Austrian School

From the middle of the 20th century onwards, the Austrian school has been considered outside the mainstream of economic thought. Austrian School views are heterodox and mainstream economists are generally critical of its methodology. Whereas mainstream economists generally use economic models and statistical methods to model economic behavior, Austrians argue that they are a flawed, unreliable, and insufficient means of analyzing economic behavior and evaluating economic theories. Instead, they advocate deriving economic theory logically from basic principles of human action, a study called praxeology. Furthermore, whereas experimental research and natural experiments are often used in mainstream economics, Austrians generally hold that testability in economics and precise mathematical modeling of an economic market are virtually impossible. They argue that modeling a market relies on human actors who cannot be placed in a lab setting without altering their would-be actions. Supporters of using models of market behavior to analyze and test economic theory argue that economists have developed numerous experiments that elicit useful information about individual preferences.