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Trumix.com listings available of EconTalk Podcasts Build your own playlists with this podcast. Romer on Growth Paul Romer, Stanford University professor and Hoover Institution Senior Fellow talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about growth, China, innovation, and the role of human capital. Also discussed are ideas in creating growth, the idea that ideas allow for increasing returns, and intellectual property and how it should be treated. This 75 minute podcast is a wonderful introduction to thinking about what creates and sustains our standard of living in the modern world. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Lucas on Growth and Poverty Bob Lucas, Nobel Laureate and professor of economics at the University of Chicago talks about wealth and poverty, what affects living standards around the world and over time, the causes of business cycles and the role of the money in our economy. Along the way, he talks about Jane Jacobs, immigration, and Milton Friedman's influence on his career. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Friedman on Capitalism and Freedom Russ Roberts talks to Milton Friedman about the radical ideas he put forward almost 50 years ago in Capitalism and Freedom. Listen to the most influential economist of the past 50 years discuss the principles of liberty, social responsibility of business, the inertia behind bad legislation and his career as economist and public intellectual. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Milton Friedman on Money Russ Roberts talks with Milton Friedman about his research and views on inflation, the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke, and what the future holds. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Bernstein on Inequality William Bernstein, author of A Splendid Exchange, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about inequality. Bernstein is worried about it; Roberts is not. Bernstein argues that inequality is damaging to the health of low-status people and hurts the health of the economy. Roberts challenges Bernstein's empirical evidence. It's a lively conversation on the economics of status, productivity and the progressivity of taxes. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Kling on Freddie and Fannie and the Recent History of the U.S. Housing Market Arnold Kling of EconLog talks with host Russ Roberts about the economics of the housing market with a focus on the role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The conversation closes with a postscript on the current financial crisis. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Karol Boudreaux on Wildlife, Property, and Poverty in Africa Karol Boudreaux, Senior Research Fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about wildlife management in Africa. Their conversation focuses on community-based wildlife management in Namibia, a policy to give communities the incentives to protect wildlife and avoid the tragedy of the commons. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Shiller on Housing and Bubbles Robert Shiller of Yale University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the current housing mess and related financial market problems. Shiller argues that the decade-long run up in housing prices was a bubble where speculative fervor outweighed any economic fundamentals. He also discusses the genesis of the Case-Shiller housing price index and his idea for how it might be used to reduce risk in the mortgage market. Note: This podcast was recorded on September 5, 2008, days before Sec ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Ellis on American Creation and the Founding Joseph Ellis, of Mt. Holyoke College and author of American Creation, talks about the triumphs and tragedies of the founding of the United States. His goal in the book and in this podcast is to tell a story for grownups rather than for children, where the Founders are neither saints nor evil white, patriarchal slave-holding demons. It is a nuanced story of triumph--a military victory over a seemingly unbeatable vastly more experienced army, the creation of the first geographically large rep ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Rauch on the Volt, Risk, and Corporate Culture Jonathan Rauch, of the Brookings Institution and the Atlantic Monthly, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the evolution of the Chevy Volt, GM's planned electric car. Due to the transparency of GM's effort, Rauch was able to spend a great deal of time on site at GM writing a piece for the Atlantic Monthly on GM's plans and hopes. Rauch discusses the huge risks, GM's past failures, and GM's hopes that the Volt might change the company's culture. The conversation closes with a discus ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Roberts on the Price of Everything Russ Roberts, host of EconTalk and author of the economics novel, The Price of Everything, talks with guest host Arnold Kling about the ideas in The Price of Everything: price gouging, the role of prices in the aftermath of natural disaster, spontaneous order, and the hidden harmony of the economic cosmos. Along the way, Roberts talks about novels vs. textbooks and other traditional treatments of economic reasoning. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website John Taylor on Monetary Policy John Taylor of Stanford University talks about the Taylor Rule, his description of what the Fed ought to do and what it sometimes actually does, to keep inflation in check and the economy on a steady path. He argues that when the Fed has deviated from the Rule in recent years, the economy has performed poorly. Taylor also assesses the chances for a monetary or financial disaster and the Fed's recent expanded role in intervening in financial markets. