Liberalism.org
Tyler Cowen
…on March 12 we’ll be launching Liberalism.org, a new project from IHS [Institute for Humane Studies]. We’re aiming to build something akin to a modern-day coffee house of the liberal tradition—a digital gathering place where today’s most innovative liberal thinkers can weigh tradeoffs, think across differences, and apply liberal values to the challenges of today and the future.The idea is to create a space that is serious but accessible—a home for exploring political, economic, intellectual, and civic freedom as a coherent and evolving tradition. We’re hoping it will serve as both an outlet for the ideas and a public-facing resource for those who care about the future of liberalism in its broad, classical sense.The post Liberalism.org appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA Fly Has Been UploadedA simple way to improve your thought and conclusionsMy Conversation with the excellent Henry Oliver
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4ryTLmB
Tyler Cowen
…on March 12 we’ll be launching Liberalism.org, a new project from IHS [Institute for Humane Studies]. We’re aiming to build something akin to a modern-day coffee house of the liberal tradition—a digital gathering place where today’s most innovative liberal thinkers can weigh tradeoffs, think across differences, and apply liberal values to the challenges of today and the future.The idea is to create a space that is serious but accessible—a home for exploring political, economic, intellectual, and civic freedom as a coherent and evolving tradition. We’re hoping it will serve as both an outlet for the ideas and a public-facing resource for those who care about the future of liberalism in its broad, classical sense.The post Liberalism.org appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA Fly Has Been UploadedA simple way to improve your thought and conclusionsMy Conversation with the excellent Henry Oliver
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4ryTLmB
Studying with Ludwig Lachmann
Tyler Cowen
Since I am in South Africa, I am reminded of my time studying with Ludwig Lachmann, the South African economist from University of the Witwatersrand. I was seventeen, and Lachmann teaching a graduate seminar at New York University. Someone (Richard Ebeling maybe?) had told me he was interesting, so I wanted to sit in on the seminar. I showed up, introduced myself to Lachmann, and asked if I could listen to the lectures. I obviously did not belong, but he was very gracious and said yes of course. He wore a suit and tie, had a very Old World manner, and he had been a Jewish refugee from Germany. He was 73 or so at the time, this was 1979.His manner of speaking was very distinctive. Of course I now recognize the South African accent, but there is more to it than that.Lachmann was best known for his connections to the Austrian School, as he was visiting at the NYU Austrian program at the time, under the aegis of Israel Kirzner. Nonetheless Austrian economics was not what I learned in the seminar.On the first day, I heard plenty about Sraffa and Garegnani, and all that was new (and fascinating to me). Lachmann had studied with Werner Sombart, so I learned about the German historical school as well.Lachmann also was my first teacher who made sense of Keynes for me, moving me away from obsessions with the hydraulic IS-LM interpretations of the General Theory. He flirted with views of cost-based pricing, brought me further into the kaleidic world of G.L.S. Shackle, and he insisted that a market economy had no overall tendency toward the constellation of a general equilibrium of prices and quantities. (He did believe that most though not all individual markets tended to equilibrate.) He inveighed against W.H. Hutt’s interpretation of Say’s Law, of course some of you here will know that Hutt also was South African. I kept on trying to read Hutt, to see if I could defend him against Lachmann’s critiques. I also imbibed Hutt’s economic critique of apartheid.Lachmann did not talk about South Africa, other than to mention how long the journey to New York was. You may know that Israel Kirzner, another early mentor of mine, had South African roots as well. He also did not talk about South Africa.“South African economics,” if you wish to call it that, played a significant role in my early intellectual development.To this day, when I think about the economics of AI, and many other matters, Lachmann’s book Capital and its Structure is one of my go-to inspirations.And I am still grateful to Lachmann for letting “a kid” sit in on his class. I paid avid attention.The post Studying with Ludwig Lachmann appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesAcademis journals and AI blegWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bH1vOw
Tyler Cowen
Since I am in South Africa, I am reminded of my time studying with Ludwig Lachmann, the South African economist from University of the Witwatersrand. I was seventeen, and Lachmann teaching a graduate seminar at New York University. Someone (Richard Ebeling maybe?) had told me he was interesting, so I wanted to sit in on the seminar. I showed up, introduced myself to Lachmann, and asked if I could listen to the lectures. I obviously did not belong, but he was very gracious and said yes of course. He wore a suit and tie, had a very Old World manner, and he had been a Jewish refugee from Germany. He was 73 or so at the time, this was 1979.His manner of speaking was very distinctive. Of course I now recognize the South African accent, but there is more to it than that.Lachmann was best known for his connections to the Austrian School, as he was visiting at the NYU Austrian program at the time, under the aegis of Israel Kirzner. Nonetheless Austrian economics was not what I learned in the seminar.On the first day, I heard plenty about Sraffa and Garegnani, and all that was new (and fascinating to me). Lachmann had studied with Werner Sombart, so I learned about the German historical school as well.Lachmann also was my first teacher who made sense of Keynes for me, moving me away from obsessions with the hydraulic IS-LM interpretations of the General Theory. He flirted with views of cost-based pricing, brought me further into the kaleidic world of G.L.S. Shackle, and he insisted that a market economy had no overall tendency toward the constellation of a general equilibrium of prices and quantities. (He did believe that most though not all individual markets tended to equilibrate.) He inveighed against W.H. Hutt’s interpretation of Say’s Law, of course some of you here will know that Hutt also was South African. I kept on trying to read Hutt, to see if I could defend him against Lachmann’s critiques. I also imbibed Hutt’s economic critique of apartheid.Lachmann did not talk about South Africa, other than to mention how long the journey to New York was. You may know that Israel Kirzner, another early mentor of mine, had South African roots as well. He also did not talk about South Africa.“South African economics,” if you wish to call it that, played a significant role in my early intellectual development.To this day, when I think about the economics of AI, and many other matters, Lachmann’s book Capital and its Structure is one of my go-to inspirations.And I am still grateful to Lachmann for letting “a kid” sit in on his class. I paid avid attention.The post Studying with Ludwig Lachmann appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesAcademis journals and AI blegWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bH1vOw
Alternatives to 911
Tyler Cowen
Almost a quarter-billion calls are placed to 911 each year in the United States. A large share of them involve social problems, not crimes or emergencies—yet police are dispatched in response. This review traces how the 911 emergency system’s institutional design shapes demand for police, who is excluded from or ill served by this system, and what alternatives exist, including nonemergency lines (with police response), government hotlines (211, 311, 988), civilian crisis teams, and community-based resources. Among the universe of municipal police departments with at least 100 sworn officers in 2020, covering 107 million US residents, police have absorbed broad social service functions, with the availability of formal alternatives restricted to the largest cities. The evidence suggests that the primacy of police reflects institutional reproduction more than public need. I propose priorities for future research.That is from a new NBER working paper by Bocar A. Ba.The post Alternatives to 911 appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The 21st Century ROAD to Housing ActHow frequent are price bubbles?
