Recently, I visited the subterranean area of Library West where the good old fashioned economics texts are located. Fellow UES luminaries accompanied me. I checked out several books that will make for interesting summer reading. Among them was The Theory of Price, 4th Ed. (1987) by the late George Stigler, a renowned Nobel prize-winning University [...]
Archive for the 'Economics' Category
Theory of Price Notes, Part I: Tastes
Published by May 12th, 2008 in Economics, Entertainment & Culture and History. 7 CommentsAn interesting decision: Apple will not accept cash payment for iPhones. Presumably this is to prevent resellers: cash does not allow Apple to ration quantities.
The popular gadget blog Gizmodo reports an update in the net neutrality saga. Another popular blog, The Consumerist, reports that the “Passenger’s bill of rights” has been shelved in Congress. In this article The Consumerist reports on further government encroachment on our private property.
This community typically decries laws extending the power of the government to [...]
The NBER is offering a free 18 hour mini-course entitled “What’s new in econometrics” taught by Jeffrey Woolridge and Guidio Imbens.
I would just like to pass along this interesting post from The Perfect Substitute blog. Essentially, the pilgrims initially starved because of a lack of property rights. The problem was later relieved by assignment of private property rights–not help from the Indians.
Famous papers in econ: most cited papers since 1970
Published by May 8th, 2008 in Economics. 0 CommentsAlthough this series will mostly stick to work done pre-1970, I would like to briefly mention this paper by E. Han Kim, Adair Morse, and Luigi Zingales: “What Has Mattered to Economics Since 1970.”
Many of the citations are to technical papers related to advances in econometrics and estimation techniques, but there is a wide selection [...]
Why are goods priced at $19.95 instead of $20.00?
Published by May 8th, 2008 in Economics. 5 CommentsThis article, which features two UF marketing professors, discusses the difference between “precise” prices like 19.95 and “imprecise” prices like 20.00. Still, the article doesn’t really address the question of this post.
To be more specific, let’s consider retailers and grocers selling relatively low cost goods in high quantities. These are the industries that we usually [...]
Famous papers in econ: Hayek 1945, The Use of Knowledge in Society
Published by May 2nd, 2008 in Economics. 7 CommentsThis is the first post in a new series at AU for this summer. The series will highlight famous papers in economics, typically older papers that have already cemented their names in history. For all of the posts in the series, I encourage everyone to at least skim the accompanying paper and comment with your [...]
One can hardly fathom a more appropriate location at which to host a roundtable discussion on disaster eonomics than the grand ballroom of a New Orleans hotel. Unfortunately, this session was somewhat limited in bent and scope. (It was sponsored by Economists for Peace and Security, and I’m pretty sure that all the panelists were [...]
My second session on Friday I chose because it was so super-relevant to the work I did in Washington last year. When I finally arrived, I was surprised to discover that there exists an entire branch of economics dedicated to such topics as volunteerism and philanthropy. I really shouldn’t have been surprised, as the purpose [...]
Most of the arts blogs I read, including those run by The Economist, trend “very liberal” to use a facebook categorization. Although the BLDGBLOG is superb from top to bottom, it is no exception to that trend. However, if you are interested in spaces or human design, it is a blog you should read — [...]
The Devil is in the DNA
Published by December 19th, 2007 in Economics, Law and Technology & Innovation. 0 CommentsRecently, several UES elders have called for a revision of intellectual property laws. While the range of opinions varies from outright abolition of intellectual property (Vakenhobbes, Admiral) to the reduction in the length and scope of protection (Monocrat, Matt), all seem to agree that reform is the name of the game. But hey, we are [...]
This excellent blog written in Spanish covers the Austrian School of Economics. Weeeeeee!
I want to share with all of you a nifty little website that allows one to look at and track the national budget and its current deficit. The nice part is it provides an easy to use interface and allows you to visualize where the money is going. You can click to view the subcategories [...]
America’s Prisoner Dilemma
Published by November 19th, 2007 in Economics, Law, Miscellaneous and Policy. 0 CommentsThere is a study that has just been published by the JFA Institute on America’s prison/incarceration dilemma. It cites a report by PEW Charitable Trust which states that “under current sentencing policies the state and prison population will grow by another 192,000 prisoners over the next five years. The incarceration rate will grow from 491 [...]