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Bueno de Mesquita on Iran and Threats to U.S. Security Bruce Bueno de Mesquita of Stanford University's Hoover Institution and New York University talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about threats to U.S. security, particularly Iran. Bueno de Mesquita argues that Iran is of little danger to the United States. He then looks at what Iran has to gain and to lose by appearing to build a nuclear weapons program and actually using a nuclear weapon. He then goes on to examine the nature of other threats to the United States. The closing topic of the c ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Barro on Disasters Robert Barro of Harvard University and Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks about disasters--significant national and international catastrophes such as the Great Depression, war, and the flu epidemic in the early part of the 20th century. What do we know about these disasters? What is the likelihood of a catastrophic financial crisis in the United States? How serious is the current economic situation in the United States? The conversation also includes discussions of economic sti ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Varian on Technology Hal Varian, Google's Chief Economist and University of California at Berkeley professor, talks with Russ Roberts about Google, the role of technology in our everyday lives, the unintended paths of innovation, and the value of economics. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Rivers on Polling Doug Rivers of Stanford University and YouGov.com talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the world of political polling. Rivers explains why publicly provided margins of error overstate the reliability of most polls and why it's getting harder and harder to do telephone polls. Rivers argues that internet panels are able to create a more representative sample. Along the way he discusses automated telephone polls, the Bradley effect, and convention bounce, and the use of exit polls in ca ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Hanushek on Education and School Finance Eric Hanushek of Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the strange evolution of school finance in the last four decades. In particular, the courts have played an important role in recent years in mandating expenditure increases for public school systems. Hanushek talks about why this has come about and the lack of effect these expenditures have had in affecting student achievement. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on the Political Economy of Public Transportation Michael Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Munger's recent trip to Chile and the changes Chile has made to Santiago's bus system. What was once a private decentralized system with differing levels of quality and price has been transformed into a system of uniform quality designed from the top down. How has the new system fared? Not particularly well according to Munger. Commuting times are up and the President of Chile has apologized to the Chilean people ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Kling on Hospitals and Health Care Arnold Kling of EconLog talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the death of his father and the lessons to be learned for how hospitals treat patients and our health care system treats hospitals. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website McKenzie on Prices Richard McKenzie of the University California, Irvine and the author of Why Popcorn Costs So Much at the Movies and Other Pricing Puzzles, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about a wide range of pricing puzzles. They discuss why Southern California experiences frequent water crises, why price falls after Christmas, why popcorn seems so expensive at the movies, and the economics of price discrimination. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Don Boudreaux on Energy Prices Don Boudreaux of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the recent surge in energy prices. They talk about why prices have risen, the implications for America's standard of living and the implications for public policy. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Cole on the Market for New Cars Steve Cole, the Sales Manager at Ourisman Honda of Laurel in Laurel, Maryland talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the strange world of new car pricing. They talk about dealer markup, the role of information and the internet in bringing prices down, why haggling persists, how sales people are compensated, and the gray areas of buyer and seller integrity. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Gene Epstein on Gold, the Fed, and Money Gene Epstein, Barron's economics editor, talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the virtues of the gold standard relative to fiat money. Epstein argues that privately issued money, backed by gold, would lead to an economy with much greater price stability and fewer and milder recessions. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Hanson on Signalling Robin Hanson of George Mason University talks about the phenomenon of signalling--the ways people spend resources to convey information about ourselves to others. It begins with Hanson revisiting his theory from an earlier podcast that we spend too much on medicine because we need to signal our concern for friends and family. The conversation then moves onto apply Hanson's model of signalling to other areas of human behavior. This is a wide-ranging discussion covering not just medicine, but ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Meltzer on the Fed, Money, and Gold Allan Meltzer of Carnegie Mellon University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about what the Fed really does and the political pressures facing the Chair of the Fed. He describes and analyzes some fascinating episodes in U.S. monetary history, discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the gold standard and ends the conversation with some insights into recent Fed moves to intervene with investment banks. This is a wonderful introduction to the political economy of the money supply an ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Chris Anderson on Free Chris Anderson talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his next book project based on the idea that many delightful things in the world are increasingly free--internet-based email with infinite storage, on-line encyclopedias and even podcasts, to name just a few. Why is this trend happening? Is it restricted to the internet? Is there really any such thing as a free lunch? Is free a penny cheaper than a penny or a lot cheaper than that? The conversation also covers whether economics has ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Nye on Wine, War and Trade John Nye of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his book, War, Wine, and Taxes. The conversation covers the history of Britain and France's trade policy, why