Peter Singer on doping in sport: At the elite level, the difference between being a champion and an also-ran is so miniscule, and yet matters so much, that athletes are pressured to do whatever they can to gain the slightest edge over their competitors. It is reasonable to suspect that gold medals now go not […]
In an interesting post Bill Kaye-Blake discusses how we might overcome internalities through autonomous precommitment. As we’ve discussed previously, commitment mechanisms tend to involve external contracts: agreements with friends, or monetary contracts are common. But might we be able to commit our future self without external mechanisms? I wonder if selecting identities is a way […]
Housing is expensive in NZ so the government commissioned a report into why that is. It said the problem was (largely) zoning restrictions constraining supply. The authorities were unimpressed. Housing is expensive in the UK so the government suggested opening up more land to housing. The papers are unimpressed. I doubt that the populations of […]
Tim Harford points to a paper on the EMH showing that: …after an anomaly has been published, it quickly shrinks – although it does not disappear. The anomalies are most likely to persist when they apply to small, illiquid markets – as one might expect, because there it is harder to profit from the anomaly. […]
There has been a small kerfuffle over the appearance of Jonathan Portes, Director of NIESR, at the Treasury Select Committee. Portes was there to discuss NIESR’s latest economic forecasts and encountered unexpectedly aggressive questioning about his political beliefs from one of the Members. Jesse Norman claimed Portes’ statement that the Government’s austerity plans had ‘failed’ […]
In following the debate on pension reform in the UK I’ve heard a lot of people talk about the contributory principle: that what you get from the welfare state should reflect your contribution. Often it’s phrased in terms of the taxes paid throughout one’s lifetime so you hear pensioners complain that they’ve paid taxes all […]