As the latest cohort of the Network Generation leave school, shirts daubed with fond farewells, Nigella Vigoroso-Heck ponders their futures.<\/p>\n
There’s a lot of stress before the start of school in\u00a0September; updating lessons with the latest economic changes, making sure those lessons comply with your school\u2019s latest teaching fad (apparently, this year it\u2019s \u201cflip-learning\u201d) and becoming au-fait with the Government\u2019s latest educational policy changes (GCSE grades 1-9 anyone).\u00a0 But there\u2019s also getting through the dreaded Results Day and saying emotional goodbyes to last year’s cohort as they head off to university.
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\nI will wish them all luck but, truthfully, my sincerest of wishes is with those that are off to read for an economics degree.\u00a0 After all, they are the ones with whom I have shared an intellectual connection for the past two years.\u00a0 I also quite like the idea that one day I might be able to claim that I taught the Chancellor of the Exchequer supply and demand.
\n\u200b<\/p>\n
\n“Millennials are not at university anymore. And they are not joining the labour force either.\u00a0 They\u00a0are\u00a0the labour force.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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\nThere is a lot of focus these days on the Millennial generation \u2014 those born between 1980 and 1996 \u2014 \u00a0and how they will fare at university and in the workplace.\u00a0 But I have noticed one big problem with all that analysis; Millennials are not at university anymore.\u00a0 And they are not joining the labour force either.\u00a0 They\u00a0are\u00a0the labour force. In 2015, Millennials became the largest generational segment of the UK workforce; some\u00a0have already seen 15 years pensionable work.\u00a0 The cohort of young boys and girls leaving school today are the generation after that; the\u00a0Network Generation.
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\nMembers of the Network Generation \u2013 the NetGens \u2013 are those born from 1997 onwards.\u00a0 And\u00a0I would like to introduce them to you; their characteristics, attitudes and behaviours.\u00a0\u00a0At the end of August 2018, I will have completed my fifth successive year of teaching NetGens \u2013 which amounts to more than 350 students.\u00a0 I recognise that every kind of person still exists in every generation, from go-getters to slackers, altruists to self-serving egoists, artists to analysts\u2026\u00a0 But it is the\u00a0trends in behaviour as a group\u00a0that allows comparison between generations.\u00a0 And NetGens certainly differ in their behaviours from their Millennial predecessors.<\/p>\nSo what\u00a0do NetGens want from their teachers? And can teachers of economics provide?
\nMy observations tell me the NetGens demand three things: it\u2019s got to be useful, it\u2019s got to be authentic \u2013 not propaganda and they want expert opinion.
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\nIt\u2019s got to be useful.<\/strong>
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\nNetGen students can often be seen on their phones during lessons and it’s no surprise to read\u00a0headline-grabbing studies that attention spans have shrunk to just eight seconds. \u00a0 Rather than being an inability to focus, however,\u00a0you would be better off to consider this as a highly evolved eight-second filter.\u00a0 This is the generation, remember, that has had internet access all their lives; their options are limitless but their time is not. As such, NetGens have adapted to sorting quickly and assessing enormous amounts of information.\u00a0 In addition, they also have a high intolerance for things they perceive as wasting their time.\u00a0 If they don\u2019t see the personal value of something within that eight-second window, they will tune out.\u00a0 Lessons have got to be useful to them.
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\nNot\u00a0just propaganda.<\/strong>
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\nBy age 15, the average NetGen will have seen about\u00a0200,000 marketing messages. With marketing so pervasive in their lives, NetGens can recognise when they are being sold to.\u00a0 And they don\u2019t trust it.\u00a0 More than that though, they have grown up in a world where their (constructed) worldviews have been consistently demolished by reality.\u00a0 Consider this quote from \u201cthe Narcissism Epidemic\u201d about what it is to have grown up during the past two decades:
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\nThey have had phoney athletes (with performance\u2013enhancing drugs), phoney rich people (with interest-only mortgages and piles of debt), phoney celebrities (via reality TV and YouTube), phoney genius students (with grade inflation), a phoney national economy (with $11 trillion of government debt) \u2026\u00a0 and phoney friends (with social networking explosion). All this fantasy might feel good but unfortunately reality always wins. The mortgage meltdown and the resulting financial crisis are just one example of how inflated desires eventually crash to earth.\u201d
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\nConsequently, NetGens tend to be more suspicious of the things they are told. Their critical thinking skills are more developed which – when combined with the empowerment they have got from their parents \u2013 means they are much more willing to critique their teachers and question the standard lines of argument.
