Summary
Dr John Tippett (economist, authored book on land economics) delivers a philosophical critique of mainstream economics at the Feb 2020 Forecast Class. Five reasons economics has failed: (1) treated humans as “units of labor” to be minimized in cost; (2) mathematics infiltration requiring unrealistic assumptions; (3) academia rewards complex math over reality; (4) refusal to apply common sense; (5) work (labor) is mischaracterized as “disutility” rather than meaningful human expression. Also discusses the removal of land as a third factor of production, subsumed under “capital” after Henry George’s movement threatened vested interests.
Key Claims
- Adam Smith’s first and primary work was the “Theory of Moral Sentiments” (1770) about human welfare — but this is forgotten in favor of Wealth of Nations / pin specialization. — confidence: high
- Economics degenerated humans to “units of labor whose cost is to be minimized.” — confidence: high (as his critique)
- Mathematics in economics requires assumptions like “perfect knowledge” that are fundamentally unrealistic, but enable publication. — confidence: high
- Land was deliberately removed as a factor of production after Henry George became famous — it was subsumed under “capital.” — confidence: high (Phil’s and Tippett’s shared view)
- Monash University required Tippett to remove all references to Henry George from his doctoral thesis before publication. — confidence: high
- Australia’s 1900 Harvester judgment established a “basic wage” defined as what a family could live on in reasonable comfort. This concept has since been replaced by “minimum wage” with no reference to human wellbeing. — confidence: high
- Work is one of three fundamental human needs: something to do, someone to love, something to aspire to. Treating it as “disutility” is a category error. — confidence: high
Predictions / Forecasts
None (philosophical/historical presentation)
Notable Quotes
“If gravity had a secret to it, whereby you could make a lot of money knowing that secret, gravity would not have been invented yet. It’s the same with economic rent.” “Monash Uni demanded that all references to Henry George be removed [from Tippett’s doctoral thesis].”