Maybe I'm biased on this issue because I studied queueing theory and operations research before I started graduate school for economics, but I find it fascinating that not only is queueing theory relevant to traditional neoclassical economics, but work on the psychology of lines is also relevant to behavioral economics. (Fun fact: queueing theory has focused on the psychology of lines since the mid-1900's, whereas behavioral economics is still a field working its way into the mainstream.) Specifically, people think a lot about the fairness of various queueing systems, according to "Dr. Queue" Richard Larson (my thesis advisor, coincidentally), and it stands to reason that this perceived (dis)utilty from waiting in line affects the valuation of the items that people are waiting in line for.
Economics Is More Like Engineering Than You'd Think, Queueing Theory Edition...
By Jodi Beggs, About.com GuideJuly 9, 2012
Economists are all too aware of the fact that one's time has economic value. (You don't have to look too far, for example, to see an economist rant about how "free" things aren't really free if you have to wait in line for an hour for them.) Therefore, fields of research that study lines, and the time spent waiting in them, are pretty relevant to the field of economics.
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Macroeconomics is two things one of which is the study of past behaviour. The other thing is the theoretical side, which you say is like engineering. It is mire than this and IS ENGINEERING of our social system. For this reason I have left with you a kind of diagram for the circulation of money throught ALL of the system, that is related to the engineers’ methodology of systems analysis. By the use of these techniquese it is possible to understand more about how our social system works.
When smaller models are used such as that implied by the Keynesian theory, it is little wonder that any of the results have no value, because they do not represent correctly how the system works (as experienced recently by the inability of the US to escape from the clutches of the economic crisis, as heinously maintained by fat-cat monopolists in land and capital).