Comments on Roger Gordon and Gordon Dahl’s
“Views among Economists: Professional Consensus or Point‐Counterpoint?”
Justin Wolfers
University of Michigan
Brookings, CEPR, CESifo, IZA and NBER
American Economic Association annual meeting, January 5 2013, San Diego.
Research Question
“ViewsamongEconomists:
ProfessionalConsensusorPoint‐Counterpoint?”

AND
“Towhatdegreedoeconomistsdisagreeaboutkey
economicquestions?”
Consensus
1.

“Our self-image as a profession would be that our
views on economic questions are based on the
accumulated academic evidence”
Point‐Counterpoint
2.

“An alternative perception…is that economists
coalesce into different camps, to a degree
reflecting a liberal/conservative divide”
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
2
Summarizing all Responses: Substantial Consensus
Disagree
stronglyor
disagree
with
"consensus",
Uncertain/
6%
Noopinion,
24%
Agree
stronglyor
agreewith
"consensus",
70%
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
3
Consensus by topic area
Consensus by field
Macro
6%
24%
International
40%
Public
4%
16%
17%
56%
69%
69%
29%
4%
7%
25%
Labor
Finance
IO
5%
24%
55%
80%
71%
Disagree or disagree strongly with consensus
Uncertain / No opinion
Agree or strongly agree with consensus
Graphs by qfield1
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
4
A Remarkable Consensus
 Moreremarkablebecause:

Thepanelisdesignedtobeheterogeneous:
“our panel was chosen to include distinguished experts
with a keen interest in public policy from the major
areas of economics, to be geographically diverse, and
to include Democrats, Republicans and Independents as
well as older and younger scholars.”

Anymeasurementerrorlookslikediscord
ExampleQuestion:Educationvoucherswouldhelpkids
Only19%disagreed.Anexample: “Maddeningly sweeping! Some
students would benefit and the
average effect might indeed be
positive. But some students
would surely be harmed.”
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
5
Is this the right dataset to test for “Consensus”?
 AfoundingideaoftheIGMExpertPanelseemstobetoshowcase
theconsensusamongeconomists:

“We're doing this because we think economists
have a distorted role in policy debates," said
Brian Barry... When experts fight about minor
points they get much more attention than when
they broadly agree about important ones. And when
they disagree about big issues, the reasons don't
often come through clearly," he said. "Sometimes,
ideas that are shaky or on the fringe get passed
off as mainstream.”
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
6
Research Question
“ViewsamongEconomists:
ProfessionalConsensusorPoint‐Counterpoint?”

AND
“Towhatdegreedoeconomistsdisagreeaboutkey
economicquestions?”
Consensus
1.

“Our self-image as a profession would be that our
views on economic questions are based on the
accumulated academic evidence”
Point‐Counterpoint
2.

“An alternative perception…is that economists
coalesce into different camps, to a degree
reflecting a liberal/conservative divide”
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
7
Point‐Counterpoint
 Researchquestion:

Do:“economists coalesce into different camps,
to a degree reflecting a liberal/conservative
divide”?
 DahlandGordon:

Research design: CanthepatternofresponsesintheIGM
EconomicExpertsPanelbeexplainedby:
Gender, cohort, field, current university, PhD,
service in Washington

Conclusion: “There are certainly some
idiosyncratic views expressed, but we found no
evidence of different camps.”
 Butthesevariablesareapoorproxyforthe
“liberal/conservative divide”
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
8
Two Separate Questions
1.
Consensus
Areyourviewssimilartothoseofothereconomists?
2.
Point‐Counterpoint
Isyourvotesimilartothatofyourideologicalmates?
Do:“economists coalesce into different camps, to a
degree reflecting a liberal/conservative divide”
Authorsconclusion
“There are certainly some idiosyncratic views
expressed, but we found no evidence of different
camps.”
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
9
Dahl and Gordon’s approach
CanthepatternofresponsesintheIGMEconomicExperts
Panelbeexplainedby:






Gender
Cohort/experience
Field
Currentuniversity
UniversityofPhD
ServiceinWashington(andonwhatside)?
Butdothesevariablesdescribethe
“liberal/conservative divide”?
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
10
Was the stimulus worth it?
“Taking into account all of the ARRA’s economic
consequences — including the economic costs of
raising taxes to pay for the spending, its
effects on future spending, and any other likely
future effects — the benefits of the stimulus
will end up exceeding its costs.”
 Agreestrongly:Cutler,Eichengreen,Obstfeld,Thaler
 Agree:Auerbach,Autor,Deaton,Goldberg,Goldin,Goolsbee,
Greenstone,Holmstrom,Maskin,Nordhaus,Rouse,Saez,
Schmalansee,Stock,Udry
 Uncertain:Acemoglu,Bertrand,Chevalier,Curry,Duffie,Fair,Hall,
Judd,Kashyap,Klenow,Scheinkman
 Disagree:Shin,Zingales
 Disagreestrongly:Alesina,Hoxby,Lazear
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
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Coding the Ideology of Expert Economists
Coding the ideological divide
Paul Krugman
Correlation = 0.73
Someone else's assessment
 Twocoders
Center
Greg Mankiw
Greg Mankiw
Center
My assessment
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
Paul Krugma
12
Was the stimulus worth it?
“Taking into account all of the ARRA’s economic
consequences — including the economic costs of
raising taxes to pay for the spending, its
effects on future spending, and any other likely
future effects — the benefits of the stimulus
will end up exceeding its costs.”
 Agreestrongly:Cutler,Eichengreen,Obstfeld,Thaler
 Agree:Auerbach,Autor,Deaton,Goldberg,Goldin,Goolsbee,
Greenstone,Holmstrom,Maskin,Nordhaus,Rouse,Saez,
Schmalansee,Stock,Udry
 Uncertain:Acemoglu,Bertrand,Chevalier,Curry,Duffie,Fair,Hall,
Judd,Kashyap,Klenow,Scheinkman
 Disagree:Shin,Zingales
 Disagreestrongly:Alesina,Hoxby,Lazear
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
13
Was the stimulus worth it?
“Taking into account all of the ARRA’s economic
consequences — including the economic costs of
raising taxes to pay for the spending, its
effects on future spending, and any other likely
future effects — the benefits of the stimulus
will end up exceeding its costs.”
Response
Averageideologyscore
(0 =averageeconomist;+1=1SDtotheleft;‐1=1SDtotheright)
Agreestrongly
+1.1
Agree
+0.5
Uncertain
‐0.2
Disagree
‐0.8
Disagreestrongly
‐2.1
OrderedProbit:
Opinion=1.3*Ideologyscore(t‐stat=4.8)
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
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Generalizing the analysis
 Repeattheanalysisoneveryquestionasked:
 Orderedprobit:
Significantat1%level
9%
Significantat5%level
20%
29%
Significantat10%level
0%
20%
40%
Insignificant
60%
80% 100%
Significant
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
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When does ideology matter?
 Foreachtopic,runanorderedprobit:
Opinion=
Ideologyscore
Topic
T‐statisticonIdeology
Economicstimulusworthit
4.7
Economicstimulushelped
3.7
Europe
3.7
Moneymarketfunds
3.3
Gasprices
3.2
Fiscalcliff
3.0
BuyAmerican
2.8
ExecutivePay
2.5
QE3
2.5
Education
2.4
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
16
The role of ideology by field
Averagevalueoft‐statistic
Response=a+bIdeologyScore
2
1.6
1.2
0.8
0.4
0
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
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What explains ideology?
 Ideologyisnotwell‐explainedbytheobservablevariables
studiedbyDahl&Gordon:
Variable
Gender
AdjustedR2 frombivariate
regression:
Ideology=a+b*Variable
‐0.01
ServedinWashington
0.02
Field
‐0.00
WhereyourPhDisfrom
‐0.12
Currentuniversity
0.22
Cohort
0.02
ServedinWashingtonfora
0.24
Democrat
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
18
Research Question
“ViewsamongEconomists:
ProfessionalConsensusorPoint‐Counterpoint?”

AND
“Towhatdegreedoeconomistsdisagreeaboutkey
economicquestions?”
Consensus
1.

“Our self-image as a profession would be that our
views on economic questions are based on the
accumulated academic evidence”
Point‐Counterpoint
2.

“An alternative perception…is that economists
coalesce into different camps, to a degree
reflecting a liberal/conservative divide”
Justin Wolfers, Comments on “Consensus or Point-Counterpoint?'
19