\n\u200b<\/p>\n\n“My observations tell me the NetGens demand three things: it\u2019s got to be useful, it\u2019s got to be authentic \u2013 not propaganda and they want expert opinion.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\u200b
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\nExpert opinion<\/strong>
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\nLifelong instantaneous access to anything \u2014 entertainment, shopping, knowledge, validation, and people\u2019s locations \u2014 has led NetGens to assume all things are accessible whenever they want them and in the format they prefer (which is usually \u201cvia website\u00a0in person\u00a0and\u00a0in app\u201d).\u00a0 As a result, students are more frequently saying that they want to be taught by the experts on any given topic; after all, they have grown up with access to the experts on most subjects at their fingertips 24\/7.
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\nGiven these challenges, how well does a university degree in economics stack up?
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\nIs economics useful?<\/strong>
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\nThere are well-documented problems with the usefulness and relevance of economics programmes at university level.
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\nIn 2013, economics professor, Ben Fine, published a paper called\u00a0Economics: Unfit for purpose. In it he argued that social issues were now only analysed “on the basis of a sorely inappropriate technical apparatus”.
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\nIn May 2014, economics\u00a0students from 41 different universities joined forces in the first global protest against mainstream economic teaching.
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\nIn 2016, Lancaster University started to run a module entitled Economics for the Real World.\u00a0 That didn\u2019t stop the publication of\u00a0Econocracy, in which it’s student authors suggested \u201cit is now entirely possible to go through an entire degree without once venturing an opinion \u2026 we\u00a0were memorising and regurgitating abstract economic models for multiple-choice exams [and]\u00a076% of exam questions required no critical thinking skills whatsoever\u201d.
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\nIn truth, the list could go on much further.\u00a0 And the criticism isn\u2019t just restricted to the UK either.\u00a0 Just last year, US economist\u00a0Steven Payson, wrote in his book\u00a0How\u00a0Economics Professors Can Stop Failing Us\u00a0that \u201ceconomics today is like astronomy before Copernicus; hiding behind academic freedom to perpetuate a fantasy model of reality, undisturbed by its real-world failures\u201d.\u00a0 It seems then that economics, as an academic field, needs some urgent attention if it is to be considered useful by the next generation.
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\nVerdict:\u00a0\u00a0NetGens reject\u00a0economics on the basis that it is not useful.
\n\u200b<\/p>\n\n“Attention spans have shrunk to just eight seconds. Rather than being an inability to focus, however,\u00a0you would be better off to consider this as a highly evolved eight-second filter.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\u200b
\nIs economics authentic?<\/strong>
\n\u200b
\nOne of\u00a0the most frequent criticisms of today\u2019s economists (academic and non-academic) is that they are just handmaidens to capitalism. Capitalism (or neoliberal economic thinking) is by far the most dominant form of economic theory.\u00a0 But let\u2019s be clear: NetGens will not reject the neoliberalism\u2019s ideas simply because they consider them to be bad.\u00a0 They might reject them, however, because they view it as a persuasive marketing tactic rather than personally meaningful advice.\u00a0 The problem is that so much neoliberal theory is intertwined with political history and, in particular, how it has been used as an extension of domestic and foreign policy to exploit others.
\nNetgens are more tolerant than previous generations.\u00a0 They have grown up in an era where there was an African-American US president during their formative years and a female British Prime Minister.\u00a0 Bullying, LGBT tolerance and consent are issues that are now actively discussed on the political agenda. As a result, The NetGens can easily see who really benefits for from this school of thought and who is left on the scrap heap.\u00a0It\u00a0should be no wonder then that pluralist economics (that is, a campaign to change the teaching and research in\u00a0economics\u00a0towards more openness in its approaches, topics and standpoints) is catching fire.\u00a0 The Mint magazine has captured the zeitgeist.
