Economics as a science

Economics as a science

We no longer ask the question whether economics is a science or an art. Science is a systematized body of knowledge. Just as physics and chemistry are sciences, economics is also a science. We observe facts, conduct experiments and make generalizations in physics and chemistry after testing the results. The same scientific methods are followed in economics also. Economics, like all other sciences, studies the relationship between cause and effect.

Sciences may be broadly divided into physical sciences and social sciences. Physics and chemistry are examples of physical sciences. Economics is a social science. It studies about a particular aspect of human behaviour. And human behaviour is full of complexity. It is not easy to study it. So economic science is not as precise and exact as the physical sciences.

But economics has a greater right to be considered as a science than other social sciences like politics or history because in economics we make use of money as a measuring rod of utility. It is true that it is only a rough measure but still it enables us to give concrete shape to the laws of economics. Sometimes, what we say in economics may not come true in real life. But this is the case with many other sciences. For example, we joke about weather forecasts. The weather report in the newspaper may say that there will be heavy rainfall on a particular day. But there might not be any rain at all on that particular day. On account of that, we cannot say that meteorology (the science of weather) is not a science. Similarly, if some economic laws do not come true, we cannot say that economics is not a science.