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4b9257L
Tyler Cowen
Almost a quarter-billion calls are placed to 911 each year in the United States. A large share of them involve social problems, not crimes or emergencies—yet police are dispatched in response. This review traces how the 911 emergency system’s institutional design shapes demand for police, who is excluded from or ill served by this system, and what alternatives exist, including nonemergency lines (with police response), government hotlines (211, 311, 988), civilian crisis teams, and community-based resources. Among the universe of municipal police departments with at least 100 sworn officers in 2020, covering 107 million US residents, police have absorbed broad social service functions, with the availability of formal alternatives restricted to the largest cities. The evidence suggests that the primacy of police reflects institutional reproduction more than public need. I propose priorities for future research.That is from a new NBER working paper by Bocar A. Ba.The post Alternatives to 911 appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The 21st Century ROAD to Housing ActHow frequent are price bubbles?
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4b9257L
Friday assorted links
Tyler Cowen
1. Redux of my 2009 post on my preferred exile. Mexico City now rates much higher, and Germany lower. Madrid would be a serious choice, in the top few. Even Rome falls under consideration. And I want more money for the exile too, which price index shall we use?2. “In the past three months of the 119th Congress, fully 25% of documents in the Congressional Record are AI-generated.” Note that AI-generated text is about 30% more “progressive,” though that is showing up in the resolutions rather than substantive legislation.3. The labor market consequences of rapid sectoral shifts.4. Right now LLMs are “too altruistic” in the Ultimatum game.5. Companies that should exist but don’t?6. Piano bars and music popularity. The market test speaks.7. An Islamic perspective on Sirat. And a very different view on the film.8. USA fact of the day.9. A subtle Straussian move?The post Friday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4luJiqU
Tyler Cowen
1. Redux of my 2009 post on my preferred exile. Mexico City now rates much higher, and Germany lower. Madrid would be a serious choice, in the top few. Even Rome falls under consideration. And I want more money for the exile too, which price index shall we use?2. “In the past three months of the 119th Congress, fully 25% of documents in the Congressional Record are AI-generated.” Note that AI-generated text is about 30% more “progressive,” though that is showing up in the resolutions rather than substantive legislation.3. The labor market consequences of rapid sectoral shifts.4. Right now LLMs are “too altruistic” in the Ultimatum game.5. Companies that should exist but don’t?6. Piano bars and music popularity. The market test speaks.7. An Islamic perspective on Sirat. And a very different view on the film.8. USA fact of the day.9. A subtle Straussian move?The post Friday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4luJiqU
The moralization of artificial intelligence
Tyler Cowen
We started by asking how moralized AI has become in public discourse. Analyzing 69,890 news headlines from 2018 to 2024, we found that AI was moralized at levels comparable to GMOs and vaccines, technologies whose moral opposition has been studied for decades. It ranked above both. The sharpest spike came within weeks of ChatGPT’s launch in late 2022.When we surveyed representative samples of Americans, a majority of AI opponents said their views wouldn’t change even if AI proved safe and beneficial. That’s consequence insensitivity, the hallmark of moral conviction, not practical calculation. Across art, chatbots, legal tools, and romantic companions, AI moralization loaded onto a single latent factor. A global moral stance, dressed up in whatever practical language is available.The behavioral data make this concrete: a one standard deviation increase in moralization scores predicted a 42% drop in actual AI usage, even when it would have benefited that person personally. The conviction preceded the behavior by up to 573 days.The next time someone gives you three different reasons to oppose AI, each one dissolving under mild scrutiny, you’re probably not watching someone think. You’re watching someone feel.Here is the tweet storm, here is the paper by de Mello, et.al.The post The moralization of artificial intelligence appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesLiberalism.orgThe trajectories of science and AIA Fly Has Been Uploaded
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bpfZBo
Tyler Cowen
We started by asking how moralized AI has become in public discourse. Analyzing 69,890 news headlines from 2018 to 2024, we found that AI was moralized at levels comparable to GMOs and vaccines, technologies whose moral opposition has been studied for decades. It ranked above both. The sharpest spike came within weeks of ChatGPT’s launch in late 2022.When we surveyed representative samples of Americans, a majority of AI opponents said their views wouldn’t change even if AI proved safe and beneficial. That’s consequence insensitivity, the hallmark of moral conviction, not practical calculation. Across art, chatbots, legal tools, and romantic companions, AI moralization loaded onto a single latent factor. A global moral stance, dressed up in whatever practical language is available.The behavioral data make this concrete: a one standard deviation increase in moralization scores predicted a 42% drop in actual AI usage, even when it would have benefited that person personally. The conviction preceded the behavior by up to 573 days.The next time someone gives you three different reasons to oppose AI, each one dissolving under mild scrutiny, you’re probably not watching someone think. You’re watching someone feel.Here is the tweet storm, here is the paper by de Mello, et.al.The post The moralization of artificial intelligence appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesLiberalism.orgThe trajectories of science and AIA Fly Has Been Uploaded
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bpfZBo
Some simple spatial analytics of Cape Town
Tyler Cowen
