I've been traveling which is why it has taken me a while to weigh in on this. But here is my take. 

Formalism has waned. Economics today is quite different than the economics I picked on 20 years ago.

My latest survey of the profession captured that clearly and I talked a lot with David Leonhart about the changes in the profession, and his sense is similar to mine. The science of economics and its engineering counterpart is becoming much more useful.  But what he missed in that article was that there is another branch of economics--political economy--which has been lost to economics, and there I agree with Humberto. 

David Colander