First awarded more than 70 years after the original Nobel Prizes began, the Nobel Economics Prize is worth some unexpected extras.…
Environment
Environmental economics looks at the positive and negative impact of growth. Especially focusing on marginal analysis and externalities, econlife looks at our current impact on the environment and our use of natural resources in the US and beyond.
Why Wedding Tickets Should (or Should Not) Be For Sale
By identifying the moral limits of markets, we can decide what should and should not be sold…like wedding tickets and high grades.…
Six Facts About Disaster Economics
When natural disasters like hurricanes, massive snowstorms, and wildfires strike a region, their economic impact is far more than the clean-up.…
The Problem With Emissions Outsourcing
Usually associated with jobs, now the outsourcing that relates to carbon emissions embedded in globally traded goods will be limited by California.…
How Phish-Tarping is a Tragedy (of the Commons)
While we know that overused resources can include the ocean, the air, and a pasture, we also should include beaches and seats.…
Why Urban Farmers Plant Their Crops in Garages
Using old containers from cargo ships, commercial urban farmers are growing hydroponic mini-lettuces and even strawberries in warehouses and garages.…
A Surprising Way to Cut Healthcare Costs
Assume for a moment you are in a doctor’s office observing an examination. A 70-year old male patient enters pulling an oxygen tank and wearing a baseball cap. Because the doctor has been seeing…
Why an Economist Can Solve a Poop Problem
Sometimes you need an economist who figures out how to improve Senegal’s sanitation by getting more people to use toilet suckers.…
The Huge Impact of a Rather Irritating Invention
While the cost of free parking in New York City is rather huge, it can be offset by what was a seemingly insignificant and irritating innovation.…
How Traffic Lights Relate to Adam Smith
When no traffic lights on the island of Nantucket has created good will among strangers, it also might show the limits of Adam Smith’s laissez-faire.…