for a “Poverty, Gender, and Development” course, I will be adding a section on gender issues relating to malnutrition. Inequalities in malnutrition in a household can arise, especially if there is a large gap in bargaining power between members. As one can see, the field of economics is tied directly to the issue of malnutrition, so the inclusion of the article in this WikiProject is necessary.

Through my research I have sought well-founded arguments and credible research, but I am seeking feedback and input on the most crucial theories of economics that apply to malnutrition. I would also appreciate feedback concerning the validity of the cited economic research, so that complete and truthful facts on malnutrition are available for everyone’s knowledge. Through this process, I seek to raise awareness of the causes and effects of malnutrition, and advocate thinking on possible solutions and policy changes that could diminish the extent of malnutrition. Khatchell (talk) 08:11, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Inclusion of Occupational Segregation in WP:Economics
I am planning on making substantial additions to the "Occupational Segregation" article as part of an assignment for my class on Poverty, Gender, and Development at Rice University. Occupational Segregation is a vital topic in economics because it results in numerous negative consequences not only for women, but also for families as units and for society as a whole. For those WIkipedians unfamiliar with the term Occupational Segregation, a bit of an explanation might be in order. Horizontal Occupational Segregation refers to segregation between occupations, and it allows for professions that consist of a majority of women to be remain both lower in status and lower in pay than other occupations. Vertical Occupational Segregation, in some cases known as ghettoization, refers to the relegation of women to the worse jobs within a given occupation. The "glass ceiling" that women face in their attempts to rise up a hierarchy and a pay scale is an example of vertical segregation. Being a sociology major, I am somewhat comfortable in researching and explaining the social causes and consequences of Occupational Segregation. I plan on greatly expanding the "Types" and "Causes" sections of the article. In addition, I plan on adding a "Consequences" section and a "Social Policy Aimed at Eliminating Occupational Segregation" sections. I must admit, however, that my understanding of economics is somewhat rudimentary, and I would really appreciate any assistance that anyone might be able to give me on the specific economic concepts relevant to occupational segregation. K Gagalis (talk • contribs) 11:00, 9 March 2012 (UTC) ````

