There are enough management consultants these days to form a small nation. But what do they actually do? And does it work?
Stephen Dubner’s conversation with David Rubenstein, co-founder of the Carlyle Group, one of the most storied private-equity firms in history. We spoke with Rubenstein for the Freakonomics Radio series “The…
The gist: If U.S. schoolteachers are indeed “just a little bit below average,” it’s not really their fault. So what should be done about it?
When Richard Thaler published Nudge in 2008 with co-author Cass Sunstein, the world was just starting to believe in his brand of behavioral economics. How did nudge theory hold up…
…However, it is worth noting that raising CAFE standards is what political scientists and economists call a “second-best” solution; we could be doing considerably better if we thought all of…
A team of economists has been running the numbers on the U.N.’s development goals. They have a different view of how those billions of dollars should be spent.
In ancient Rome, it was bread and circuses. Today, it’s a World Cup, an Olympics, and a new Saudi-backed golf league that’s challenging the P.G.A. Tour. Can a sporting event…
Can you ever really know how another person feels? What’s the best way to support a grieving person? And why doesn’t Hallmark sell empathy cards?
He’s a Harvard physician and economist who just started a third job: host of the new podcast Freakonomics, M.D. He’s also Steve’s former student. The two discuss why medicine should…
The British art superstar Flora Yukhnovich, the Freakonomist Steve Levitt, and the upstart American Basketball Association were all unafraid to follow their joy — despite sneers from the Establishment. Should…
What is the relationship between “catastrophizing” and anxiety? How did Angela react when her mother came close to drowning? And how can you gain perspective when the worst-case scenario is…
Serial entrepreneur Miki Agrawal loves to talk about the bodily functions that make most people flinch. That’s why she’s building a business around the three P’s: periods, pee, and poop.
The biggest sports league in history had a problem: While most of its players were Black, almost none of its head coaches were. So the N.F.L. launched a hiring policy…
When the uncelebrated Leicester City Football Club won the English Premier League, it wasn’t just the biggest underdog story in recent history. It was a sign of changing economics —…
From politics and economics to psychology and the arts, many of the modern ideas we take for granted emerged a century ago from a single European capital. In this episode…
From politics and economics to psychology and the arts, many of the modern ideas we take for granted emerged a century ago from a single European capital. In this episode…
…work). So let’s help him out: please use the comments section to brainstorm the best way to set up the program he’s thinking about, replete with potential pitfalls. Bonus points…
We speak with a governor, a former C.D.C. director, a pandemic forecaster, a hard-charging pharmacist, and a pair of economists — who say it’s all about the incentives. (Pandemillions, anyone?)
We’re working on a new Freakonomics Radio piece about what might best be called “retail etiquette.” It was inspired in part by this blog post, about how the quantity and…
Tom Dart is transforming Cook County’s jail, reforming evictions, and, with Steve Levitt, trying a new approach to electronic monitoring….
Also: how does a comedian cope with tragedy? With Eugene Mirman….
The U.S. spent the past few decades waiting for China to act like the global citizen it said it wanted to be. The waiting may be over.
…answer, as determined by us. Write the best headline you can think of that would suck the most traffic to a blog post. Keep it as clean as it needs…
…in an effort to create “the world’s best economics department.” The WSJ reports: “We’re doing this because we think economists have a distorted role in policy debates,” said Brian Barry,…
When Stephen Dubner learned that Dallas–Fort Worth will soon overtake Chicago as the third-biggest metro area in the U.S., he got on a plane to find out why. Despite getting…
…all in the title. (Thanks again, Linda Jines.) Check out Lulu Titlescorer, a fairly addictive little website that attempts to calculate whether a book’s title will make it a best-seller….
…what the government should do about it. They, like virtually all economists, think the auto industry bailout under consideration is not the right solution. They believe the best option is…
Tom Vanderbilt, the author of Traffic, is launching a month-long “hive” project at Slate called Nimble Cities. It asks for suggestions to improve urban mobility: “we want your best proposals…
Actually, the reasons are pretty clear. The harder question is: Will we ever care enough to stop?…
Why do so many promising solutions — in education, medicine, criminal justice, etc. — fail to scale up into great policy? And can a new breed of “implementation scientists” crack…
