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Positive economics focuses on the description, quantification and explanation of economic phenomena, [1] while normative economics discusses prescriptions for what actions individuals or societies should or should not take. [2] The positive-normative distinction is related to the subjective-objective and fact-value distinctions in philosophy. [3]
Statements of value (normative or prescriptive statements), which encompass ethics and aesthetics, and are studied via axiology. This barrier between fact and value, as construed in epistemology, implies it is impossible to derive ethical claims from factual arguments, or to defend the former using the latter.
The essay argues that economics as science should be free of normative judgments for it to be respected as objective and to inform normative economics (for example whether to raise the minimum wage). Normative judgments frequently involve implicit predictions about the consequences of different policies.
On the other hand, "vegetables contain a relatively high proportion of vitamins", and "a common consequence of sacrificing liberty for security is a loss of both" are positive claims. Whether a statement is philosophically normative is logically independent of whether it is verified, verifiable, or popularly held.
"Positive economics" became the term created to describe certain trends and "laws" of economics that could be objectively observed and described in a value-free way, separate from "normative economic" evaluations and judgments. Paul Samuelson (1915–2009) wrote the best selling economics texts.
Much of economics is positive, seeking to describe and predict economic phenomena. Normative economics seeks to identify what economies ought to be like. Welfare economics is a normative branch of economics that uses microeconomic techniques to simultaneously determine the allocative efficiency within an economy and the income distribution ...
He divided economics into "positive economy" (the study of what is, and the way the economy works), "normative economy" (the study of what should be), and the "art of economics" (applied economics). The art of economics relates the lessons learned in positive economics to the normative goals determined in normative economics.
Interesting as a development of an ethical postulate, [such an effect] does not at all follow from the positive assumptions of pure theory." (pp. 137, 141) [3] Economics as science is about "ascertainable facts" of the positive as distinct from normative (ethical) judgments on economic policy. (p. 148). [1]