My insight in college taking some economics courses side by side higher level physics and engineering courses was that economics has mostly gotten stuck in algebra and has thus far failed to develop its calculus.
The easiest analogies for me to make are to electronics. Talking about cash/debt is like talking about instantaneous voltage. It's sort of interesting, but it isn't doing any actual work. In electronics it is the flow of that voltage, the current, that is more often more important and more interesting and more directly applicable to the "work" of a circuit...
I think you get a very different view of economics if you model it more like electronics circuits than just about any of the other economics models I see discussed. I've often wondered what would happen if someone actually bothered to attempt such a model and apply some deep scientific rigor to it.
Thanks for the interesting reference to look up. I had not heard of the MONIAC before. Looks like this is also a sideways referent in Terry Pratchett's Making Money which draws in some interesting dots in that book.
comments like this are amazing. you are completely ignorant of the current state of economics yet wonder if economists have bothered to construct dynamic models of the economy. i guess your intermediate macro course didn't get that far...
Do you have any links for what you consider to be the current state of economics? I will the first to admit that I am not an economist, but I do try to at least keep an ear out for what may be current and certainly in terms of what I've been hearing from a layman's perspective, for the most part my comments remain valid against current economics work. That said, it's also why I prefaced my comments that they were primarily centered from several years ago back when I was in college and that the analogy was mostly personal opinion. If it is personal opinion founded in ignorance, I am happy to be proven wrong or shown cool things, if you are interested in a deeper discussion beyond insults.
Certainly, the models that we see in day to day political discussions and popular/lay culture have not seemingly progressed much beyond the macroeconomics courses I took in college, but again I'm willing to admit I certainly have my biases/blinders. Also, I'm sure that dynamic models exist, I was more curious if there are economists that have played with models more closely aligned with my physics analogies, specifically.
Thus far the one of most interesting things in economics right now, to myself at least, is I have done some reading on some of the work of theorists in Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) and I liked where it seemed to be heading (not to mention its ties to turn of the last century Social Credit theories/works). That certainly seems close to what I'd expect/like to see more of in economics, but correct me if I'm wrong, it still seems "fringe" in the current state of economics.
The easiest analogies for me to make are to electronics. Talking about cash/debt is like talking about instantaneous voltage. It's sort of interesting, but it isn't doing any actual work. In electronics it is the flow of that voltage, the current, that is more often more important and more interesting and more directly applicable to the "work" of a circuit...
I think you get a very different view of economics if you model it more like electronics circuits than just about any of the other economics models I see discussed. I've often wondered what would happen if someone actually bothered to attempt such a model and apply some deep scientific rigor to it.