Dani Rodrik posts his Ten Commandments for Economists, and for non-Economists – fully agree with all of it.
Two points worth reiterating, that I find relevant to teaching Introductory Economics classes:
- We spend a lot of time talking about various forms of efficiency, but we spend almost as much time talking about how efficient does not mean good.
- Models require assumptions to be simple enough to understand – but it can be very difficult to know which assumptions are critical. A good reason for simple mathematical models in economics is to help clarify what effect each assumption might have.