Why do all the fashionistas land up in the Dept. of Economics?

(OK, to begin with I'm not highly passionate about my chosen subject or anything, but this is what trying to study ET- Economic Thought, for the uninitiated- does to me. This post was inspired by a certain friend of mine who quakes with fear at the sight of some of my classmates!)

Many of the students in the various Sciences have often commented on how 'inappropriately' suited some of my classmates are to the pursuit of intellectual greatness. Often, I've overheard people secretly bitch about how, 'well-turned' out we are and how we consider our college a ramp...well, to those people, I have only one thing to say...you're absolutely right. It is true, we do sort of represent the stereotype of the quintessential Stella Marian that outsiders think of.
We are (or, at least the 'public faces' of our class are) fashionable and do appear to be greatly interested in well...the vagaries of life, if i might call it that.

But, in our defense, I'd have to point out that we're just fulfilling the exacting standards demanded by our chosen course of intellectual pursuit.

The great study of Economics can be said to begin with the Classical School and it's founding great-grandfather Adam Smith. Now, what does the Classical School state? If you've succesfully been bored by repetitive lectures on this, every sem, you'll know what it is...yes, it's supply side economics. Basically, this implies that whatever you produce will conveniently be demanded on account of it being produced. Hence new "wants"(no, not "needs", as any economist worth their salt will tell you, they ARE different!) are inspired, much like the demand for ipods (no one wrote to Apple & asked them to produce it). In economic terms, this boils down to "supply creates its own demand".

Then came the great disaster that led to economists, the world over clucking and greying and writing angry missives to each other, in an attempt to solve it (Oh! Did I mention that it also led rogue wannabe economists like me to the brink of bleary-ness, exasperation and tone-deafness...thanks, to the number of times people got yelled at for sleeping during these lectures!). This was the Great Depression of the 1930s. Here was born the great Keynes who was instrumental in solving, to an extent, the problem of business cycles. Mr. K (later, Lord K.) kicked classical economics on its backside and brought in demand side economics in through the back door. This school of thought basically says that producers should produce those commodities that consumers specifically hold a gun to their head and ask them for (ok, so maybe it wasn't so dramatic, but it would'nt hurt to imagine that it was!)...in other words, the consumer's the king.

Then came the Oil crisis of the 1950s (or was it the 1970s?), where there occured the problem of Stagflation (inflation + unemployment, FYI, this was a crisis 'cos theoretically, there's supposed to be a trade-off between inflation and unemployment i.e., if u reduce one the other will increase and vice-versa). To cut a long story short, this unfortunate state of affairs (though i must admit, this state is pretty commonplace now) led to the Classical school slaying the Keynesian school and the re-emergence of the Neo-Classicals (or, New Classicals) as the new emperors of Economicdom.

Then again another series of events took place, this time leading to the victory of the Keynesian School of thought in the form of the Neo-Keynesians.

Thus, this cat and mouse chase game continues till the present day, with no one quite sure anymore, of exactly which school they belong to. Anyway, the purpose for this whole spiel on economics was to bring out the cyclical nature of Economics (ya, okay so i also made a failed attempt to sound intellectual!). Trends(or should I say, schools of thought) keep returning!

Now, coming to Fashion...Do I see you wearing those polka dots, gypsy skirts, aviator glares, boot-cuts, etc. Well, guess what they were around even in the '70s!

So fashion is cyclical and surprise, so is Economics...get the drift? So my dear aforementioned friend from the Sciences, when you see my department going all bling and sporting the latest fashion accessories, remember, we're just being good economists!!!

Disclaimer: Please don't even think of quoting any of this in your end-sems...as the blog mentions, it's bogus crap after all!