Jokes in Economics & about Economist

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An economist returns to visit his old school. He's interested in the current exam questions and asks his old professor to show some. To his surprise they are exactly the same ones to which he had answered 10 years ago! When he asks about this the professor answers: "the questions are always the same - only the answers change!" 

Economics is extremely useful as a form of employment for economists. 

A central banker walks into a pizzeria to order a pizza.
When the pizza is done, he goes up to the counter get it. There a clerk asks him: "Should I cut it into six pieces or eight pieces?"
The central banker replies: "I'm feeling rather hungry right now. You'd better cut it into eight pieces."  

Reproduced below is an Economist Joke that illustrates the separate facilities solution to an externality problem.
Three guys decide to play a round of golf: a priest, a psychologist, and an economist.
They get behind a *very* slow two-some, who, despite a caddy, are taking all day to line up their shots and four-putting every green, and so on. By the 8th hole, the three men are complaining loudly about the slow play ahead and swearing a blue streak, and so on. The priest says, "Holy Mary, I pray that they should take some lessons before they play again." The psychologist says, "I swear there are people that like to play golf slowly." The economist says, "I really didn't expect to spend this much time playing a round of golf."
By the 9th hole, they have had it with slow play, so the psychologist goes to the caddy and demands that they be allowed to play through. The caddy says O.K., but then explains that the two golfers are blind, that both are retired firemen who lost their eyesight saving people in a fire, and that explains their slow play, and would they please not swear and complain so loud.
The priest is mortified; he says, "Here I am a man of the cloth and I've been swearing at the slow play of two blind men." The psychologist is also mortified; he says, "Here I am a man trained to help others with their problems and I've been complaining about the slow play of two blind men."
The economist ponders the situation-finally he goes back to the caddy and says, "Listen, the next time could they play at night."  

A physicist, a chemist and an economist are stranded on an island, with nothing to eat. A can of soup washes ashore. The physicist says, "Lets smash the can open with a rock." The chemist says, "Lets build a fire and heat the can first." The economist says, "Lets assume that we have a can-opener..."

Paul Samuelson 

Q: What's the difference between a finance major and an economics major?
A: Opportunity Cost  

An economist, a philosopher, a biologist, and an architect were were arguing about what was God's real profession. The philosopher said, "Well, first and foremost, God is a philosopher because he created the principles by which man is to live." "Ridiculous!" said the biologist "Before that, God created man and woman and all living things so clearly he was a biologist." "Wrong," said the architect. "Before that, he created the heavens and the earth. Before the earth, there was only complete confusion and chaos!" "Well," said the economist, "where do you think the chaos came from?"  

The First Law of Economists: For every economist, there exists an equal and opposite economist. The Second Law of Economists: They're both wrong.   pkm's existence theorem: for every finite set of answers there exists an infinite set of novel models 

If all the economists were laid end to end

a) it would be a good thing

b) they would be more comfortable

c) they would never reach conclusion

d) all of the above

e) none of the above

f) they would point in different directions 

Two economists are walking down the street. One sees a dollar lying on the sidewalk, and says so.

"Obviously not," says the other. "If there were, someone would have picked it up!"

PS. Replace the dollar with a relevant research idea and you get a new joke. 

We have 2 classes of forecasters: Those who don't know . . . and those who don't know they don't know.

- John Kenneth Galbraith  

"Murphys law of economic policy": Economists have the least influence on policy where they know the most and are most agreed; they have the most influence on policy where they know the least and disagree most vehemently.

- Alan S. Blinder 

An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today.

- Laurence J. Peter 

A study of economics usually reveals that the best time to buy anything is last year.

- Marty Allen 

Having a little inflation is like being a little pregnant--inflation feeds on itself and quickly passes the "little" mark.

- Dian Cohen 

I don't think you can spend yourself rich.

- George Humphrey 

If all economists were laid end to end they would not reach a conclusion.

- George Bernard Shaw 

Practical men ... are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. economist

- John Maynard Keynes 

If you put two economists in a room, you get two opinions, unless one of them is Lord Keynes, in which case you get three opinions.

- Winston Churchill 

Shall I tell you the opinion of a famous economist on jealousy? Jealousy is just the fact of being deprived. Nothing more.

- Henry Becque 

Stephen M. Goldfeld, in _The Journal of Money, Credit and Banking_. November, 1984, p. 611: "An economist is someone who sees something working in practice and asks whether it would work in principle." 

Economists don't answer to questions others make because they know what the answer is. They answer because they are asked.  

There is also a joke about the last Mayday parade in the Soviet Union. After the tanks and the troops and the planes and the missiles rolled by there came ten men dressed in black.
"Are they Spies?" Asked Gorby?
"They are economists," replies the KGB director, "imagine the havoc they will wreak when we set them loose on the Americans"  

The mathematician's child and the economist's child were in the third grade together, and the teacher asked, "If one man with one shovel can dig a ditch in ten days, how long would it take ten men with ten shovels to dig the same ditch?" Both children raised their hands.
The teacher said to the mathematician's child, "Johnny, how long?" and little Johnny v. said, "One day, teacher."
The teacher looked at the economist's child and said, "John Maynard, is that right?"
Little John Maynard said, "Teacher, it all depends."

Most of the following jokes were forwarded to me by Russell Gum to whom I owe a big thanks.
"Having a house economist became for many business people something like havinga resident astrologer for the royal court: I don't quite understand what this fellow is saying but there must be something to it." Linden. (Jan. 11, 1993). Dreary Days in the Dismal Science. Forbes. Pp. 68-70.

The following joke is a joint invention of Preston McAfee, Phil Reny and several so far anonymous writers.
Why God Never Received Tenure at the University

1. Because he had only one major publication.
2. And it was in Hebrew.
3. And it had no cited references.
4. And it wasn't published in a refereed journal or even submitted for peer review.
5. And some even doubt he wrote it himself.
6. It may be true that he created the world but what has he done since?
7. His cooperative efforts have been quite limited.
8. The scientific community has had a very rough time trying to replicate his results.
9. He never applied to the Ethics Board for permission to use human subjects.
10. When one experiment went awry, he tried to cover it up by drowning the subjects.
11. When subjects didn't behave as predicted, he often punished them, or just deleted them from the sample.
12. He rarely came to class, just told students to read the book.
13. He had his son teach the class.
14. He expelled his first two students for learning.
15. Although there were only ten requirements, most students failed his tests.
16. His office hours were infrequent and usually held on a mountain top.

A sure fire way to determine if someone is an economist: Ask the suspect "what's the difference between ignorance and indifference?" If the reply is "I don't know and I don't care" you can be pretty sure its an economist. Now the only question is what to do with him. 

If an economist and an IRS agent were both drowning and you could only save one of them, would you go to lunch or read the paper? 

The National Institute of Health (NIH) announced that they were going to start using economists instead of rats in their experiments. Naturally, the American Agricultural Economics Association was outraged and filed suit, but NIH presented some compelling reasons for the switch:

1) NIH lab assistants become very attached to their rats. This emotional involvement was interfering with the research being conducted. No such attachment could form for an economist.
2) Economists breed faster.
3) Economists are much cheaper to care for and PETA won't object regardless of the experiment.
4) There are some things even rats won't do.
However, it is difficult to extrapolate test results to human beings. 

How many economists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

1. Just one, but it really gets screwed.
2. One to prepare the proposal, an econometrician to run the model, one each MS and PhD students to write the theses and dissertations, two more to prepare the journal article (senior authorship not assigned), four to review it, and at least as many to refine the model and replicate the results. 

