Caught you staring. open.substack.com/pub/matthewg...

These are all towns in Rhode Island, amiright?

What does it mean to “be here now”? open.substack.com/pub/matthewg...

“My students are embracing altruism and reciprocity because they’ve never been taught how rent seeking works.”

Economic analysis that reflects cognitive dissonance explains better than standard analysis eg why •noninformational advertising works •Social Security/safety legislation is popular •flood insurance isn’t—Akerlof&Dickens (1982) HT @matthewgnagler.bsky.social buff.ly/Q6aAXQ8

No need for consumers to be irrational for incentives for deceptive advertising to be effective, argues @matthewgnagler.bsky.social. Bounded rationality—and notably cognitive dissonance (eg refusing to admit they’ve been deceived)—is a sufficient condition: buff.ly/V0Rz0xA

Behavioural economics has deep roots. This (1982!) paper by Akerlof and Dickens shows how cognitive dissonance can be woven into standard (rational) economic decision making models and more accurately predict actual behaviour: buff.ly/JhhamLh HT @matthewgnagler.bsky.social

I "continue as a guest" on the Plant Yourself Podcast with Howie Jacobson. In this episode, we range over the landscape of behavioral economics, pausing briefly to talk about my new work on cognitive flexibility. We also talk about Golden Balls. Wouldn’t you? plantyourself.com/golden-balls...

Fall is here and I am once again teaching micro to grad students

Is the suspense killing you? 🥁 It must be time to read the latest edition of Zen and Economics! open.substack.com/pub/matthewg...

In the US we celebrate tech moguls who “move fast & break things,” yet we struggle with whether someone should have the right to declare their own gender identity My most recent Substack gets to the bottom of our conflicted ideas on cognitive flexibility: matthewgnagler.substack.com/p/dont-be-a-...

The idea that journalism can be transformative is grounded in a sort of behavioral economics. The narratives we employ influence our thoughts and so inevitably our choices (by way of our preferences). Here’s what I wrote on the broader economics of this: link.springer.com/article/10.1...

At the library in Telluride, Colorado

Going to miss Boulder

Greetings from Wyoming

Seen in Denver #streetcommentary

Cautionary tale of what happens when you place a department in receivership for not toeing the line

Sending an appreciation card to a friend who’s working in the Federal Government. Our personal expressions of moral support matter right now. Let’s get them through this.

Not sure I want my coffee “brazen”

A good morning from Crested Butte

Back to Crested Butte. Winter not over yet! ❄️

Economic efficiency ftw

I liked Sam Altman for about 5 minutes

Back at the Coffee Stand today

Greenland had a message for Trump at the polls this week re his desire to control the island: thanks, but no thanks.

Sticking up for the territories

Calling these guys “misers” was a misnomer. Does anyone have better names for them?

Got mad, did another thing www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...

In case one needed more reasons to avoid Bezos’ businesses: TIL that Whole Foods is no longer offering 10c rebates for reusable bags. So retrograde.

Hmm, do I live in a college town?

For the record, I did NOT click

If one wanted to stop funding research on certain topics, one could say, “We won’t fund new projects in these areas.” To instead pull the plug on active funded projects is to tell the world the US cannot be taken seriously as a center for research - of any kind, regardless of project area.

Gratuitous Boulder-themed pic alert 🚨

If you’re looking for me I’m working at the Coffee Stand in Boulder this afternoon

Started yet another book without having finished the others. As always the quandary: Where do I find a new bookmark?

Donald Trump is lying to you.

BREAKING: Real analysis has been pressed into MAGA service

this!

“In a perfect contradiction we are urged to buy a ‘styled’ artifact because others are also buying it - that is,we are asked to express our genius by giving up our genius.” —James Carse

Why importing lumber from Canada poses a threat to national security

TFW you’re Rumpelstiltskin and you receive an email asking, “What did you do last night?”

“You come here with a paper written in Word. Don’t you know how to use LaTeX?”

Bear-zhnev

Back to Breckenridge today

Thinking today of the contrast between Brian Driscoll making the most of his accidental appointment as acting head of FBI, and Dante from Clerks…

It was the eigenvectors

When you run it like a business, see how much better things get?

Why aren’t more public libraries like this?