Sunday, June 30, 2013

Jared Bernstein — When the Results Look Weird, Check the Methods…Carefully!

Once you see these results—and in one appendix table, real income falls for every income group, 1989-2007 (so…um…where did the economy’s growth go?)—your best move is to say, “we have proved that given data constraints, we are unable to reliably impute income including yearly changes in asset valuations.” That’s actually a helpful finding. To plough ahead without that introspection, and to claim your findings reveal “dramatic” reductions in inequality suggests either methodological carelessness or an ideological thumb on the scale.
On the Economy
When the Results Look Weird, Check the Methods…Carefully!
Jared Bernstein | Senior Fellow, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
(h/t Mark Thoma at Economist's View)

Another biased study, where the outcome is fixed by choice of assumptions and method, like the arithmetic not adding up.

1 comment:

Magpie said...

Call me cynical, but isn't the sheer coincidence something?

I mean, mainstream economist Mankiw's 1% defense was rebuked by virtually everyone and their dogs; and then, out of the blue, comes this research by mainstream economists Armour, Burkhauser, and Larrimore showing that each and every other data source, research plus everybody's own real-life experience are wrong: in reality, the 1% are about to lose their shirts!

And people still say that mainstream economists are incapable of empathy...