A guy walks into a DC curio shop. While browsing he comes across an exquisite brass rat. "What a great gag gift" he thinks to himself. After dickering with the shop keeper over the price, the man purchases the rat and leaves. As he's walking down the street, he hears scurrying noises behind him. Stopping and looking around, he sees hundreds, then thousands of rats pouring out of the alleys and stairwells into the street behind him. In a panic he runs down the street with the rats not far behind. The street ends at a pier; he runs to the end of the pier and heaves the brass rat into the Potomac. All of the rats scurry past him into the river where they drown. After breathing a sigh of relief and wiping his brow, the man heads back to the curio shop, finds the shop keeper and asks, "Do you have any brass economists?" 

TEN THINGS TO DO WITH A GRADUATE ECONOMICS TEXTBOOK

1. Press pretty flowers.
2. Press pretty insects.
3. Use it as paper weight on your already overcluttered desk.
4. Leave out in obvious places to impress uninformed undergraduates.
5. Mail to the White House as an intimidation tactic.
6. Give it a walk-on part in a boring European existentialist play.
7. Just throw the damn thing away.
8. Leave out for the rain and other forces of nature to reckon with.
9. Read it (ha ha ha), and weep.
10. Get a refund from bookstore so you can buy weekend's beer supply. 

How can you tell when an economist is lying?
His lips are moving. 

Why won't sharks attack economists?
Professional courtesy. 

Q: What do you get when you cross the Godfather with an economist?
A: An offer you can't understand. 

Q: How many economists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Hell, you need a whole department of them just to prepare the research grant. 

They say that Christopher Columbus was the first economist. When he left to discover America, he didn't know where he was going. When he got there he didn't know where he was. And it was all done on a government grant. 

Why do economists carry their diplomas on their dashboards?
So they can park in the (morally/intellectually) handicapped parking. 

A grade school teacher was asking students what their parents did for a living. "Tim, you be first. What does your mother do all day?"
Tim stood up and proudly said, "She's a doctor."
"That's wonderful. How about you, Amy?"
Amy shyly stood up, scuffed her feet and said, "My father is a mailman."
"Thank you, Amy" said the teacher. "What does your parent do, Billy?"
Billy proudly stood up and announced,
1. "Nothing. He's an economist."
2. "My daddy plays piano in a whorehouse." The teacher was aghast and went to Billy's house and rang the bell. Billy's father answered the door. The teacher explained what his son had said and demanded an explanation. Billy's dad said, "I'm actually an economist. How can I explain a thing like that to a seven-year-old?" 

A Berkeley economist died and went to heaven (No, that's not the joke). There were thousands of people ahead of him in line to see St. Peter. To his surprise, St. Peter left his desk at the gate and came down the long line to where the economist was, and greeted him warmly. St. Peter took the economist up to the front of the line, and into a comfortable chair by his desk. The economist said, "I like all this attention, but what makes ME so special?" St. Peter replied, "Well, I've added up all the hours for which you billed your consultation clients, and by my calculation you're 193 years old!" 

A Chicago economist died in poverty and many local futures traders donated to a fund for his funeral. The president of (the Merc, the Board of Trade, etc.) was asked to donate a dollar. "Only a buck?" said the president, "only a dollar to bury an economist? Here's a check; go bury 1000 of them." 

An economist and a physician had a dispute over precedence. They referred it to Diogenes, who gave it in favor of the economist as follows: "Let the thief go first, and the executioner follow." 

What's the difference between mathematics and economics?
Mathematics is incomprehensible; economics just doesn't make any sense. 

A judge was hearing a drunk-driving case and the defendant, who had both a record and a reputation for driving under the influence, demanded a jury trial. It was nearly 4 p.m. and getting a jury would take time, so the judge called a recess and went out in the hall looking to empanel anyone available. He found a dozen economists and told them that they were a jury. The economists thought this would be a novel experience (none had ever been at a trial before, except as a defendent or an expert witness) and followed the judge into the courtroom. The trial was over in about 10 minutes and it was very clear that the defendant was guilty. The jury went into the jury-room, the judge started getting ready to go home, and everyone waited. After three hours, the judge sent the bailiff into the jury- room to see what was holding up the verdict. When the bailiff returned, the judge said, "Well, have they arrived at a verdict yet?" The bailiff shook his head and said, "Verdict? Hell, Judge, they're still doing nominating speeches for the foreman's position!" 