GDP by sector: Economy of Slovenia
I see that in the example listed at Template talk:Infobox economy (for Canada), the shares of GDP by sector sum to 100%. I wish to add the information about GDP by sectors to the infobox in Economy of Slovenia, but the table listed in my source (3. BRUTO DOMAČI PROIZVOD (3=1+2), by the Slovenian Institute of Macroeconomic Analysis and Development) also includes the item "correction rates" in the table, if it is to make 100%. Should I list "correction rates" in the infobox and if I do, where should I link it? The first item (A) cites agriculture, forestry, fishing. Should I merge it as 'agriculture' or as 'primary sector'? --Eleassar my talk 11:47, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * What are the two corrections, "a" and "b"? Sorry, I don't speak Slovenian. Correction "b" is some flavour of subsidy...? If the "corrections" are not very large, and if they're all aggregate (it's not possible to get numbers for a and b which are broken down for individual sectors) then I think that the best way to report GDP of specific sectors is to use the pre-correction percentages and add a footnote. So, your infobox might say that in 2010, manufacturing provided 20% of GDP (6273.4/31309.9) plus a footnote pointing out that this is before correction for X and Y and Z. Does that sound reasonable?
 * Are there any other sources? Sources like Eurostat are generally a good idea if you want numbers which can be compared consistently between different countries... bobrayner (talk) 13:27, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the advice. There is the corrections line (see "korektivne postavke") in addition to agriculture, industry and services. I don't know what it is about. I'll try to use international or at least English-language sources where available, but I don't know why economywatch.com is marked as spam and also see there may be some differences between the sources. Is the CIA World Factbook a reliable source? --Eleassar my talk 17:55, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Ok, the general consensus seems to be that it is, but I don't understand why in some cases official sources differ from it. I don't believe anyone is intentionally making up the data. --Eleassar my talk 00:18, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Merge discussion for List of U.S. minimum wages
An article that you have been involved in editing, List of U.S. minimum wages, has been proposed for a merge with another article. If you are interested in the merge discussion, please participate by going, and adding your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. Metallurgist (talk) 17:57, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Expanding on Measuring Capabilities
I am proposing to add to the article titled Capability Approach, I would like to further contribute to the subsection that covers the measuring of capabilities. The current section needs further explanation for the critique offered by Capabilities Approach of economics-based measures that are used as measures of well-being. These indices, in fact, only offer an indication of possible economic well being that do not account for inequalities such as income distribution. There is quite a bit to be added about the need for such measures and the history behind such measures, which would include the misuse of Gross Domestic Product and Gross National Product. Further expansion is also necessary on the move towards alternative measure of wellbeing that better capture the essence of Capabilities. In addition, more information needs to be added because the critique of economics-based measures is an important component of Capabilities Approach. Furthermore, the explanations of the Human Development Index, Gender Empowerment Measure, and the Gender-related Development Index are brief and there is potential to make the definitions of these measures as well as the use of the measures and the relationship with Capabilities Approach more clear. I would appreciate any feedback that would improve my proposal and revision of the subsection. I look forward to contributing. LupeAguilera (talk) 03:17, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Economics sidebar: Mathematical ... methods
Outside thoughts are requested for the economics sidebar. One question is whether the term the JEL 's Mathematical and Quantitative Methods should be called "Technical Methods", following the old New Palgrave (but not the current NP, which follows the JEL). Another question is whether game theory should be classified among the mathematical/quantitative methods (per JEL) or among the economic subfields, alongside information economics and industrial organization. Thanks, Kiefer.Wolfowitz  (Discussion) 08:56, 11 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Let me add a bit more to the above. IMO some background may help here. A quick overview of a  relevant earlier discussion is at Template talk:Economics sidebar, 1st para.  with striking parallels to later discussion (and yet to come).
 * A separate matter from KW’s concerns above is particular links under the contested heading ("Technical methods" or  "Mathematical & quantitative methods"), in particular to-be-discussed (re)-adds of links to that sidebar section as to fewer or  more.  Earlier variations on this were discussed at Template talk:Economics sidebar.
 * * The earlier "Techniques" (sic) link in the Econ sidebar was to  JEL classification codes), as are current competing sidebar labels listed above.  "Technical methods" is being proposed as a heading label [for the same JEL] link (irrespective of the JEL classification system used in the 2008 NP).   It does appear that current discussants have had some  substantial things to say  on the issue of  Template talk:Economics sidebar, especially inviting comment there.
 * Placement of Game theory may be better here focussed in a separate (sub)section on that subject, rather than mixing it in passing in a (sub)section primarily on another subject, making even a headcount possibly problematic.
 * Personal time lines will limit my contributions to Template talk:Economics sidebar in the immediate future. No matter.  I’ll get back there as soon as I can. I do believe that recent discussion will assist in weighing competing template alternatives.  Thanks.  –Thomasmeeks (talk) 15:01, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I believe that the template has many of the dysfunctions of the Monty Hall problem, that is, Thomas and I have been discussing first principles and arguing over content. I am tired of arguing, and instead I would like some agreement that the template should follow the consensus of the economics profession---i.e., the JEL classification system, and a rather standardized M.A. curriculum, each of which precisely specifies the core methods and fields of economics.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz  (Discussion) 15:43, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I have added a bracketed term to my 2nd sentence of paragraph (*) above and changed the piped heading above to "[Economics] sidebar: Mathematical [...] methods" for explicitness (with brackets to indicate adds). --Thomasmeeks (talk) 16:22, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Time stamp here to avert premature archiving. -- TM 17:54, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Feedback on 3 questions raised here about Template:Economics sidebar
Please provide some feedback, now that you have seen the info-box for a month: Thanks! Best regards, Kiefer .Wolfowitz 18:41, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
 * 1) Should it be reverted?
 * 2) Should the long "Mathematical and quantitative methods" be renamed to "mathematical and statistical methods" or to "Mathematical methods" or even to "quantitative methods" (sic, imho).
 * 3) Is the section too long? Should some of the topics be dropped or moved elsewhere?
 * Generally, I prefer sticking to JEL whenever possible. I wouldn't mind shortening the long section name to "Mathematical methods" just for conciseness, but even there I feel the full form best describes the section -- strictly, I would only call the first five "mathematical", the last two are rather "statistical" (which I suppose can be lumped fairly easily with mathematical) and experimental economics, which doesn't really fit with the others.
 * CRGreathouse (t | c) 21:01, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Music to my ears! :-)
 * "and quantitatitive" is redundant, as I've noted many times (following C.S. Peirce). Statistics is a mathematical science, so that "Mathematical methods" can serve as a shorter title.
 * Keeping the current length, I favor the substitution of "statistical" for "quantitative", because experimental economics employs one of the two main methods of scientific statistics, experimentation (the other being sampling); these core empirical-scientific fields are the primary reason that statistics is not a subfield of applied mathematics, but rather a mathematical science. Your calling these other areas statistical (rather than mathematical) is correct and important, imho.
 * If we keep "national account(s/ing)" as a method, then it is more of an official statistics topic than a mathematical topic, so statistical is again an apt descriptor. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 20:07, 14 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Agree with CRGreathouse, that to avoid conflict, it's probably best to stick with JEL categories. I also agree with the change from "Mathematical & quantitative methods" to "Mathematical & statistical methods". IMO, 'quantitative' methods (as opposed to 'qualitative') can be deemed to include 'mathematical methods'. LK (talk) 02:51, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Charles S. Peirce criticized the use of "quantitative" for "mathematical", particularly in Germany. Topology is an important part of mathematical economics, in addition to order/lattice theory and other non-numerical topics. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 02:55, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree that "quantitative" is not the same as "mathematical", which is why I used the words "can be deemed". However, when people speak of qualitative vs quantitative work, they usually would lump mathematical economics on the quantitative side. I think its best to avoid the term, due to the ambiguity. LK (talk) 10:12, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Time-stamp marker here to avert premature archiving per ongoing efforts to narrow differences related to the above discussion. Thanks. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 17:54, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

I index the following for ease of reference.

0T. I have edited the subheading to the above for more specificity and transparency. The top editor (KW) subsequently changed  the Econ sidebar heading from “Mathematical & quantitative methods” (the JEL-link name  to the current  “Mathematical & statistical methods” Template heading). Of course, my concern below is to improve the Template, not to suggest otherwise of any other discussant.

1T. For the record, Template discussion as to variations on the same subject has been ongoing since 3 December 2010 by the same 2 parties. In November 2010, one them changed the Template heading at issue to “Methods”. Its predecessor was “Techniques” with a duration was almost 2 years (13 December 2008-10 to November 2010. Its initial placement followed discussion that began on 24 October 2008 (here). There were 5 discussants along the way to "Techniques". Final discussion accompanying the heading change to "Techniques" is in what became a subsection here.

2T. 2nd question of the top Edit:
 * Should the long "Mathematical and quantitative methods" be renamed to "mathematical and statistical methods" or to "Mathematical methods" or even to "quantitative methods" (sic, imho).

is problematic for several reasons.#§  It is a biased question in referring exclusively to alternatives the first editor favored  (except for “Quantitative methods” set off  by the  pejorative  “(sic, imho)”) but not to the template heading of “Technical methods” favored by the other discussant (me) on the Template talk page. So, a “Yes” to “Technical methods” is excluded by the question.

# The 1st question at the top:
 * ''Please provide some feedback, now that you have seen the info-box for a month:
 * Should it be reverted?

presumably on reverting the Template heading from “Mathematical & quantitative methods” to its predecessor “Econometrics”, is now moot but open to the similar problems. Both were favored by KW over “Technical methods”, which was favored by the other discussant (me). So, a “Yes” to either works against “Technical methods”  by suppressing it as an option. Arguments for “Technical methods” over “Mathematical methods” as the heading  are at Template talk:Economics sidebar  at  (3T, 5T-6T, & 9.1T)  in Jan. 2011.

