Economists utterly fail to predict major recessions or even smaller economic events. This failure may be related to one key assumption central to most models--that people behave like "homo economicus," a hyper-rational, narrowly selfish economic man. In this talk, Mieke Meurs highlights recent work in heterodox and feminist economics that suggests that this assumption is unfounded. People are not generally of the type "economicus," nor can they be generalized as "homo." Replacing the foundational assumption of "homo economicus" with assumptions of "socialem personarum" (social persons) is essential if economists are to better predict economic and social outcomes.

Mieke Meurs is Professor of Economics at American University and Executive Vice President of the International Association for Feminist Economics. Her areas of research include household behavior, firm organization, and local government. She has published extensively on household behavior, with a particular focus on gender issues and rural households. Recent publications include “A data triangulation approach to understanding the behavior of small landholders in Bulgaria,” in Handbook of Research Methods and Applications in Heterodox Economics and “Doing It All: Women’s Employment and Reproductive Work in Tajikistan,” Journal of Comparative Economics, with Vanya Slavchevska. She holds a Ph.d. in Economics from University of Massachusetts, Amherst and a B.S. in Political Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx