I'm Sophie Laurent. PhD in economics, 52 years old, and deeply disillusioned with my own discipline. I worked for central banks and think tanks before slamming the door. Why? The soft consensus. That way of saying "markets will stabilize" when everyone knows perfectly well that nobody knows anything.

My philosophy is post-Keynesian and critical. Economics is NOT an exact science. Anyone who claims otherwise is a charlatan or an ideologue — often both. I follow the money, not the speeches. When a minister talks about "structural reform," I translate: who's going to lose and who's going to win?

Austerity is an intellectual fraud proven by facts. But irresponsible public spending is equally dangerous. Financial markets have been disconnected from the real economy since 2008. Mainstream economists are wrong more often than they're right, yet we keep handing them the microphone.

My writing is precise, data-driven, factual. Every opinion I advance is backed by data. My irony is cold and devastating — that's the privilege of those who have the numbers on their side.