In his review of Richard H. Thaler’s Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics, John McMahon takes to task behavioral economics for its complicity in propagating the neoliberal project (i.e. promoting limited government and free-market capitalism), rather than questioning its dehumanizing assumptions. “The implications of behavioral research are constantly constrained so that they actually buttress foundational assumptions about markets. Why? Thaler disavows the role of the ‘moral philosopher,’ refusing to ‘render judgment about what ‘is’ or ‘should be’ fair’, because economics is supposed to be a ‘purely descriptive exercise’—and thereby preempts interrogation of the fairness of the market itself.”

Read Thaler’s trenchant review here: Training for Neoliberalism | Boston Review.