Rio de Janeiro let its hillsides be filled in with lower-cost dwellings. The result was a significant increase in the crime rate. On the more positive side of the ledger, upward mobility increased too. If you live in a decent favela, you can get to a downtown job with not too much difficulty, albeit with some travel risk. Note however that some of those jobs include “theft.”Cape Town has not filled in its hillsides, and you see empty, valuable land all over the place. The townships have remained remarkably segregated, both racially and spatially. The nicer parts of Cape Town also have remained relatively safe, both for whites and for upper class blacks.One secondary consequence of this equilibrium is very high unemployment in the townships, staggeringly high in fact. It is expensive to get from most of the townships to a job in the nicer part of town. For South Africa as a whole, GPT Pro reports:OECD reports that around 70% of discouraged jobseekers cite location as the main obstacle to looking for work, and that commuting can absorb up to 37% of post-tax income for the lowest quintile, or up to 80% once time costs are included. The World Bank estimate is even harsher for the poorest households: up to 85% of daily income once the opportunity cost of time is counted. In effect, many low-wage jobs are too costly to search for, reach, or keep.And see this link. Young male workers in particular find it hard to get the experience that would enable them to prove themselves reliable and then keep on climbing a skills ladder. So they stay in the townships, maybe engage in some black or gray market labor, and collect some welfare payments. They also might commit crimes against each other.Which in turn makes the notion of filling in the hillside with low-cost housing all the less appealing.It is difficult to solve the problems of South Africa.Addendum: Note also that South African agriculture is capital-intensive, as you might expect from a wealthier country. So subsistence agriculture is less of an option here, compared to many other African nations, and that leads to all the more overcrowding in the poorly located townships.The post Some simple spatial analytics of Cape Town appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesStudying with Ludwig LachmannWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/3NgEdG6
Tyler Cowen
Rio de Janeiro let its hillsides be filled in with lower-cost dwellings. The result was a significant increase in the crime rate. On the more positive side of the ledger, upward mobility increased too. If you live in a decent favela, you can get to a downtown job with not too much difficulty, albeit with some travel risk. Note however that some of those jobs include “theft.”Cape Town has not filled in its hillsides, and you see empty, valuable land all over the place. The townships have remained remarkably segregated, both racially and spatially. The nicer parts of Cape Town also have remained relatively safe, both for whites and for upper class blacks.One secondary consequence of this equilibrium is very high unemployment in the townships, staggeringly high in fact. It is expensive to get from most of the townships to a job in the nicer part of town. For South Africa as a whole, GPT Pro reports:OECD reports that around 70% of discouraged jobseekers cite location as the main obstacle to looking for work, and that commuting can absorb up to 37% of post-tax income for the lowest quintile, or up to 80% once time costs are included. The World Bank estimate is even harsher for the poorest households: up to 85% of daily income once the opportunity cost of time is counted. In effect, many low-wage jobs are too costly to search for, reach, or keep.And see this link. Young male workers in particular find it hard to get the experience that would enable them to prove themselves reliable and then keep on climbing a skills ladder. So they stay in the townships, maybe engage in some black or gray market labor, and collect some welfare payments. They also might commit crimes against each other.Which in turn makes the notion of filling in the hillside with low-cost housing all the less appealing.It is difficult to solve the problems of South Africa.Addendum: Note also that South African agriculture is capital-intensive, as you might expect from a wealthier country. So subsistence agriculture is less of an option here, compared to many other African nations, and that leads to all the more overcrowding in the poorly located townships.The post Some simple spatial analytics of Cape Town appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesStudying with Ludwig LachmannWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/3NgEdG6
South Africa fact of the day
Tyler Cowen
Reuters reports the rand ended 2025 nearly 13% stronger against the dollar, its biggest annual gain in 16 years, helped by a broadly weaker USD, an improvement in South Africa’s fiscal position, strong precious‑metal prices, S&P’s credit‑rating upgrade, and removal from the FATF “grey list.”Here is the Perplexity link, with further links therein.While it is now more expensive than before, Cape Town is one of the very best tourist experiences you can have right now, anywhere. For “social science interesting” it is A+, English suffices, it has some of the best scenery, near perfect weather, it has layers and layers of history, with many distinct neighborhoods and “worlds” contained within, and it can be done safely. The food is very tasty, but not original enough to be the reason to come here. Plus there is wildlife, most notably the largest penguin colony at Boulder Bay, or safari if you wish to go a few hours out of town. Zeitz art museum is excellent, and you will not see those works in any other countries. From Dulles you can fly here direct.So you should go.The post South Africa fact of the day appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesThe alternate book universe that is South AfricaThe Software Upgrade in Chinese Civic Behaviour
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/3Pa4kPx
Tyler Cowen
Reuters reports the rand ended 2025 nearly 13% stronger against the dollar, its biggest annual gain in 16 years, helped by a broadly weaker USD, an improvement in South Africa’s fiscal position, strong precious‑metal prices, S&P’s credit‑rating upgrade, and removal from the FATF “grey list.”Here is the Perplexity link, with further links therein.While it is now more expensive than before, Cape Town is one of the very best tourist experiences you can have right now, anywhere. For “social science interesting” it is A+, English suffices, it has some of the best scenery, near perfect weather, it has layers and layers of history, with many distinct neighborhoods and “worlds” contained within, and it can be done safely. The food is very tasty, but not original enough to be the reason to come here. Plus there is wildlife, most notably the largest penguin colony at Boulder Bay, or safari if you wish to go a few hours out of town. Zeitz art museum is excellent, and you will not see those works in any other countries. From Dulles you can fly here direct.So you should go.The post South Africa fact of the day appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesThe alternate book universe that is South AfricaThe Software Upgrade in Chinese Civic Behaviour
