Are Economists Good People? Should You Marry One?
There are good reasons to call economics the "dismal science." Economists, Steven Rhoads jokes, see a bittersweet quality in the groundbreaking of a new community center. They might brood: "By spending money here and not elsewhere, we give up the mobile heart units that would save four lives a year, a remedial reading program ... [etc., etc.]" (22). This may be technically true. But isn't this view of life a little ... inhuman? Rhoads approvingly quotes Kenneth Boulding: "No one would want his daughter to marry an economic man, one who counted every cost and asked for every reward, [and] was never afflicted with mad generosity or uncalculating love" (34). Czech philosopher Zdeněk Neubauer suggests something similar when he argues "price is unholy."¹ Economists are suspicious of single-minded devotion to single goals at the expense of others. Because opportunity costs are everywhere, they will usually emphasize marginal investments in p...