The Price of Virtue: Some Hypotheses on How Tractability Has Shaped Economic Models

Cherrier, Béatrice

doi:10.2139/ssrn.4189091

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…It was effective, in the sense that Gordon's model could be used to identify the lack of property rights as the source of rent dissipation and hence poverty among the too numerous fishermen-which he initially observed in the field. In that respect, Gordon's work mirrored what other economists were doing at that time, e.g., Robert M. Solow and Paul A. Samuelson's work in macroeconomics, where compacity and simplicity were viewed as a virtue of models (Boumans 2001;2023).…”

Section: Gordon and Schaefer: Static Economics And Biological Dynamicsmentioning

confidence: 79%

Building Integrated Models in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics: The Case of Gordon’s 1954 Fishery Model

Parent¹,

Mouysset²,

Missemer³

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Environmental and natural resource economics lies inherently at the interface between economic and natural dynamics (e.g. geological constraints, climate change, biodiversity evolution). Building models in that field often means building integrated models, calling on knowledge and methods from both economics and physics, climatology, biology or ecology. Howard Scott Gordon’s 1954 article on fishery economics is considered to be seminal in the history of bioeconomic modeling, integrating biological and economic variables in a microeconomic model. Yet the precise role played by biology in Gordon’s initial work remains unclear. On the basis of archival material and thorough analysis of Gordon’s early research, this paper examines Gordon’s model building and his persistent oscillation between two objectives – the production of a heuristic economic model with standard assumptions and the conception of a predictive policy tool relevant from a fishery-biology standpoint – and how he finally favored the first over the second. Moreover, contrary to received wisdom, we show that it was not Gordon but biologist Milner B. Schaefer who transformed Gordon’s model into an integrated model. These results shed new light not only on Gordon’s 1954 contribution but also on a whole tradition of integrated environmental and natural resource economics models, based on his work.

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Section: Gordon and Schaefer: Static Economics And Biological Dynamicsmentioning

confidence: 79%

Building Integrated Models in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics: The Case of Gordon’s 1954 Fishery Model

Parent¹,

Mouysset²,

Missemer³

et al. 2023

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…It was effective, in the sense that Gordon’s model could be used to identify the lack of property rights as the source of rent dissipation and hence poverty among the too numerous fishermen—which he initially observed in the field. In that respect, Gordon’s work mirrored what other economists were doing at that time, e.g., Robert M. Solow and Paul A. Samuelson’s work in macroeconomics, where compacity and simplicity were viewed as a virtue of models (Boumans 2001; Cherrier 2023).…”

Section: Heuristics Vs Prediction: Gordon’s Final Take On Fishery Eco...mentioning

confidence: 79%

Building Integrated Models in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics: The Case of Gordon’s 1954 Fishery Model

Parent,

Mouysset,

Missemer

et al. 2023

J Hist Econ Thought

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Environmental and natural resource economics lies inherently at the interface between economic and natural dynamics (e.g., geological constraints, climate change, biodiversity evolution). Building models in that field often means building integrated models, calling on knowledge and methods from economics and physics, climatology, biology, or ecology. Howard Scott Gordon’s 1954 article on fishery economics is considered to be seminal in the history of bioeconomic modeling, integrating biological and economic variables in a microeconomic model. Yet the precise role played by biology in Gordon’s initial work remains unclear. On the basis of archival material and thorough analysis of Gordon’s early research, this paper examines Gordon’s model building and his persistent oscillation between two objectives—the production of a heuristic economic model with standard assumptions, and the conception of a predictive policy tool relevant from a fishery-biology standpoint—and how he finally favored the first over the second. Moreover, contrary to received wisdom, we show that it was not Gordon but biologist Milner B. Schaefer who transformed Gordon’s model into an integrated model. These results shed new light not only on Gordon’s 1954 contribution but also on a whole tradition of integrated environmental and natural resource economics models, based on his work.

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“…The first lens with which to observe the mainstream economics is the progressive shift toward empirical research (Backhouse & Biddle, 2000;Backhouse & Cherrier, 2016, 2017Cherrier, 2022). Neoclassical economics, which is the theoretical framework on which mainstream economics is based since the seventies, built its fortune on the ability to provide clear models expressed using a very formal flavour of mathematics, mostly calculus-based.…”

Section: The Interpretative Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…4 I want to highlight two factors that have probably helped this shift. The first are the new data-driven methodologies, which are able to deal with a wider range of hypotheses than the neoclassical calculus-based approach (Cherrier, 2022). The second one is the return from the imperial conquests of other social sciences (Fourcade et al, 2015;Marchionatti & Cedrini, 2017), which has widened the domains of research and introduced new methodologies, like the laboratory experiments that behavioural economists have learnt from psychology.…”

Section: The Interpretative Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

How has Mainstream changed? A Topic Model insight

Redigonda

2023

Preprint

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This paper has two aims: to explore the suitability of computational tools in order to get a description of long-term evolution of mainstream economics and to test the "mainstream pluralism" hypothesis.A topic model is developed using full-text from papers published in a sample of top economics journals and the hierarchical Stochastic Block Model algorithm.The model is able to replicate many qualitative facts about the history of mainstream economics.Finally, the reason of the failure to test for the "mainstream pluralism" hypothesis are discussed.

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The Price of Virtue: Some Hypotheses on How Tractability Has Shaped Economic Models

Cited by 4 publications

References 46 publications

Building Integrated Models in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics: The Case of Gordon’s 1954 Fishery Model

Building Integrated Models in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics: The Case of Gordon’s 1954 Fishery Model

Building Integrated Models in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics: The Case of Gordon’s 1954 Fishery Model

How has Mainstream changed? A Topic Model insight

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