1. Why is there no government chief anthropololgist?
   1. We have hundreds of government economists in all departments
      1. What do they say they do?
      2. Communicate their subject to non specialist colleagues
2. Paradox in public policy economics
   1. Putting economics into practice, but we cannot remain outside our models. As soon as we implement something we inevitably step into the model as it is all around us
   2. Do we take this strange perspective into account
3. Inherent conflict between technical expertise needed to run an economy and political practicality. See Greece, Italy and the technocratsI
4. Opportunity costs are a dirty word in politics. Economists job is to tell politicians that cake can only be eaten once ;)
   1. All solutions have costs - Ronald Coase 1936 paper
   2. Cost/benefit analyses
   3. What sort of costs?
      1. Change of behaviour as a result of policy.
      2. Possibly overweights costs and benefits that can be measured in monetary terms rather than softer costs. But only economists are able to do this well.
   4. Example: taxis
      1. Why are taxis in short supply?
         1. Local authority regulation
         2. Licence is a barrier to entry
         3. Incumbents never want reform
            1. Medallion in new York is worth 600k and in Milan it's 132k euros.
            2. John fingleton in Dublin. Created a system where new medallions were given to existing medallion holders and allowed to sell them so they shared in the benefit of the new medallions and their objections were disarmed.
            3. Non economists would likely not have come up with such a solution.
   5. Example: behavioural economics and directory enquiries.
      1. Market dominated by two old players.
         1. Two biggest incumbents actually increased their share after deregulation because the new numbers that were given out were just too many and confusing for people. So they went for the best marketed number, the 118118 campaign.
      2. Only economists do this kind of quant analysis. Other social sciences don't do this kind of stuff.
5. Economic modelling
   1. Abstraction of life to key features.
   2. Capturing what's important rather than accurate facsimile of real life, as in Picassos Cockerel.
   3. Economists often at heart of producing evidence in reports. Barker, Dilnot, Lyons etc reports
      1. Often difficult to translate these reports into policy. Voices of vested interests are often louder.
   4. Also economists make apparently good regulators, the subject knows the dangers of regulatory capture in a way other sciences don't.
      1. Make good tough decisions e.g. Airport monopoly break up
      2. See also technocratic government in Italy.
         1. Cf Francisco gervazzi in Milan
6. Economics is inescapably political. How well does it transfer from the ivory tower to the policy maker
   1. Flattering to be asked for advice b someone close to power.
   2. Topic
7. Happiness economics
   1. There is a link between economic growth and happiness, regardless of what the public and politicians think
8. Macroeconomics
   1. 30 years ago macro was simply ideology: Keynesianism versus monetarism.
      1. Monetarists won, but when policies were implemented they showed it was impossible. There was no monetary aggregate that was meaningful
         1. Goodhart's Law
         2. New Classical Synthesiss
         3. The Great Moderation
         4. Now after the great crash we are back to polemical fights, e.g. Krugman versus Lucas.
   2. Macro is the mad wife in the attic that nobody likes to acknowledge!
      1. Politics and nuance are strangers to each other!
         1. See argument between Lancet and economists over subtle nuances in economics research about NHS reform. 08/11/2011 Lancet Bloom, Cooper etc
            1. Policy based evidence!
9. So what are the public responsibilities
   1. Be brave when we know we are right
   2. Be modest when we dont
   3. Be honest and open about our own opinions and our patrons and interests
      1. Revelation that many economists had received funding for research from investment banks was really damaging to the reputation of the profession.
   4. Communicate better with non economist public.
10. The economists motto: nobody likes us and we don't care!
11. When the weather forecaster gets it wrong they get a bigg and more power full computer but economists just get criticisms.