All You Could Want To Know About Chocolate

When a crash in chocolate markets almost forced growers on two small islands to leave the industry, they changed how they competed.

The Mystery of the Missing Bucatini

Our story starts when a journalist named Rachel gets a call from her mom. The mother is distressed because her supermarket has stopped selling De Cecco bucatini. Even on Amazon, there is none: But it gets worse from here. A…

The Story of a New Apple (Called the SnapDragon)

Similar in some ways to Apple’s iPhone 12, Cornell University has developed two new apples that reflect years of research and development.

The Economic Side of Competitive Eating

Known as the super bowl of competitive eating, the July Fourth Nathan’s Famous hot dog contest is a business for the top eaters.

Why Competitive Eating is About Much More Than Food

When Joey Chestnut guzzles 72 Nathan’s hot dogs in 10 minutes, his competitive eating takes us to much more than food and entertainment.

How Our French Fries Became More Expensive

When the price of your French fries increased during the past decade, one reason was a potato cartel that was rather similar to OPEC.

Rockets, Feathers and Gasoline Prices

Gasoline prices rise faster than they fall because monopolistic competition provides retailers with some price control although their product is identical.

Weekly Roundup: From Greek Games to Tennis Matches

Our everyday economics includes externalities, branding, monopolistic competition, sovereign debt, game theory, elasticity, taxes, markets and the glass ceiling.

How Honeycrisp is Similar to American Pharoah

With the creation of the Honeycrisp, perfect competition became monopolistic competition in the apple industry and quality and quantity incentives changed.

A Cranberry Blog

Yesterday morning, during my “rantum scoot” around a Nantucket cranberry bog, our group leader unknowingly presented a supply and demand story. This is the bog: Nantucket Cranberries Starting with some history, he said the island of Nantucket was ideally suited to growing…