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/3Pa4kPx
Saturday assorted links
Tyler Cowen
1. Zvi on GPT 5.4.2. Haitian tasting menu is coming to Shaw.3. Which technology did kill the bank teller?4. “These findings highlight macro-sentiment as an important and previously underexplored determinant of demographic change, bridging demographic economics with behavioral macroeconomics.”5. The Anthropic Institute.6. Hamlet’s soliloquy in singlish.7. Does AI favor cyber defense over cyber offense?8. “Today, I launch The British Cræft Prize.“The post Saturday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bkEOOU
Tyler Cowen
1. Zvi on GPT 5.4.2. Haitian tasting menu is coming to Shaw.3. Which technology did kill the bank teller?4. “These findings highlight macro-sentiment as an important and previously underexplored determinant of demographic change, bridging demographic economics with behavioral macroeconomics.”5. The Anthropic Institute.6. Hamlet’s soliloquy in singlish.7. Does AI favor cyber defense over cyber offense?8. “Today, I launch The British Cræft Prize.“The post Saturday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bkEOOU
Jürgen Habermas, RIP
Tyler Cowen
Here is one obituary. My favorite book of his was The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society.The post Jürgen Habermas, RIP appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesThe moralization of artificial intelligenceLiberalism.orgA Fly Has Been Uploaded
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4brHmLg
Tyler Cowen
Here is one obituary. My favorite book of his was The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society.The post Jürgen Habermas, RIP appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesThe moralization of artificial intelligenceLiberalism.orgA Fly Has Been Uploaded
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4brHmLg
Tricameralism in apartheid South Africa
Tyler Cowen
Yes. South Africa really did have a tricameral Parliament under the 1983 Constitution, in force from 1984 until the democratic transition. But the phrase can mislead, because it sounds more pluralistic than it really was. The system created three racially separate parliamentary chambers: a House of Assembly for whites, a House of Representatives for Coloured South Africans, and a House of Delegates for Indian South Africans. The black African majority was excluded altogether from this Parliament.The key to how it worked was the distinction between “own affairs” and “general affairs.” Each chamber could legislate for the “own affairs” of the racial group it represented; these included areas such as education, housing, welfare, local government, culture, and recreation. But the central levers of power—“general affairs”—remained matters such as defence, finance, foreign policy, justice, law and order, commerce, internal affairs, and agriculture. Those were handled at the center, not by the separate chambers acting independently.Formally, then, it was a three-house legislature. In practice, it was a system of segregated representation plus retained white dominance. The constitutional text itself says Parliament consisted of the three Houses. But the white chamber was far larger and more institutionally powerful: the House of Assembly had 178 members, while the House of Representatives had 85 and the House of Delegates 45. The Constitution also vested executive authority in the State President, with different advisory structures for “own affairs” and “general affairs,” which further centralized power above the chambers themselves.Here is the full GPT discussion, with links as well. As Harrison points out to me, in history tricameralism of any form is extremely rare.The post Tricameralism in apartheid South Africa appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/474cXRU
Tyler Cowen
Yes. South Africa really did have a tricameral Parliament under the 1983 Constitution, in force from 1984 until the democratic transition. But the phrase can mislead, because it sounds more pluralistic than it really was. The system created three racially separate parliamentary chambers: a House of Assembly for whites, a House of Representatives for Coloured South Africans, and a House of Delegates for Indian South Africans. The black African majority was excluded altogether from this Parliament.The key to how it worked was the distinction between “own affairs” and “general affairs.” Each chamber could legislate for the “own affairs” of the racial group it represented; these included areas such as education, housing, welfare, local government, culture, and recreation. But the central levers of power—“general affairs”—remained matters such as defence, finance, foreign policy, justice, law and order, commerce, internal affairs, and agriculture. Those were handled at the center, not by the separate chambers acting independently.Formally, then, it was a three-house legislature. In practice, it was a system of segregated representation plus retained white dominance. The constitutional text itself says Parliament consisted of the three Houses. But the white chamber was far larger and more institutionally powerful: the House of Assembly had 178 members, while the House of Representatives had 85 and the House of Delegates 45. The Constitution also vested executive authority in the State President, with different advisory structures for “own affairs” and “general affairs,” which further centralized power above the chambers themselves.Here is the full GPT discussion, with links as well. As Harrison points out to me, in history tricameralism of any form is extremely rare.The post Tricameralism in apartheid South Africa appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/474cXRU
Christopher Sims, RIP
Tyler Cowen
Here is one notice. Here are previous MR posts on Sims, with a survey of his Nobel contributions at the top.The post Christopher Sims, RIP appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesSome simple spatial analytics of Cape TownStudying with Ludwig LachmannWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bFimBr
Tyler Cowen
Here is one notice. Here are previous MR posts on Sims, with a survey of his Nobel contributions at the top.The post Christopher Sims, RIP appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesSome simple spatial analytics of Cape TownStudying with Ludwig LachmannWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bFimBr
Is Germany actually that good at research?
Tyler Cowen
Jannik Reigl writes:Germany’s remaining research strengths are disproportionately concentrated in fields with limited commercial value. Consider climate science. German institutions co-lead with the United States. The Max Planck Institute in Hamburg, the UK Met Office Hadley Centre, ECMWF in Reading: these are world-class operations. Klaus Hasselmann won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physics for climate modeling. Genuine excellence. But climate research doesn’t directly generate economic returns. The value lies in technology. And yes, while some of the most important assets of the near future are subsumed under “climate technologies”, they are essentially the product of other research fields. Batteries, solar cells, carbon capture, and grid technology are all technologies stemming from engineering and materials science. These require strength in chemistry, materials science, and engineering. The fields where Germany is losing ground.The Max Planck Society is Germany’s highest-performing research body in the Nature Index. Its ranking fell from 4th place globally in 2021 to 11th in 2025, an “unusually large” decline according to Nature. Chemistry tells the starkest tale: Max Planck consistently ranked in the top 5 from 2015 to 2021, then dropped to 10th in 2022, and sits at 14th in 2025. Physical sciences show a similar pattern: Max Planck held 2nd place from 2015 to 2022 before falling to 4th, where it has remained.German patents were cited 14 percent less than comparable US patents in the 1980s, and that this gap widened to 41 percent by the 2000s. This represented a steeper decline than that observed for both the United Kingdom and Japan. More recent studies do not use the same dataset or methodology, but they point in a similar direction.One reason might be that the top research institutes disincentivise high-risk high-reward R&D by denying young talent scientific independence. In the United States, the system is built on the ‘flat’ Principal Investigator (PI) model. A talented scientist in their early 30s can secure a tenure-track Assistant Professorship, win their own NIH or NSF grants, and run a fully independent lab. They succeed or fail on their own scientific agenda.Germany, by contrast, operates on a hierarchical ‘fiefdom’ model.Here is the full essay, via Emma.The post Is Germany actually that good at research? appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesAcademis journals and AI blegA simple way to improve your thought and conclusionsStudying with Ludwig Lachmann
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/46WQqq3
Tyler Cowen
Jannik Reigl writes:Germany’s remaining research strengths are disproportionately concentrated in fields with limited commercial value. Consider climate science. German institutions co-lead with the United States. The Max Planck Institute in Hamburg, the UK Met Office Hadley Centre, ECMWF in Reading: these are world-class operations. Klaus Hasselmann won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physics for climate modeling. Genuine excellence. But climate research doesn’t directly generate economic returns. The value lies in technology. And yes, while some of the most important assets of the near future are subsumed under “climate technologies”, they are essentially the product of other research fields. Batteries, solar cells, carbon capture, and grid technology are all technologies stemming from engineering and materials science. These require strength in chemistry, materials science, and engineering. The fields where Germany is losing ground.The Max Planck Society is Germany’s highest-performing research body in the Nature Index. Its ranking fell from 4th place globally in 2021 to 11th in 2025, an “unusually large” decline according to Nature. Chemistry tells the starkest tale: Max Planck consistently ranked in the top 5 from 2015 to 2021, then dropped to 10th in 2022, and sits at 14th in 2025. Physical sciences show a similar pattern: Max Planck held 2nd place from 2015 to 2022 before falling to 4th, where it has remained.German patents were cited 14 percent less than comparable US patents in the 1980s, and that this gap widened to 41 percent by the 2000s. This represented a steeper decline than that observed for both the United Kingdom and Japan. More recent studies do not use the same dataset or methodology, but they point in a similar direction.One reason might be that the top research institutes disincentivise high-risk high-reward R&D by denying young talent scientific independence. In the United States, the system is built on the ‘flat’ Principal Investigator (PI) model. A talented scientist in their early 30s can secure a tenure-track Assistant Professorship, win their own NIH or NSF grants, and run a fully independent lab. They succeed or fail on their own scientific agenda.Germany, by contrast, operates on a hierarchical ‘fiefdom’ model.Here is the full essay, via Emma.The post Is Germany actually that good at research? appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesAcademis journals and AI blegA simple way to improve your thought and conclusionsStudying with Ludwig Lachmann
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/46WQqq3
Tracing the Genetic Footprints of the UK National Health Service
Tyler Cowen
The establishment of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in July 1948 was one of the most consequential health policy interventions of the twentieth century, providing universal and free access to medical care and substantially expanding maternal and infant health services. In this paper, we estimate the causal effect of the NHS introduction on early-life mortality and we test whether survival is selective. We adopt a regression discontinuity design under local randomization, comparing individuals born just before and just after July 1948. Leveraging newly digitized weekly death records, we document a significant decline in stillbirths and infant mortality following the introduction of the NHS, the latter driven primarily by reductions in deaths from congenital conditions and diarrhea. We then use polygenic indexes (PGIs), fixed at conception, to track changes in population composition, showing that cohorts born at or after the NHS introduction exhibit higher PGIs associated with contextually-adverse traits (e.g., depression, COPD, and preterm birth) and lower PGIs associated with contextually-valued traits (e.g., educational attainment, self-rated health, and pregnancy length), with effect sizes as large as 7.5% of a standard deviation. These results based on the UK Biobank data are robust to family-based designs and replicate in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing and the UK Household Longitudinal Study. Effects are strongest in socioeconomically disadvantaged areas and among males. This novel evidence on the existence and magnitude of selective survival highlights how large-scale public policies can leave a persistent imprint on population composition and generate long-term survival biases.Here is the link, via S.The post Tracing the Genetic Footprints of the UK National Health Service appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesIf you have the right to die, you should have the right to try!AI Won’t Automatically Accelerate Clinical Trials
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4suEmVT
Tyler Cowen
The establishment of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in July 1948 was one of the most consequential health policy interventions of the twentieth century, providing universal and free access to medical care and substantially expanding maternal and infant health services. In this paper, we estimate the causal effect of the NHS introduction on early-life mortality and we test whether survival is selective. We adopt a regression discontinuity design under local randomization, comparing individuals born just before and just after July 1948. Leveraging newly digitized weekly death records, we document a significant decline in stillbirths and infant mortality following the introduction of the NHS, the latter driven primarily by reductions in deaths from congenital conditions and diarrhea. We then use polygenic indexes (PGIs), fixed at conception, to track changes in population composition, showing that cohorts born at or after the NHS introduction exhibit higher PGIs associated with contextually-adverse traits (e.g., depression, COPD, and preterm birth) and lower PGIs associated with contextually-valued traits (e.g., educational attainment, self-rated health, and pregnancy length), with effect sizes as large as 7.5% of a standard deviation. These results based on the UK Biobank data are robust to family-based designs and replicate in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing and the UK Household Longitudinal Study. Effects are strongest in socioeconomically disadvantaged areas and among males. This novel evidence on the existence and magnitude of selective survival highlights how large-scale public policies can leave a persistent imprint on population composition and generate long-term survival biases.Here is the link, via S.The post Tracing the Genetic Footprints of the UK National Health Service appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesIf you have the right to die, you should have the right to try!AI Won’t Automatically Accelerate Clinical Trials
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4suEmVT
A New Order of Things
Alex Tabarrok
Big infrastructure projects in the developing world for things like water and electricity are under-pressure. Chinese and US funding is down and these projects often fall apart due to corruption and political incentives to build but not maintain. It is possible to break old institutions and establish new ones, but “there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.” Connor Tabarrok gives a great example. Ek Son Chan in Cambodia:In 1993, the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority was a catastrophe. The city was emerging from decades of war and genocide. Only 20 percent of the city had connections at all, and water flowed for just 10 hours a day. 72 percent of the water was non revenue water. It was lost to leaks or stolen through illegal connections.Into this mess walked Ek Son Chan, a young Cambodian engineer appointed as Director General. Over the next two decades he executed an incredible institutional turnaround.Chan replaced corrupt managers with qualified engineers. He got rid of unmetered taps. Every single connection received a meter and was billed. The old system of manual billing was replaced with a computerized system, which cut down on low level employees giving out free water and receiving kickbacks. Bill collection rates went from 48 percent to 99.9 percent. These changes were intensely unpopular, and Chan faced fierce resistance from rent seekers, from freeloading customers to his own employees. He established an incentive system based on bonuses among the workers, introduced an internal discipline system with a penalty for violators, and set up a discipline commission for all levels of the organization to deal with corruptionHe divided the distribution network into pressure zones with flow monitoring. A 24 hour leak detection team walked the streets at night with listening bars to identify underground leaks.The institutional change dwarfed the infrastructural change, but was absolutely necessary to make the infrastructure investment worthwhile….This commitment would not be untested. When Chan tried to enforce bill payment on Cambodia’s elite, and sent his team out to install a water meter on the property of a high ranking general who had been freeloading. The general refused the installation of a meter, so the team attempted to disconnect the water. The general and his bodyguards ran them off the property. When Chan heard of this, he decided not to back down, and mobilized his own team to dig up the pipe and install the meter. Always a leader from the front, Chan jumped in the hole to take a shift at digging. When he looked up, his team had fled, and he was facing down the general himself, pointing a gun at his head. In Cambodia in the 90s, consequences for such a high ranking official were unlikely. CHan didn’t give up. He mobilized the local armed police and returned with 20 men to standoff against the general, disconnected him from service and left him out to dry. Chan said this about the dispute:”He had no water. My office was on the second floor and the general came in with his ten bodyguards to look for me. I said, “ No. You can come here alone, but with an appointment”. He couldn’t do anything. He had to return. He said, “Okay”! At that time we had a telephone, a very big Motorola. He came in to make an appointment for tomorrow. I said, “ Okay, tomorrow you come alone”. So he comes alone, we talk. “Okay. I’ll reconnect on two conditions. The first condition is that you have to sign a commitment saying that you will respect the Water Supply Authority and second, you need to pay a penalty for your bad behavior and you must allow us to broadcast the situation to the public, or no way, no water in your house”. So he agreed. “….By 2010, coverage in the city went from 25 percent to over 90 percent with 24 hour service. The utility became financially self sustaining and turned a profit. It was listed…
Alex Tabarrok
Big infrastructure projects in the developing world for things like water and electricity are under-pressure. Chinese and US funding is down and these projects often fall apart due to corruption and political incentives to build but not maintain. It is possible to break old institutions and establish new ones, but “there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.” Connor Tabarrok gives a great example. Ek Son Chan in Cambodia:In 1993, the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority was a catastrophe. The city was emerging from decades of war and genocide. Only 20 percent of the city had connections at all, and water flowed for just 10 hours a day. 72 percent of the water was non revenue water. It was lost to leaks or stolen through illegal connections.Into this mess walked Ek Son Chan, a young Cambodian engineer appointed as Director General. Over the next two decades he executed an incredible institutional turnaround.Chan replaced corrupt managers with qualified engineers. He got rid of unmetered taps. Every single connection received a meter and was billed. The old system of manual billing was replaced with a computerized system, which cut down on low level employees giving out free water and receiving kickbacks. Bill collection rates went from 48 percent to 99.9 percent. These changes were intensely unpopular, and Chan faced fierce resistance from rent seekers, from freeloading customers to his own employees. He established an incentive system based on bonuses among the workers, introduced an internal discipline system with a penalty for violators, and set up a discipline commission for all levels of the organization to deal with corruptionHe divided the distribution network into pressure zones with flow monitoring. A 24 hour leak detection team walked the streets at night with listening bars to identify underground leaks.The institutional change dwarfed the infrastructural change, but was absolutely necessary to make the infrastructure investment worthwhile….This commitment would not be untested. When Chan tried to enforce bill payment on Cambodia’s elite, and sent his team out to install a water meter on the property of a high ranking general who had been freeloading. The general refused the installation of a meter, so the team attempted to disconnect the water. The general and his bodyguards ran them off the property. When Chan heard of this, he decided not to back down, and mobilized his own team to dig up the pipe and install the meter. Always a leader from the front, Chan jumped in the hole to take a shift at digging. When he looked up, his team had fled, and he was facing down the general himself, pointing a gun at his head. In Cambodia in the 90s, consequences for such a high ranking official were unlikely. CHan didn’t give up. He mobilized the local armed police and returned with 20 men to standoff against the general, disconnected him from service and left him out to dry. Chan said this about the dispute:”He had no water. My office was on the second floor and the general came in with his ten bodyguards to look for me. I said, “ No. You can come here alone, but with an appointment”. He couldn’t do anything. He had to return. He said, “Okay”! At that time we had a telephone, a very big Motorola. He came in to make an appointment for tomorrow. I said, “ Okay, tomorrow you come alone”. So he comes alone, we talk. “Okay. I’ll reconnect on two conditions. The first condition is that you have to sign a commitment saying that you will respect the Water Supply Authority and second, you need to pay a penalty for your bad behavior and you must allow us to broadcast the situation to the public, or no way, no water in your house”. So he agreed. “….By 2010, coverage in the city went from 25 percent to over 90 percent with 24 hour service. The utility became financially self sustaining and turned a profit. It was listed…
Robert Trivers, RIP
Tyler Cowen
The greats have been falling…The post Robert Trivers, RIP appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsIs Germany actually that good at research?On the future of war
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4rwcfUE
Tyler Cowen
The greats have been falling…The post Robert Trivers, RIP appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsIs Germany actually that good at research?On the future of war
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4rwcfUE
Sunday assorted links
Tyler Cowen
1. Henry Oliver has further thoughts on his CWT.2. A Canticle for Leibowitz.3. Building Brasilia.4. The post-Christian condition. One of the most interesting essays of this year. I am glad I started paying for his Substack.5. The chronology problem.6. Scott Sumner on the fiscal theory of the price level.7. Thiel does Rome.The post Sunday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media Comments#7: spoiler – Peter comes out as the anti-Christ by Old Programmer
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4upqxZX
Tyler Cowen
1. Henry Oliver has further thoughts on his CWT.2. A Canticle for Leibowitz.3. Building Brasilia.4. The post-Christian condition. One of the most interesting essays of this year. I am glad I started paying for his Substack.5. The chronology problem.6. Scott Sumner on the fiscal theory of the price level.7. Thiel does Rome.The post Sunday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media Comments#7: spoiler – Peter comes out as the anti-Christ by Old Programmer
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4upqxZX
What should I ask Toby Wilkinson?
