How do you learn from economists with different perspectives?

Current growth GDP or Gross Domestic Product formula is obsolete and not aligned to the Paris Agreement, Neither to The Planetary Boundaries. A New Gross Planetary Product (GPP) is required, where current GDP Formula gets upgraded by pricing / adding first Environmental Externalities; & later on Planetary Boundaries, Social &!Digital Ones. GPP : Sustainable Gross Planetary Product Y = C + G + I + (X-M) + Environmental Externalities (Planetary Ones) + Social + Digital Externalities This new formular is critical to move economic growth with Planetary Boundaries but also to address 21st Century Challenges: 1) Rebalance Humans with Nature & Planet 2) Rebalance Humans with Humans 3) Rebalance Humans with Digital Living Exponential Techs

Diversity in economics is crucial for advancing the field, creating fair and effective economic policies, and ensuring that economic analysis reflects the realities and needs of diverse populations. Behavioral economics emerged as a subfield because neoclassical economic models failed to explain certain behaviors. Early pioneers of that subfield were not even necessarily "economists" (e.g., Tversky was a psychologist). Academic economics has been criticized as a misogynistic field (see, for example, Claudia Sahm's blog posts). Claudia Goldin was awarded the Nobel Prize for her research on the gender wage gap and the evolution of women's participation in the labor market over the past 200 years, perhaps because she can relate to it.

Agreed on almost all of this. Obviously, there is both macro & microeconomic theory. They’re modeled completely different. I’m not sure if there’s too much that going into having different goals. If that’s field or study - for example EM’s economist vs US economist, network with people closest to your specific interest. But also try to get a good mix of credible viewpoints and viewpoints. It’ll help you perfect your own in the end.

Looking at the breath of views within economics is taking a narrow view of diversity. Understanding the complexity of economics in the real world is better served by adding perspectives and models outside of economics such as system thinking from engineering and biology.

The discipline is pushed forward when people explore new areas within the field. Gatekeeping can prevent the proliferation of new ideas, which is a big loss to the world.

Finding diverse sources is incredibly easy. LinkedIn actually isn’t the worst place to start, but if you just watch Bloomberg or read any financial publications, you may find analysts/groups you’re interested in. From there you can look into different analyst insights more and really get a wholistic picture of different ideas if you want. You should always verify anything you find suspicious. Maybe an easier way to put it is if you have the internal drive and desire, you’ll find a way to seek out multiple viewpoints.

It's not just about finding different sources of information and data or texts that expand your knowledge. It's crucial to have the self-discipline to regularly read texts, as this provides continuity in the accumulation of knowledge. For example, one activity I regularly engage in is reading most of the articles from The Economist that are published every Saturday.

If you want to explain how firms compete in an oligopoly then your standard economic textbook is likely the best source. i.e. the mainstream textbooks will give you the best guidance for economics that provides hypotheses that can be empirically tested. I use the word "likely", because the world is more complex and firm behaviour may be driven by other forces, such as institutional regulatory capture or interest group theory - these are still economic concepts but they intertwine with other disciplines and could be considered less "orthodox". When moving from "how things work" to "how should they work", then reading widely across different opinions will be the best route to understand what you truly value.

Diverse sources come from our eagerness to learn different perspectives and reflect them to real life where all theories are put in practice and exchange one to another

Diverse sources of information search starts with preparing for questioning all the possible aspects and look for the answers, starting from the local to global level information. The local data and information must be given a priority before reaching for global information. This happens with many projects that the local data, problems and solutions are sometimes ignored while adopting global best practices which results failure of achieving the desired objectives often.

You read critically by asking yourself questions along the way. A key part of reading is absorbing the knowledge you’re gaining. If you can’t correlate what you learned in a real life setting, it’s almost useless. You should have some recognition of how what you’re reading applies specific to your goals.

Finding sources with contradicting arguments can be helpful for understanding multiple perspectives and get practice with not taking one perspective at face value. It's also good to get in the habit of being critical of your own perspectives and be open to change in the face of evidence or alternative logical arguments.

