The heart of economics is an understanding of human choice. Our theories are almost all constructed on a utilitarian model of preferences and choice so understanding how we can improve that model is crucial to progress. Plenty of work has been done by behavioural empiricists on the heuristics that guide our behaviour and the anomalies […]
VoxEU have recently launched a book on forward guidance and it has demonstrated wonderfully my ignorance of central banking. I thought that when bankers issued ‘forward guidance’ they were doing it to escape the zero lower bound by promising to keep rates lower for longer than they normally would. Something like this: The ‘Odyssian’ guidance […]
Economists love to distinguish between facts and values, positive and normative. We think of ourselves as scientists examining society and pronouncing truths that policy-makers can use to make a decision. Regular readers of this blog will know that we employ this rhetoric at every opportunity. I’ve read three people comment on it recently but I […]
Every specialist, owing to a well-known professional bias, believes that he understands the entire human being, while in reality he only grasps a tiny part of him. – Alexis Carrel HT: Chris Dillow
The OECD have recently released a new survey of skills and it has prompted plenty of wailing about the failings of the English education system. The crucial slide from Andreas Schleicher’s summary is this one: It shows that English adults have excellent literacy skills relative to their peers internationally but young people have fallen well […]
It’s been a few months since I wrote about how much I love Quandl so you might be wondering how things are working out for me. The good stuff is still really good but there are a few things that still need work.