General Articles related to Economics

Is it Useful?

Economic Surplus
The Harvard Crimson, Online Edition, June 02, 2008
By JEFFREY A. MIRON
[Why is economics so darn popular among Harvard students? It pays well to be an econ grad and the subject can be useful in making sense of how the world works.]

The Hot Major For Undergrads Is Economics
By JESSICA E. VASCELLARO
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
July 5, 2005
[Yeay!]

June 4, 2003
The Dismal Science? Hardly!
By ROBERT D. MCTEER, JR.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
[Economics helps you catch those proposing loony public policies.]

Economist Class
By Moisés Naím
Foreign Policy
March/April 2006
[Economics can be a lot more fruitful if economists listen to sociologists.]

Economic Systems

March 12, 2002
To Have and Have Not in Havana
By MAX BOOT
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
[A contemporary communist society]

July 5, 2001
Pursuing an American Dream While Following the Koran
By SUSAN SACHS
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[Religious principles once determined the nature of an economic system. Echoes of those influences persist.]

July 5, 2001
Loans, Interest Rates and a Religious Principle
By SHIRA J. BOSS
THE NEW YORK TIMES

Data Problems

August 31, 2002
Professors Offer a Reality Check For Politicians
By LYNNLEY BROWNING
THE NEW YORK TIMES

December 4, 2003
Economy Online: Where to Read The Tea Leaves
By DAVID WESSEL
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Signifying nothing?
Jan 29th 2004
The Economist
[Too many economists misuse statistics]

July 11, 2003
Data in Conflict: Why Economists Tend to Weep
By DANIEL ALTMAN
THE NEW YORK TIMES

January 4, 2000
Storms That Surprised Europe Show Forecast Limits
By SUZANNE DALEY with WILLIAM K. STEVENS
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[It's not just economists that find prediction difficult!]

May 26, 1999
Government Asks, How Big Is the Digital Economy?
By JERI CLAUSING
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[Sometimes it might be hard to even measure the thing you are interested in.]

September 21, 1999
U.S. Commerce Dept to Collect Data on Online Sales
By REUTERS
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[Economists depend on governments for a lot of the data they use.]

The fruits of fieldwork
Aug 15th 2002
The Economist
[Might visiting a pin factory provide insights official statistics cannot?]

Try it and see
Feb 28th 2002
The Economist
[In the social sciences, it is often supposed, there can be no such thing as a controlled experiment. Think again]

Value Judgments in Economics

Oil-Rich Norway Hires Philosopher As Moral Compass: State Seeks Ethics Lesson On Investing Its Bonanza; Mr. Syse Reads Hobbes
By ANDREW HIGGINS
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
December 1, 2005
[The Norwegian government has hired a philosopher to figure out how best to spend all the extra money that poured into the country when oil prices shot up. Good for them! Economists concentrate on how to make the size of the pie larger and have little to say on how the pie should be shared. For that you need a philosopher.]

July 25, 2006
TV Review: ‘P.O.V.’ on PBS: How Missionaries Spread the Word, and U.S. Capitalism
By VIRGINIA HEFFERNAN
The New York Times
[Christian missionaries supported the spread of capitalism in the Third World. Why? Not necessarily because Christianity and capitalism were intrinsically related. Perhaps the missionaries simply thought that they knew better than the poor people they were preaching to and pushed capitalism just as they pushed Christianity, even though they were there to do only the latter. The spread of capitalism may have simply been an unintended byproduct of evangelical work.]

Liquid Assets: Two Economists Look At America Through Very Different Glasses
By Joel Achenbach
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 23, 2004
[Here are two economists disagreeing on virtually every issue. Why?]

September 18, 2003
Genetic Basis to Fairness, Study Hints
By NICHOLAS WADE
The New York Times
[Even monkeys hate being treated unfairly. Economists assume that people behave rationally. But sometimes our deep need for fair treatment trumps the economists' narrow notions of what constitutes rational behavior.]

March 4, 2003
Harvard Professor Proposes Alternative Economics Class
By DAVID LEONHARDT
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[Disagreements among economists often stem from the simplifying assumptions they make in their theories.]

Social Goals: Economic Efficiency is Necessary but not Sufficient

November 27, 2003
Materialism damages well-being
By Richard Tomkins
Financial Times

September 08, 2001
A Civilized Society
By ANTHONY LEWIS
THE NEW YORK TIMES

May 19, 2001
If Richer Isn't Happier, What Is?
By DAVID LEONHARDT
THE NEW YORK TIMES

What money can’t buy
May 10th 2001
The Economist
[How education and friends enrich us.]

Economics Education

Economists' blogs: The invisible hand on the keyboard
The Economist
Aug 3rd 2006
[Why do economists spend valuable time blogging? To set the dumbasses straight.]

September 1, 2005
The Opportunity Cost of Economics Education
By ROBERT H. FRANK
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[If you are taking an introductory economics course, don't assume that you will learn much: "Unfortunately, however, most students seem to emerge from introductory economics courses without having learned even the most important basic principles." Why? First, the courses cover too much material without focusing on the essentials. Second, the courses are designed for the few students who intend to become econ majors rather than the overwhelming majority who go on to major in something else. Third, and most disappointingly, even the professors often tend to be confused about the concepts they are supposed to be teaching!]

Economists Join Blogging Frontier: Web Provides Visibility And Voice to Spread Ideas; A Federal Reserve Blogger
By AGNES T. CRANE
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
August 11, 2005
[A new way for economists to get their two cents into public debate.]

April 27, 2005
Survey Finds Many Have Poor Grasp of Basic Economics
By MARY WILLIAMS WALSH
The New York Times
[Tsk, tsk!]

April 1, 2004
Economic Scene
By ALAN B. KRUEGER
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[How well informed is the American public on economic issues? Not very.]

November 16, 2002
Teachers Wrap Lessons in Fiction
By PATRICIA COHEN
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[Sometimes the best way to teach economics is through novels and short stories.]

Economists Do the Darndest Things

June 24, 2006
Sportonomics Beguiles 3 Economists
By JOE NOCERA
THE NEW YORK TIMES
[You can learn a lot about what works and what doesn't work in sports by using the tools of economics. Joe Torre, pay attention!]

August 3, 2003
The Probability That a Real-Estate Agent Is Cheating You (and Other Riddles of Modern Life)
By STEPHEN J. DUBNER
THE NEW YORK TIMES

April 28, 2003
Economics Medal Is Given To Levitt for Crime Studies
By JON E. HILSENRATH
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

April 26, 2003
Provocative Economist at Chicago Awarded Prize
By DANIEL ALTMAN
THE NEW YORK TIMES

April 27, 2001
Social Issues Meet Market Models In the Work of the New Economists
By JON E. HILSENRATH
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

June 24, 2001
What the Market Will Bear
By JAMES RYERSON
The New York Times
[Richard Posner takes the law and economics movement a step farther and seeks "to unify the many scattered territories of the law by reformulating legal concepts in the language and equations of the marketplace". The influence of economics on the law has become such that "most good law schools in the country now employ at least one economist, and policy reforms in fields as diverse as antitrust law, environmental regulation and criminal sentencing bear the distinctive imprint of economic analysis."]