Reading critically means that you are fully aware that what you are reading is not the only truth. If you understand the logical sequence of the arguments you can often find where the author is making a leap of faith.

Reading critically and relating it to practical, ground situation is very important for understanding. It will start with first a through understanding of the concept the writer is intended to explain. Then questioning the thought with different angles in order to gauge the correctness and completeness of information.

I think this is the most important thing. You can never engage in the process of life long learning if you have a closed mind, one that can hear no voice but that of its own. The only way to growth and progress is open-mindedness. Be agile, and accept the fact that you will be wrong at times. The world is changing and so are the theories that we grew accustomed to. Hence, we should all entertain even the most drastic of ideas or else the discipline of economics will not be able to keep up with the dynamic world we live in.

You should respect everyone’s point of view, but I believe a healthy debate can be very constructive. Remember that you’re debating the idea, you’re not looking to argue with the speaker. I learned this line in college constitutional law (it was a requirement where I went). Justice Brandeis famously wrote “the right to swing one’s fist ends where another man’s nose begins”

With sufficient time and effort, you can usually dig down to the assumptions that result in economists reaching different views on the same subject. If these differences are driven by values or personal incentives, then dialogue may not necessarily move them. However, it may help elucidate why the differences exist and help others decide where they stand on particular issues.

Engagement with experts of diverse nature is the essence of learning new things in this era. This revolves around explaining your ideas well and then listening others patiently with open mind. Convince others with evidence and welcome new ideas to change your analysis. This will make an enriched analysis. If an economist, can not make other non-economist experts understand his analysis output in a simple and common sense way, then his/her effort will be of no use. Similarly, if economist fails to understand the other experts thoughts then same will happen.

A set of ground rules helps orient the conversation productively, especially since economic discussions can get polarized by their proximity to political issues. The basic rules of logic are a good starting point (no ad hominems, etc.). Understanding the language of your counterpart is also critical: are they an empiricist, or more Austrian/philosophical? This can influence what type of evidence they consider to be valid.

I find thinking from first principles to be a useful creative strategy. A line of thinking can be compared later to other existing perspectives, but a first-principles-based strategy can help with identifying new perspectives.

Thinking creatively out of the box is critical when you are analysing (often incomplete) facts and data to understand how a market functions. That said, you need to use your standard economist toolbox and use creativity to build from that.

Applying creatively comes from two aspects. First, is letting our creative minds read realities and abstracts them. Second, is by putting our observation to bodies of theories but not reading the theories with our non-creative minds.

As a social science, anyone approaching Economics would benefit from different perspectives and should consequently be open to that. Being those coming from scholars based in different regions of the globe and/or different background (Anglo-Saxon, French speaking countries, BRICS and other recently developed countries, ect.). Learning and confronting other′s views, while growing and nurturing our knowledge shall be a life long process.

Learning from economists with different perspectives make us able to communicate and try to avoid misunderstanding from others. But we need to be realistic there are people that have been encapsulated in a specific thought and those one are ready for talking and bridging among thoughts.

Our body of knowledge will only move forward if we are humble enough to thoughtfully listen to those with different points of view and seriously consider what they have to say. That is as true for economics as it is for other fields of study. New ideas, if they contradict old ideas, can be difficult for many to accept because if these new ideas are correct, it means their old ideas were wrong. No one wants to be proven wrong. It is easier to just ignore (or try to discredit or silence) those with new ideas. But then we get stuck where we are instead of moving forward.

Ultimately, economics is not about money. It's about people making choices in a finite world. Understanding how those people react to incentives (especially to the level of 2nd and 3rd-order effects), and what their choices say about their preferences and their environment, can help us to understand how those factors influence the behavior of companies and other organizations, and perhaps find situations where they can be improved to encourage human thriving.

I would suggest starting from highly reputable economists (not consensus, necessarily). It’s a difficult question to give guidance on because I think so many people have interesting market/economic views and they’re almost all worth giving the time to study, assuming they’re serious. You can’t decide if something is a nonsensical theory (as an example) if you haven’t read it…