I am planning an editorial in the journal I edit that encourages more public sector participation in published, public economic discussions. I’d appreciate comments on the draft below.
As the Editor of Economic Papers: A Journal of Applied Economics and Applications I actively seek quality applied economics papers, particularly those with a policy orientation, that address current events. It is important to provide inputs from economists on policies to do with health, the environment, microeconomic and macroeconomic policy, superannuation and so on, to at least provide one quality control check on public policy discussions from the significant perspective of economics. The purpose of a publication like EP is to help provide such a check. For the most part, however, contributions to professional economic publications in Australia are made by university academics rather than those employed in the public sector. I think that this specialization represents a misallocation of resources by the public sector and a source of missed opportunity.
It cannot be denied that some of the best economic research in Australia is occurring outside the Australian universities. Groups such as the Productivity Commission, the ACCC, the Reserve Bank of Australia, State and Commonwealth Treasuries as well as various government departments such as the BITRE (Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics), Immigration and Citizenship, and so on, have natural advantages in doing applied research because of their closeness to policy–making processes, because of their ongoing links with very particular economic policy concerns and because of their ability to access large teams of highly intelligent, dedicated and well-resourced, researchers. Yet these groups often do not become involved in public economic debates. Why?
A first reason is that public researchers often work under stringent time guidelines and are therefore busy. A task is assigned to them by policy authorities and they often must respond to that task promptly. Writing up a paper for publication that summarizes the core economic ideas contained in a broader policy report is somewhat diverting. It has a high opportunity cost for researchers and employing institutions in terms of cost and time – particularly if complete reports are posted on websites or are available for purchase at low cost. In addition, there may be few rewards to the individual researches involved in preparing a paper for academic publication. Indeed there may be possible costs to providing what might be seen as a contrarian, individual in a bureaucracy that does not appreciate deviations from a single official viewpoint. In some cases public agencies may simply see involvement in a public debate on economic issues as time consuming and a waste of resources. Some of these costs are indisputable.
But the costs need to be assessed against benefits derived from public involvement in public debates. One clear benefit is that ideas promoted by public bureaucracies become contestable when they are published because they are open to scrutiny by skilled economics professionals. ‘Groupthink’, telescopic vision error and simply errors of fact and logic can be a problem even among the most skilled and dedicated civil servants. In fact, these issues are universal problems that afflict academics as well.
In addition, involvement by the public sector in academic economic debates helps to drive the direction of public debates and discussions in ways that can promote the social advantage. This latter point often seems unappreciated. University economists often have, at best, a limited prescribed research agenda that is all too often driven by the imperatives of making a splash in terms of technical virtuosity rather than in addressing socially important issues – the current Australian Research Council obsession with journal rankings helps foster this blinkered view of what it is to be making a worthwhile contribution as an economist. Getting university academics to focus on applied economics issues, such as reforming the public health system for example, is at least as important as narrower technical economic concerns and should help feed the latter lines of inquiry.
If benefits from active publication strategies exceed costs then resources should be diverted in public economic think-tanks to writing up economic research in a form assessable to academic economists. The key concern is to isolate the key economic ideas and the core issues of evidence.
The notion that departments cannot engage in a debate because of the need to present a united front to policy makers can be overstated. It is often not necessary to adopt a strongly partisan view that might differ from a prevailing departmental ethos. Of course the core economics that drive a particular viewpoint should be justifiable and amenable to scrutiny.
I restate the strong interest EP has in accessing inputs from the Australian public sector and welcome discussion and debate on these issues. Ways of encouraging extra outputs from those in the public sector are worth thinking about.
To avoid retribution, you could offer to publish papers under a pseudonym such as “By an Esteemed Colleague of Henry Thornton”.
More seriously, if sound government policies are to be explained to the electorate then it is incumbent on economists’ principals to see the value of greater public fostering of informed debate. Publication of Nick Stern’s and Ross Garnaud’s reports on the economics of climate change would have been well served by extended discussion both in refereed journals and in the mainstream press of their core finding. Instead, we have had a stream of denialist claptrap from the country’s largest newspaper group – a disease that has even infected the board of the ABC.
I am reminded of an old joke:
Q: How can you tell an extroverted economist?
A: When he talks to you he stares at your shoes rather than his.
Harry, you need to convince your colleagues that this is not time to be staring at shoes. Look for the whites of their eyes.
Whilst I’m not familiar with the academic research funding process, why not adopt some sort of research funding system for the public sector? The government could set up a fund, which could do two things:
1. Provide funding for public servants to do research on topics of specific interest to the government – ie rather than commissioning the Productivity Commission to do a small study, or the public servants in a particular departmental unit to do the work, specific research could be tendered out across the entire government.
2. Provide funding for public servants to do research on topics of specific interest to them – they would have to submit proposals and have them assessed. These would topics that the government may not need a study on right at this time, but would still contribute to the wider policy debate and inform government decisions in the future.
