File this under “economics of the future” or something. I’m not sure if it was the detox tea I had the other morning because I was out of coffee or just brainstorming as my spreadsheet at work tore through 38k rows of data trying to find one thing, but I started thinking about how the [...]

The sad truth among about pets is that there are too many dogs and cats in this country. Millions are killed every year using lethal injections and gas chambers because no one wanted them. Caught as strays, turned in by owners that no longer want them, or taken from illegal puppy mills, only a small [...]

A couple of years ago the business press was typing away on the concept of moral hazard.  It trickled its way down  I95 and then our elected officials in DC starting talking about it.  Moral hazard is the idea that someone can take risks without worrying about the repercussions of those risks.  They were talking [...]

This is a post you either don’t give a crap about or will really pay attention to. Which way you lean will likely depend on one thing: kids. If you got them, you care, if you don’t, you don’t. I don’t have kids, but my family is very much tied to the education system. If [...]

Nudge, is a book very much in the vein of Predictably Irrational or The Economic Naturalist.  It’s the idea (in layman’s terms) that people are inherently stupid.  We make bad decisions.  Some books just make these observations, but Nudge is a complete package.  It’s: you make bad decisions, they are hard to avoid, here’s how [...]

I love the beach, and not just because it’s the beach.  You see, my wife and I are people watchers.  We watch, we judge, and we feel guilty about it (well, she might).  On a recent trip to the beach, I sat in my hat, sunglasses, under a canopy, and enough sunscreen to refract 2 [...]

Borrowing an idea from the Macro Man blog, I want to ask you readers to be the contributor to this post. Below are 20 questions about finance, the economy, and your wallet. Number you answers in the comments, trying to keep everything to one or two words. I don’t want explanations, just want to get [...]

NY Times contributor and economist Tyler Cowen writes: Car owners may not want to hear this, but we have way too much free parking. Higher charges for parking spaces would limit our trips by car. That would cut emissions, alleviate congestion and, as a side effect, improve land use. Donald C. Shoup, professor of urban [...]