The Austrian account of economic depression requires thinking on more than one level to arrive at the truth, whereas economists these days are more likely to be looking for obvious explanations and even-more-obvious solutions, even when these neither explain nor solve anything.
This puts the Austrians in an interesting position within the intellectual culture of any time and place. They must go against the grain. They must say the things that others do not want to hear. They must be willing to be unpopular, socially and politically. I'm thinking here of people like Benjamin Anderson, Garet Garrett, Henry Hazlitt, and, on the Continent, L. Albert Hahn, F.A. Hayek, and, above all, Ludwig von Mises. They gave up career and fame to stick with the truth and say what had to be said.
Later in life, when speaking before a group of economics students, Hayek bared his soul about this problem of the moral choices economists must make. He said that it is very dangerous for an economist to seek fame and fortune and to work closely with political establishments, simply because, in his experience, the most important trait of a good economist is the courage to say the unpopular thing. If you value your position and privileges more than truth, you will say what people want to hear rather than what needs to be said.
(bold emphasis added)
This is from Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. from Economics and Moral Courage
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