Economics & conservatism

Two interesting data points this week seem to confirm one of my long-standing suspicions: economic knowledge and conservative political philosophy are strongly correlated. My belief, cultivated from years of observing liberals I know, is that those on the political left tend to favor some form of moral or ethical worldview, placing cold economic realities much further down the scale of importance than conservatives like myself.

The first point is a study conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (not exactly a hotbed of conservative propaganda):

Most notably, the study found that the more economics classes a person took, the more likely he or she was to be a member of the Republican Party and to donate money to a political candidate or a cause.

“In sum,” the study said, “those taking more economics classes favored less regulation or government intervention affecting prices for specific goods and services, including wages and salaries.”

The second point of reference is a more controversial survey conducted by Professor of Econ at George Mason, Dr. Daniel Klein, and Zogby researchers. They asked eight questions, and counted as incorrect only those responses that explicitly opposed basic economic consensus on each subject. The design of the study could have been more neutral had they asked questions that challenged conservative sacred cows, but at least they admit that in the WSJ article summary. Here are the results:

Here they are, best to worst, with an average number of incorrect responses from 0 to 8: Very conservative, 1.30; Libertarian, 1.38; Conservative, 1.67; Moderate, 3.67; Liberal, 4.69; Progressive/very liberal, 5.26.

Americans in the first three categories do reasonably well. But the left has trouble squaring economic thinking with their political psychology, morals and aesthetics.

I consider myself to be a Libertarian with an asterix (I don't always agree with Libertarian foreign policy leanings - I tend to be more of a hawk).