Lawyers can be disbarred for all sorts of reasons: on the basis of unethical and illegal activities such as fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation, or for any other reason that amount to being unfit to be an attorney. Medical doctors can be disqualified if they engage in sexual misconduct with a patient, are found guilty of fraud (for example, falsely altering medical records or charging for treatments the patient did not receive), prescribe unneeded medication, and for alcoholism or drug addiction. If a psychologist dates a patient while she is under his care, that pretty much wraps up his career. When a pharmacist mixes up medications, that’s more or less it for him.

Then, there are recalls for almost everything under the sun: cars, tires, foodstuffs, candy, toys, dolls, child car seats – you name it.

Why is it that there is no such penalty for economists? Is it because we are so much better than our professional counterparts? Are we purer? Smarter? More ethical? Hardly. And yet when is the last time you heard about any such number cruncher losing his Ph.D. due to malpractice? Never, that’s when. But, surely, there are at least some economists who are guilty of malpractice, dereliction, unprofessional conduct, negligence, etc. The Origins of Totalit... Hannah Arendt Best Price: $8.49 Buy New $12.90 (as of 06:35 UTC - Details)

High up on the list of scholars who should have their Ph.D.s rescinded and lose their jobs for which the degree is a requirement, are all those who deny that the minimum-wage laws lead to unemployment for unskilled workers. They are truly traitors to the dismal science. They know full well, or at least ought to know, that a minimum-wage law will unemploy all those whose marginal revenue product lies below the pay level stipulated by law; that when placed above the equilibrium point, it creates a surplus of labor, known to the non-cognoscenti as joblessness. Sometimes econometric analysis fails to demonstrate this effect. If so, economists are cognizant of the fact or at least ought to be, that such results emanate from false data, or not enough time to yield these results, or to the failure to maintain ceteris paribus conditions. Yet, instead, they do irreparable harm to the least, last and lost of us whose productivity levels are below the level mandated by law.

Milton Friedman stated: “A minimum-wage law is, in reality, a law that makes it illegal for an employer to hire a person with limited skills.” In the view of Gary Becker: “It’s simple: Hike the minimum wage, and you put people out of work.” Thomas Sowell likened this law to an attempt to “Repeal … the Law of Gravity” and demonstrated “Why racists love the minimum wage laws” (they disproportionately create unemployment for black workers).

Now consider the case of the Marxist “economists.” They still believe in the labor theory of value, according to which this factor of production, alone, is responsible for the creation all goods and services, but is exploited by payments for profit, interest, rent, etc. They are economic quacks. They are the equivalent of flat-Earth geographers, phlogiston chemists and astronomers who maintain that the Earth is flat and that the sun revolves around it. They would not last a minute in an academia that had any standards, yet they prosper at present.

Then there are those – professional economists, believe it or not – who maintain that free trade is pernicious, that rent control is needed to prop up the supply of housing and be fair to tenants, and that profits are evil and harmful. The invisible hand? Spontaneous order? Fughedaboudit! Better Stretching: 9 M... Yoon, Joe Best Price: $5.78 Buy New $18.30 (as of 09:51 UTC - Details)

Well, perhaps it is not an altogether good idea to advocate the dismissal of members of this profession. It is entirely possible, given the sad state of this discipline, that the inmates will vote out the guardians. Just who, exactly, would do the voting? There are some economists who actually believe that truth may best be determined based on majority vote! Others flirt with the notion, tongue in cheek to be sure, that the way to determine correctness in this field is on the basis of the last man left standing in a debate: he who publishes last. Excellent economists of the sort mentioned above might be booted out if such a process were instituted. Maybe it is best to leave sleeping dogs as they are.

But there is clearly one Ph.D. who clearly does not deserve the tile of Dr. Surely; plagiarism on a massive scale is totally outside of all scholarly fields. We all know, however, why justice will not prevail in this particular case.

This originally appeared on WND and was reprinted with the author’s permission.

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