Why are these two things positioned as opposing/contradictory? Why can't those people be wrong but we still try to figure out why they think that way?
Why can't it be true that the economics profession is wrong, or better yet "not even wrong" and not really even talking about anything that has real world applicability?
Given the last few decades that should probably be the starting premise of any analysis.
I'm not ruling it out, only pointing out that it's a lazy argument to handwave away the statistics while not providing evidence that's equal or better than the ones you're trying to refute. This is especially true when the discrepancy is from a group of people who can't get basic facts right. Maybe they're actually right but there's some contrived reason they're not answering straightforward factual questions correctly, or maybe they're just wrong.
Which, in fairness, I didn’t mention earlier and isn’t necessarily something that moves forward a message board discussion anyways.
But like maybe consider the possibility that at this point “mainstream economics” is a lot closer to astrology than it is to science.