§ The 3rd question at the top, which I welcome, has been discussed on Template talk subsequent to the top edit here (Template talk:Economics sidebar) in  passing. I believe that further simplification of the Template section that follows the heading  back to where it was on 10 November 2010 would significantly improve the Template, but that piecemeal & simultaneous discussion here might work at cross purposes to the heading question. The latter can be settled independently of the former, although simplicity as a criterion applies to both.

3T. The 2nd question looks a lot like a poll, which is deprecated in a WP:Guideline (Polling is not a substitute for discussion and following) -- for one thing because it may unnecessarily polarize discussants, rather than leaving room for discussion or in any way constraining a proposed heading by reasons. If polling is the path taken, however, IMO it should include arguments on the other side from Template talk:Economics sidebar. Omission of such arguments would tend to skew discussion by short-circuiting relevant Template talk content & locking in an option that might be rejected if arguments on the other side had been presented at the same time. Presenting arguments after the “vote” by others may also lock in one alternative, not a good thing if it is prejudicial to consideration of the neglected alternative. IMO, that runs against the WikiProject Economics statement that “[t]he vision of this project is to improve every economics article...,” presumably including those with the templates in them.

Now the above discussion might be crying over spilt milk -- except that it could happen again & again &...

4T. I hope that my holding off comment on this subsection until now would have worked toward a consideration of “Technical methods” on its own merits and despite the above, and I acknowledge that no one has in this section has to this point argued against Technical methods.

5T. Earlier and still-relevant general arguments for “Technical methods” at Template talk:Economics sidebar IMO also apply to “Technical methods” over “Mathematical & statistical methods”. Let me restate them here:
 * 5.1T. "Technical methods" as a heading is a general but restrictive term that facilitates transitioning to, among others, a more specific term below it, namely 'mathematical' in Mathematical economics.  Of course, the general-specific paradigm  is common one for headings. The trick is to make the heading restrictive enough.
 * 5.2T. 'Technical' has 2 [Merriam-Webster] dictionary definitions – (2b): "relating to  ... a practical subject organized on scientific principles" and (4):  as an adjective cognate of  'technique'.  'Technique' itself has corresponding suitable definition – (2a)  here: "a body of technical methods (as in a craft or in scientific research)."  The definitions above include 'scientific principles' & 'scientific research' in them, similar to terms one of the discussants above invoked (appropriately IMO).
 * 5.3T. "Mathematical & statistical methods" is still about twice as long as the other Template headings and "Technical methods", fills the whole line (unusually), and in so doing goes against a WP:STYLE guideline ("Neither too narrow nor too broad").  The heading-length concern  goes back to 2008.
 * 5.4T. In The New Palgrave: A Dictionary of Economics (1987), there is a Subject Index, which at (9) has a classification category for the New Palgrave articles called "Techniques" that approximates  JEL classification codes (the JEL-section link of the Template heading) in including under it such subheadings as  "Mathematical Economics", "Mathematical Methods " [thus distinguished from "ME"], "Accounting, Private and Social," and "Econometrics" (below which are respective New Palgrave article listings). So, again, that is a WP:VER usage more supportive of  “Technical methods”  than "Mathematical and statistical methods."  Technical methods  is simpler and  more concise than Mathematical & statistical methods. Most readers, esp. including most general readers, may appreciate such austere user-friendliness in a section heading, particularly in a sidebar template.  Conversely,  unnecessary heading words and the alternate heading  might discourage interest in both the heading link and links in the section below the heading.
 * 5.5T. The Preface to The New Palgrave (2008), 2nd Edition, v. 1, p. ix, has this statement by the editors:
 * ''[Since the 1st New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics edition in 1987, econ] has grown enormously in analytical and technical sophistication....
 * That suggests that 'technical' is still appropriate today in the template heading.

All the above is relevant to comments before the top edit. Let me note comments made thereafter on the Talk:Template page that point in the same direction as to "Technical methods" over "Mathematical & statistical methods".
 * 5.6T. For one thing, Economic statistics was removed from Template:Economics sidebar per comments initiated by others at Template talk:Economics sidebar. Its presence in the sidebar may have tipped discussion to the (current) sidebar heading "Mathematical & statistical methods", to the undue disadvantage of  “Technical methods”.
 * 5.7T. "Mathematical & statistical methods" may be decomposed into its implied parts: "Mathematical methods" and "statistical methods". So what about the “Mathematical methods”  part of the heading?  That too has problems as noted at Template talk:Economics sidebar at  (22T & 22TT) and the, may I say, forthright discussion that followed:
 * 22T. An additional argument against the 'Mathematical' portion of  "Mathematical and quantitative methods" is its ambiguity.  Within mathematical economics a "mathematical method" may refer to relevant higher-level methods in math (beyond geometry), like matrix algebra.  That’s how the term is used in Chiang (2005), Fundamental Methods of Mathematical Economics (per fn. 1 of Mathematical economics) and The New Palgrave: A Dictionary of EconomicsSubject Index for example.  The heading of  "Mathematical & ...  methods" misleadingly suggests that Math econ itself is one of the "mathematical methods", rather than a user'' of such methods.  "Technical  methods" as a heading avoids that  misleading suggestion.
 * 22TT. Put more strongly, the heading should not strongly suggest a misconception. If further evidence is needed,  The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics (2008) classifies Debreu's superb "Math econ" article under Econ Methodology (v. 8, p. 857, B4), not under JEL:M&QM. That's hard to explain if "Math econ" is well described as a "Math method"....
 * I added as a corollary there that any heading that encourages bad math-econ diction (like "Math ... methods") as to placement of Mathematical economics  under that heading can't be right, & one that avoids such (like "Technical methods")  may be right.  So, that’s another argument in favor of  "Technical methods" over “Mathematical ... methods”.  –Thomasmeeks (talk) 22:07, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

P.S. The change of the Template:Economics sidebar section name to "Technical methods" was made earlier. TM 13:50, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Feedback on 3rd question above as to size of 'Technical methods' section of Template:Economics sidebar
At long last I have added a new subsection 2.3 at Template talk:Economics sidebar to allow an opportunity for comment there (or here) on the 3rd question at the top of the previous subsection for an edit dated 12 May 2011:
 * Is the section too long? Should some of the topics be dropped or moved elsewhere?

