The World's Best Economics Department?

A new website from the University of Chicago’s Initiative on Global Markets (IGM) will “pose one question a week and post answers from 40 senior professors at elite U.S. universities” in an effort to create “the world’s best economics department.”

The WSJ reports: “We’re doing this because we think economists have a distorted role in policy debates,” said Brian Barry, the director of IGM. “When experts fight about minor points they get much more attention than when they broadly agree about important ones. And when they disagree about big issues, the reasons don’t often come through clearly. Sometimes, ideas that are shaky or on the fringe get passed off as mainstream.”

So far, economists have responded to questions about federal “buy American” mandates, education and taxes.