Can a great leader or manager be humble in public? Or is exuding confidence, even when it may not be merited, a key part of leadership? In this episode of EconTalk, host Russ Roberts talks with David Deppner, CEO of Psyberware, about an email David sent Russ wondering how Russ might reconcile his passion for humility a...

By Michael Munger

Division of labor combines specialization and the partition of a complex production task into several, or many, sub-tasks. Its importance in economics lies in the fact that a given number of workers can produce far more output using division of labor compared to the same number of workers each working alone. Interesti...

By Scott Sumner

Here's The Economist: A forthcoming paper by Diego Aparicio and Roberto Rigobon of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology helps make the point. Firms that sell thousands of different items do not offer them at thousands of different prices, but rather slot them into a dozen or two price points. Visit the website fo...

By Roger Donway

In 1976, Friedrich Hayek effectively read Samuel Smiles out of the classical-liberal movement. In The Mirage of Social Justice, Hayek said that the work of Samuel Smiles (1812-1904) constitutes a snare and a delusion for pro-capitalists. Smiles's defense of free enterprise, Hayek lamented, seemed to be "the only defenc...

By Amy Willis

Can economics be utilized to improve the criminal justice system? Or are economists too enamored of unintended consequences to be effective in this realm? Is technology transforming criminal justice for the better or worse? In this week's episode, EconTalk host Russ Roberts welcomed economist Jennifer Doleac to talk ab...

Author and economist Tyler Cowen of George Mason University talks about his book, Big Business, with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Cowen argues that big corporations in America are underrated and under-appreciated. He even defends the financial sector while adding some caveats along the way. This is a lively and contrari...

By David Henderson

  Arnold Kling, an EconLog mainstay, posted this morning with a link to his mother's fascinating testimony before a St. Louis meeting of the famous House Unamerican Activities Committee. His mother, Anne Ruth Kling, nee Yasgur, had been a member of the Communist Party during and slightly after World War II. Tha...

By Anders Aslund

From 1989 to 1991, communism foundered throughout the former Soviet bloc in Europe and Asia. From Prague to Vladivostok, twenty-eight countries in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe abandoned similar political and economic systems.1 The Collapse of the Socialist System At the end of communism,...

By Arnold Kling

Much of the time, it is in the interest of the individual to follow the crowd but in the social interest for individuals to say and do what they think best. Well-functioning institutions take steps to discourage conformity and to promote dissent, partly to protect the rights of dissenters but mostly to protect interest...

Historian Andrew Roberts talks about the life of Winston Churchill and the art of biography with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. How did Churchill deal with the mistakes he inevitably made in a long career? Was he prescient or just the right man in the right place at the right time? Was he an alcoholic? Did he suffer from ...

By David Henderson

  Mr. Romer’s answer is to do with this moment what Burning Man does every summer: Stake out the street grid; separate public from private space; and leave room for what’s to come. Then let the free market take over. No market mechanism can ever create the road network that connects everyone. The government m...