Via Mark Thoma, and drawing upon James Bullard at the St. Louis Fed, MacroMania writes: I think that Bullard makes a persuasive case that the amount of household wealth evaporated along with the crash in house prices should likely be viewed as a “permanent” (highly persistent) negative wealth shock. Standard theory (and common sense) suggests […]

Bryan Caplan has a very good post on the human capital and signalling models of education. The key point is this, under the human capital model someone who forgets knowledge is no better than someone who failed to learn the same knowledge. Under the signaling model, however, failing and forgetting are very different. Bryan illustrates: […]

Here are some 2nd-year Cooper's Hawks (birds in their first adult plumage) with retained juvenile flight feathers (the pale brownish ones). Note the lack of any grayish color and the more distinct banding of the juvenile feathers. […]

From Ricardo Hausmann: Greece will have to bring its current account deficit down to zero at some point. This can happen in two ways: either Greece exports more or spends less. Adjusting the current account by spending less would require an additional fall in GDP of 25 per cent, given that in Greece only one […]

If you're reading this blog, you probably didn't fail a lot of classes in school.  But I bet that you've totally forgotten a lot of those classes.  I got A's in junior high and high school Spanish, but barely speak a word of it.Now ask yourself this:How would your career have been different if you had failed all the classes you've to […]

I heard a rumor that a famous economist was asking about my book in progress, The Case Against Education.  So I sent him the following email:I heard you were asking about me at the GMU dinner earlier this week.  I am indeed working on a book defending the empirical importance of the signaling model of education.  I'm happy to discuss my project at lengt […]

A little while ago I came across this delightful essay, On Being the Right Size, by , courtesy of the always-interesting Farnam Street blog. An essay that seems to be about biology (and for more on this see 2010′s Royal … Continue reading → […]

1. There is no great stagnation: the horizontal shower. 2. What if Star Trek had social networks? 3. The culture that is Iceland. 4. New economics blog from Phillips Exeter Academy. 5. TGS for musical instruments? 6. Profile of Scott Stern’s work on the economics of science. 7. Kristof has quite a reasonable review of […]

When I spoke at Princeton last year, I talked with neuroscientist Sam Wang, who told me about a project he did surveying incoming Princeton freshmen about mental illness in their families. He and his coauthor Benjamin Campbell found some interesting results, which they just published: A link between intellect and temperament has long been the […]

The New Republic has assembled a symposium on what the United States should do about Syria.  Among others, contributors will include Larry Diamond, Anne-Marie Slaughter, and... er... me: The New Republic wouldn’t be soliciting my take if there was an easy solution to this policy conundrum. Indeed, Syria is such a tough nut to crack that I fear the best appro […]