Stigler saw markets as producing wrong knowledge because they satisfy popular prejudice
Evidence
However, Stigler had already argued that one should not trust the academy to regulate itself. Absent some jolt from the outside, a faculty would become “mediocre and complacent.” But this raised a perplexing question. If the organizing principles of intellectual life and markets really were the same, then how could one reasonably hold—as Stigler did—that there was something persistently wrong with the kind of knowledge it produced? Stigler’s answer is worthy of close scrutiny. Markets did give people what they wanted. But this was nothing to celebrate, because most people are instinctively predisposed to hold the wrong views about them. Markets produced the wrong kind of knowledge because they gave people what they wanted. — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 120
Categorization
- DEEPTHINKING: A genuinely counterintuitive hinge: the leading free-market economist arguing that markets supply what is wanted rather than what is true — collapsing the usual pro-market defense of the marketplace of ideas.
- XREF: connects to: Stigler thought public lectures on economics were useless and politically dangerous — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 145; Prejudice persists because people dismiss evidence contradicting existing attitudes; Prejudiced individuals misattribute their dislike to group attributes rather than vice versa. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 841 (+5 more)
Broader Connections
- Prejudice persists because people dismiss evidence contradicting existing attitudes
#expands(0.85) - Markets are products of truth struggles, not validators of truth
#complicates(0.80) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 288 - Prejudiced individuals misattribute their dislike to group attributes rather than vice versa.
#corroborates(0.75) — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 841 - Perceived resource scarcity combined with a competitive outgroup triggers instrumental prejudice.
#expands(0.75) — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1489 - Advantaged groups manufacture prejudiced justifications to protect their gains
#complicates(0.72) — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1516