My somewhat abbreviated response here is: yes, yes, and thank you for asking. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 13:50, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I have recently added a couple of points to subsection 2.3 at Template talk:Economics sidebar after responding to collateral discussion at Talk:Mathematical economics.  I am commencing to implement the above proposal on the Econ sidebar. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 11:04, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

New Article Gender Inequality Index
I am a student at the University of Utah taking a class on Gender Economic Development and as part of my course work I am planning on creating the article Gender inequality Index (GII) which is a new measurement of gender discrimination built off of the same framework as the Human Development Index (HDI). The (GII) is a replacement for the Gender-related Development Index and the Gender Empowerment Measure which have been the primary measurements of gender inequality since 1995. The (GII) exposes gender discrimination using three dimensions; reproductive health, empowerment, and the labor market whereas the Gender-related Development Index and the Gender Empowerment Measure which focused on income levels and left out other aspects of inequality. The (GII) is used in conjunction with the Human Development Index (HDI) and can not be used independently. Depending on the level of the (GII) it negatively impacts the Human Development Index (HDI) score and because no country has perfect gender equality all countries are negatively impacted. I feel the (GII) is an extremely important topic to cover among the Wikipedia community and a good contribution in the areas of Gender Studies, International Development, Economics, and the United Nations projects. Any comments or suggestions are greatly appreciated and welcome. Teashias (talk) 05:04, 14 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Look for review articles or scholarly encyclopaedia articles (ie: SAGE encyclopaedias aimed at scholars) to determine the broad scale structure and weight of the article. Then find scholarly secondary sources to fill in the structure, facts, importance, criticisms.  Finally, look for lower quality secondary sources (media coverage, for example) to finalise the article.  Be wary of using material contributed by activist agencies, and consider our sourcing policy when doing so.  Your contribution sounds like a valuable addition to the encyclopaedia, good luck! Fifelfoo (talk) 00:09, 29 March 2012 (UTC)


 * See Global Gender Gap Report.—Wavelength (talk) 00:59, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Measuring/Valuing Unpaid Work
I plan to write a Wikipedia article on the measurement and valuation of unpaid labor. I will include the different methods that feminist economists have proposed to accomplish this, as well as arguments for and against these quantifications. Data acquisition methods include: time use data, survey questions, in-depth interviews, diaries, participant observation, and the inclusion of multitasking. Some problems included in these methods are collecting accurate information, ease of comparability across societies, the lack of adequate universal language, and the complexity of domestic labor and the separation of unpaid labor categories.

The valuation methods proposed fall into several main categories: opportunity cost, replacement cost, input and output costs, and outputs of care. There are a host of different problems associated with these valuation methods, which include the difficulty of deciding which monetary levels are to be chosen for each of these methods, as well as the problems of using the market system to determine values.

This topic needs to be expanded on Wikipedia, as it is only minimally addressed under Feminist Economics, Theory and Methodology: Domestic Systems. On the Labor Force site, it does mention the issue briefly under Paid and Unpaid Labor: Unpaid Labor and Gender, as well as on the Work Intensity article page, as it is mentioned under Multitasking, and the Labor Economics site, under Criticisms of Labor Economics and Recent Research. Although on all of these sites unpaid labor is mentioned, it is only explained enough to say that it exists, and that the attempts to measure it exist as well. I plan on revising an existing article subsection, specifically: Feminist Economics, 2.1 Domestic systems, under 2. Theory and methodology of the Feminist Economics article. There are also multiple other articles which I will add a few sentences to, along with a link to the revised article (mentioned above).

I would like feedback on the general arguments for and against, and the other info I plan to include – perhaps some reference suggestions or just points to include? Thanks!

Fmveblen (talk) 21:07, 18 March 2012 (UTC)Fmveblen


 * This sounds like a great project. There's not a lot of coverage of the informal economy in Wikipedia at the moment. Be careful to follow the guidelines WP:NPOV and WP:OR. CRGreathouse (t | c) 03:00, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
 * You should ask your teacher to provide you with an annotated bibliography of the large literature from the 1970s on the Labour theory of value and domestic housework ("reproduction of labour"). Also, Arthur Stinchcombe discussed the USA family farm being uneconomical except for wives' unpaid labor subsidizing the family farm. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 19:52, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
 * This sounds like a massive field, and I'd love you to fully contribute encyclopaedic articles on unpaid labour. Remember that surplus value is unpaid labour because (following Harry Cleaver in Reading Capital Politically on the contestability of categories), the wage rate is politically determined as "socially necessary".  This is a massive field, so restricting work to unpaid domestic labour in proletarian households might be a good idea to actually get your assignment completed.  Incidentally, unpaid domestic labour in proletarian households is the central point of research interest in the wages for housework controversy. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:13, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

New article notice: Feminization of Agriculture
I plan on adding an article titled Feminization of Agriculture. Its going to focus on the recent (last 30 years or so) trends of gendered labor in the agricultural sectors of the undeveloped world. As the phenomenon has been focused there, i will discuss the trends and effects for primarily Africa and Latin America.

A discussion of this concept is very important as it has no coverage on the wikipedia yet has been studied for over twenty years! The economics of agriculture in these regions would make an important addition to the wikipedia's coverage. There are a number of important sociological developments in these sectors. I will include an analysis of the liberalization process and it's effects on the family dynamics in rural areas.

