WSJ: "Self-identified liberals and Democrats do badly on questions of basic economics"

[Dark]

This has got to be the worst piece of trash I've read in a while.


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703561604575282190930932412.html?mod=WSJ_WSJ_US_PoliticsNCampaign_6

<i>Who is better informed about the policy choices facing the country—liberals, conservatives or libertarians? According to a Zogby International survey that I write about in the May issue of Econ Journal Watch, the answer is unequivocal: The left flunks Econ 101.

Zogby researcher Zeljka Buturovic and I considered the 4,835 respondents' (all American adults) answers to eight survey questions about basic economics. We also asked the respondents about their political leanings: progressive/very liberal; liberal; moderate; conservative; very conservative; and libertarian.

Rather than focusing on whether respondents answered a question correctly, we instead looked at whether they answered incorrectly. A response was counted as incorrect only if it was flatly unenlightened.

Consider one of the economic propositions in the December 2008 poll: "Restrictions on housing development make housing less affordable." People were asked if they: 1) strongly agree; 2) somewhat agree; 3) somewhat disagree; 4) strongly disagree; 5) are not sure.

Basic economics acknowledges that whatever redeeming features a restriction may have, it increases the cost of production and exchange, making goods and services less affordable. There may be exceptions to the general case, but they would be atypical.</i>

The other 7 questions are even stupider.

Also, 538 (http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2010/06/are-you-smarter-than-george-mason.html) has already debunked the questions as "ambiguous, substanceless, or confusing."

This is PURE BULLSHIT.

[Ian David]

1. I took that survey years ago, and half the questions were about names of who wrote what.

All this proves is that Conservatives and Republicans are better at remembering names-- because their Machiavellian way of thinking requires keeping track of who has and has not screwed them over.

[marmar]

2. The left flunks WSJ Econ 101

Also known as Corporate Dominionism

[Enrique]

3. here's a tip for the quiz

the correct answer is always tax cuts.

[Junkdrawer]

5. and deregulation n/t

[w4rma]

19. Tax cuts and deregulation. (nt)

[gratuitous]

4. Ah yes, those darned restrictions

Imagine, building houses in conformance with some, I don't know what you'd call it, bunch of rules and regulations! A building . . . oh, call it a code, that restricts the freedom of developers to throw up any old kind of house they want. But nooooo! There's rules about walls and windows and electrical wiring and roofs and doors and practically everything you can imagine! And all it does is make housing less afforable. All because of libruls and big government!

"Pure bullshit" is to damn this nonsense with faint praise.

[Johonny]

9. The housing prices are always cheaper

after they find out your development is built on/next to a toxic waste site. That's just basic economics. Sure that house was more affordable, but those medical bills and burial fees start to add up...

[NC_Nurse]

6. Well, if $$$ is all you care about - then "affordability" is king. The Repub way.

Distract the masses with cheap, crappy houses and infrastructure so they won't see how they're robbing you blind and ruining the environment. Works every time.

[On the Road]

43. Here is Some Extremely Affordable Housing

with very little government regulation:

[BootinUp]

7. The WSJ opinion page has pure bullshit everyday. nt

[phasma ex machina]

32. All of the WSJ is pure bullshit everyday. nt

[Cant trust em]

8. Taking this test, I felt like they are all slanted towards the right anyway.

They make me give answers that make me cringe.

[Dark]

27. The monopoly question is the only one that doesn't seem slanted.

I could come up with 8 questions about economics that would paint republicans as idiots simply because of the issue selection.

[Cant trust em]

33. Seems more like a test about critical thinking than economics.

If you disagree with the assertions, then you're more likely to question authority and less likely to be conservative.

[mmonk]

10. The WSJ style of economics brought down the US economy.

This "Econ" is politics, not factual.

[Blue_Tires]

44. +1

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

11. The questions are vague enough that just about any answer could be justified

Most of the questions are vauge enough that any answer could be soundly defended depending on the context applied to the question. Basically, most of the questions boil down to opinions. A progressive would say conservatives got most questions wrong and conservatives would say progressives got most questions wrong.

IMO, only questoins #1, #4 could have fairly concrete answers. The rest depend on context.

Mandatory licensing of professional services increases the prices of those services (unenlightened answer: disagree).
I agree because regulation and qualification raises the VALUE of a product and the cost of labor to produce it.

A company with the largest is a monopoly (unenlightened answer: agree)
"Largest market share" does not necessarily describe a "vast majority market share"
ie: the largest car manufacture does not have have a monopoly despite having the largest market share.

[Oregone]

14. But purchasing a more quality, more expensive product may be cheaper than...

continually purchasing replacement goods & services, as well as maintenance.

Yes, the initial price of services may be increased from licensing, but because someone receives a quality product, the continued costs may be far less.

A population may save money, all in all, from licensing (and get more value). So, it also depends on how someone perceives these questions.

[Dark]

25. Not to mention, they threw out half the questions.

That's like polling America's opinions on GLBT issues and not asking about marriage, dadt.

Plus, the survey questions are all terrible.

[kevirnspock]

12. Zogby was declared worst pollster in the United States by statistician Nate Silver

Nobody cares about your fake liberal-hating "studies," Zoggo:

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2010/06/pollster-ratings-v40-results.html#comments

[Oregone]

13. So is a "less affordable" home going to cost more than a cheaper money pit?

You may pay more up front, yet save more over the long run (depending on the interest involved).

Its actually a very tough question, that first one, and not really cut and dry at all.

Im not sure if Id pass this piece of shit either

[deminks]

15. "All will be well in the garden."

My standard answer for any econ question.

Because I think of econ as an art, not a science.

IMHO.

[burnsei sensei]

16. I'm sure that in that question,

the writer is deliberately confounding "restrictions" with "regulations".

[avaistheone1]

17. Republicans like Hoover and Bush 41 and Bush 43 showed us how to take care of the economy.

BWAH HA HA HA HA HAH HAAAAAH!

:rofl:

[librechik]

18. Thios from idiots who think lowering taxes raises revenue. Fuck them!

they probably blew the arithmetic

[Cant trust em]

35. If you lower taxes, it decreases the desire to intentionally omit income from your tax return.

You know, become a tax cheat.

That is literally their argument.

[Ruby the Liberal]

20. Here is a classic example of "Conservative Economic Thought":

"BP’s image in the U.S. matters only so long as it tries to do business in the U.S. If it cuts its losses and gets out now, it can carry on fine in Japan, France, Argentina and all the other countries where no one is really that bothered by what happens in the Gulf of Mexico.

Just say: “Thanks for everything guys. It was good while it lasted. Sorry about the oil spill, but so it goes. Goodbye and goodnight.”

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8515840

[JDPriestly]

21. The test measures the extent to which the test-taker agrees with

a conservative economic viewpoint. That's all it measures. Obviously, liberals will fare badly.

If we wrote a test on economics, the conservatives would flunk.

The test measures whether you are a conservative or a liberal, not how much you understand about real life economics.

I understand that when there are no restrictions on housing development, the quality of life for low-income people deteriorates to a sub-human level. Do you think conservatives understand that principle? I seriously doubt it.

[Politicalboi]

22. Did these assholes

Live here during the Bush years????

[Rex]

23. Whatever, I wouldn't wipe my ass with the WSJ

might get a paper cut.

[TroglodyteScholar]

31. Might improve the quality of what's on the paper, though n/t

[benld74]

24. 8 effin questions?! IS that all your so called poll takes into consideration?

[Dark]

26. Well, they tossed out half the survey.

But it's just because that part wasn't about economics enough, supposedly.

[JonLP24]

28. Wall Street Journal

There is a WSJ article bashing young people that half are agreeing with. This type of story should just let everyone know what their agenda is.

[Odin2005]

29. That's because most "Mainstream Economics" is pro-corporate BS pretending to be "facts".

"Humans are rational utility maximizers" is a "fact" of "mainstream economics", which just goes to show how bogus this shit is.

[sendero]

30. After hanging around here for years..

... it's not hard to believe that the assertion is basically true.

That said. I'm pretty sure you only do well on this test if you believe in Republican economics, the variety that has brought the country to its knees.

[Cant trust em]

34. I mostly agree.

I think that a lot of liberals are less atuned to the market's whims and cares of businesses and more focused on employees and people affected.

The other side of this is that most republicans probably don't know as much about dynamics of working poverty or the needs of organized labor as a means of building economic opportunity.

[EFerrari]

51. Hanging around here isn't a fair test because there are only liberals here.

Remember, freepers think Sarah Palin has a plan for the country.

LOL

[Initech]

36. WSJ = now owned by Rupert Murdoch

[phasma ex machina]

37. Peer of the Realm Murdoch sends his regards.

[alcibiades_mystery]

38. "Basic economics" = Capitalist economic theory

Let's remember that these are the fucking geniuses that plunged their own system of goods and service allocation into chaos and panic, and basically do so every ten to fifteen years if they are not curbed. The greatest economic minds of capitalist thought ran Long Term Capital Management into the ground and almost sunk the global economy as recently as 12 years ago. The genius whiz kids and "quants" coming out of all the smartest math and business schools invented the profoundly stupid instruments that have sunk millions into misery. Forgive me if I don't have a lot of time or respect for capitalist economic theory, which pretends to be something like a "universal truth" in order to better dominate the working class, which it exploits with as much viciousness as any feudal lord. Fuck them and their "basic economics."

[JVS]

45. "almost sunk the global economy as recently as 12 years ago."

It's not 2019 yet!

[spanone]

39. rupert murdoch's wall street urinal

[Blue_Tires]

40. wait...so it's liberals who don't understand BASIC economics in a poll

but it's the randian true-believer disaster capitalist free-market humpers playing god on wall street who started a nationwide economic shit hurricane (without knowing how to stop it)?? do i have that right?

true to form, the WSJ can never point the finger at their own country club buddies

[Blue_Tires]

41. wait...so it's liberals who don't understand BASIC economics in a poll

but it's the randian true-believer disaster capitalist free-market humpers playing god on wall street who started a nationwide economic shit hurricane (without knowing how to stop it)?? do i have that right?

true to form, the WSJ can never point the finger at their own country club buddies

[On the Road]

42. I Have a More Conventional Set of Economic Views

than a lot of posters here; some would probably call them overly corporate. I have an MBA and work for a major corporation.

But dear God, is this poll awful, and the interpretation is even worse. None of the questions are even of the true/false variety, and can be argued endlessly from many points of view. For what’s supposed to be a bimary poll, the authors spend most of their article qualifying, justifying, and explaining their supposedly simple and universal answers.

Take the questions:

1) Restrictions on housing development make housing less affordable.
The argument would seem to be that if fewer houses can be built, the price for the remaining new houses that are allowed will be higher. That's simple economics.

But it depends on the kind of restrictions. Prohibitions on construction in environmentally sensitive areas might simply move construction to other areas without affecting price. Restrictions of other kinds, like mandating retail space on the first floor of high rise apartments, does not necessarily make housing less affordable.

The authors actually go to great leng”ths to reject this line of thinking: Challengers might say something like: 'Well, not every restriction on housing development makes housing less affordable,' but such a challenger would be tendentious and churlish. But it is a leap of faith to assume that everyone frames the question the way and has the same kind of examples in mind.

2) Mandatory licensing of professional services increases the prices of those
services.
I wouldn't argue with this one. Whether licensing is always a bad tradeoff is another matter.

3) Overall, the standard of living is higher today than it was 30 years ago.
I suspect the authors tracked the average family income adjusted by inflation to establish that living standards have gone up. But that does not take into account the huge divergence in distribution of income, the inadequacy of the CPI as a measure of inflation, or the enormous increases in the costs of many basic needs such as housing and medical care. Have your living standard really gone up if you can afford an iPod and a laptop but can't afford gas, rent, or prescription drugs?

If you look at the median, at blue-collar families, or at some other measure of the majority, it is not at all clear that living standards are higher for most people. And when standard of living is defined more broadly than simple income adjusted for inflation, it's even harder to argue their point. Much less making it a test of of economic literacy.

4) Rent control leads to housing shortages.
You could argue that this is inarguably true given the history of New York City. It probably is true universally, but there are many ways of implementing controls, and you need more than one egregious example to do establish that all of them have the same effect. Most people outside the Northeast or under 40 may not be aware of any rent control laws.

5) A company with the largest market share is a monopoly.
I agree, a monopoly definitely does not mean the company with the largest market share.

However, from some of the side comments, the authors may not get what a monopoly really is, and the respondents certainly don't. It is not the only company who provides a particular product or service. It is a compay who among other things is able to erect barriers to entry, raise prices at will, engage in effective price wars with smaller competitors, and so on. I doubt most of the 'correct' responsdents understand the concept either.

6) Third-world workers working for American companies overseas are being exploited.
Does “exploited” have an economic definition of some kind? I understand both sides of the argument here, but throwing everyone in the ignorant bin who claims exploitation is unbelievable.

7) Free trade leads to unemployment.
Whether free trade increases employment on both sides of a trading relationship may be correct. However, it inarguably leads to specific, identifiable job losses, especially in the higher-wage partner. The authors are claiming that anyone who does not believe that those losses are compensated for indirectly by job gains somwhere else (in a way that no economist can point to) is “unenlightened.”

