Ukraine bond yields
Right now in the neighborhood of 46%. Right before the election they were roughly at 34%. ...
Friday assorted links
1. New blood test for pancreatic cancer. 2. More on IRBs and the law. 3. Freedom...
How the System Works
Charles Mann is worried that so few of us have any notion of the giant, interconnected...
Passive listeners on Spotify
I have been reading the new Liz Pelly book Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and...
How to teach people how to work with AI
I have a very concrete and specific proposal for teaching people how to work with AI. ...
Income inequality in the Nordics
Our analysis suggests that income equality in the Nordics is primarily driven by a significant compression...
Thursday assorted links
1. Samir Varma is now on Substack. 2. “This is consistent with my (and Habermas’s) view...
Steel Tariffs in Two Pictures
Recall Principle 2 of Three Simple Principles of Trade Policy, Businesses are Consumers Too. Case in...
Place Effects on Fertility Decision: Evidence from Mover Design
This paper investigates the causal impact of place-based factors on fertility decision using mover design and...
Will stablecoins herald a broader-based dollarization?
That is the topic of my latest Bloomberg column. Here is one excerpt: Stablecoins are programmable...
Wednesday assorted links
1. Nvidia markets in everything? 2. Selfish Reasons to Have Kids is now available on audiobook....
Why it is hard for the Executive to disobey the judiciary
An excellent thread from Dilan Esper. Excerpt: I have pointed out already that Elon Musk has...
The danger of Trump disobeying court orders
Ilya Somin covers this question over at Volokh Conspiracy. I receive many queries about this, some...
What should I ask Austan Goolsbee?
Yes I will be doing a Conversation with him. So what should I ask? Here is...
The three levels of AI understanding
If you are trying to contextualize someone’s opinion on current AI, I suggest asking three basic...
China fact of the day
Marriages in China plunged by a fifth to the lowest level on record last year, a setback to...
What should I ask Jennifer Pahlka?
Yes, I will be doing a Conversation with her. From Wikipedia: Jennifer Pahlka (born December 27, 1969) is...
Tuesday assorted links
1. How much did the modern mortgage support the baby boom? 2. “Over the 2008-2016 period,...
Lift the Ban on Supersonics: No Boom
Boom, the supersonic startup, has announced that their new jet reaches supersonic speeds but without creating...
Protection against asteriod strikes
I have some bad news, fellow Earthlings: There is a newly discovered asteroid, called 2024 YR4, headed...
The Effect of European Monarchs on State Performance
We create a novel reign-level data set for European monarchs, covering all major European states between...
Greenland Next
Hat tip: Max The post Greenland Next appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION. CommentsI assume you...
The exhaustion of rents
A computer expert who has battled for a decade to recover a £600m bitcoin fortune he...
Monday assorted links
1. One way the demand for donkeys and horses might rise (speculative). 2. Is France the...
Dwarkesh’s Question
One question I had for you while we were talking about the intelligence stuff was, as...
Niall Ferguson on world music
Worlds collide, as Niall is interviewed (very effectively) in Songlines magazine, and yes I am a...
It’s later than you think
Here is a short essay by Hollis Robbins on AI and education, excerpt: Every faculty member...
New York City fact and poetic passage of the day
If the coastline of the New York Harbor region were stretched out, it would be longer...
Sunday assorted links
1. Quantum technologies for health care? (speculative!) 2. ChatGPT comments on Tanner Greer. 3. Mercatus looking...
Minimum Wages, Efficiency, and Welfare
Recently Alex raised some doubts, to say the least, about the Card-Krueger view of minimum wage...
USPS as a failed sovereign wealth fund
The U.S. government has a direct stake in natural resource wealth, collecting royalties from the extraction...
Saturday assorted links
1. Long-form interview with Cesar Gaviria, Colombia’s reforming president. 2. Among the Post-Feminists. 3. Both AI and...
The Licensing Racket
I review a very good new book on occupational licensing, The Licensing Racket by Rebecca Haw...
How effective was pandemic aid?
We use an instrumental-variables estimator reliant on variation in congressional representation to analyze the macroeconomic effects...
*Atlantic Cataclysm*
The author is David Eltis and the subtitle is Rethinking the Atlantic Slave Trades. Here is...
The Afrikaner exception
The White House just issued an executive order on South Africa that includes admitting Afrikaner South...
“By your culture, we shall know ye”
From President Trump: At my direction, we are going to make the Kennedy Center in Washington...
Michael Pettis responds in the FT
Robert Armstrong at the FT gives him a chance to respond to Noah and Krugman and...
Friday assorted links
1. Using AI to cut government spending. 2. “I built RPLY to never miss a text...
Alex and I consider how to reform the NSF in economics
Here is a redux of our 2016 Journal of Economic Perspectives piece. Here is the abstract:...
My excellent Conversation with Ross Douthat on God and religion
Here is the audio, video, and transcript. I am very glad Ross flew down from Connecticut...
“Can America Win the AI War with China?”
A long video chat, with Geoffrey Cain, who is more hawkish than I am. Bari Weiss...
Thursday assorted links
1. Is DOGE leading an AGI revolution in government? 2. And on the legislative front…? (does...
Three Simple Principles of Trade Policy
Are we in a trade war today? Who knows? Doesn’t really matter. It’s always a good...
What should I ask Sheilagh Ogilvie?
She is a Canadian economic historian at Oxford, here is from her home page: I am...
Deep Research considers the costs and benefits of US AID
You can read it here, summary sentence: Based on the analysis above, the net assessment leans...
I wonder if he enjoyed our Markets in Everything series?
Now he is in it: A former senior adviser to the Federal Reserve Board of Governors...
Wednesday assorted links
1. Douglas Irwin on dismantling the Indian license raj. And Indians praying for visas under Trump. ...
Trumpian policy as cultural policy
The Trump administration has issued a blizzard of Executive Orders, and set many other potential changes...
US AID bleg
What are the best sources to read on US AID, and its costs and benefits? I...