ABSTRACT
What does the quest ion imply? In modem terms, if economists are useful in distinguishable ways, then they must have something that other sorts of professionals do not. With the necessary allowances, however, distinguishing expertise on policy questions has been a mark of economic thinkers for centuries, certainly long before there were professional economists. Policy, not professionalization, is the key ward here. For as long as public affairs have involved money, prices, interest rates, and inflation; questions of employment, industry, growth, and decay; trade, exchange rates, and terms of trade; the revenue of the "prince;" a monopolizing spirit, enterprise, risk, and return; for so long has there been a need for policy advice by those with an "economic" understanding.