I have a few articles and books from which to derive the article, but there is always more to add, thus if there are any reputable sources that might be of benefit, I would be happy to include them. If you have any contributions to add feel free to comment or message. Thekappen (talk) 07:15, 19 March 2012 (UTC)


 * This sounds like a quite interesting article. The only tidbit on Wikipedia I could find which was relevant was in the Labor Force article Labor_force. One thing though - while you can focus on "recent" trends and Latin America and Africa, you should have at least a little bit of a background section to make sure the article is broad enough. A bit of economic history here wouldn't hurt. I'll try to provide more specific suggestions and references here as this develops. Volunteer Marek 23:50, 28 March 2012 (UTC)


 * This sounds like an excellent contribution. While I expect that there'd be a link between proletarianisation and feminisation, I would be interested to see if you find this borne out in the high quality literature of African and Latin American experiences.  IIRC, feminisation of agriculture in Vietnam was connected with proletarianisation, commodification and valorisation through the fish sauce taxing events and their extended sequelae. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:01, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Whats Happenning Here?
Are you kidding. Every one of these comments covers the needs of the individual and not those for a proper encyclopedic presentation of the subject of Economics per se. In particular the matter of Macroeconomics needs to be better defined and the various details sorted out into a locical and comprehensive order under various sub-headings. I doubt if the present editor has appreciated how important this matter is because the situation has not improved over the few months I have been reviewing it.

Should the managers of this subject require some assistance, then I am willing to oblige but I feel that I would need a course on Wikipedia in general before my attempts of improvement would have some useful output. Also I would appreciate if the various critics had a knowledge and ability to express themselves which at least matches what I am likely to say! I am not a new-comer to Macroeconomics and have written and am writing on it quite frequently although my academic degree is in MSc science/engineering of a different kind. The claim for verifiable material is difficult. Not every treatment can be verified and certainly not all of them are sufficiently accepted by the economic community as to be true facts. My interest in macroeconomics comes from my awareness about how badly this general subject seems to be understood and taught and by the fact that I wish to see some better kinds of improvements based on logic rather then premiss.Macrocompassion (talk) 14:28, 21 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Find a topic that interests you. Discover the full gamut of literature on the topic, hopefully through field reviews.  Note which types of macro-economic analysis have contributed to this field: "Mainstream," Keynsian / neo-Keynsian, heterodox, etc.  Think about structure and weighting, especially in terms of what a reader will require, and what the high quality literature demands be said.  If there is a major heterodox analysis, consider creating a sub-article, ie, "Austrian analysis of commodity pricing" instead of "Commodity pricing" being dominated by a too large Austrian section.  Good luck and keep in touch. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:04, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Revision and Expansion of the "Social Risk Management (SRM)" Entry
As part of a course project for the Poverty, Justice and Human Capabilities class offered at Rice University, I intend to revise and expand the entry titled "Social Risk Management (SRM)". The Social Risk Management page is a short entry regarding a World Bank conceptual framework for efficient risk management. This is a crucial application of economics in the field of international development. Revision and expansion of this entry page to include background that led to the creation of this conceptual framework, detailed strategies and terminology proposed and defined by the World Bank and the current and future implications of the approach can make this entry a resourceful for economists in general and development economists in particular. I would like to request the members of WikiProject Economics for suggestions to improve the page through reorganization and addition of content. Please feel free to propose changes in addition to the ones mentioned above that you would like to see on the page and any questions you would like to have answered by the entry. Thank you.Kjhooda (talk) 06:16, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Remember that Social Risk Management should portray the common scholarly opinion, primarily, with secondary scholarly opinions and professional (ie: World Bank) opinions being given secondary importance in the discussion. Within that caveat your suggested expansion sounds great.  Remember our WP:Reliable Sources policy while writing! Fifelfoo (talk) 02:12, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the reminder Fifelfoo! I have added some modifications to the Social Risk Management page and would love your feedback on it.Kjhooda (talk) 11:45, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:HighBeam
HighBeam describes a limited opportunity for Wikipedia editors to have access to HighBeam Research. —Wavelength (talk) 17:40, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Helicopter drop
I am working on a draft article to explain the concept of the helicopter drop. You can find it here - User:Remember/Helicopter drop. Please help me make it better. Remember (talk) 12:08, 9 April 2012 (UTC)


 * I feel like I heard a nice quote on the topic, something like "if you think we can't fight deflation, I know a central banker from [Zimbabwe? Nigeria? somewhere else?] who knows how to handle it." Wish I could remember... CRGreathouse (t | c) 15:19, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Review for Economic history of Argentina
Economic history of Argentina was nominated for Good Article status in late January, however it's still waiting for a review. Can someone from the WikiProject take a look at it and help in the decision of whether it should, or should not, be recognized as a good article? Thank you.--eh bien mon prince (talk) 18:52, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Dilemma - Felix's Corollary?
I have a dilemma regarding some content in the Rule of 72 article. The article describes Felix's Corollary - from a web search, I've been unable to find a reference to Felix's Corollary that does not stem from the Wikipedia article. It seems that it came to be in an edit by an ip user back in 2007 ( here ), but it has no references or other evidence that it is not WP:OR. Does anyone have any insights about this corollary that might merit its being kept as part of the article? If not, it seems it should be removed. —Zach425 talk / contribs 19:48, 14 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Good catch! It should be removed until some reliable reference is found. I have done so. LK (talk) 08:17, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Template:Economics sidebar:
Thomas Meeks has proposed replacing with on the Template:Economics sidebar.
 * "mainstream and heterodox"
 * "heterodox economics"

Please comment.

Kiefer .Wolfowitz 17:26, 22 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Not quite (per the above as a description of my proposal, on which see below).
 * Per subsection below, I hope that comments would be directed to Template talk:Economics sidebar. -- Thomasmeeks (talk) 20:39, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Econ sidebar: on restoring "Heterodox approaches" there by rm "Mainstream econ"

 * My proposal on the above is at Template talk:Economics sidebar, described more accurately in the heading there than KW has done in the section immediately above ("Template:Economics sidebar:"). In response to his suggestion there, I specifically requested there that discussion continue there, not on this page:
 * IMO, discussion ought to be concentrated here [that is at Template talk:Economics sidebar ...] Still, I'd be happy to put a neutral notice at [Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Economics]. But that seems premature now, & I'd hope that it would be unnecessary.
 * The point of discussion there is not to have discussion in this section preempt discussion there.
 * I hope that any comments would be directed there, not here, so that all discussion would be in one place to ensure a more informed discussion.
 * I reiterate my request that, if KW has additional comments to make, he does so there. Thanks.  --Thomasmeeks (talk) 19:36, 22 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't have the time or eyesight to deal with another discussion with you. Kiefer .Wolfowitz 19:51, 22 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you for preserving the sub-heading title in your Edit summary.
 * I do believe that positive things have come from our, I'm sorry to say, incredibly extended exchanges at Template talk:Economics sidebar and hope to comment on that in due course there.
 * Adieu or another time. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 20:39, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Tiny stub, maybe merge?
Please comment at Talk:Leather currency as to what should happen to this tiny stub. There are several possible merge targets, such as banknote or history of money or Chinese currency. D O N D E groovily  Talk to me  00:04, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

WikiProject Council/Proposals/Copyright
This proposal is related to copyrights. Feel free to discuss. --George Ho (talk) 16:51, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Title of the financial crisis article
Hello folks,

We're currently having a discussion on what should be the appropriate title for the article about the financial crisis, which is currently called 2007–2012 global financial crisis. To summarize the discussion till now, most of us agree that the "crisis" ended sometime between 2009 and 2011 - which should be reflected in the title. Our main problem seems to be gathering conclusive sources.

I was wondering if people here have any inputs regarding this. Kindly contribute your thoughts and suggestions to the discussion: here

Thanks,  S Pat   talk 15:57, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

MIT/Harvard Economic Complexity Project
I'm part of a project at MIT/Harvard that has created a product tree map generator found at the MIT/Harvard Observatory of Economic Complexity. These product treemaps communicate a lot of information quickly, and can be used in different ways to illustrate a nation's imports or exports, compare countries, see who imports or exports any product. We've been starting to place export treemaps on country pages or, if the country has one, "economy of x country". We're hoping that others might find them useful on different pages. The treemaps can be generated at MIT/Harvard Observatory of Economic Complexity.

Would appreciate any feedback as we're newbies on Wikipedia. What advice would you guys have for how to find people who might be into this sort of thing on Wikipedia? The Wikiproject Economics Page seemed a good place to start asking for help. Thanks! --Doubleodd (talk)

Here are a few examples of the treemaps:




 * They look nice, and they're data-rich - as long as they're based on reliable sources, what's not to like? However, if they're slicing up trade by sector and by country, then country articles might not be the only place to put them - a few sector-specific articles could benefit from them too (ie. International trade in Food) and this is an area where en.wikipedia seems to be quite weak at the moment.
 * Thanks. The sector specific suggestion is a good one. Any other advice for a newbie on how to network effectively within Wikipedia around something like this? --Doubleodd (talk)
 * Maybe you could have a browse of the village pump or the community portal - although the latter is mostly a place to look for new work to do, and it seems like you already have a to-do list! If you have any random little queries, feel free to drop in on my talkpage - it'll make a nice change from the controversial stuff and drama that usually lands on my talkpage. bobrayner (talk) 19:16, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

AfD/Michael Rowbotham
I've nominated Michael Rowbotham, an article under the auspices of this Wikiproject, for deletion. Please comment here: WP:Articles for deletion/Michael Rowbotham (2nd nomination) Thanks, LK (talk) 08:03, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Outdated articles?
Comments on Village_pump_(idea_lab) will be appreciated, so we can get a general perspective on this. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 13:32, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

WikiProject Globalization proposal
Hi WikiProject Economics members, A few of us are trying to get a WikiProject Globalization up and running. Members of this project would work together to improve the quality of articles on Wikipedia on Globalization, global issues and related topics. If you're interested in globalization, please come by and check out our proposal. We'd appreciate any feedback about our ideas, and of course your support if you were interested in lending it. Thanks, DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 11:39, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Structural economic problems (current)
Hi all, I have sent Structural economic problems (current) to AfD. Your comments would be welcome. bobrayner (talk) 16:44, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Useful work growth theory is also at AfD now; again, the sage words of WikiProject Economics folk are particularly welcome. bobrayner (talk) 22:25, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Globalization
The article Globalization has undergone major re-structuring. WikiProject Economics members are invited to review and comment on the article and add relevant missing information or sections in which your project may have an interest. Also, you may be interested in reviewing the updated WikiProject Council/Proposals/Globalization proposal for a new WikiProject. Regards, Meclee (talk) 14:32, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

Internal devaluation
The page on this subject refers to "propaganda by Keynesian economists." I see no reason to connect internal devaluation to Keynes or his followers, who have no reason to promote internal devaluation. The term "Keynesian economist" is of doubtful value too, since most economists (including the Chicago school) agree with Keynes's main ideas, though not always with those of his self-identified followers. TonyWelsh (talk) 18:32, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

The page on this subject has large sections of uncited original research that, to my eyes, is heavily POV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.206.175.219 (talk) 12:14, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

Category:Systemic Risk - Behavioral & Social Facets
Category:Systemic Risk - Behavioral & Social Facets, which is within the scope of this WikiProject, has been nominated for discussion. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the Categories for discussion page. Thank you. -- Black Falcon (talk) 19:03, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

Austrian economics at Econometrics: Edit warring
There is edit warring at Econometrics. Second opinions are requested.

Kiefer .Wolfowitz 09:55, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Comment: I think a small note in the criticism section of the econometrics' article of Austrian criticism of econometrics would be or is (depending on the state of the edit war) fine. I note Hayek talks about this in his nobel prize lecture and I think Frisch explicitly addressed this issue somewhere in the early days when econometrics proper was just starting. I think then the debate was more between those who wanted economic planning the economtrics people - and those like Keynes on the one hand and Austrians on the other wanted a bigger role for the market. (Anyway I have added notes on econometrics talk page too - and might be regarded as an interested party). (Msrasnw (talk) 11:39, 23 April 2012 (UTC))


 * How can anyone oppose the use of statistical methods in economics? I am gonna check this edit war out, ASAP --Forich (talk) 15:00, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

New WikiProject Globalization
WikiProject_Globalization is a new project to improve Wikipedia's coverage of aspects of Globalization and the organization of information and articles on this topic. This page and its subpages contain their suggestions and various resources; it is hoped that this project will help to focus the efforts of other Wikipedians interested in the topic. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks. Meclee (talk) 18:40, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

2nd opinion request for Ted Snyder (economist)
Could someone take a look at this edit. I think I may have trouble being objective.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:02, 20 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I think it's too promotional; not neutral enough. -- Econterms (talk) 22:00, 20 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Indeed. WP:WEASEL/WP:PEA applies. And recommend Template:Infobox economist template rather than scientist.--S. Rich (talk) 23:57, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Yet another financial crisis name change RfC
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:2007%E2%80%932012 global financial crisis. Yaniv256 (talk) 23:56, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

selling a spouse as noncapital?
I'd like to know something about about capital expenditure in order to improve articles, especially wife selling (English custom).

Inflation adjustments are applied to monetary amounts for English sales of wives of centuries ago. The Inflation template does not apply to capital expenses. Since these sales were often or typically functionally divorces, rather than sales of stock to pimps for prostitution, these appear to be capital expenses or capital purchases. However, a counterargument is that the prices were artificially depressed by the selling husbands to signify to their communities that they were divorcing women whom they considered almost or actually worthless (some so-called sales were for free or a glass of ale). Unfortunately, we can't know whether that counterargument applied in every case for which an inflation-adjusted equivalent value is being given in the article. Further, one could countercounterargue that the low value was not artificially low but accurately reflected the economic value to the selling husband of the wife, since she might have been unwilling to help him but glad to help another man whom she had in mind, and that would correlate with the divorce happening. Is the expense that is attached to a wife sale (even when not due to prostitution or pimping) sometimes not a capital expense?

I asked virtually the same question at the capital expenditure talk page July 23, 2012, but no reply has been posted yet.

Thank you. Nick Levinson (talk) 15:50, 2 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Prices of diverse goods and services don't march in lockstep over the long term, so it's unhelpful to focus on precision. We could get better context for long-ago prices by comparing to some relevant contemporary value (ie. a contemporary worker's wage?).
 * The UK CPI series started relatively recently, so how on earth was it applied to 18th and 19th century prices? Even the RPI series only goes back to 1947. Even if they stretched back further, these series are really comparing the costs of a typical basket of purchases by a household, and the purchase of a wife is anything but typical, even if it were really a purchase rather than a sham transaction. bobrayner (talk) 16:21, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

National debt to national GDP ratio
Your coverage of of USA national debt to GDP ratio at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt-to-GDP_ratio#cite_note-0 is alarmingly out of date when it could be so useful for warning our country that we are in serious financial trouble. Your last ratio for debt to GDP for the USA at 68% is so wrong as to be misleading. The numbers are approximately 15.5 trillion for the national debt and the same number for the current yearly GDP, giving a ratio of 100% and alarms should be going off in every corner of any government body charged with regulating government spending. If Wiki wants to play a useful role in informing citizens of serious economic problems it should put high priority on updating this topic. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rm32644 (talk • contribs) 17:52, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

Two dozens JEL classification categories are nominated for deletion
See Categories for discussion/Log/2012 September 11. jonkerz ♠talk 00:55, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

Keynesian Economics - Austrian criticism
Hello. I wanted to try to open up the Austrian School Criticism discussion at the Keynesian Economics talk page to a larger audience since it seems to have stagnated and there has not been a real resolution to this issue. The discussion is specifically related to a section of the Keynesian economics page, but I felt it might get some more attention if it was mentioned here. Thanks. Wormbread (talk) 19:59, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Distributism as a "Third Way"
Our article Distributism uses the term "Third Way", which I assume will be unfamiliar to many readers. There's a dispute about whether we should link to Third Way (centrism).

If interested, please discuss at Talk:Distributism.

-- 186.221.135.185 (talk) 16:14, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Very tiny mistake found in definition of job vacancy rate, in "Beveridge Curve" article
I am completely new to editing Wikipedia, so it was by accident that I signed my edit. The icon with the blue pen tip looked to me to be for a strike-through font, for a perceived error.

Anyway, the article originally defines the job vacancy rate as vacancies over the labor force. I checked with the European Commission (http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/Glossary:Occupied_post), the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304587704577335944226268750.html), and EconGuru.com (http://glossary.econguru.com/economic-term/job+vacancy+rate. All of them agree that the job vacancy, for a given population/industry is

job vacancies / (job vacancies + filled positions)

I'm sure my correction looks ugly, as I really don't know how to use the interface. But I stand by the substance of the correction, and only hope that one of you experienced editors will have time to clean it up.

