The Experts Keep Getting the Economy Wrong
President Trump likes to brag about the supposedly booming economy. So do other Republican politicians. Some journalists have gotten into the habit too, exaggerating the strength of the economic expansion,…
Women in Economics Report Rampant Sexual Assault and Bias
A panel discussion at the American Economic Association conference in Atlanta in January. The association has announced several measures to combat harassment and discrimination against women and minorities in the…
Alan B. Krueger, Economic Aide to Clinton and Obama, Is Dead at 58
President Barack Obama introduced Alan B. Krueger as the next chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in a Rose Garden ceremony at the White House in August 2011.CreditLarry Downing/Reuters…
Alan Krueger’s Two Lessons
Alan Krueger devoted part of his decorated career as an economist to studying happiness. One time, when he and I were on the phone more than a decade ago talking…
Repayment flexibility and risk taking: Evidence from credit contract
Starting or expanding a business often entails undertaking costly and risky investments. In developing countries, where credit and insurance markets are imperfect, entrepreneurs face constraints on both fronts. It is…
The dark side of decision-making in groups: Nastiness to outsiders
Plato wrote about the limits of democracy, as did the founding fathers of the American constitution. More recently, social scientists have also worried about the dynamics of group decision-making, speculating…
Assortative matching in cities
In most countries around the world, there are large internal wage disparities between cities (Moretti 2011, Combes et al. 2008). Germany is no exception. In 2014, the average hourly wage…
The return on information technology
The interest from economists and politicians in information technology (IT) is not new. However, opinions among economists about the importance of IT are divided. While Robert J. Gordon, macroeconomist and…
The short-run effects of GDPR on technology venture investment
On 25 May 2018, the EU’s sweeping new data law went into effect. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is comprised of 99 articles that outline how EU businesses –…
The role of high deductibles in healthcare spending growth
An enduring goal of health policy around the world is improving quality while reducing costs. This goal is particularly pressing in the US, where both healthcare spending levels and growth…