For three years, the young assistant professor took his vacations at a country inn. He had an affair with the innkeeper's daughter. Looking forward to an exciting few days, he dragged his suitcase up the stairs of the inn, then stopped short. There sat his lover with an infant on her lap! "Why didn't you write when you learned you were pregnant?" he cried. "I would have rushed up here, we could have gotten married, and the child would have my name!" "Well," she said, "when my folks found out about my condition, we sat up all night talkin' and talkin' and we finally decided it would be better to have a bastard in the family than an economist." 

Santa Claus, the tooth fairy, a practical economist, and an old drunk are walking down the street together when they simultaneously spot a hundred dollar bill. Who gets it? The old drunk, of course, the other three are mythological creatures. 

A Harvard economist had a summer house in the Maine woods. Each summer he'd invite a different friend (no, that's not the punch line) to spend a week or two. On one occasion, he invited a Czechoslovakian to stay with him. They had a splendid time in the country - rising early and living in the great outdoors. Early one morning they went out to pick berries for their morning breakfast. As they went around the berry patch along came two huge bears. The economist dashed for cover. His friend wasn't so lucky and the male bear reached him and swallowed him whole. The economist ran back to his car, drove to town as fast has he could, and got the sheriff. The sheriff grabbed his rifle and dashed back to the berry patch with the economist. Sure enough, both bears were still there. "He's in THAT one!" cried the economist, pointing to the male. The sheriff looked at the bears, and without batting an eye, leveled his gun, took careful aim, and SHOT THE FEMALE. "Whatd'ya do that for?!" exclaimed the economist, "I said he was in the other!" "Yep," said the sheriff, "and would YOU believe a economist who told you that the Czech was in the Male?" 

WASHINGTON DC GOVERNMENT ECONOMIST HUNTING REGULATIONS AND BAG LIMITS

GENERAL

1. Any person with a valid Washington DC hunting license or a Federal Income Tax Return may harvest government economists.
2. Taking of economists with traps or deadfalls is permitted. The use of currency as bait is prohibited.
3. Killing of economists with a vehicle is prohibited. If one is accidentally struck, remove the dead economist to side of the road and proceed to the nearest car wash.
4. It is unlawful to chase, herd, or harvest economists from limousines, Mercedes Benz's, the Metro, or Porsches.
5. It shall be unlawful to shout "research contract" or "I need a policy consultant" for the purpose of trapping economists.
6. It shall be unlawful to hunt economists within 100 feet of government buildings.
7. It shall be unlawful to use decision memos, draft legislation, conference reports, or RFP's to attract economists.
8. It shall be unlawful to hunt economists within 200 feet of Senate or House hearing rooms, libraries, whorehouses, massage parlors, special interest group offices, bars, or strip joints.
9. If an economist is elected to government office, it shall be a felony to hunt, trap, or possess it. It will also be a shame.
10. Stuffed or mounted economists must have a DC Health Department inspection certificate for rabies and vermin.
11. It shall be illegal for a hunter to disguise as a reporter, drug dealer, pimp, female congressional aid, sheep, legislator, policy maker, bookie, lobbyist, or tax accountant for the purpose of hunting economists.

BAG LIMITS

1. Econometrician: 2
2. Two-faced Policy Analyst: 1
3. Macro Policy Wonk: 4
4. Big-mouthed Populist: 2
5. Relevant Economist: EXTINCT
6. Cut-throat Administration Seeker: 2
7. Back-stabbing Senior Author: 2
8. Brown-nosed Deputy Kisser: 2
9. Silver-tongued Congressional Consultant:; $100 BOUNTY
10. Wise-assed CivilLibertarian: 7 11. Staff economist: NO LIMIT

Given 1000 economists, there will be 10 theoretical economists with different theories on how to change the light bulb and 990 empirical economists laboring to determine which theory is the *correct* one, and everyone will still be in the darkk.

That's all folks!

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