--Pastshelfdate (talk) 16:34, 17 September 2012 (UTC)Pastshelfdate


 * The issue is a bit more complicated. In academic work, both theoretical and empirical, the vacancy rate IS defined as # of vacancies/labor force. The unemployment rate is # of job seekers/labor force. The reason for defining the variables that way is because the matching function takes "number of job seekers" and "number of vacancies" as inputs to produce the output "number of matches". Volunteer Marek 23:06, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Antal E. Fekete
Hi, this bio contains a lot of unsourced statements and could use the attention of knowledgeable editors. The unsourced article on the New Austrian School of Economics seems to be part of this, as is Sandeep Jaitly (currently at AfD). This is not my field, so any input is welcome! --Guillaume2303 (talk) 14:25, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Corporate tax rate and hiring costs
I've run across a couple blog posts ( and ) which confirm the recently empirically validated idea that decreasing the effective corporate tax rate tends to suppress hiring because it puts the cost of paying taxes on profits below the expected risk of hiring and further production using pre-tax revenue, which also involves a feedback threshold effect in the macroeconomic situation when many businesses are facing the same changes in the effective tax rate (if they all aren't hiring, the risk of investing in further production increases because consumer spending is suppressed.) As we've seen, this is accompanied by a spike in profits and bank deposits. I've come across some very oblique references to this effect in old theory papers, and in one recent labor economics sourcebook, but I'm looking for more mainstream sources on it. Does anyone have any suggestions for where this particular situation might have been studied in academic journal papers? &mdash; Cup co  04:55, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Wealth Distribution in Southeast Asia
I am a student at Rice University in Houston, TX, and I'm planning to write an article entry about wealth distribution in Southeast Asia for my Poverty, Justice, and Human Capabilities class. This existing page on Southeast Asia is quite extensive in its depiction of the region’s history, political systems, geography, and culture, but lacks an analysis of development – an extremely relevant subject in a region with expanding economies. The Southeast Asia page does has an “Economy” section with a little over five hundred words, but lacks within that section any information about wealth on a non-macro level or about human capabilities. The word “poverty” is not mentioned once in the entire Southeast Asia Wikipedia page. There are also various pages on income-specific inequality in the United States, a short article on international inequality, and other related topics. They do not, however, adequately address the issue of wealth distribution and corresponding measurements of human capabilities in the region being examined. A region-specific article that focuses on macroeconomic development as well as individual wealth distribution could unite these issues into a more targeted analysis of wealth in that region, and perhaps encourage future work on other regions. Therefore, I plan to write a new, comprehensive article with information regarding and various analyses of wealth distribution and poverty in Southeast Asia, with a link to this new page as a subsection under “Southeast Asia / Economy”. As previously discussed, my article will focus on wealth distribution on Southeast Asia, the various forces acting on said distribution (tax policy, globalization, market forces, socio-economic relationships, etc.), and effects of various levels of wealth throughout the region on human capabilities and overall economic development in Southeast Asian countries. I believe this is a better course of action than to simply revise and expand upon the “Economy” section of the Southeast Asia Wikipedia page, as an expansion of a topic such as this one might lead to an unreasonably lengthy addition to an already lengthy article. An extensive focus on individual capabilities through wealth distribution analysis may overshadow the section’s (and article’s for that matter) focus on macro-economic policy, history, and indices. Note, however, that I do support the overall expansion of the "Economy" section of this page as it is an extremely important aspect of this developing region. With a new article clearly linked (probably as a subsection of “Economy”), I will be able to more easily connect with and build upon scattered and often inadequate pages on poverty and human development in various countries in Southeast Asia. As a highly interconnected region through ASEAN, trade, social exchange, and many other mediums, the region as a whole warrants a more cohesive and comprehensive analysis regarding poverty and human development. By looking at wealth distribution in the region (among and within different countries) with a new Wikipedia article, we can more effectively examine these issues pertinent to the shaping of policies in those countries. I'm expecting to encounter some problems along the way, the most difficult of which is probably the scope of the region as a whole with regard to development on the individual level. I welcome constructive criticism and ideas to overcome these problems, so please let me know if you have any questions or concerns about my planned contribution. Thanks,

Reillysolis (talk) 20:45, 3 October 2012 (UTC)
 * This looks like a good idea. Remember - the three most important things you need are sources, sources, and sources. 718smiley.png
 * Could you clarify - are you going to expand the existing Southeast Asia article, or are you going to write a new article? Or both? Starting a new article can be very challenging for new editors, but if you need a hand, just shout. Also, there are several other articles which overlap slightly on this topic - maybe you'd like to make some minor updates to them too? Don't worry, you don't have to commit now (unless your tutor needs you to commit to particular work in advance), and often you can find yourself changing direction slightly as you find new things in the text and the sources. bobrayner (talk) 21:14, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Social market economy
There is interest to expand the article. Anyone interested in sharing that project? --Pass3456 (talk) 10:57, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

Fractional Reserve Banking
The term "fractional reserve banking" relates to a period in history when the role of the banking institution shifted from that of a depository institution to a lending institution. The first modern depository institution was the Bank of Amsterdam, a good description of which is found in the book "The Wealth of Nations" by Adam Smith (1776). This bank accepted deposits of gold and coinage then in circulation and minted coinage of a standard gold content and weight, held on deposit for bank customers, who were issued what amounted to a certificate of deposit that was accepted in the commercial world as currency. As Smith describes, the bank's directors eventually committed fraud on the public by issuing bank notes not fully backed by gold owned by the bank. They operated on the observation that with the increase in circulation of the certificates of deposit, only a small percentage of depositors came to the bank to withdraw their "money" at any given time. Thus, the bank directors adopted a practice of keeping only fractional reserves of specie (i.e., hard money) in the vault.

The Bank of England was later chartered from the first as a fractional reserve bank, its depositors protected (or, insured) by the revenue raising capacity of the British Crown. From this point onward, the distinction between depository banks and fractional reserve lending institutions ended.

Present-day regulation over banking institutions (at least in most countries) imposes no requirement on all that the bank holds specie in reserve against outstanding loans. In the United States, notes issued by the Federal Reserve System (which is owned by the nation's nationally-chartered commercial banks and is not an agency of the national government) are by law legal tender currency. However, the exchange value of Federal Reserve Notes (FRNs) is governed not by reserves of precious metals or any basket of goods or commodities but by public confidence in the strength of the nation's economy. In essence, the FRNs could be described as "promises to pay nothing in particular," as demonstrated by the almost continuous decline in the quantity or quality of goods or services one can obtain with a fixed unit of currency.

ACTUAL BANK RESERVE REQUIREMENTS

Central banks in most countries have some degree of regulatory oversight over the investment and lending activity of financial institutions. The central bank may or may not set a reserve requirement for banks to keep a level of currency balance on deposit with the central bank as a protection against depositor runs on the banks as has periodically occurred in every country. The establishment of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation in the United States in 1933 (to which banks pay an insurance premium) ostensibly protected deposits from loss of deposit balances in the event a bank becomes insolvent and is closed by regulators. EdwardJDodson (talk) 22:18, 8 October 2012 (UTC) EdwardJDodson

Microeconomics
Althought this article should be quite central, I just observed that its twin macroeconomics is much better written mainly because: 1.It ilustrates basics concepts of the field (in micreconomics the only basic concept explained is opportunity cost) 2.It's entirely lacking a development of the field part, which I think its important to someone trying to gain insight on the matter. --Lbertolotti (talk) 22:50, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program course assignment
This article is the subject of an educational assignment at University of Utah supported by the Wikipedia Ambassador Program&#32;during the 2012 Q1 term. Further details are available on the course page.

The above message was substituted from by PrimeBOT (talk) on 16:41, 2 January 2023 (UTC)