Macroeconomics

February 9, 2015

One Reason We Can’t Believe in Innate Talent

Limiting potential economic growth, the myth of innate talent in disciplines like philosophy diminishes the pool of female and Afro-American human capital.

January 27, 2015

The Reason It Can Be Tough to Cross the Street

Called the American Dream, the income mobility that lifts a child beyond a parent's poverty can depend on a community's characteristics.

January 21, 2015

Can Economists See the Hot Hand?

With implications that extend beyond sports, believers in classical economics and in behavioral economics are debating whether players can have streaks.

January 20, 2015

How Chocolate Chip Cookies Explain Why We Save Less

Explained by behavioral economics, we save relatively little for retirement because of intertemporal selfishness and seeing our future selves as strangers.

January 15, 2015

A Mystery: Trying to Find the Middle Class

While everyone refers to the middle class and most of us say we are in the middle class, few know the characteristics of the group to which they refer.

January 9, 2015

How Men Act When They Outnumber Women

How gender ratios in the U.S. and China affect men's financial behavior can be explained with supply and demand and behavioral economics from Gary Becker.

January 8, 2015

Understanding a New Tax Issue

With the House requiring dynamic scoring of tax legislation from the CBO, the bigger tax debate resurfaces on how much redistribution and spending.

December 31, 2014

Alcohol, Marijuana or Tobacco: Which is Most Harmful?

When government miscalculates the negative externalities of substances like marijuana and alcohol, they waste land, labor, capital, time and money.

December 28, 2014

Why the Metric Switch is so Tough

The expense and complexities of switching to the metric system have prevented the change, and have affected how standard weights and measures help globalization.

December 26, 2014

How the Fed Solves the Old Money Problem

Part of keeping the money supply at the right level involves the Fed monitoring the paper money that enters circulation and recycling cash that leaves it.

December 22, 2014

The Seven Ways We Pay For Free Parking

Including congestion, wasted gas, time and emissions, cheap parking creates negative externalities that variable pricing of parking spaces can eliminate.

December 16, 2014

Why Academy Award Winners Might Live Longer

Relating income inequality to the stress felt by low status Bolivian Tsimane men and academy award losers, researchers said that stress that harms health.