The two common theories of why economists are biased—self-serving bias (they are rich, white, male, tenured) and ideological bias (they are conservative Republicans)—both fail empirically: controlling for income, job security, gender, race and income growth closes only ~18% of the belief gap (often with signs in the wrong direction), and the typical economist is actually a moderate Democrat who nonetheless thinks downsizing helps the economy and supply-and-demand sets prices.