Economics is right-wing propaganda - an essay

as we all know, rPoliticalhumor is nothing but smug text-wall seriousposts devoid of all humor as seen here. just look at all the words holy shit, no way am i reading all this

I wanna state that regarding right-wing ideologies, I studied a Bachelor of Economics/Bachelor of Commerce and I worked my butt off to achieve distinctions/High distinctions. I studied about 80+ hours a week for the first 18 months, then dropped to part time whilst working full time and still studied 40+ hours a week for years in order to understand the logic behind all the economic theories. Basically all they taught was free market ideology, which I believed at first, but I began to notice discrepancies between the real world and what we were being taught.

Economics sold out to the right and created this entire dilemma. 40 years ago there used to be a dichotomy between the working class and the business owners. Inequality was the lowest level since at least the 1800s, public debt was low, global gdp growth was higher despite no globalization or the internet and China being in poverty, unemployment was lower across the entire English speaking world (I think America was actually one of the few outliers, countries like Australia and England had unemployment rates averaging below 2% for 40 years), houses were affordable, wages were rising.

Then, despite the fact there was no economic theory in support of it, populist governments held unemployment below the natural rate of unemployment, and the Vietnam war resulted in the American government spending too much money. There was an oil price shock and suddenly there was stagflation.

A problem that wasn't even caused by economists at the time was blamed on their economic model by people like Milton Friedman, Frederich Hayek and the Mont Pelerin society. They preached that we should lower taxes on all members of society (which particularly effected the rich), that we should eliminate all economic regulations (thus increasing corporate profits), the government should stop trying to manage the economy and leave it up to the private sector via the 'invisible hand' a.k.a. Economic's version of God. Given the outsized influence the top 1% tends to have on politics, the obvious benefits of this type of policy to them and the presence of an inflationary crisis, they managed to change the economic system we're in. Now mainstream economics basically only teaches their theories.

Now data has proven all of their theories wrong. It turns out the Post-Keynesians were right (not to be confused with Keynesians, who tend to combine Keynes's general theory with classical neoliberal ideology). Ever since adopting a new system global gdp growth has been lower, inequality has trended up to the highest levels seen since at least the 1800s across the Western world and is growing, unemployment has been higher across most of the Western world, from an average of 1.9% to over 5% in Australia, public debt/gdp has been growing, interest rates have trended down to their lower bounds which has pushed up the cost of housing (and today's youth completely missed out on this boost in wealth given to the Boomers, interest rates can't keep falling), real wages have been stagnant for 40 years despite productivity (real output per unit of work) steadily trending upwards, bank loans/GDP have grown to twice their WW2 peak, the entire financial system looks like it will collapse within the next 10 years. If you follow post-keynesian economics all of these effects were easily predicable consequences of neoliberalism. Yet the economics community refuses to admit they made a mistake, and these problems remain invisible to those who trust in the free market.

They teach the Economic equivalent of right-wing propaganda in almost every economics degree in the English speaking world. They teach the crap in high school. They teach it so, whether they intended it this way or they're just ignorant, people vote in politicians who support policy that damages their own life, e.g. private healthcare/no minimum wage/lowering estate taxes. They teach it because Universities get funding based on their journal rankings and all the top journals support free market ideology. Researchers who support free market ideology tend to receive more funding. Graduates who disagree with free market ideology will struggle to find work in their field. It's the dumbest shit in the world, Economist's nowaday's are less accurate in their predictions than a fricking coin flip, yet they refuse to admit their models must be wrong. But yeah, this free market ideology bullshit tends to favor right-wing politics and is part of the reason why right-wing idiots support shit like privatized healthcare and lowering the taxes of the rich, because they've been brainwashed by credible sources. Peter Schiff has no idea how the economy works.