Edmund Burke on the Six Reasons Why Americans Love Liberty
The British statesman and philosopher Edmund Burke gave a "Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies" on March 25, 1775. He sought to explain why those pesky Americans were so strident and obsessive about their love of freedom and liberty. He said:
- 04/07/2018
- 3
Black-White Income and Wealth Gaps
Black-white gaps in income and in wealth have been fearsomely persistent over time. Here, I'll mention some main themes from two studies, one focused on income differentials and one on wealth differentials.
- 03/07/2018
- 8
Nudge Policies
A considerable body of evidence suggests that people's decisions are affected by how a choice is presented, or what the default option looks like. There's a reason that grocery stores put some products at eye-level and some near the floor, or why the staples like milk and eggs are often far from the door (so you have to walk through the store to grab them), or why the checkout counters have nearby racks of candy. There's a reason that gas stations sometimes advertise that gas is 5 cents a gallon less if you pay cash, but never advertise that gas is 5 cents more per gallon if you don't pay cash. There's a reason that many people have their employer automatically deduct money from paychecks for their retirement accounts, rather than trying to make their own monthly or annual payments to that same account.
- 02/07/2018
- 3
Homeownership Rates: Some International Comparisons
High-income countries vary considerably in the share of households that own their own homes, The US rate of homeownership was about average by international standards 20-25 years ago, but now is below the average. Here are some facts from Laurie S. Goodman and Christopher Mayer, "Homeownership and the American Dream" in the Winter 2018 issue of Journal of Economic Perspectives (32:1, pp. 31-58).
- 01/07/2018
- 7
The Problem of College Completion Rates
There's one event that very often turns college enrollment into a poor financial decision with a negative payoff: not completing a degree. Then that happens, the student has spent both money and some years of time in a program that not only offers little financial payoff, but may also leave them saddled with student loans to repay for years to come. More broadly, society's investment in higher education isn't paying off. Two DC think-tanks, ThirdWay and the American Enterprise Institute, have published a set of five readable papers on the subject:
- 30/06/2018
- 4
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