Tyler Cowen
Yes I will be doing a Conversation with him. He is one of the leading historians of ancient Egypt, and he has a recent book out on Ptolemaic Egypt, namely The Last Dynasty: Ancient Egypt from Alexander the Great to Cleopatra.Here is his Wikipedia page, he also has served as Vice Chancellor of Fiji National University, and worked extensively as a development director for Cambridge. Here is his personal home page.So what should I ask him?The post What should I ask Toby Wilkinson? appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesMy Conversation with the excellent Henry OliverWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The alternate book universe that is South Africa
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4uwOH4R
Tyler Cowen
Yes I will be doing a Conversation with him. He is one of the leading historians of ancient Egypt, and he has a recent book out on Ptolemaic Egypt, namely The Last Dynasty: Ancient Egypt from Alexander the Great to Cleopatra.Here is his Wikipedia page, he also has served as Vice Chancellor of Fiji National University, and worked extensively as a development director for Cambridge. Here is his personal home page.So what should I ask him?The post What should I ask Toby Wilkinson? appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesMy Conversation with the excellent Henry OliverWhy is the USDA Involved in Housing?!The alternate book universe that is South Africa
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4uwOH4R
Who is a victim?
Tyler Cowen
Moral disagreement across politics revolves around the key question, “Who is a victim?” Twelve studies explain moral conflict with assumptions of vulnerability (AoVs): liberals and conservatives disagree about who is especially vulnerable to victimization, harm, and mistreatment. AoVs predict moral judgments, implicit attitudes, and charitable behavior—and explain the link between ideology and moral judgment (usually better than moral foundations). Four clusters of targets—the Environment, the Othered, the Powerful, and the Divine—explain many political debates, from immigration and policing to religion and racism. In general, liberals see vulnerability as group-based, dividing the moral world into groups of vulnerable victims and invulnerable oppressors. Conservatives downplay group-based differences, seeing vulnerability as more individual and evenly distributed. AoVs can be experimentally manipulated and causally impact moral evaluations. These results support a universal harm-based moral mind (Theory of Dyadic Morality): moral disagreement reflects different understandings of harm, not different foundations.That is from a recent paper by Jake Womick, Emily Kubin, and Kurt Gray. Via the excellent, non-victimized Kevin Lewis.The post Who is a victim? appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsAlternatives to 911On the future of war
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bmBVNv
Tyler Cowen
Moral disagreement across politics revolves around the key question, “Who is a victim?” Twelve studies explain moral conflict with assumptions of vulnerability (AoVs): liberals and conservatives disagree about who is especially vulnerable to victimization, harm, and mistreatment. AoVs predict moral judgments, implicit attitudes, and charitable behavior—and explain the link between ideology and moral judgment (usually better than moral foundations). Four clusters of targets—the Environment, the Othered, the Powerful, and the Divine—explain many political debates, from immigration and policing to religion and racism. In general, liberals see vulnerability as group-based, dividing the moral world into groups of vulnerable victims and invulnerable oppressors. Conservatives downplay group-based differences, seeing vulnerability as more individual and evenly distributed. AoVs can be experimentally manipulated and causally impact moral evaluations. These results support a universal harm-based moral mind (Theory of Dyadic Morality): moral disagreement reflects different understandings of harm, not different foundations.That is from a recent paper by Jake Womick, Emily Kubin, and Kurt Gray. Via the excellent, non-victimized Kevin Lewis.The post Who is a victim? appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsAlternatives to 911On the future of war
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bmBVNv
Why you should work much harder RIGHT NOW
Tyler Cowen
If strong AI will lower the value of your human capital, your current wage is relatively high compared to your future wage. That is an argument for working harder now, at least if your current and pending pay can rise with greater effort (not true for all jobs).If strong AI can at least potentially boost the value of your human capital, you should be investing in learning AI skills right now. No need to fall behind on something so important. You also might have the chance to use that money and buy into the proper capital and land assets.So…WORK HARDER!The post Why you should work much harder RIGHT NOW appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsChristopher Sims, RIPSome simple spatial analytics of Cape Town
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/3P6JuAF
Tyler Cowen
If strong AI will lower the value of your human capital, your current wage is relatively high compared to your future wage. That is an argument for working harder now, at least if your current and pending pay can rise with greater effort (not true for all jobs).If strong AI can at least potentially boost the value of your human capital, you should be investing in learning AI skills right now. No need to fall behind on something so important. You also might have the chance to use that money and buy into the proper capital and land assets.So…WORK HARDER!The post Why you should work much harder RIGHT NOW appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media MediaRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsChristopher Sims, RIPSome simple spatial analytics of Cape Town
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/3P6JuAF
Understanding Demonic Policies
Alex Tabarrok
