"They used to say the organic chemistry requirement saved more lives than penicillin."

How do you know you've written a good Substack? See how many people are offended and unsubscribe. "Are You Obscene?" ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/are-you-ob...

"95% of Americans Are Falling into Intellectual Barbarism. Here's Why It Won't Lead to the Dark Ages" These thoughts comfort me. Maybe you too-- or maybe you don't think China taking over culture is a plus. ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/95-of-amer...

My 7th grade math girls came up with the best method for filling out your tax returns: Have your husband do it. Assigning them the Schedule D capital gainsworksheet probably has made them more eager to get married early.

How should Catholics react to a Pope's statements? See ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/what-obedi... Comments and corrections welcomed.

Today's substack: Easy and quick ways to reform universities: ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/easy-ways-...

Here's something to add to your plan: ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/eat-ideas-...

ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/pi-day-fri... Help make Bluesky more intellectual. Repost this fun math tweet.

I am a transactional lawyer and I've had 3 clients this week tell me they ran documents through Chat GPT and it gave them legal advice that contradicated my advice. In all 3 cases the Chat GPT advice was wildly wrong but sounded convincing to my clients

An alternative to price controls is being able to sue firms that raise their prices. Even more extreme, firms that didn't raise them, but have high prices.

My latest substack is about "emeritus" status. ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/at-indiana...

Where have all the comments gone? For decades, the American Economic Review regularly published formal comments — papers that replicate, reassess, or challenge earlier AER articles. In our latest blog post, we show: they’ve nearly disappeared.

I just wrote this: ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/up-from-sl...

My new Substack,with two student poems. ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/high-two-p...

My Substack seems to be getting a lot of views on this. I really do do a better job of selecting Best of 2025 than most people. I guess it helps not having famous authors as friends. ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/the-best-o...

I just submitted a referee report: Dear [young professor], I hereby submit my referee report. I did start to use the Springer online form, but ran into problems. I then realized I shouldn’t be wasting my time fiddling with their forms anyway, since that is a way for them to save cheap secretary

We should have a list of first names which immigrants must use for their children under aged 5 or as yet unborn. France had someting like this for everybody, at one time.

A Substack I didn't intent to write, on the Indiana redistricting vote: ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/the-indian...

The minutia of gun control and police search are familiar ground, I know, and will affect maybe even 20 people per year, but wouldn't it be nice to hear some mult100-billion dollar tax and business law questions too?

On Bluesky I hope for useful, if negative comments, but just get abuse and insults. On Twitter/X, on the other hand, I don't get much abuse, I sometimes get useful negative comments, and very often get ones that are responsive, just dumb. (Most people are dumb, so that's OK.)

My latest Substack is an open letter to the American Economic Association on the self-righteousness of expelling Larry Summers. ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/expelling-...

True, all times are equally bad to quit caffeine. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/04/d...

Excellent post. In my ancestral Illinois, pan-fried corn mush was the equivalent. Are Newfoundlanders (I am being polite) genetically related to American Indians? Fried dough is a big deal here.

wtf is a FIFA peace prize? that's like being an NFL laureate in physics

A first question is whether the President can deploy the National Guard at all. Aren't these the state militia, the state armies? Why does anybody but the Governor have authority?

If the US Coast Guard stops a ship in international waters and seizes their cocaine, is that a war crime? The ship has not done anything illegal. Should we prosecute the Coast Guard Captain for piracy?

On killing floating drug dealers: ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/killing-fl...

Great idea! Some Michelin starred restaurant could make a lot of money from these in winter. What kind of mushrooms would be best, I wonder? Button, shitake, morels, oyster, coprinus, lions-mane, . . . ?

Kid was imagining a perfect ice skating rink and said they would have “warm mugs of hot mushroom broth” which is the sort of thing that completely delights me.

The French have a nice phrase "thoughts on the stairs" for things you would liked to have said, but it's too late. I just revised my Thanksgiving readings post with thoughts on the stairs. Next year! ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/to-read-at...

when trying on pants, do this in the store. then tell the sales associate "the menswear guy told me to do this." IG mr.funkys0ul

An oddity: online, I am much more encouraged by positive comments than discouraged by negative. Live, or in book reviews, etc., it is the opposite. Probably it is because online negative comments are almost always stupid.

This reminds me of Cardinal John Henry Newman's book Definition of a Gentleman. I often cite Newman's book because it's so instructive. The term gentleman is so overwrought and frequently abused, but to the degree it means anything at all, I think Newman captures it here:

I just published my what-to-do-on-Thanksgiving Substack, revised from last year: ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/to-read-at...

Take a look on Twitter/X, folks-- lots of humorous unveilings tonight of fake-American accounts from Paraguay, Thailand, etc., with the new policy of listing location of each poster.

I once knew a Federal bank examiner, and one time someone asked him why we had to KEEP inspecting banks over and over. He basically said every new batch of business school grads invents bank fraud from first principles.

"Don't take notes of what the professor says, take note." www.rasmusen.org/rasmapedia/i...

Do appellate lawyers consult for trial lawyers who want to do their own appeals? This sounds like a lucrative and socially useful business.

Bad news for Bluesky; Today, I couldn't even remember the name "Bluesky" at first. I thought it might be something lose to NASA.

Today's Substcak, on the Larry Summer-Jeffrey-Epstein emails. Summers is humiliated, but not for the reason you think. ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/larry-summ...

It seems Keyu Jin led Larry Summers on to get access, and he hoped for intimacy and asked Epstein for advice, but she outsmarted him. How could Summers be stupid enough to ask Epstein for advice, in writing , after being bitten when the World Bank "Summers memo" was leaked? www.keyujin.co/pdf/cv.pdf

Still working our way through approx. 23,000 pages of Epstein related documents released by House Oversight Cmte. In another email.. this one from Feb. 2017.. Epstein references Trump ==>

Not sure if I misunderstand myself. Or the Political Tribes quiz misunderstands me (and possibly the world). yourpoliticaltribe.com

Fascinating. It sure looks like "Why I resigned" is "Because I was about to be fired." He doesn't seem to under negotiating or nonprofit law. I'm glad it looks like he didn't have to sign a nondisparagement agreement. Somebody needs to ask for his money deal though. Probably FOIA it.

NEW: Adriana Kugler, who abruptly left the Fed, repeatedly violated the central bank’s trading rules. New disclosures show trades in individual stocks, like Apple, Southwest Airlines and Cava, many of which took place during the blackout period ahead of policy votes www.nytimes.com/2025/11/15/b...

Tucker Carlson talks redistricting, abortion and Ukraine during Turning Point event at IU www.idsnews.com/article/2025...

“we shall not cease from exploration / And the end of all our exploring / Will be to arrive where we started / www.thefp.com/p/things-wor...

My latest substack: See ericrasmusen.substack.com/p/the-2025-c...

But why would anyone want to force taxpayers to make a poor kid and (usually) two adoptive parents worse-off for the benefit of one single mother unwilling to endure the hardship of simultaneously working and caring for her child?* www.betonit.ai/p/infant-ado...