EconLog Archive
Economic History
The Blogging Meme
The term “blog” was coined in 1999, and it now gets 105,000,000 google hits. Compare that to “democracy,” which only gets 43,800,000. Wikipedia provides a fascinating and thorough discussion.
Economics of Education
Academic Self-selection
Andrew Samwick writes, An elite university is like a kibbutz hooked up to an ATM. It is the closest thing we may ever find to a socialist enterprise that endures. The key element of the kibbutz–that the workers collectively decide on the activities of the entity–is hardwired into the university via faculty governance. (The departure .. MORE
Economics of Health Care
Health Insurance Administrative Costs
In this essay, I suggest how health insurance administrative costs could be reduced. A management consultant would recommend eliminating unnecessary interfaces. For example, you could eliminate state regulators and employers from the insurance process. Having 51 different sets of state health regulations means that it is impossible for health insurers to offer the same plans .. MORE
Energy, Environment, Resources
Gas Price Conspiracy?
The Cincinnati Enquirer writes, How can prices climb so much, seemingly overnight, when the gasoline in the tank beneath the station was bought by the retailer a day or two before and was probably refined from crude oil weeks or even months ago? James Brock, professor of economics at Miami University, blames a smaller pool .. MORE
Information Goods, Intellectual Property
Normality Signaling: A Test Case
My student Howard Wu passed along an interesting anecdote on signaling that you’re normal. True story: In my company once we received a resume sent along with a dress shoe. And the cover letter says: “now that I have a foot already in the door, can I have the interview?” .. this guy sure spends .. MORE
Regulation and Subsidies
Blue Laws
The Washington Post reports, Maryland lawmakers yesterday approved legislation that would effectively require Wal-Mart to boost spending on health care… Lawmakers said they did not set out to single out Wal-Mart when they drafted a bill requiring organizations with more than 10,000 employees to spend at least 8 percent of their payroll on health benefits .. MORE
Energy, Environment, Resources
The Energy Outlook
I presume that Alan Greenspan is a relatively well-informed observer. Clearly, limited substitution possibilities across fuels have resulted in persistent cost differentials, but those very differentials inspire the technologies that, over time, reduce such limitations. A clear example is gas-to-liquids (GTL) technology, which converts natural gas to high-quality naphtha and to diesel fuel. Given the .. MORE
Regulation and Subsidies
FDA: Public, Economists, and Specialists
I’ve come across two interesting surveys on the Food and Drug Administration. The first is the latest gem by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Among other topics, it has the dirt on public opinion about regulation of drugs. Does the public favor more, less, or the same amount of regulation of the following? Area More Regulation .. MORE
Social Security
Social Security
In this essay, I write Imagine that Social Security had been structured to phase out, so that only those workers now over the age of 30 are required to be in the system. Under this assumed scenario, workers under age 30 would only have Social Security if they chose to participate voluntarily or if they .. MORE
Politics and Economics
Best… Compliment… Ever
If you’re thinking of becoming an academic, be warned: You aren’t going to get a lot of positive reinforcement. Most of the time you will simply be ignored. Almost all of the remaining feedback is negative. (Stop by my office, I’ll show you my drawer full of rejections). Given all this, I’m frankly touched by .. MORE
Labor Market
The Joy of Market-Clearing Wages
When people compare the U.S. and Europe, they often conclude that the U.S. is richer and more economically efficient, but that Europe is happier because they don’t measure everything in dollars and cents (or even Marks and Pfennings). One of the prime examples people often point to: America’s less regulated, more flexible labor markets versus .. MORE
Growth: Consequences
The Anti-Malthusian
Ray Kurzweil is always fascinating. We’ll ultimately disconnect the sensual and social pleasures of eating from the biochemical task of keeping an optimum set of nutrients in our bloodstream. That sounds like a very concise statement of the goal for food research. For Discussion. Would we become food addicts in such a scenario, or would .. MORE
Energy, Environment, Resources
More Gas for Washington
The Washington Post reports, A who’s who of right-leaning military hawks — including former CIA director R. James Woolsey and Iraq war advocate Frank J. Gaffney Jr. — has joined with environmental advocates such as the Natural Resources Defense Council to lobby Congress to spend $12 billion to cut oil use in half by 2025. .. MORE
Behavioral Economics
“Faith” Means Not Wanting to Believe What is True
You may have heard the odd factoid that faith in government drastically increased immediately after 9/11. Impossible, you say? Surely when a great tragedy happens, the organization charged to prevent it will lose credibility, not gain it? The factoid checks out; there’s an excellent write-up by Gary Langer in Public Perspective. The facts: There is .. MORE
Economic Growth
Pre-historic free trade?
Jason Shogren, Richard Horan, and Erwin Bulte argue that free trade contributed to humans’ outcompeting Neanderthals. Archaeological evidence exists to suggest traveling bands of early humans interacted with each other and that inter-group trading emerged, says Shogren. Early humans, the Aurignations and the Gravettians, imported many raw materials over long ranges and their innovations were .. MORE
Social Security
Boskin on Social Security
Michael Boskin writes, First, we should switch from wage indexing to price indexing, but raise benefits more rapidly for those with low earnings. This would eliminate most of the long-term insolvency, but do so in a manner that leads to rapidly rising real benefits for people with low incomes, and more slowly for people with .. MORE
Economics of Education
Feelings vs. Consequences
Pre-kindergarten education is one of those policies that feels right to do-gooders. What are the actual consequences? According to an NBER report, early education does increase reading and mathematics skills at school entry, but it also boosts children’s classroom behavioral problems and reduces their self-control. Further, for most children the positive effects of pre-kindergarten on .. MORE
Social Security
Et tu, Barro?
Robert Barro writes, A serious analysis with asking why we have Social Security. If we were not so used to it, we would find it odd for the government to collect money from young workers and give it to the old (mostly workers’ parents). One rationale is that the government should help people who lack .. MORE
Books: Reviews and Suggested Readings
Second Thoughts About Stats vs. Personal Experience
I can’t believe I took so long to discover Thomas Gilovich‘s excellent How We Know What Isn’t So. I’ve read almost all of the semi-popular books in cognitive psychology, and this turns out to be one of the best. All too often, cognitive psychologists exhibit the very biases they denounce – overconfidence to take just .. MORE
Income Distribution
How Everyone Can Get Richer as Per-Capita Income Falls
When people argue about whether immigrants are pulling down our standard of living, they rarely notice a simple but deep arithmetical fact: Everyone in a country can get richer as per-capita income falls. Proof by example: Suppose the residents of Country A earn $50,000 per year each without immigration, and $60,000 per year with immigration. .. MORE
Economic and Political Philosophy
Let Them Get Roommates
A fun fact about the U.S. versus Europe is that poorest 25% of Americans have more living space than the average European. But some Americans have been left behind. Our most deprived citizens often sleep three to a room, eat prison-grade food, and share bathroom facilities with dozens of unhygenic strangers. They are known as… .. MORE