Then why aren't all the quant shops snapping them up? It's not like their hiring needs are affected much by changes in the macro economy (except maybe trading volume and liquidity).
Because it's a very different type of math than that used in Quant Finance. Econ PhD programs don't want people with broad math skills, they want people who know the very narrow slice of math needed to solve these very unusual models. Quant Finance mainly uses PDEs and Brownian Motion stuff that all Math and Physics majors learn.
Borrowing a line from Rentec, probably because they'd rather prefer pure-math or physics people not "tainted" by economic dogma
On the other hand Cliff Asness and AQR are perfectly happy to rake in money by using the "dogma" as you describe it to analyze and trade in financial markets.