Robina
You think economics is a antiquated field? All I am hearing you two talk is a lot of wishy washy stuff that are neither finance or economics. Here the economic question is simple. How do you increase productivity? You have i think 15 million qorkerz underemployed and in low productivity jobs. You want to increase their productivity to create more ? How do you do it? We did the infrastructure thing it has grown govt spending and not solved this problem
Yes, a big chunk of economics is outdated. Too many loopholes in the old theories. For instance on this blog and other fora, people struggle to capture reality - which economic metrics don't capture. GDP, GNP, per capita, HDI, Gini. How is the economy doing? You can only use English not economics to express the situation.
I know you're a management consultant. Most of you lot are antiques. You walk into a struggling business, say KQ, and the output is a massive bill and whitepaper. Bye! Imagine your doctor says you have a bad heart - and sayonara, good luck!
Of course the armchair analysis is usually already tried and failed due to circumstance. Management consulting is a talkshop with no action aka politics.
I don't mean that natural or physical sciences or engineering are better. That's a separate matter. But at least physicians or astronomists face out and keep researching and discovering. Stuff like the theory of competition really - perfect competition is supposed to cause innovation. But we all know better, no? Who is more innovative - Safaricom or KQ? Google or GE? It is the monopoly that innovates - not the cash-strapped restaurant or retail business. Restaurants are a perfect competition - but zero innovation - cause no cash. It is why they put granny at the counter and the kids do the dishes in the back. The entire market theory is outdated. Newtonian classics were supplanted first by quantum then Einstein's relativity. Economic inventions or innovations are slow, scarce or non existent.