Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Behavioral game theory on the MA Turnpike

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A recent story in the Boston Globe sounds like a behavioral economics seminar on transaction costs: why are a third of the tolls on the Mass...
4 comments:
Monday, June 29, 2009

Where the wait for a parking permit is 8 to 10 years

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In Rye, NY, that's apparently how long it takes to get a parking permit at the commuter rail station. The NY Times reports that the rece...
3 comments:
Sunday, June 28, 2009

You can be too rich or too thin: Repugnance and fashion

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Well, maybe you still can't be too rich (although let's wait until all the government bailouts settle down before we rush to judgmen...
Saturday, June 27, 2009

Price gouging

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Michael Giberson at Knowledge Problem offers an extended discussion of price gouging. Here is the most recent entry: Predictable consequence...
Friday, June 26, 2009

Money for eggs for stem cell research

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While it has long been legal for women to sell eggs to help infertile couples have children, it is most often illegal for researchers to pur...
1 comment:
Thursday, June 25, 2009

Kidney exchange in Canada

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From small beginnings, Kidney Exchange is spreading. The Globe and Mail reports 'Kidney swap' a medical first for Canadian doctors ...

Testing companies as (nonprofit) gate keepers

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In the U.S., the gate keepers to many kinds of opportunities are testing companies. Tests are the "standardised" part of college a...
1 comment:
Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Breast feeding

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Some people find the sight of breast feeding repugnant, and the usual way that makes the news is with a story like this: Breastfeeding '...

Unraveling and uncertainty: The NBA draft

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Last year, the NY Times published a story about high school basketball player Brandon Jennings, who went to play pro ball in Italy rather th...
2 comments:
Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Even adoption is sometimes viewed as repugnant

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Sometimes even the adoption of a child strikes some people as a repugnant transaction that should be prevented. The recent case of the sin...
1 comment:
Monday, June 22, 2009

Why did books replace scrolls? Random access and the market for texts

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Why did books replace scrolls? That is, why did the modern form of the book, the codex , with pages bound together on a spine, replace pages...
6 comments:
Saturday, June 20, 2009

Liver Transplant for Jobs in Tennessee

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The title of this post doesn't mean that people are donating organs in return for work, but that Apple's founder Steve Jobs has rece...
1 comment:

Political pressure in Illinois college admissions

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At the University of Illinois, politically connected applicants sometimes gained admission over the protests of admissions staff. Here are s...
1 comment:
Friday, June 19, 2009

Computer assisted markets

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I'm giving a brief talk today on Computer Assisted Markets at the HBS Digital Economy Symposium . I plan to talk about how some of the m...
2 comments:
Thursday, June 18, 2009

Retail market for gold

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You may not have thought that we were missing gold-dispensing vending machines, but we're about to find out, the NY Times reports . &quo...
1 comment:
Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Queuing to tee up at the Bethpage State Park Black Course

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The USGA 2009 US Open golf tournament begins tomorrow, June 18. The host golf course is the Bethpage State Park Black Course. You have to b...
Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Michael Sandel on Markets and Morals

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My Harvard colleague, the political scientist Michael Sandel, lectures on the BBC on Markets and Morals The Reith Lectures . Here is the tr...
3 comments:
Monday, June 15, 2009

Children can't get organ donations in Japan, because they can't be deceased donors

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Even organ donation can be regarded as repugnant. CNN reports on a Boy not allowed to get life-saving transplant in Japan . ""We w...
2 comments:
Sunday, June 14, 2009

Education for matching

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David Brooks reflects on what to tell high school graduates, and he thinks about skills we don't teach for making matches: Advice for Hi...
1 comment:
Saturday, June 13, 2009

"Yield" in college admissions

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The Chronicle of Higher Education has a thoughtful article: What Yield Says About a College : "As usual, some colleges had to do much m...