Journalism and Economics: The Tangled Webs of Profession, Narrative, and Responsibility in a Modern Democracy

Abstract

What can be done to improve this situation? The answer is clearly important if economics is to contribute to better public policy. It is surely a necessary condition for effective reporting that journalists become more economically literate and better rewarded for doing so. It is also surely necessary that economists undertake research that is relevant. However, what is interesting and most provocative in this paper, is the suggestion that this might not be sufficient. Parker correctly points to the key actor often missing in this discussion — the public.

He suggests that even the clearest statement of what economists know about policy, written by journalists who are as well trained in economics as the economists themselves, might still not penetrate the public’s consciousness unless the reporting can be captured by the filters by which the public organizes and processes information. In particular, the public imposes a moral and human interest frame on news which economics, as a discipline, severely underplays. The public, according to Parker, has deeply rooted views which are at odds with the individualistic, rational- decision maker paradigm which underemphasizes the role of institutions and collective action.

If Parker is correct, the implications are at once important and somewhat depressing. Unless the discipline changes in a most fundamental and not very likely way, no matter how brightly the light is shined by journalists, economists and the public may be doomed, like strangers passing in the night, never quite to meet. Nonetheless, Richard Parker is surely right that we are far better off understanding the reasons for these difficulties in communication, than in trying to ignore them. He is also right in pointing to the need for improved understanding of how the public learns from journalism and in particular how it interprets and evaluates economic news. All in all, this is a most stimulating paper. It is well worth reading, both for the central argument it makes and for the many perceptive observations it contains.