O PERSPECTIVĂ CRITICĂ ASUPRA IDEII DE RAŢIONALITATE A AGENTULUI ECONOMIC
A Critical Perspective on the Idea of Economic Agent Rationality

Summary/Abstract: According to the mainstream neo-classical economics, the economic model based on the idea of homo oeconomicus, understood as a perfectly rational agent, acting always in order to maximize his utility was a useful and effective way to explain everything that happens in the economy. But since the middle of the last century, scholars began to generalize this model, believing that the model of the economic man does not only describe what happens in the market, but can be also used to explain and predict all kinds of social phenomena, and therefore should be used by all human and social sciences. But is the human being really a perfectly rational agent? Recent discoveries in the field of behavioural sciences seem to suggest that the theory of homo oeconomicus is rather an ideal model, and the myth of perfect rationality should be either abandoned or, at least, radically amended.

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