Matt Yglesias has a good post on the UK’s Triple Lock, which requires that UK pensions rise in line with whichever is highest: wages, inflation, or 2.5 percent. Luis Garicano calls this “the single stupidest policy in the entire Western world” — and I’d be inclined to agree, if only the competition weren’t so fierce.The triple lock guarantees that pensioner incomes grow at the expense of everything else, and the mechanism bites hardest when the economy is weakest. During the 2009 financial crisis wages fell and inflation declined, for example, yet pensioner incomes rose by 2.5 percent! (Technically this was under a double-lock period; the triple lock came slightly later — as if the lesson from the crisis was that the guarantee hadn’t been generous enough.)Now, as Yglesias notes, if voters were actually happy with pensioner income growing at the expense of worker income, that would be one thing. But no one seems happy with the result. The same pattern is clear in the United States:As I wrote in January, there is a pattern in American politics where per capita benefits for elderly people have gotten consistently more generous in the 21st century even as the ratio of retired people to working-age people has risen.This keeps happening because it’s evidently what the voters want. Making public policy more generous to senior citizens enjoys both broad support among the mass public and it’s something that elites in the two parties find acceptable even if neither side is particularly enthusiastic about it. But what makes it a dark pattern in my view is that voters seem incredibly grumpy about the results.Nobody’s saying things have been going great in America over the past quarter century.Instead, the right is obsessed with the idea that mysterious forces of fraud have run off with all the money, while the left has convinced itself that billionaires aren’t paying any taxes.But it’s not some huge secret why it seems like the government keeps spending and spending without us getting any amazing new public services — it’s transfers to the elderly.The contradictions of “Elderism” are an example of rational irrationality. Individual voters bears essentially no cost for holding inconsistent political beliefs — wanting generous pensions and robust public services and low taxes is essentially free, since no single vote determines the outcome. The irrationality is individually rational and collectively ruinous. Voters are not necessarily confused about what they want; they simply face no price for wanting incompatible things. Arrow’s impossibility theorem adds another layer: even if each voter held perfectly coherent preferences, there is no reliable procedure for aggregating them into a coherent social choice. The grumpiness Yglesias documents may not reflect hypocrisy so much as the incoherence of demanding that collective choice makes sense — collective choice cannot be rationalized by coherent preferences and thus it’s perfectly possible that democracy can simultaneously “choose” generous pensions and “demand” better services for workers, with no mechanism to register the contradiction until the bill arrives.The post Understanding Demonic Policies appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media Comments“I’d be inclined to agree, if only the competition ... by Wayfaring StrangerRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsA simple way to improve your thought and conclusionsWhy you should work much harder RIGHT NOW
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4dn8D3R
Alex Tabarrok
Matt Yglesias has a good post on the UK’s Triple Lock, which requires that UK pensions rise in line with whichever is highest: wages, inflation, or 2.5 percent. Luis Garicano calls this “the single stupidest policy in the entire Western world” — and I’d be inclined to agree, if only the competition weren’t so fierce.The triple lock guarantees that pensioner incomes grow at the expense of everything else, and the mechanism bites hardest when the economy is weakest. During the 2009 financial crisis wages fell and inflation declined, for example, yet pensioner incomes rose by 2.5 percent! (Technically this was under a double-lock period; the triple lock came slightly later — as if the lesson from the crisis was that the guarantee hadn’t been generous enough.)Now, as Yglesias notes, if voters were actually happy with pensioner income growing at the expense of worker income, that would be one thing. But no one seems happy with the result. The same pattern is clear in the United States:As I wrote in January, there is a pattern in American politics where per capita benefits for elderly people have gotten consistently more generous in the 21st century even as the ratio of retired people to working-age people has risen.This keeps happening because it’s evidently what the voters want. Making public policy more generous to senior citizens enjoys both broad support among the mass public and it’s something that elites in the two parties find acceptable even if neither side is particularly enthusiastic about it. But what makes it a dark pattern in my view is that voters seem incredibly grumpy about the results.Nobody’s saying things have been going great in America over the past quarter century.Instead, the right is obsessed with the idea that mysterious forces of fraud have run off with all the money, while the left has convinced itself that billionaires aren’t paying any taxes.But it’s not some huge secret why it seems like the government keeps spending and spending without us getting any amazing new public services — it’s transfers to the elderly.The contradictions of “Elderism” are an example of rational irrationality. Individual voters bears essentially no cost for holding inconsistent political beliefs — wanting generous pensions and robust public services and low taxes is essentially free, since no single vote determines the outcome. The irrationality is individually rational and collectively ruinous. Voters are not necessarily confused about what they want; they simply face no price for wanting incompatible things. Arrow’s impossibility theorem adds another layer: even if each voter held perfectly coherent preferences, there is no reliable procedure for aggregating them into a coherent social choice. The grumpiness Yglesias documents may not reflect hypocrisy so much as the incoherence of demanding that collective choice makes sense — collective choice cannot be rationalized by coherent preferences and thus it’s perfectly possible that democracy can simultaneously “choose” generous pensions and “demand” better services for workers, with no mechanism to register the contradiction until the bill arrives.The post Understanding Demonic Policies appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media Comments“I’d be inclined to agree, if only the competition ... by Wayfaring StrangerRelated StoriesA New Order of ThingsA simple way to improve your thought and conclusionsWhy you should work much harder RIGHT NOW
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4dn8D3R
Monday assorted links
Tyler Cowen
1. Interview with Ding Liren.2. Germany attacking free speech.3. Sunstein on Habermas.4. What do robot demos and videos show?5. How WWI damaged British innovation?6. Social media is more of a habit than an addiction.7. The rise of popcorn at the movies (WSJ).8. Hartley on Chris Sims.The post Monday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bwFMYA
Tyler Cowen
1. Interview with Ding Liren.2. Germany attacking free speech.3. Sunstein on Habermas.4. What do robot demos and videos show?5. How WWI damaged British innovation?6. Social media is more of a habit than an addiction.7. The rise of popcorn at the movies (WSJ).8. Hartley on Chris Sims.The post Monday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.MediaMedia Media Media Media Media Media Media
via Marginal Revolution https://bit.ly/4bwFMYA