Poor people, gross. They’re everywhere. They beg for food or money, live off the government, and work low wage jobs. Thank goodness they live in the cities and aren’t disturbing my queit, sheltered life in the suburbs. Whether you say it out loud or not, when you see someone you deem as poor, part of [...]

Yesterday, I wrote about how behavioral economics doesn’t seem to do much for getting people to be smarter about what they’re eating. But because policy is so hard to implement, politicians don’t try to do introduce the kind of legislation that could actually make a difference. Years ago, I’ll bet people said the cigarettes were [...]

Why did behavioral economics get so popular so fast? What, you read a book about it and were fascinated so you started a blog just so you could talk about it? Oh wait, that’s me. But that is kind of how behavior economics did become so popular. People were fascinated by it because it offered [...]

Ever been arrested? If you’re a loyal follower of this blog I doubt it, mostly because there aren’t many amateur economists/criminals out there. But maybe you got a DUI when you were young or got busted for that little bit of pot in your car. Sometimes you don’t have to post bail when you are [...]

You’re probably on Facebook. There’s going to be a few of you that aren’t but most of you are. I actually have two accounts, one for The Weakonomist and one for the real me. I’m going to talk about me today. There are two kinds of people on Facebook. Those that understand privacy and those [...]

The mind behind Free Money Finance ran a post yesterday about paying for your pet care.  An AP poll showed some disappointing results, people generally will not pay a lot to save their pets. It’s not surprising mind you, especially all the horror stories my wife and I have heard while taking our own dog [...]

As it turns out, your taxes are helping those on fixed incomes to purchase lottery tickets. Not that this is surprising, but it is disappointing. A study carried out in 2009 by Theos, a British think-tank, found that poor Britons spent a greater part of their income on lottery tickets, particularly scratch cards, than rich [...]

Social Ties Within South Africa South Africa’s official campaign of the 2010 FIFA World Cup was launched in 2007 with the aim to create 20 community centers around Africa to provide public health, education and football facilities in the hopes that the game would be able to attract young people who would then benefit from [...]