In the New Yorker, James Surowiecki explains why it’s not just cable providers who like the current cable-TV system that bundles channels: “The appeal of bundling is partly that it reduces transaction costs: instead of having to figure out how much each part of a package is worth to you, you can make a blanket judgment.”
Robert Jervis writes in the Boston Globe that to improve intelligence, CIA investigators should stop thinking so intuitively, pay more attention to what they see in front of them, make assumptions that can be disproven, and realize that terrorists don’t see the world like they do.
The common wisdom on testosterone is that it contributes to risky and aggressive behavior, but new research reveals a different pattern. In a study, 121 women were dosed with testosterone or a placebo and then played the ultimatum bargaining game (see Chapter 3 of SuperFreakonomics for more than you ever wanted to know about Ultimatum).
On the list of illegally downloaded e-books, that is.
Here’s the Washington Post with the story, and here’s the N.Y. Times.
The underlying study claims that more than 9 millions copies of books were illegally downloaded last year.
Blog reader Abe Mirrashidi sent us this photo of a vending machine at his workplace which has a most unusual pricing scheme. The Cheetos and Doritos in “A0” and “A2” sell for $.65, and are identical to the Cheetos and Doritos in “B0” and “B2,” both of which go for $.75. You can guess which slots get sold out first.
During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) broadcast anti-Tutsi propaganda and called for violence against Tutsis, which many experts believe significantly contributed to the violence. An interesting new job-market paper by David Yanagizawa seeks to determine the precise role that RTLM played in the genocide.
The BPS Research Digest blog reports that those dire health warnings on cigarette packs may actually drive some people to smoke. Psychologists interviewed 39 student smokers about the importance of smoking to their self-esteem. The students were then divided into two groups and shown two different sets of cigarette packs – one set with death-related health warnings and one with death-neutral warnings.
The Biosphere 2 project in the Arizona desert, begun in the early 1990’s, was supposed to have been the largest functioning sealed environment ever created. But it failed almost immediately and was sold to developers who have yet to rebuild it.
If Captain Steve hasn’t answered all your airline questions yet, tune in to The Crew Lounge, a weekly podcast hosted by flight attendant bloggers Sara Keagle and Bobby Laurie. It promises to give listeners “a peek behind the galley curtain,” and will answer questions from listeners.
European countries are fining the wealthy more for speeding.
My wife and I did two hours of volunteer work on Maui, trying to remove sea grape, an invasive species. Twelve people in total had to divide the tasks of using large shears, raking brush, and hauling away all the cuttings.
I recently attended my third Renaissance Weekend in Charleston, where among the normal cornucopia of ideas and fellowship, Sam Horn was incredibly generous in helping me sharpen my elevator pitch for a new project.
According to sociologist Pepper Schwartz they are — as car passengers. Schwartz reports that even in households that consider themselves feminist, men are far more likely to take the keys when the couple rides together. Does the evidence back her up?
I’ve been working with the American Time Use Survey, a great data set collected by the Department of Labor. The ATUS is chock-full of fun facts; for example, American adults report spending more than two- and-one-third times more time at gambling establishments than at museums.
Unredacted, the National Security Archive’s blog, has posted Lee Harvey Oswald’s request to the Soviet Union for citizenship. “I want citizenship,” Oswald wrote, “because I am a communist and a worker; I have lived in a decadent capitalist society where the workers are slaves.”
Teach for American (TFA) is known for putting recent college graduates in low-income public schools for two-year teaching stints, a mission that has produced a lot of passionate debate. The organization’s founders hope that these young teachers will eventually become education leaders and advocates – and many of them have.
As the Associated Press reports, the Chinese city of Guangzhou has introduced a strong incentive to discourage spitting in public: residents lose their homes if they get caught spitting seven times within a two-year period.
O.K., this is a pretty crude analysis. But still, this year’s conference suggests to me that the economics profession is healing itself.
Al Jazeera reports on one of the projects driving China’s magical 8 percent GDP growth. Ordos is a modern, luxurious “city of the future” in Inner Mongolia, built entirely over the last five years with government funds. It’s also a ghost town with almost no residents or businesses.
In terms of carbon dioxide emissions, how does China’s dirtiest city stack up against America’s cleanest?
Charlie Rose interviews Paul Volcker, longtime former chairman of the Federal Reserve and currently the chairman of the Economic Recovery Advisory Board. Volcker talks bluntly about fixing the broken financial system, compensation on Wall Street, the future of the American economy, and the Obama administration’s performance so far. Volcker is particularly pessimistic about getting things done in Washington: “The American political process is about as broken as the financial system.” [%comments]
A study by sociologists Diego Gambetta and Steffen Hertog reveals that engineers are “three times more likely to become violent terrorists than their peers in finance, medicine, or the sciences,” as reported in Slate. So why the career change?
On the eve of the annual meeting of the American Economic Association, Justin Lahart writes in the Wall Street Journal about how economists are cheapskates.
There’s really no need to panic over the prospect of EPA dominance. Instead, industry should take the hint that’s it high time to push hard for climate-change legislation. Sure, the move by the EPA to exercise regulatory authority over carbon — a power granted to it by a 2007 Supreme Court ruling — was designed to give President Obama moral leverage in Denmark. But it also serves as a presidential prod to Congress to pass a climate-change law. No matter how you feel about global warming, greenhouse-gas emissions are not going to go unregulated. I suspect Obama ultimately nudged the EPA because he wants the U.S. Congress to do the regulating. Industry should support him on this.
Before you commit to those New Year’s resolutions, you might want to read Jonah Lehrer’s recent article on the limitations of willpower.
A movie theater in Santa Monica, California, advertises that it will give you a free box of popcorn if you donate $2 to charity.
The usual gimmick at movies is that the profits from sale of popcorn and other refreshments go to some charity.
The companies Tiger Woods endorsed – and their shareholders – are feeling the negative effects of his extramarital affairs. A new company called Off the Market, reports CNBC’s Darren Rovell, hopes to take advantage of this development by helping athletes keep their existing relationships “positive and sexy.”
We’ve blogged repeatedly about the fascinating capabilities of monkeys and now it seems our primate cousins may beat us to Mars. Russia’s Cosmonautics Academy, which first sent monkeys into orbit in 1983, is in talks with Georgian scientists to prepare monkeys for a simulated Mars mission.
Despite the recession, the Associated Press reports, U.S. crime rates continue to fall in 2009 compared to last year. Sociologists and crime experts are citing the economic stimulus, people staying home from lack of work, and even an aging population as possible causes of the drop.
Each week, I’ve been inviting readers to submit quotations for which they want me to try to trace the origin, using The Yale Book of Quotations and my own research. Here is the latest round.
Only one in ten Israeli adults is an organ donor and the country is addressing the situation with an innovative new policy. Organ donors and their close relatives will now receive priority if they require a transplant.
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