Economic heterodoxy declined because graduate training filtered out non-economists

Evidence

I believe it was no accident that all manner of otherwise tolerant eclectic people started claiming that heterodoxy in economics was finally a thing of the past precisely during the Bubble run-up to 2007; perhaps we can now appreciate it as the twin offspring of the neoliberal herald of the “end of history,” akin to the “Great Moderation,” only now in the precincts of intellectual endeavor. The profession had been rendered starkly more homogeneous in outlook and training, not least through graduate recruitment of tyros with no undergraduate degree in economics, which had significant consequences for the bumbling responses of economists when the crisis hit. Training and backgrounds had grown so narrow that the newer generation had no idea there had ever been anything alien to their tradition, and hence their impressions of intellectual freedom were simple artifacts of their ignorance. — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 64

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Mirowski’s broader ‘thought collective’ thesis and the idea that the profession’s homogenization explains its crisis response blind spots. — connects to: Professional exclusion of heterodox economists makes neoclassical orthodoxy self-reinforcing — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 824; Summers blamed graduate training standards for economics’ predictive failure — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 15; Neoclassical training immunized economists against even recognizing financial conflicts of interest — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 591 (+4 more)
• QUESTION: What empirical evidence exists for the graduate recruitment claim — no UG economics degree — and how has it been verified?

Broader Connections

• Professional exclusion of heterodox economists makes neoclassical orthodoxy self-reinforcing #expands (0.90) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 824
• Summers blamed graduate training standards for economics’ predictive failure #exemplifies (0.85) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 15
• Economics departments eliminated methodology courses by training out all qualified instructors #exemplifies (0.85) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 460
• Neoclassical training immunized economists against even recognizing financial conflicts of interest #expands (0.80) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 591
• Mainstream economics dismissed dissenting figures for lacking mathematical rhetoric #exemplifies (0.80) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1772