the British drink beer and why Ricardo's example of Britain trading wool for Portuguese wine is bizarre. Nye turns the traditional story on its head--he argues that France was more of a free trader than Britain and that the repeal of the Corn Laws was not the dividing line between Britain's protectionist ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Bernstein on the History of Trade William Bernstein talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the history of trade. Drawing on the insights from his recent book, A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World, Bernstein talks about the magic of spices, how trade in sugar explain why Jews ended up in Manhattan, the real political economy of the Boston Tea Party and the demise of the Corn Laws in England. The discussion closes with the political economy of trade today and the interaction between trade and income inequality ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Roberts on the Least Pleasant Jobs EconTalk host Russ Roberts talks about the claim that for capitalism to succeed there have to be people at the bottom to do the unpleasant tasks and that the rich thrive because of the suffering of those at the bottom. He critiques the idea that capitalism is a zero sum game where to get ahead, someone has to fall back. He also looks at the evolution of the least pleasant jobs over time and how technology interacts with rising productivity to make the least pleasant jobs more pleasant. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Coyle on the Soulful Science Diane Coyle talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in her new book, The Soulful Science: What Economists Really Do and Why it Matters. The discussions starts with the issue of growth--measurement issues and what economists have learned and have yet to learn about why some nations grow faster than others and some don't grow at all. Subsequent topics include happiness research, the politics and economics of inequality, the role of math in economics, and policy areas where econo ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Coyne on Exporting Democracy after War Christopher Coyne of West Virginia University and George Mason University's Mercatus Center talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his book, After War: The Political Economy of Exporting Democracy. They talk about the successes and failures of America's attempts to export democracy after a war. In some cases, Japan and Germany, for example, after World War II, American efforts have led to stability and democratic institutions. In many other cases, Cuba, Somalia, and Haiti, for example, ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website McCloskey on Capitalism and the Bourgeois Virtues Deirdre McCloskey of the University of Illinois at Chicago and the author of The Bourgeois Virtues talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about capitalism and whether markets make people more ethical or less. They also discuss Adam Smith's world view, whether people were nicer in the Middle Ages, and the role of prudence and love. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on Subsidies and Externalities Mike Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the economics of subsidies. What is the economic argument for subsidies? What is the history of the economic argument and what is its relevance today? Munger draws on his personal experience as a farmer to help listeners understand the pros and cons of using government-funded payments to encourage various activities deemed to be worth encouraging. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Cowen on Monetary Policy Tyler Cowen of George Mason University and Marginal Revolution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about money, inflation, the Federal Reserve and the gold standard. Cowen argues that alternatives to the current Federal Reserve system promise more risk than return. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Marglin on Markets and Community Stephen Marglin of Harvard University and author of The Dismal Science: How Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Community talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the markets and community. Marglin argues that markets and commercial transactions undermine the connections between us. He wants people to pay more attention to what is lost and not just what is gained by the pursuit of material well-being. Topics discussed include the nature of community, the role that voluntary association ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Vernon Smith on Rationality in Economics Nobel Laureate Vernon Smith of Chapman University and George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his new book, Rationality in Economics: Constructivist and Ecological Forms. They discuss the social and human sides of exchange, the robust nature of equilibrium in experiments and the real world, the seeming contradiction between Adam Smith's two great works, the unpredictability of how innovation emerges and its rationality, what neuroscience might tell u ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Sowell on Economic Facts and Fallacies Thomas Sowell of Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his new book, Economic Facts and Fallacies. He discusses the misleading nature of measured income inequality, CEO pay, why nations grow or stay poor, the role of intellectuals and experts in designing public policy, and immigration. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Brook on Vermeer's Hat and the Dawn of Global Trade Timothy Brook, professor of history at the University of British Columbia and author of Vermeer's Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the expansion of global trade between Europe and the rest of the world, and in particular, North American and China. He discusses the differences and similarities between Chinese and Western attitudes toward trade and exploration and the implications for innovation and knowledge. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Easterly on Growth, Poverty, and Aid William Easterly of NYU talks about why some nations escape poverty while others do not, why aid almost always fails to create growth, and what can realistically be done to help the poorest people in the world. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Dan Klein on Coordination and Cooperation Dan Klein of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the marvel of economic coordination that takes place without a coordinator--the sequence of complex tasks done by individuals often separated by immense distances who unknowingly contribute to everyday products and services we enjoy. Klein also discusses what he calls "the people's romance"--the idea that the highest form of human cooperation is through government action. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Collier on the Bottom Billion Paul Collier of Oxford University talks about the ideas in his recent book, The Bottom Billion, an analysis of why the poorest countries in the world fail to grow. He talks about conflict, natural resources, being landlocked, and bad governance, four factors he identifies as causes of the desperate poverty and stagnation in the countries where 1/6 of the world's poorest peoples live. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Don Boudreaux on Globalization and Trade Deficits Don Boudreaux, of George Mason University, talks about the ideas in his book, Globalization. He discusses comparative advantage, the winners and losers from trade, trade deficits, and inequality with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on the Nature of the Firm Mike Munger, of Duke University, talks about why firms exist. If prices and markets work so well (and they do) in steering economic resources, then why does so much economic activity take place within organizations that use command-and-control, top-down, centralized structures called firms? Within a firm, most of the goods and services that the workers use are given away rather than allocated by prices--computer services, legal services and almost everything else is not handed out by compet ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Edward Castronova on the Exodus to the Virtual World Edward Castronova, of Indiana University and author of Exodus to the Virtual World, talks about his provocative thesis that a growing number of people around the world will be spending more and more time playing multiplayer games in virtual reality both as a form of escape and as a search for meaning. He talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how this trend might affect government, religion, and our happiness. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Duggan on Strategic Intuition William Duggan, professor of management at Columbia Business School at Columbia University, talks about his latest book, Strategic Intuition. Duggan critiques traditional methods of strategy and planning and suggests that the opportunism and adaptability are more productive detailed plans. He also discusses the nature of intuition and creativity along with insights into how the brain works to better understand problem-solving. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Karol Boudreaux on Property Rights and Incentives in Africa Karol Boudreaux, Senior Research Fellow at George Mason University's Mercatus Center, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about her field work and research in Rwanda and South Africa. In Rwanda, she studied how a change in incentives and property rights for coffee farmers has allowed the coffee bean growers to improve quality and prosper. In South Africa's Langa Township, she looked at how renters were allowed to become homeowners and how the ability to own changed their lives. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Boettke on Austrian Economics Pete Boettke, of George Mason University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the origins and tenets of Austrian economics. This is a wonderful introduction to how the so-called Austrian economists look at the world and how they continue to influence economics today. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on Fair Trade and Free Trade Mike Munger, frequent guest and longtime Econlib contributor, speaks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about fair trade coffee and free trade agreements. Does the premium for fair trade coffee end up in the hands of the grower? What economic forces might stop that from happening? They discuss the business strategy of using higher wages as a marketing strategy to attract concerned consumers. They turn to the issue of free trade agreements. If the ideal situation is open borders to foreign prod ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Cole on the Market for New Cars Steve Cole, the Sales Manager at Ourisman Honda of Laurel in Laurel, Maryland talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the strange world of new car pricing. They talk about dealer markup, the role of information and the internet in bringing prices down, why haggling persists, how sales people are compensated, and the gray areas of buyer and seller integrity. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Gene Epstein on Gold, the Fed, and Money Gene Epstein, Barron's economics editor, talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the virtues of the gold standard relative to fiat money. Epstein argues that privately issued money, backed by gold, would lead to an economy with much greater price stability and fewer and milder recessions. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Hanson on Signalling Robin Hanson of George Mason University talks about the phenomenon of signalling--the ways people spend resources to convey information about ourselves to others. It begins with Hanson revisiting his theory from an earlier podcast that we spend too much on medicine because we need to signal our concern for friends and family. The conversation then moves onto apply Hanson's model of signalling to other areas of human behavior. This is a wide-ranging discussion covering not just medicine, but ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Meltzer on the Fed, Money, and Gold Allan Meltzer of Carnegie Mellon University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about what the Fed really does and the political pressures facing the Chair of the Fed. He describes and analyzes some fascinating episodes in U.S. monetary history, discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the gold standard and ends the conversation with some insights into recent Fed moves to intervene with investment banks. This is a wonderful introduction to the political economy of the money supply an ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Chris Anderson on Free Chris Anderson talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his