Bill Mitchell — The Bandwagon effect – caution not credit is needed

We all know what the – Bandwagon effect – is. There is a lot of research literature in social psychology trying to understand why people who believe one thing one minute, suddenly ditch that belief system and appear to be proponents of a new belief system, often, in total contradiction to their previous views. The effect is related but distinct from the Groupthink phenomenon which I have written about extensively in relation to the way mainstream economics has maintained a hold on the public debate despite being unable to explain anything useful. Whatever the underlying explanations – social norms, conformity pressures, information cascades and the rest of it – the ‘Bandwagon effect’ is rampant at the moment among economists. It appears that everyone has become an expert on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) and want to drop the term into their Op Eds, media articles etc despite, in many cases, writing in the not to distant past, ridiculous mainstream articles that are the anathema of MMT. I give those who are jumping on the bandwagon no credit at all. The reason is that these sort of shifts are dangerous. They typically misrepresent our work and attempt to interpret it within the old paradigm, which just leads to the general public, especially where the commentator has a high public profile, being mislead … as usual. Everyone, apparently is an MMTer now. But from what they say we know that is not the case. And just as this cohort swing to save face in what is a glaringly obvious empirical rejection of all the mainstream predictions and theoretical constructs, they will swing again and start talking about ‘budget repair’ and ‘inflation’ and ‘debt burdens on our grandchildren’ when the dust settles and the elites push to regain their dominant position. We should not be lulled into creating liaisons that are not sustainable or based on a true shift in view....

False friends and untrustworthy allies.

On the one hand, it is a good thing that our work has now reached mainstream status and more people are realising that the main insights are undeniable, despite years of denial from those opposed.

But, as I have cautioned before, when there is a paradigm shift going on in any academic discipline, the resistance from the dominant but degenerative paradigm takes many forms.

The smarter members, who see the writing on the wall, try to capture the emerging paradigm and re-express it in their own language and concepts – just as the Hicksian IS-LM framework stole Keynes’ work not long after it was published.

Those on the periphery of the dominant paradigm, the media and commentators who continually reinforce the dominant paradigm through their journalism get stuck betwixt.... 

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
The Bandwagon effect – caution not credit is needed
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia