If American readers knew the track record of most economic gurus, they would cancel their subscriptions and demand a refund.

This article is nearly 30 years old.

But perhaps even more true today, as the profession of journalism has become even younger and lower paid than it was before.

Without the steady subscription revenue of the past, you can't afford to hire big name writers with decades of experience anymore.

heh.

He doesn't like the economist at all.

I don't agree in general, the economist is often good. This article (and economics generally)... I have to agree. Heavy on Oxbridge feel, light on actual ideas.

Most of what these kind of articles convey is a feel, justified by technical sounding babble that a friendly reader will assume is adequate.

Ironically, the iconic example of this kind of carry on is marxism. 93.6% of all communist/marxist writing was a sharp tongued criticism. Moral critiques of capitalism. Critical reporting on the state of the urban working class in Europe. But, Marx (and his Bougie Oxbridge readers) needed more than that though. They needed to refute "Bourgeoisie Economists" and "Liberal Political Scientists." That's why Das Capital was so important. No one read it, but owning a copy added intellectual weight to one's marxism.