I think basic economics is just as important to understanding these topics than mathematics. I hear very naive statement about economics from people who know enough mathematics to easily understand the economics, if they had studied it.
Do not get me wrong, that is great that technology, programming, science is so easy to study now.
What I wish is similar quality resources being available in other topics, I am bad with: economy, laws, business, psychology...
I am placing my bets on these topics being in high demand. Yet it takes a geek interested in technology to be also interested in unrelated subjects.
E: grammar.
I agree it is very important to understand something about (beyond introductory) various approaches to economics if you want to understand how key people involved were thinking about these problems. Here the use of the methods are more important that their accuracy or precision.
For that matter, understanding politics (something neither maths or economic thinking does well) is probably much more important to your stated examples.