There are plenty of stupid doctors and engineers.

Well, duh. There's plenty of stupid people of ANY classification. But at least most doctors and engineers have proven that they can understand systems analysis and think critically, or they wouldn't have their licenses. Software engineering is barely regulated/licensed, so I certainly wouldn't apply this to most software engineers.

What does understanding systems analysis have to do with being a good politician?

What would a doctor or engineer do differently?

Make a decision based on emotion and then retroactively use math to justify that decision.

I am so glad that this response is here.

HN in general has this disease, but it's pretty prevalent in STEM fields in general- The "I know how to solve a differential equation so that means I am a rational decision maker" disease.

It's important to acknowledge that the more education a person has the more likely they are to reverse-engineer a reason to think something that they want to think, especially when it comes to emotionally charged issues like those that politicians encounter every day.

Having technical skills does not automagically make you a good leader or policymaker. It just means you have good technical skills.

I would go so far as to say there are probably more people with good technical skills that should not be making policy than the opposite.

I think having technical people on staff is really important. That the elected leader has a STEM background? Not important. Leaders should be general purpose coordinators of groups that solve problems. Understanding the psychology of all the participants is as important as solving the specific issue.

In context, a STEM background is someone who has and can actually engineer or science. Writing some code doesn't qualify. Every human on the planet should be able to design an experiment and do basic statistics. I think the bar we have for our fellow human should be much higher than it currently is. The moniker, that person is an "Every (Hu)Man" , should be a badge of honor.

Approve construction of market rate housing, presumably.

Easier to win votes by selling castles in the sky.

thats more or less what china does

Most Chinese officials aren't engineers or doctors, they might have a degree given to them in something like Chemical engineering, but they've never practiced as an engineer and have the full life training of a politician.

Minus the "we ... elect" part.