• TheReanuKeeves@lemmy.world
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    12 hours ago

    I went to uni for business admin with a concentration in finance and I disagree with all of it.

    Econ is a social science that studies the effects decisions have on a market, it uses math to explain it. Econ is not the cause, econ is the study of.

    Finance is not an arbitrary subset of mathematics. It’s calculus, derivatives, and polynomial models that predict and explain.

    You may as well call math and logic imaginary

    • nonentity@sh.itjust.works
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      4 hours ago

      Economics is the social control mechanism that filled the void vacated by religion after the enlightenment.

      Finance replaced mythology. Banks and financial institutions replaced churches and cathedrals. Economists replaced the clergy. GDP replaced God.

      Mathematics is the foundation of reality, accounting is a selective subset of mathematics.

      Economics is functionally religion that wears a tattered robe of finance which is patched with parts of accounting that economists find useful to support the doctrine of their particular model.

      Like religion, economics can prove useful for a society, but similarly it has no intrinsic legitimacy imposing influence on or over those who don’t willingly and non-coercively subscribe to its narrative.

    • 🇨🇦GreenBeard🇨🇦@lemmy.ca
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      9 hours ago

      Except in terms of predictive power it’s just barely more successful than random chance. As a discipline it’s still largely in its most primitive stage, and still full of unproven and largely hypothetical assumptions that amount to little more than idle musings and superstitions. It’s so full of holes it’s just slightly more rigorous than pseudoscience. Perhaps in 100 years it will develop into a more respectable discipline, but at this stage it’s at best a tool for short term modelling and post hoc analysis.

    • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      8 hours ago

      it uses math to explain it

      It uses math sometimes.

      Economics is not a hard science. Which is fine. But let’s not pretend it’s all math and logic. It includes attempting to predict human behavior, you can’t do that with just math.

      “Do people think we’re currently in a recession” is actually used by economists as a recession indicator.

      • TheReanuKeeves@lemmy.world
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        7 hours ago

        I’m not saying it’s a hard science, im disagreeing with it being closer to theology than physics, that’s absurd

    • brendansimms@lemmy.world
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      10 hours ago

      in my experience, Econ education is the study of a single economic system - capitalism. Did they ever discuss alternative socioeconomic systems or simply say ‘state ownership = bad’?

      • TheReanuKeeves@lemmy.world
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        7 hours ago

        You studied capitalism because you live in a capitalist society. Did you major in econ? If not, you likely wouldn’t have been taught much more than what is relevant to your life.

        • brendansimms@lemmy.world
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          7 hours ago

          No not my major - my experience was just econ 101 but I like reading about economics in my free time, and it seemed like econ 101 at my US university should have been called Capitalism 101. My comment was moreso to see if that changes at later stages in the economics-major program.

          • TheReanuKeeves@lemmy.world
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            7 hours ago

            It’s the same with History class in high school, they’re going to teach you more about your country than others until you dive deeper academically because the base knowledge they want to teach is stuff that would be relevant to you. I didn’t major in econ but it was mandatory all 4 years. Once you get into macroeconomics they start discussing international econ more.

            There seems to be some huge misconception that economics is what causes problems when economics is actually the diagnostic tool to explain what’s going on. The same backwards logic as people who think the inflation rate is set by a government or bank and controls how much prices should go up as opposed to a number calculated based on how much prices have gone up.

    • Maeve@kbin.earth
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      9 hours ago

      I think you may need to simply define the terms used after “calculus.” I just did two things that oddly coincide with having read this comment. One, skipped a YT video that promised to simply explain calculus, and two, commented elsewhere:

      "One thing that really scares me about the fall of the empire of my birth is, even if a revolution succeeded, not only who would be in charge, but would they actually understand large scale administration, distribution, logistics, of goods and finance? We’ve allowed ourselves to be so proudly uneducated for si long, because “There are professionals for that.” Well, yes, but honest ones?“

      Edit, because I should add, an honest one that actually will be appointed to the task.

      • TheReanuKeeves@lemmy.world
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        7 hours ago

        Derivatives is a part of calculus and polynomial models are algebraic equations with multiple variables, is that what you’re asking?