Don’t miss David Henderson’s amiable podcast on disagreement in economics. His tale of disillusion with Krugman alone is worth the price of admission.

This podcast reminds me of an idea I’ve had for a while: Creating a meta-petition of policies that a broad consensus of economists oppose. Any economist could add a policy to the list, and any economist could express agreement or dissent. Once the number of respondents exceeds, say, 100, and 80%+ favor repeal, the candidate policy gets added to the meta-petition of economic common sense.

For example, Dan Klein might propose legalizing the sale of organs. He’d quickly get 100 yeas; and I doubt that there’d be 20 economists with the gall to say no. A market for organs would then go on the growing list of ideas that people in the know see to be right.

And then the majority of the public would have to admit error, right? Oh well, we work at the margin.