Sometimes the media is careless. This is especially on account of being sympathetic to their own or somebody perceived to be their own. I don't know about you, but I do not consider Andrew Mwenda to be a journalist; and I know for a fact that he is not an economist.
I think Mr. Mwenda has careless opinions, especially on matters economics. Take for instance his latest outburst that there is no relationship between corruption and economic growth.
It is easy to see where the problem is. Because Mr. Mwenda is lazy, he doesn't appreciate the fact that an economy's growth function does not have a single variable. I guess his point is that if you run a regression of economic growth as the dependent variable (the one to be determined) and corruption - whichever way you measure it - as the independent variable (the one determining), you will find no relationship.
In reality, the growth of an economy has many determinants. Numerous studies that I have seen where corruption is one of the explanatory variables find that it (i.e corruption) is a major contributor in a negative sense to the economy's performance. See for instance here, and here purely for illustration.
But trust Mr. Mwenda - neither a journalist nor an economist - to let facts and logic interfere with an opportunity to sound profound and draw attention to himself!
I think I know where the problem is. Mr. Mwenda suffers from the so-called Dunning-Kruger effect. This is basically a cognitive bias where a quack suffers from some self-perception of having a much higher intellectual ability. The converse of this is where highly skilled individuals underestimate their competencies and in the process assume that what is obvious to them is obvious to others.
It is therefore bizarre that the Daily Monitor refers to Mr. Mwenda as a "veteran" journalist. As far as I can tell, journalists intermediate news and information; they are not a source of news. In this case Mr. Mwenda has company in the Daily Monitor when it comes to laziness. I see no journalist, leave alone veteran; instead I see a careless pseudo-pundit.
I have not fully read Mwenda ' story. The criticism appears a personal rather than intellectual. If we got a ratio of losses to GOD would this be significantly worrying. Not being an economist does not mean you don't have e comics sense. Why don't we conduct a research and.make serious conclusions instead of personal attacks. How did Kynes start you think. He had green in economics? OR are too harsh on the young man.
ReplyDeleteLosses as a ratio of GDP worrying. True corruption undermines social services and disenfranchises many as seen on the stolen Katosi road valley dams pensions...Maybe Osoro needs to help us and link this in his research and analysis to economic development
ReplyDeleteCorruption disenfranchises and robs social services. Maybe bwana Osoro should help the lay readers link losses of Katosi road, valley dams, pension, global funds, chogam to impact on social economic development. Can we have an intellectual discussion and not personal egos. Mwenda is free to make any statements. Challenge him intellectually and educate the rest of us peasants of economics
ReplyDelete@Kandle I will encourage you to, first, read the remarks attributable to Mr. Mwenda (for you explicitly say you haven't); then read the two papers I cite above (all the three links are in the post so you do not need to search very far. I will then welcome any observations; otherwise it is premature for you to conclude that this is not an intellectual discourse.
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