That is until they endorsed Barack Obama.
It was such an appalling display of a once great magazine aiming to boost their subscribership by sacrificing their standards so they could appeal to a fad and a brainwashed mass that I ended my then 11 year subscription to the magazine. It called into question the entire purpose and integrity of The Economist. Why would anybody, who was at least intellectually honest and cared about economic reality, subscribe to what had ultimately and quickly become tripe?
Well, if you look at an old post I had, it once again shows you the ole Captain might know what he's talking about.
The Economist is nothing but a biased, albeit, highly dressed up, left wing rag. Their readership is not about advancing economies and increasing standards of living and helping out humanity, it's about purchasing "The Economist" so they can say to their other UN diplomats and dignitaries that "they read "The Economist"" and sound intelligent. It's for liberal arts students to avoid real debate and say, "they read the economist" which then makes them the smartest person in the room. It's for middle aged people who decide to "upgrade" from the local paper and buck for a promotion when their manager realizes "Hey, he's reading THe Economist!"
Understand The Economist is NOT a legitimate publication. It is simply a "badge of honor" somebody can buy to make themselves sound intellectual. It's like buying a degree from a degree mill. You are better served reading various independent blogs and getting your economic data from economic databases than you are reading The Economist because "The Economist" (despite its name) isn't anything approaching what a real economist would do.
To remind you of this, I need not do anything else than post this chart;
Thus is the typical "Economist" subscriber and why you might as well not even bother ever subscribing to it. Because if you couldn't predict Obama would be bad for the US, then what kind of "economist" were you?
Answer - a shill
I reached the same conclusion some time ago. I was also a long time reader.
ReplyDeleteYeah, either I got more critical as I got older or they took a major leap off the wagon.
ReplyDeleteI remember reading it in the 80's, and it was solid, if sometimes wrong, magazine with interesting articles & sharp writers.
The articles starting getting weaker and less in depth, less technical, and becoming basically clever editorials dressed up with with some data.
I heard afterward they had switched editors and were "trying to broaden market appeal" - rather than defending a profitable little market niche for people who wanted information, and when they were given opinions were at least opinions buttressed by solid facts.
I fear a little for the Wall Street Journal in this regard too, they too are going maintream, adding "lifestyle sections"... ugh.
since some time in europe we call it "the communist"
ReplyDeleteYep, my whole extended family got it until maybe 10-15 years ago when one by one they lost us.
ReplyDeleteIt was a solid read in the 80's
What do you read now in place of the economist?
ReplyDeleteThe only country in the world that would go for McCain is Georgia? Even that is probably because they were invaded by the Ruskies a few months prior and McCain at least had a few stern words for them.
ReplyDeleteYup... how long will it be until the Economist suffers the same fate as Newsweak.
ReplyDeleteWhen your marketing is base on dishonest pursuit of fads rather than based on intellectual honesty, it's ultimately going to cost you when the "fad" is over.
So any bets for how long takes for the Economist to go under?
"The articles starting getting weaker and less in depth, less technical, and becoming basically clever editorials dressed up with with some data."
ReplyDeleteThat pretty much sums up why we (my wife and I) let our subscription lapse, as well.
Slightly off topic, Scientific American used to be a good read, too, some years ago. Then they made an editorial decision to include more of the softer sciences (i.e. social sciences) and it seems that since then, the magazine has become far more political than it used to be. *sigh* That was also a subscription that I let lapse some time ago and have no intention of renewing. (Not to mention the whole threat of suing Bjorn Lomborg for copyright violation -- that REALLY pissed me off.)
The Economist can still serve as an indirect litmus test, though. You just have to look for people who say, "I used to read The Economist."
ReplyDeleteI think you´re being too harsh with the Economist. I have a more benign explanation. It is a mag which although devoted to free-market Liberal principles does not wish to stray too far from the mainstream (a typical article is alway tiptoeing between both sides of an argument, bending over backwards to appear to be balanced, not always a bad thing) and since at the time Obama was the craze they did not want to stray too far. But I admit their endorsement of Obama made no sense (I wrote them a letter at the time).
ReplyDeleteA less benign interpretation: pandering to their readers as you stated. Notice all the ads, they tend to be from political international organizations, a typically lefty crowd.
Still, despite its flaws it´s by far the best source for international news if you do long commutes and internet is not an option.
PS: regarding Econ bias, notice how they always refer to the governing turkish party as "mildy islamic", as in "not-that-bad" islamic? But if a politician ran for office with any sort of christian agenda I´m sure they wouldn´t call him "mildly christian".