next book project based on the idea that many delightful things in the world are increasingly free--internet-based email with infinite storage, on-line encyclopedias and even podcasts, to name just a few. Why is this trend happening? Is it restricted to the internet? Is there really any such thing as a free lunch? Is free a penny cheaper than a penny or a lot cheaper than that? The conversation also covers whether economics has ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Nye on Wine, War and Trade John Nye of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his book, War, Wine, and Taxes. The conversation covers the history of Britain and France's trade policy, why the British drink beer and why Ricardo's example of Britain trading wool for Portuguese wine is bizarre. Nye turns the traditional story on its head--he argues that France was more of a free trader than Britain and that the repeal of the Corn Laws was not the dividing line between Britain's protectionist ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Bernstein on the History of Trade William Bernstein talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the history of trade. Drawing on the insights from his recent book, A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World, Bernstein talks about the magic of spices, how trade in sugar explain why Jews ended up in Manhattan, the real political economy of the Boston Tea Party and the demise of the Corn Laws in England. The discussion closes with the political economy of trade today and the interaction between trade and income inequality ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Roberts on the Least Pleasant Jobs EconTalk host Russ Roberts talks about the claim that for capitalism to succeed there have to be people at the bottom to do the unpleasant tasks and that the rich thrive because of the suffering of those at the bottom. He critiques the idea that capitalism is a zero sum game where to get ahead, someone has to fall back. He also looks at the evolution of the least pleasant jobs over time and how technology interacts with rising productivity to make the least pleasant jobs more pleasant. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Coyle on the Soulful Science Diane Coyle talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in her new book, The Soulful Science: What Economists Really Do and Why it Matters. The discussions starts with the issue of growth--measurement issues and what economists have learned and have yet to learn about why some nations grow faster than others and some don't grow at all. Subsequent topics include happiness research, the politics and economics of inequality, the role of math in economics, and policy areas where econo ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Coyne on Exporting Democracy after War Christopher Coyne of West Virginia University and George Mason University's Mercatus Center talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his book, After War: The Political Economy of Exporting Democracy. They talk about the successes and failures of America's attempts to export democracy after a war. In some cases, Japan and Germany, for example, after World War II, American efforts have led to stability and democratic institutions. In many other cases, Cuba, Somalia, and Haiti, for example, ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website McCloskey on Capitalism and the Bourgeois Virtues Deirdre McCloskey of the University of Illinois at Chicago and the author of The Bourgeois Virtues talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about capitalism and whether markets make people more ethical or less. They also discuss Adam Smith's world view, whether people were nicer in the Middle Ages, and the role of prudence and love. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on Subsidies and Externalities Mike Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the economics of subsidies. What is the economic argument for subsidies? What is the history of the economic argument and what is its relevance today? Munger draws on his personal experience as a farmer to help listeners understand the pros and cons of using government-funded payments to encourage various activities deemed to be worth encouraging. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Cowen on Monetary Policy Tyler Cowen of George Mason University and Marginal Revolution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about money, inflation, the Federal Reserve and the gold standard. Cowen argues that alternatives to the current Federal Reserve system promise more risk than return. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Marglin on Markets and Community Stephen Marglin of Harvard University and author of The Dismal Science: How Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Community talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the markets and community. Marglin argues that markets and commercial transactions undermine the connections between us. He wants people to pay more attention to what is lost and not just what is gained by the pursuit of material well-being. Topics discussed include the nature of community, the role that voluntary association ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Vernon Smith on Rationality in Economics Nobel Laureate Vernon Smith of Chapman University and George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his new book, Rationality in Economics: Constructivist and Ecological Forms. They discuss the social and human sides of exchange, the robust nature of equilibrium in experiments and the real world, the seeming contradiction between Adam Smith's two great works, the unpredictability of how innovation emerges and its rationality, what neuroscience might tell u ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Sowell on Economic Facts and Fallacies Thomas Sowell of Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his new book, Economic Facts and Fallacies. He discusses the misleading nature of measured income inequality, CEO pay, why nations grow or stay poor, the role of intellectuals and experts in designing public policy, and immigration. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Brook on Vermeer's Hat and the Dawn of Global Trade Timothy Brook, professor of history at the University of British Columbia and author of Vermeer's Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the expansion of global trade between Europe and the rest of the world, and in particular, North American and China. He discusses the differences and similarities between Chinese and Western attitudes toward trade and exploration and the implications for innovation and knowledge. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Easterly on Growth, Poverty, and Aid William Easterly of NYU talks about why some nations escape poverty while others do not, why aid almost always fails to create growth, and what can realistically be done to help the poorest people in the world. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Dan Klein on Coordination and Cooperation Dan Klein of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the marvel of economic coordination that takes place without a coordinator--the sequence of complex tasks done by individuals often separated by immense distances who unknowingly contribute to everyday products and services we enjoy. Klein also discusses what he calls "the people's romance"--the idea that the highest form of human cooperation is through government action. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Collier on the Bottom Billion Paul Collier of Oxford University talks about the ideas in his recent book, The Bottom Billion, an analysis of why the poorest countries in the world fail to grow. He talks about conflict, natural resources, being landlocked, and bad governance, four factors he identifies as causes of the desperate poverty and stagnation in the countries where 1/6 of the world's poorest peoples live. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Don Boudreaux on Globalization and Trade Deficits Don Boudreaux, of George Mason University, talks about the ideas in his book, Globalization. He discusses comparative advantage, the winners and losers from trade, trade deficits, and inequality with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on the Nature of the Firm Mike Munger, of Duke University, talks about why firms exist. If prices and markets work so well (and they do) in steering economic resources, then why does so much economic activity take place within organizations that use command-and-control, top-down, centralized structures called firms? Within a firm, most of the goods and services that the workers use are given away rather than allocated by prices--computer services, legal services and almost everything else is not handed out by compet ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Edward Castronova on the Exodus to the Virtual World Edward Castronova, of Indiana University and author of Exodus to the Virtual World, talks about his provocative thesis that a growing number of people around the world will be spending more and more time playing multiplayer games in virtual reality both as a form of escape and as a search for meaning. He talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how this trend might affect government, religion, and our happiness. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Duggan on Strategic Intuition William Duggan, professor of management at Columbia Business School at Columbia University, talks about his latest book, Strategic Intuition. Duggan critiques traditional methods of strategy and planning and suggests that the opportunism and adaptability are more productive detailed plans. He also discusses the nature of intuition and creativity along with insights into how the brain works to better understand problem-solving. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Karol Boudreaux on Property Rights and Incentives in Africa Karol Boudreaux, Senior Research Fellow at George Mason University's Mercatus Center, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about her field work and research in Rwanda and South Africa. In Rwanda, she studied how a change in incentives and property rights for coffee farmers has allowed the coffee bean growers to improve quality and prosper. In South Africa's Langa Township, she looked at how renters were allowed to become homeowners and how the ability to own changed their lives. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Boettke on Austrian Economics Pete Boettke, of George Mason University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the origins and tenets of Austrian economics. This is a wonderful introduction to how the so-called Austrian economists look at the world and how they continue to influence economics today. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on Fair Trade and Free Trade Mike Munger, frequent guest and longtime Econlib contributor, speaks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about fair trade coffee and free trade agreements. Does the premium for fair trade coffee end up in the hands of the grower? What economic forces might stop that from happening? They discuss the business strategy of using higher wages as a marketing strategy to attract concerned consumers. They turn to the issue of free trade agreements. If the ideal situation is open borders to foreign prod ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Botkin on Nature, the Environment and Global Warming Daniel Botkin, ecologist and author, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how we think about our role as humans in the natural world, the dynamic nature of environmental reality and the implications for how we react to global warming. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Sunstein on Worst-case Scenarios Cass Sunstein of the University of Chicago talks about the ideas in his latest book, Worst-Case Scenarios. How should individuals and societies cope with low-probability events with potentially catastrophic consequences? In this conversation with EconTalk host Russ Roberts, Sunstein discusses the uselessness of the precautionary principle as a guide to behavior and the psychological challenges we all face in coping with uncertain, risky events. He also speculates why we have chosen politica ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Henry Aaron on Health Care Costs In this bonus middle-of-the-week podcast, Henry Aaron of the Brookings Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about health care costs. Researchers in a New England Journal of Medicine article have estimated that the US could save $209 billion if the US went to a single-payer system like Canada. Is this number reliable? Aaron takes a deeper look at the estimate and discusses the relevance of such estimates for health care