Here’s the thing, if I’m permitted to briefly hijack this thread. I believe we’ve had debates around here on whether economics is a real science or not. I’d say it’s at least partly a scientific discipline, but I’ve noticed that often when you look at economic studies, you can predict what the conclusion will be if you know the researcher’s (or their employer’s) biases. That doesn’t seem very scientific to me.
I’ve seen similar things in the economic debates here, most recently the one on [thread=495799]economic stimulus for Canada[/thread] where the New Deal was discussed. In that thread we can see the following posts:
and then
A battle of cites showing that the New Deal was either a terrible idea, or a good (if imperfect) idea. So which is it? Since we know Sam Stone is a conservative while Kendall Jackson is more left-wing, we could predict what they’d think of the New Deal even before reading their posts, and of course they’d be able to support their opinions. And both of these posters have a good reputation for their knowledge of economics. I realize mine isn’t as good as theirs – my strong points are elsewhere – but while I don’t think Quebec’s economy is perfect, and it’s certainly not as good as Alberta’s, it isn’t terrible either (I can see it; I live here) so I’m sure I can find some evidence that some economic decisions by Quebec’s government (even when left-wingers were in power) have had positive effects.
The Fraser Institute is a right-wing think tank, and it’s based in Western Canada. We can expect it to focus on the problems with Quebec’s economic policy, and choose to report the economic variables that prove this. But if I find economic studies by left-wing economists at the UQAM, I’ll expect them to focus on the economic variables that either show Quebec’s economy isn’t doing as badly as Sam Stone would think, or that businesses in Quebec aren’t taxed as heavily as Sam Stone thinks they are (the latter is what the report I linked to indicates). But I’m not going to believe that the conclusions of either the Fraser Institute or the UQAM’s Chaire d’études socio-économiques are absolute fact.