But I'm not sure that Smith is claiming that reading Marx gives you **economic** knowledge at all so the Popperian or Kuhnian nature of the subject is besides the point.
Rather, I think the claim is that reading Marx gives you information about human psychology -- particularly the kinds of claims about economics that people really want to make and even the kind of bias/fallacies that economic related thought is vulnerable to.
I can definitely see a valuable role for the philosopher of economics who publicly critiques the theories presently being operationalized by policymakers, bringing to light any background values and other assumptions they rely on.
In this layperson’s lifetime it seems, at least with public-facing economists, there’s been an obvious prioritization of efficiency and aggregate wealth over distributional concerns and the elimination of poverty for example.
But I'm not sure that Smith is claiming that reading Marx gives you **economic** knowledge at all so the Popperian or Kuhnian nature of the subject is besides the point.
Rather, I think the claim is that reading Marx gives you information about human psychology -- particularly the kinds of claims about economics that people really want to make and even the kind of bias/fallacies that economic related thought is vulnerable to.
I can definitely see a valuable role for the philosopher of economics who publicly critiques the theories presently being operationalized by policymakers, bringing to light any background values and other assumptions they rely on.
In this layperson’s lifetime it seems, at least with public-facing economists, there’s been an obvious prioritization of efficiency and aggregate wealth over distributional concerns and the elimination of poverty for example.