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\nVerdict: NetGens\u00a0reject\u00a0economics\u00a0on the basis that it is neoliberal propaganda.
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\nWho are the economics experts?<\/strong>
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\nAcademic expertise comes with publication.\u00a0 Unfortunately, the process of publishing in economics is far from satisfactory.\u00a0 Steven Payson has written at length about the \u201cperverse incentives\u201d and \u201cself-reinforcing value system\u201d that leads to the abuse of citation counts\/data.\u00a0 And many of the world\u2019s most prominent economics professors have expressed similar despair about the way in which the subject is being driven by publications.
\n\u200b<\/p>\n\n“They have grown up in a world where their (constructed) worldviews have been consistently demolished by reality.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\u200b
\nIn particular, they are critical of the scientification of economics and the enormous amount of \u201cmathematical weightlifting\u201d that any student of advanced economic theory has to undertake \u2013 all at the expense of any real social benefit for those seeking to understand the economy and its workings.\u00a0 In 2009, for example, Paul Krugman noted: \u201c[In the aftermath of the great recession]\u00a0the profession\u2019s failure was the desire for an intellectually elegant approach that also gave economists a chance to show off their mathematical prowess \u2026 this romanticised vision of the economy led most economists to ignore all the things that can go wrong\u201d. More recently, Greek economist Yanis Varoufakis wrote that \u201cthe more scientific our models of the economy become, the less relation they bear to the real existing economy out there\u201d.
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\nVerdict: NetGens\u00a0will inevitably seek out the \u201cexperts\u201d.\u00a0 In doing so, it is likely that they will be exposed to the \u201cmathematical weightlifting\u201d exponents of our subject more often and earlier on in their studies.\u00a0 NetGens may well reject economics then on the basis that it is not useful to them in the real world or simply on the basis that it is just boring.\u00a0 On the other hand, some may accept that this is what economics is and continue the drive towards the scientification.
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\nTo an outsider, the state of economics as an academic subject might look relatively healthy.\u00a0 The number of students taking\u00a0A-Level Economics is rising and Economics UCAS applications have been increasing steadily for ten years.\u00a0 But it is clear that students \u2013 once at university \u2013\u00a0are already beginning to reject it.
\n\u200b<\/p>\n\n“It seems then that economics, as an academic field, needs some urgent attention if it is to be considered useful by the next generation.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\u200b
\nFurthermore, given the behavioural make-up of the NetGens, it is easy to see how (and why) this negative trend may continue.\u00a0 Every academic field will have its own challenges to face with regards to the NetGen generation but economics seems particularly badly placed.\u00a0 In particular, the key criticisms will be that it is not useful enough and that it is just a vehicle for neoliberal propaganda.\u00a0 Put simply: economics, in its current format, does not satisfy the needs and wants of the NetGen generation.
\n\u200b
\nWith this in mind, the next logical conclusion to make is that the best and brightest students coming out of sixth form and university education may well reject economics as a field for their potential careers.\u00a0 A society for professional economists should consider this a warning.\u00a0 What does it say about your future employees, your future colleagues and the future flag-bearers for your profession?
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\nAnd so: economics needs to become more useful by breaking away from its neoliberal shackles and mathematical weightlifting.\u00a0 To some extent, it is already happening but it needs much more.\u00a0 Syllabuses at universities and schools need to become more pluralistic; teachers need to bring the real world into every lesson; learning activities need to have unbiased outcomes; and academic journals need to be more relevant and less abstract.\u00a0 But non-academic professional economists need to do their part too.\u00a0 They need to get into the classroom more often (or on the internet, podcast, or simply via their own actions) to show the NetGens why economics is so incredibly useful in the real world.\u00a0 Their own legacies depend on it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the latest cohort of the Network Generation leave school, shirts daubed with fond farewells, Nigella Vigoroso-Heck ponders their futures. There’s a lot of stress before the start of school … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":57,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,103],"tags":[110,132,124,135],"class_list":["post-56","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-columns","category-education","tag-confessions","tag-economics","tag-sept-2018","tag-teaching"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}