Why Experiment In Economics?  

Oleh:

Binmore, Ken

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: The Economic Journal (EBSCO) vol. 109 no. 453 (Feb. 1999), page 16-24.
Fulltext: 16.pdf (105.68KB)

Isi artikel

Experimental economics is now so popular that a Nobel prize is doubtless imminent for those who pioneered the subject. But one may ask what economists are doing in the laboratory at all. Would it not be better to leave laboratory experiments to psychologists who are trained to run them properly? The answer to this question requires making the same distinction in social science that hard scientists make between physics and engineering. Physicists try to ®nd out how the world works and engineers use whatever happens to be known at present to make things. A similar unacknowledged division exists in economics between what one might call scienti®c economists and policy advisers. It seems to me uncontroversial that laboratory experimentations for policy purposesÐas in Plott's recent testing of the rules of the big American spectrum auction for the Federal Communications CommissionÐis not only ®rmly established as a tool for widening debate, but that it is an activity that can only sensibly be undertaken by economists who understand the institutions that are to be reformed. My concern is therefore with whether scienti®c economists are wasting their time in the laboratory.

Opini Anda

Klik untuk menuliskan opini Anda tentang koleksi ini!

Kembali