&gt; At a general level is that not the point of education? If people who have studied economics dont understand economics, the benefits and perils of different economic policies and activities, better then those who have never thought about it, then surely there&#x27;s something seriously wrong?<p>Yes, but the people who are are often for &quot;progressive&#x2F;liberal&quot; economic policies (not to be confused with neoliberal economic policies) are often not in the field of economics.<p>Krugman and most in the Keynesian school, a &quot;left leaning&quot; school, knows the value of free trade. Yet if you go to other intellectuals in other subjects, such as Philosophy, etc, you will find little tolerance for the ideas of free trade. Honestly, I don&#x27;t know if Krugman or even Galbraith fit under the &quot;liberal&quot; spectrum anymore, economically speaking, because the rise of Warren and Bernie are not inline the universally accepted ideas of 99% of economists.<p>Really outside of the school of business on campuses, you will find that everyone completely disagrees with everyone in the school of business about economics.<p>So no, it isn&#x27;t because people are &quot;specialized&quot; in a subject and believe they can leverage that on other people&#x27;s lives or policies. I&#x27;m pretty sure that&#x27;s not quite what Smith had in mind when he spoke of specialization. I believe it is an elitist mindset they the educated are -better- people and -should- run the lives of others, etc through &quot;progressive&quot; policies. That doesn&#x27;t mean they know anything about the subject of economics or know anything about other people&#x27;s lives.<p>Do I agree with some of those policies? Sure, but if you talk to some people on campus their world view is completely paternalistic and illogical.