Matt Nolan • Mar 30, 2014 •
I am not around. Over the next three weeks, there are a series of really rubbish auto-posts are coming up about “factor shares” – I normally write posts in advance, but it is unlikely I am going to add anything or move posts around to include new ones. During that time I’ll be reading and […] … Read More
Matt Nolan • Mar 12, 2014 •
Offsetting recently posted about a tweet by Gareth Morgan on eating and control, including a reply I popped up. Essentially, Gareth’s tweet implied that the way individuals make choices indicates we have no choice over how much they eat. I disagreed talking about precommitment – he stated I assumed perfect information, which is both a […] … Read More
Matt Nolan • Jan 16, 2014 •
As you may or may not know, I am a vegetarian. As a result, occasionally I talk myself into needing more protein. To do this I eat cashews, which I think are actually just mainly fat, but are very yummy. Anyways, I went along to the supermarket and purchased a small number of cashews. The […] … Read More
Matt Nolan • Nov 14, 2013 •
I see that the Listener (ht Agnitio) has picked up on this piece on psychology today (ht Andrew F), which claims that an education in economics inherently changes our behaviour making economists worse citizens. At first brush I would like to note that we have a psychology lecturer suggesting that this implies more people should study […] … Read More
Matt Nolan • Oct 15, 2013 •
At the moment, many of my friends are getting married. At the same time some of my other friends who are not married are telling me they don’t understand why people get married. While I am not married, I think the idea of marriage is grand. I think it is a great way of dealing […] … Read More
Eric Crampton • Aug 03, 2013 •
My column on the economics of self-control is up at CANTA. A few choice excerpts: If the psychologists and the behavioural economists are right, then we effectively have warring factions inside our head, all the time. There's the me who wants to chec... Read More
Eric Crampton • Jan 13, 2013 •
Imagine that you have a meta-preference against smoking, but your day-to-day preference is always to delay quitting. If only you had some way of stopping yourself, you'd be better off. In the absence of other commitment mechanisms, regulatory or tax me... Read More
James Zuccollo • Jan 10, 2013 •
We’ve written a lot previously about cigarette taxes as a precommitment device that can increase welfare. However, while those models fit the stylised facts, it’s hard to know for sure if people are better off. For that you’d need to make a prediction about their increase in subjective wellbeing and test it. Now a couple [...] … Read More
James Zuccollo • Jan 09, 2013 •
Cory Doctorow has written a thoughtful and interesting article for the Guardian, which argues that pricing externalities will inhibit the creation of public value. …the infectious idea of internalising externalities turns its victims into grasping, would-be rentiers. You translate a document because you need it in two languages. I come along and use those translations [...] … Read More