[kjdal2001]

"For Excel users, this should be a good story to keep in mind before sharing results of an Excel model."

Shouldn't this be an argument for sharing your model before drawing conclusions and sharing those?

Also, maybe using Excel isn't a great idea for building models that will affect economic policy. Complex Excel sheets can be difficult to debug and version when compared to a more traditional programming language.

[justinlardinois]

Scientists are notoriously bad at sharing their source code, so I wouldn't be surprised if economists are bad at sharing their Excel spreadsheets.

As for Excel versus a programming language: I doubt most economists know any programming languages. Excel is almost universally known in finance and economics.