8) Minimum wage laws raise unemployment.
The minimum wage increased from $5.25 to $7.25 within recent memory without noticeably affecting the job market. People who draw the obvious conclusion that a 38% increase results in no detectable unemployment fail the authors' test.

The authors themselves admit that ” most economists agree that “minimum wages increase unemployment among young and unskilled workers.” So by the authors’ own standards, they would classify a certain minority of professional economists as “unenlightened.” Unbelievable.

-------------------------------------

The authors bizarrely claim that “Several of the questions would seem to be fairly neutral with respect to partisan politics, particularly the questions on licensing, the standard of living, monopoly, and free trade,” thus showing their blissful ignorance of the whole history of the progressive movement.

The bottom line, however, is that any simpleton who simply parrots the ‘experts’ they heard on Fox News passes the test with flying colors. Anyone with the slightest leanings toward progressive policies is simply considered to be ignorant, no matter how thoughtfully they might be able to defend their views.

This only scratches the surface of how awful this poll is. Let Zogby ask another set of questions on whether cutting tax rates increases tax revenue, whether wider income distribution slows economic growth, and the effects of moving to a gold standard. All of a sudden they would get completely opposite results. Then they could scratch their heads.

[Yavin4]

55. Here Are My Answers

1) Restrictions on housing development make housing less affordable.

Vague question. An area could be overbuilt with plenty of housing, and restrictions may be for other economic reasons such water use and transportation.

2) Mandatory licensing of professional services increases the prices of those
services.

I know plenty of licensed attorneys who work for almost nothing.

3) Overall, the standard of living is higher today than it was 30 years ago.
For some, but definitely not for all nor most.

4) Rent control leads to housing shortages.
Depends on the population density of the area in which one lives.

5) A company with the largest market share is a monopoly.
No, the technical definitiion of a monopoly is if a company has the majority of the market total share and can control access to the market.

6) Third-world workers working for American companies overseas are being exploited.
Yes. Third world nations manipulate their currencies so as to maximize profits from exported goods to developed nations. Thus, their workers are being rendered poorer every day.

7) Free trade leads to unemployment.
Unregulated and unplanned for Free trade leads to unemployment.

8) Minimum wage laws raise unemployment.
No. Lack of demand is the primary cause of unemployment, not wages.

[ecstatic]

46. My answer to the example question is based on how in my area

a moratorium was placed on building homes that costed under $200k. I think the reasoning was that they didn't want to flood the area with lower priced homes. So if only high priced homes are being built, in theory, the property values of everyone else's home will go up, which means housing will be less affordable.

[county worker]

47. It looks like a quiz on right wing ideology. If you agree your are right, if not your are wrong.

"Restrictions on housing development make housing less affordable."

I don't think there were restrictions on housing development during the housing bubble creation and the prices were not affordable as seen by the foreclosures and short sales. The loans were easy to get but people could not afford the payments.

[Arkana]

48. "WRONG! THE ANSWER TO EVERY QUESTION IS 'BOOTSTRAPS', U DUMM LIEBERALS!"

[arbusto_baboso]

49. Yeah, well WSJ idiots still believe tax cuts result in MORE tax revenue for the Fed Govt.

I still have people spouting that moronic bullshit to me all the time.

WSj is just typical of right-wing "info" sources: lying and/or ignorant and insistent that it is right when it is demonstrably the opposite. Assholes, the lot of them.

[Occulus]

50. I did very badly in Econ 101- almost failed it

because what I was being taught in Econ 101 did not not NOT agree with the reality I was seeing around me. I was answering test questions based on the reality I saw and not the fictions I was being taught.

[guitar man]

52. That's probably because

Our answers are based on economic reality instead of some far out fantasy penned into a work of fiction by a 3rd rate hack of an author. If you want to see who has really failed economics, take a look at who has had stewardship of our economy for the last 30 years and the results it brought us to. Fuck the WSJ! :grr:

[arbusto_baboso]

53. The REAL Law of Supply and Demand =......

If you control the supply of something, you can demand any fucking price you want.

Don't believe me? Look at gasoline prices...

[ieoeja]

54. Isn't "size" one of the more common housing restrictions?

And wouldn't limiting the size result in lower priced housing?

As you stated, this is PURE BULLSHIT. And this is a perfect example of what is wrong with this country right now. EVERYBODY learning economics in college right at this moment are being taught pure, unadulterated Rightist economic theories. Which means NO future economists are going to be taught the economic theories that produced only rarely interrupted economic growth for decades before Reagan.