Writing a good dissertation
I supervise a lot of dissertations and find myself giving the same advice over and over again. I don’t mind doing this, but I thought that s
Celebrating 200 years of a deeply unintuitive idea: Comparative advantage
This past week marked the 200th publication anniversary of David Ricardo’s On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation. Despite...
Conjoining and disconjoining with another person
There was that strange moment again today when we said goodbye. He was with me, and then, a moment later, he was not. My boyfriend still...
Is science like manufacturing or like farming?
It is obvious why specialization improves productivity for manufactured goods (even if people seem to systematically underestimate just...
Why we under-appreciate the division of labor
Economists have long known that a key source of society's wealth is the division of labor. Robinson Crusoe was marvelously...
What is Cognitive Science of Markets?
Since I say I am a "cognitive scientist of markets," I damned well better have an answer to what this means. It's not quite behavioral...
Smith's *The Wealth of Nations*: Introductory thoughts
The first book I am blogging is Adam Smith's masterpiece An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776). Although...
My British rebirth
I was reborn last week on the other side of the Atlantic. I've traveled before, even to London, but I have never lived outside of...
What you are reading / what I am writing
Things are changing fast. Last week, I moved to London. Next fall, I am starting as a faculty member (at the U.K.'s University of Bath)....