policy. This is a special mid-week podcast. It's a follow-u ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Waldfogel on Markets, Choice, and the Tyranny of the Market Joel Waldfogel of the Wharton School of Business talks about the idea in his new book, The Tyranny of Markets: Why You Can't Always Get What You Want. He argues that when fixed costs are large, markets don't necessarily give people what they want and that, analogous to the political process, you can be hurt as the number of people with preferences that differ from yours gets larger. Host Russ Roberts challenges Waldfogel's claim that these phenomena are widespread and argues that in many ca ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Arnold Kling on the Economics of Health Care and the Crisis of Abundance Arnold Kling of EconLog talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the economics of health care and his book, A Crisis of Abundance: Rethinking How We Pay for Health Care. Kling discusses whether we get what we pay for when we spend money on health care, why health care isn't like cars, and why health care insurance isn't really insurance. The conversation closes with a discussion of innovation in America's health care system and why America is so unlike everywhere else. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Yandle on the Tragedy of the Commons and the Implications for Environmental Regulation Bruce Yandle of Clemson University and George Mason University's Mercatus Center looks at the tragedy of the commons and the various ways that people have avoided the overuse of resources that are held in common. Examples discussed include fisheries, roads, rivers and the air. Yandle talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the historical use of norms, cooperative ventures such as incorporating a river, the common law, and top-down command-and-control regulation to reduce air and water p ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Ayres on Super Crunchers and the Power of Data Ian Ayres of Yale University Law School talks about the ideas in his new book, Super Crunchers: Why Thinking-by-Numbers Is the New Way to Be Smart. Ayres argues for the power of data and analysis over more traditional decision-making methods using judgment and intuition. He talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about predicting the quality of wine based on climate and rainfall, the increasing use of randomized data in the world of business, the use of evidence and information in medicine ra ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Robert Frank on Economics Education and the Economic Naturalist Author Robert Frank of Cornell University talks about economic education and his recent book, The Economic Naturalist. Frank argues that the traditional way of teaching economics via graphs and equations often fails to make any impression on students. In this conversation with host Russ Roberts, Frank outlines an alternative approach from his new book, where students find interesting questions and enigmas from everyday life. They then try to explain them using the economic way of thinking. ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Cowen on Your Inner Economist Tyler Cowen, of George Mason University, talks about his new book, Discover Your Inner Economist: Use Incentives to Fall in Love, Survive Your Next Meeting, and Motivate Your Dentist. Cowen, legendary blogger at MarginalRevolution.com, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the economics of parenting, reading, dentistry, art museums and education. Highlights include Tyler's favorite art museum and what to see there along with the challenges of being a tourist in Morocco. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website George Shultz on Economics, Human Rights and the Fall of the Soviet Union George Shultz, the Thomas W. and Susan B. Ford Distinguished Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution and Secretary of State under Ronald Reagan, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the role of economics in his career, the tension between morality and pragmatism in foreign policy, and the role of personalities and economics in diplomacy, particularly in US/Soviet relations in the 1980s. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website McCraw on Schumpeter, Innovation, and Creative Destruction Thomas McCraw of Harvard University talks about the ideas of Joseph Schumpeter from his book, Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction. McCraw and EconTalk host Russ Roberts discuss innovation, business strategy, the role of mathematics in economics, and Schumpeter's vision of competition embodied in his most important idea--creative destruction. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Boudreaux on Market Failure, Government Failure and the Economics of Antitrust Regulation Don Boudreaux of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about when market failure can be improved by government intervention. After discussing the evolution of economic thinking about externalities and public goods, the conversation turns to the case for government's role in promoting competition via antitrust regulation. Boudreaux argues that the origins of antitrust had nothing to do with protecting consumers from greedy monopolists. The source of political demand f ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Grab Bag: Munger and Roberts on Recycling, Peak Oil and Steroids Mike Munger, of Duke University, and EconTalk host Russ Roberts clean up some loose ends from their previous conversation on recycling, move on to talk about the idea of buying local to reduce one's carbon footprint and then talk about the idea of peak oil. They close the conversation with the Rick Ankiel story and the implications for the Barry Bonds saga. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Epstein on Property Rights, Zoning and Kelo Richard Epstein, of the University of Chicago and Stanford's Hoover Institution, makes the case that many current zoning restrictions are essentially "takings" and property owners should receive compensation for the lost value of their land. He also discusses the Kelo case and the political economy of the regulation of land. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Romer on Growth Paul Romer, Stanford University professor and Hoover Institution Senior Fellow talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about growth, China, innovation, and the role of human capital. Also discussed are ideas in creating growth, the idea that ideas allow for increasing returns, and intellectual property and how it should be treated. This 75 minute podcast is a wonderful introduction to thinking about what creates and sustains our standard of living in the modern world. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Gordon on Ants, Humans, the Division of Labor and Emergent Order Deborah M. Gordon, Professor of Biological Sciences at Stanford University, is an authority on ants and order that emerges without control or centralized authority. The conversation begins with what might be called the economics of ant colonies, how they manage to be organized without an organizer, the division of labor and the role of tradeoffs. The discussion then turns to the implications for human societies and the similarities and differences between human and natural orders. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Weingast on Violence, Power and a Theory of Nearly Everything Barry Weingast, Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and the Ward C. Krebs Family Professor in the Department of Political Science at Stanford University, talks about the ideas in his forthcoming book with Doug North and John Wallis, A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History. Weingast talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how violence shapes political institutions, the role of competition in politics and economics, and why most development adv ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Hanushek on Educational Quality and Economic Growth Eric Hanushek, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, talks about his research on the impact of educational quality on economic growth. Past efforts to increase the economic growth rate of poor countries have focused on years of schooling, neglecting the quality and true education that needs to take place. Hanushek presents dramatic findings about the decisive nature of cognitive ability and knowledge in driving economic growth. Join us as Hanushek talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts ab ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Henderson on Disagreeable Economists David Henderson, editor of the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics and a research fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about when and why economists disagree. Harry Truman longed for a one-armed economist, one willing to go out on a limb and take an unequivocal position without adding "on the other hand...". Truman's view is often reflected in the public's view that economic knowledge is inherently ambiguous and that economists never agree on anything ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Bueno de Mesquita on Reagan, Yeltsin, and the Strategy of Political Campaigning Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, NYU and the Hoover Institute, talks about the political economy of political campaigns and his forthcoming book, The Strategy of Campaigning: Lessons from Ronald Reagan and Boris Yeltsin. He talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the different strategies politicians pursue in attracting support from voters and party delegates, the persistence of negative campaigning, the cost to politicians of sticking to their principles and how the political choices of Reagan ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Ticket Prices and Scalping EconTalk host Russ Roberts talks about scalping and visits AT&T Park hours before Major League Baseball's All-Star Game to talk with a scalper, a merchandiser, a fan, and the police about prices, tickets, baseball and the law. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Leamer on Outsourcing and Globalization Is outsourcing good for America? How does foreign competition affect wages in the United States? Ed Leamer, professor of economics at UCLA, talks about the effects of outsourcing on wages, jobs, and the U.S. standard of living. Drawing on a review of Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat, Leamer talks with host Russ Roberts about technology, trade, productivity and inequality. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Munger on Recycling Mike Munger, professor of economics and political science at Duke University and frequent guest of EconTalk, talks with host Russ Roberts about the economics and politics of recycling. Munger argues that recycling can save resources, of course, but it can also require more resources than production from scratch. Some curbside recycling, for example, makes sense, while other forms (such as green glass) may be akin to a form of religious expression rather than a wise policy that is environmen ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Caplan on the Myth of the Rational Voter Bryan Caplan, of George Mason University and blogger at EconLog, talks about his book, The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies. Caplan argues that democracies work well in giving voters what they want but unfortunately, what voters want isn't particularly wise, especially when it comes to economic policy. He outlines a series of systematic biases we often have on economic topics and explains why we have little or no incentive to improve our understanding of the w ... Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Weinberger on Everything is Miscellaneous and the Wonderful World of Digital Information Author David Weinberger, a fellow at Harvard's Berkman Institute for Internet and Society, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his latest book, Everything is Miscellaneous: The Power of the New Digital Disorder. Topics include the differences between how we organize and think about physical and digital information, the power of the internet to let us consume information in unique and customized ways and the implications for retailing, politics and education. Listen | Listen in your iPhone | Download | View full cache | Visit Website Dan Pink on How Half Your Brain Can Save Your Job Author Dan Pink talks about the ideas in his book, A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future. He argues that the skills of the right side of the brain--skills such as creativity, empathy, contextual thinking and big picture thinking--are going to become increasingly important as a response to competition from low-wage workers overseas and our growing standard of living. Listen | Lis