The NSF's Investment in the Social Sciences
An Opinion Piece in the LA Times argues that the NSF should do a better job prioritizing its strategic investments in basic science.
Self Protection Against Air Pollution in Urban China
Back in 1972, Issac Ehrlich and Gary Becker wrote a very important JPE paper on endogenous probabilities. Consider a simple example of a fire that burns down your house. This event is a random variable that every family fears.
Crowd Sourced Metrics of Worker Quality
Tyler Cowen's Uber Column makes several very interesting points. Every time I'm in an Uber car, the driver starts talking about his Uber rating. This rating is some moving average of how his last X riders have rated him.
Residential Choice Patterns by Middle-Class Black and Hispanic Households
David Leonhardt has written a nice piece about a recent 2015 Stanford Study by some Sociologists. The Stanford Study is available here. I am slightly amused because Denise DiPasquale and I made this point 16 years ago in our published 1999 Real Estate Economics paper.
Ed Lazear's WSJ Piece on the Role of State Policy as a Determinant of Economic Growth
In today's WSJ, Prof. Lazear has written a piece highlighting the importance of a state's "business climate" as a driver of local growth. He focuses on "Right to Work" legislation as a key empirical benchmark for identifying "business friendly" states.
Will I Raise Average Teaching Quality at USC?
I will spend the 2015-2016 academic year at USC. I'm running this "field experiment" to see if I'm a better match teaching USC undergrads and advising USC graduate students than what I've achieved at UCLA.
Some Brooklyn Real Estate Economics 101
In gentrifying Brooklyn, early property owners are getting rich. In this piece, we learn about the life story of several residents. Here I would like to provide a couple of direct quotes that provide some useful insights about urban housing markets.
1.
Big City Mayors Seek to Raise the Local Minimum Wage: Intended and Unintended Consequences
On Twitter, I am a "follower" of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti. Here is a "retweet" from Twitter and a happy photo of a set of big city mayors. This group of optimistic and happy people is convinced that they have helped the 99% by raising the minimum wage.
Faculty Quality and Research Progress at Universities that Do Not Offer Tenure
Slate has a thought provoking piece about the quality of future Universities if faculty do not have tenure. Economics offers a few insights here.
Point #1: Salaries would rise to compensate faculty with outside options for taking on the "risk premium" of being fired by their Deans.
Climate Change Adaptation Will Offer a Sharp Test of the Claims of Behavioral Economics
The Economist's Voice has just published my short essay that states six predictions about how we will adapt to climate change.
Spotting (and Creating) the Next Uber
Mirror mirror on the wall, who is the most creative economist of them all? For those worn out talking about multipliers, austerity, interest rates, and the 1% --- focus your attention on identifying the next big Internet Startup.
Durable but Crumbling Urban Infrastructure: The Political Economy of Spatial Investment in Public Capital
The NY Times reviews Rosabeth Kanter's new book called "Move". Keynesians like to point to "infrastructure" as a leading example of a public capital stock that we are under-investing in. For example, here is a FT piece by Larry Summers.
Shedding Possessions (or the Marginal Utility of Stuff)
The NY Times has embraced the Piketty Agenda of sharply raising taxes on the wealthy. Such new taxes will increase government revenue and allow the state to expand government services, public goods and providing a more generous safety net.
Sunday Graduation at the UCLA IOES
In June 2014, I was in Rome when UCLA graduated and I missed this event. This Sunday I will be one of the faculty sitting there to the right as the 2015 graduates receive their diplomas. During my 9 years on the UCLA faculty, I have taught hundreds of environmental science majors.
Some Quotes from Harvard President Faust's 2015 Commencement Speech
This Sunday I will participate and attend the UCLA IOES graduation. To prepare for this event, I skimmed this Commencement Speech by Harvard President Drew Faust. Here I will reproduce some quotes for you to ponder:
I see a rejection of the "invisible hand".
Environmental and Urban Economics at USC
Tomorrow I will sign the official paperwork as I join USC as a Visiting Professor. USC is making a larger investment in environmental and urban economics than UCLA. Antonio Bento will be joining the USC Price School.
NSF Budget Dynamics and Equating the "Bang Per Buck" Across Research Fields
Republicans in the House Science, Space and Technology Committee have crafted legislation that will increase the National Science Foundation's budget by $253 million above this year's actual funding level.
Why Is Environmental Economics Flourishing?
The American Environmental and Resource Economics Association just held its Summer Meeting in San Diego. Here is the program. Roughly 350 economists attended and the old Grant Hotel in seedy downtown San Diego was rocking. While I never made it to the water, I had a great time.
Weitzman on "When does the world wake up and address climate change?"
I am reading the transcript of Martin Weitzman's recent appearance on Econtalk. Professor Weitzman seeks to attract readers for his excellent new book Climate Shock (joint with Gernot Wagner). At the 28th minute of the interview, here is an exact quote.
Ranking California Economists as of May 2015
While Southern California features high taxes, drought and earthquakes, plenty of economists continue to live here. Here is the REPEC ranking of the top 100 California economists. You will see some talent on this list. If you search hard, you can find me ranked somewhere between #41 and #43.
Income Mixing During a Time of Falling Crime
Raj Chetty's research on the causal role of "place" is big news both in academic economics and in policy circles. Does urban economics offer any insights that would inform his recent policy prescriptions? From reading this brookings piece, I see 6 policy proposals that merit close attention.
