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Animal Spirits by George A. Akerlof and Robert J. Schiller1
Premise
The basic premise of Animal Spirits is that people are not purely rational creatures, and that emotions or "animal spirits" play...
In 2009 the new car market is in a slump. Manufacturers are trying to forecast demand. There is a debate over whether demand will bounce back or whether there has been a permanent change in buyer...
Why do financial intermediaries exist?
September 18, 2008 Freakonomics post on "the recent financial upheavals."
Interesting paper by Diamond and Dybvig on the role of banks and bank runs. The...
Behavioral economics is a very cool area. It's percolating into popular discourse quickly, as in this column by David Brooks in the New York Times. Brooks says that behavioral economics will...
Popular Books about Economics
this is an overview page
As the NYT Freakonomics Blog notes, few principles of economics texts mention market bubbles and crashes. Princeton economists are studying bubbles. Note to self - include this in the next...
The Stern Report
The most comprehensive study of the economic impact of climate change was commissioned by the British government. It is know as the Stern report after its principal author, the...
The standard model of consumer behavior in economics assumes that consumers are the best judges of what they want. But what if consumer choices can be influenced, and consumers end up making...
Email: ude.esahcrup|koorbaes.divad#ude.esahcrup|koorbaes.divad
Here's a story about the challenge of evaluating the costs and benefits of expensive new drugs.
Here's an excellent radio program from NPR that explains the banking crisis more clearly than any other source I've found (about 45 minutes).
There's a Credit Crunch when Financial Institutions...
Discover Your Inner Economist by Tyler Cowen1
What I liked about Cowen's book was his point that although "people respond to incentives" is a cornerstone of modern microeconomics, he points out...
Blog Name
Description
Baseline Scenario
A blog about the financial crisis run by Simon Johnson, an MIT economist who was formerly the chief economist of the IMF
The Big Picture
I haven't read...
This is a wiki for developing introductory microeconomics class material. It consists mainly of links to useful sources and news stories. If you are an instructor and wish to contribute to this...
Crude oil is traded on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX). Here's a link to NYMEX light sweet crude oil futures prices. You can click on one of the contracts to see its price chart.
Here's a...
Link to the Scientific American article on the Traveler's Dilemma. The premise of the game is that two people who traveled on an airline bought identical items that were both damaged. They both...
Traffic congestion is a classic externality and congestion pricing is the classic solution, but it can be a tough political sell.
Just gotta love this story of hedge fund hubris!
Shutdown Point
Here's a news article about GM's costs and its need to raise capital. GM still produces automobiles - even though it is losing money - because it is making enough to cover its...
The "Eureka" moment from "A Beautiful Mind":
Notes
Binmore on bargaining
*
The Bureau of Economic Analysis produces National Income Accounts in the United States. This is the source of the often-quoted statement that "consumer spending counts for two thirds of the...
How do you know that you're getting the best treatment? Cancer surgery success rates vary widely, yet patients may not have access to the information they need to choose a surgeon.
1994 paper on...
Prices in the housing market in the U.S. are tracked using the Case-Schiller index.
The National Association of Realtors maintains a Housing Affordability Index, calculated by dividing average...
If you are allowed to edit pages in this Site, simply click on edit button at the bottom of the page. This will open an editor with a toolbar pallette with options.
To create a link to a new page,...
Joseph Stiglitz writes that the cause of free markets has been harmed by the U.S. response to the financial crisis.
Interesting Slate article by Tim Harford on apple-picking incentives. How you pay people has an impact on productivity. Big surprise! But seriously, it's often not obvious how to design incentives....
Information is everywhere in our lives. We spend much of each day searching for it, evaluating it acting on it. And yet economics doesn't give information the respect it deserves. Despite awarding...
Here is Paul Krugman's defense of the IS-LM model as a teaching tool.
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This site welcomes Principles of Microeconomics instructors. If you have some ideas of material or pedagogy that work for introductory microeconomics please contribute them!
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What is the best job? According to a survey published in early 2009, the best occupation in the U.S. is mathematician.
Wages may be sticky because of adverse selection and morale.
Unemployment...
Vulnerable people need protection from loan sharks.
This is a microeconomics wiki. However, we microeconomists are constantly pestered by people who ask about things like recessions and the role of the Federal Reserve. We hear distant sounds of...
Cargill profits (legally) by trading on inside information about commodities.
Prediction Markets
Prediction markets such as InTrade use the market mechanism to estimate the likelihood of future...
Iron Ore
There are only three major global producers of iron ore: Vale (of Brazil), Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton. Historically the firms have used the "price leader" model of behavior, where one...
As Schotter points out in the introduction to his book "Microeconomics: A Modern Approach", microeconomics is usually presented as settled knowledge, rather than as an evolving science. It's...
How do you teach introductory microeconomics? It's easy if you're teaching motivated and mathematically able students - just present the analytical techniques and let them puzzle out solutions to...
New York instituted a new measure of poverty in 2008. A July 22, 2008 New York Times editorial summarizes the results of using the new poverty measures in New York City. The poverty measure...
Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely1
Ariely's book is about how our minds really make decisions. Instead of being rational most of the time, we consistently make irrational decisions. If we...
Price controls can have unintended consequences, as in this this attempt to reduce credit card fees. Interchange fees are a big part of bank revenues.
Airline ticket prices are a familiar example of price discrimination - charging different prices to different customers. Here's a video from the Wall Street Journal about a return to the minimum...
The price elasticity of demand for sugary sodas has entered the discussion of a soda tax, aimed at reducing obesity while raising money for health care.
China's government enacted land use reform in October 2008 that gave small farmers the right to sell their land.
Tragedy of the Commons
Article on how fishing quotas can combat the tradegy of the...
Health-care rationing is a hot topic. Miley Cyrus is concerned about how her concert tickets get allocated.
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Taxes are barely progressive in the United States, according to Mark Thoma's blog The Economist's View
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Topics
Behavioral Economics
Bubbles
Climate Change
Consumer Behavior
Cost-Benefit Analysis
Credit Crunch
Energy Prices
Experimental Economics
Externalities
Finance
Firm Costs
Food Prices
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Reading Graphs
Here's a basic tutorial on reading graphs.
Why would Pepsi be buying back its main bottlers?
According to Wikipedia, the world largest wiki site:
A Wiki ([ˈwiː.kiː] <wee-kee> or [ˈwɪ.kiː] <wick-ey>) is a type of website that allows users to add, remove, or otherwise edit...
Hidden Face of Globalization video
Factory of the World video - Kristof, New York Times.
Chomsky on "Globalization".
"Globalisation is Good" video
Naomi Klein of "No Logo" fame video
Here's a...