Combined with this, implement a policy across government that any public servants who obtain such funding can use X amount of hours per week to work on this research – or more subject to the discretion of departmental management.
Departments could be assessed/ranked on how they perform in securing such funding, to develop a culture where contributing to the public policy debate is encouraged. Whether such research is published in journals such as Economic Papers could be a way of assessing a department’s “external influence and engagement”.
Apart from allowing public servants to engage in the public policy debate, it could also improve job satisfaction and make a public service career more appealing – e.g somebody may be working in health policy but could also have an interest in transport policy which they could pursue through this avenue.
Just an idea…
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Just to add to that, if the government didn’t want to spend money to set up a fund – they could just focus on assessing/ranking departments in terms of research by public servants that is published in journals e.g by requiring that it is reported in their annual reports. Additionally, if departments were given targets to meet then that could assist in developing a culture where contributing to the public policy debate is encouraged.
Krystian,
the problem with your idea is that it leads to what we have in the university system (where I believe more money is now spent trying to get grants than the actual amount awarded). If you think that works well, then maybe it’s a good idea.
I personally don’t see the problem with a combination of tenders and small departments set up to look at topics where there is little other expertise.
hc: you said “As the Editor of Economic Papers: A Journal of Applied Economics and Applications I actively seek quality applied economics papers, particularly those with a policy orientation, that address current events”. I asked you not long ago to consider accepting one such paper here, which to my amazement the ANU’s RMAP has (as I write) agreed to host at RMAP (Coombs B 12.30 29th April). Here is the Draft Abstract:
The paper begins by challenging the quasi-Malthusian assumption going back to Wigley (CRU-UEA & CSIRO, Tellus 1993) and maintained by Sokolov et al (MIT, 2009), that there is a fixed limit to the volume of CO2 emissions that can be absorbed by land and ocean biospheres. Wigley’s assumption is central to the MAGICC models relied on by IPCC to project global climate to 2100, as it results in more than doubling the projected rate of growth of the atmospheric concentration of CO2, from the actual 0.4% (1958-2009), to 1% p.a (2000-2100).This paper shows there is no evidence to support Wigley’s Malthusian assumption (of diminishing marginal returns to CO2, all other inputs constant) and provides counter-factuals for no such evidence being likely to emerge in future) including regression analysis of the impacts of temperature and atmospheric CO2 on forestry, fisheries, and agriculture. Its data on incremental CO2 content of increases in world food production per capita since 1960 – e.g. over 40% of the world’s daily cereal intake embodies carbon – shows how reducing CO2 emissions to 40 percent of the level in 2000, is likely to reduce world food consumption pro rata. Policy implications of such unintended consequences of the drive to eliminate anthropogenic CO2 emissions conclude the paper.
Hc: any comments? or are you like the philistines? No, that is unkind, I remain available for 18 holes of golf whenever you are next in Canberra, with sheep stations as the stake, I am currently about 20 up thanks to my wife’s better bridge, but could need her help at golf.
As the Mogambo puts it in the Big Cahuna- “The US government has added US$4.11 billion of deficit spending every single day since September 2007. That means the Obama administration is borrowing $287.70 a week for each non-taxpayer-paid worker in the country – which non-taxpayer-paid workers will then have to pay back! And the so-called US government gets away with this!!!” while David Goldman pores over the graphics here- http://blog.atimes.net/?p=1430 and just what sort of public sector debate can we expect from a bunch of rusted on Keynesians that have no vested interest whatsoever in raising any objection to this economic madness?
Now while it’s true Australia started from an envious Budget surplus position and we have the luxury of a lot of expensive dirt per capita, what has been the response of our public sector to following this ROW madness? Stony silence on everything from Fuelwatch, Grocerywatch, insulation to school computers and school hall debacles, not to mention flinging money from the balcony for ‘reshiftable’ energy programs. On the last point watch for the uproar when at recent count there were still 42000 ‘free’ solar systems to get up by the early July cutoff and the industry can’t possibly manage it with the bleating that ensues. Another Budget allocation and a new bunch of public servants to investigate what went wrong no doubt. We can all look forward with trepidation to Canberra managing our hospitals in future. Keynesians commenting without fear or favour on public policy and economics? Don’t make me laugh!
Here’s the rub on typical Keynesian money printing and flinging it from the balcony-http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=831
The name of the game everywhere nowadays is to get your snout in the trough early and hop in for your chop before the inevitable occurs, as Treasury and Finance eventually summon up the cohones to give the relevant Minister the ugly facts about the fallacy of composition of such brainfarts and largesse. Then comes the furious recriminations from those who missed out and the blame game for the particular industry involved.
Happy to golf with you in Canberra Tim.
With thanks for sharing this post, it was helpful.