Monday's Child is Full of Links!

1,  Interview on CNN with the EYM. 

2.  Anatomy of a smear campaign. Not sure it was a "campaign," but it is an example of how information cascades plague social media. 

3.  An idiosyncratic, but interesting, history of fantasy football. 

4.  Why do basketball players make more than teachers?

5.  Plato v. Mises? (Mises wins...) 

6. James Buchanan's normative vision. 

7.  Econtalk: On the Future of Higher Education.

8.  IHS: Is capitalism sustainable?

9.  The "Munger's Guide to Academic Publishing."

10. The "Answers" ad from my 2008 Governor campaign.

"Genius Faculty" at ILS Freedom Week

Pretty great video.



I like the part that the students talk about the "Genius faculty."  But then they show Steve Horwitz. (Thanks, folks, I'll be here all week!)

Love Gov: The Series

Here's the first installment of the quite funny, yet disturbingly creepy, "Love Gov" series from the Independent Institute:




You can find the rest of the them here.  Worth watching them all. 
Premise:  clever. 
Execution:  so accurate that it's a little uncomfortable.

Love Gov!

An amazingly high-quality, but also skin-crawling, series from the Independent Institute.

Here's the trailer link.  I'll put up the others, or you can just go to the web site and binge watch.

And the trailer, if you just want to watch it here:

Drop It Like It's Hoppe

Banska Bystrica, Matej Bel University: What is Voluntary Exchange?

The video of my talk in lovely Banska Bystrica, with thanks to my good friend Richard Durana and the folks at INESS.

Downsize?

Some interesting videos on "downsizing" specific parts of the federal government.  From my man Caleb Brown....

Agriculture

http://youtu.be/vwKpT7P9OiU

Education

http://youtu.be/xXyJ9hpX0Vo

HHS

http://youtu.be/hgAet3xa94U

Energy

http://youtu.be/_i4u3FHBxbE

Labor

http://youtu.be/0OuOSxgaSN0

Love Scalpers, or Hate Them?

Bruce Yandle BRINGS It on the B&B Meme

Just tremendous.  Bruce is a national treasure.  And cute, too.

How Nations Succeed

Why Do People Exchange?

The newest, and last, of the Learn Liberty videos I did in March 2012.  I like the way this one turned out, because it captures something everybody cares about.  Free t-shirts!



UPDATE:  One of the comments, on Youtube, was this:  "This guy looks like Patrick!"  (Which is true.  I lost 40 pounds not long after filming this video.  Pretty strange to look back at...)

Economic Progress From Der Horwitz

Economic progress is not the creation of jobs.  It's actually the destruction of jobs that we can do without...because we have progressed.

Dub-MOE!

The Dub-MOE killin' it with "Why Are Gas Prices So High?"

Learn Liberty: You Can't GIVE Money Away

 UPDATE:  Okay, the above is an exaggeration.  You CAN, in fact, "give money away."  Here is a looping gif of the Ben Bernank as a young fellow, proving the point.

 

Video Contest: Awesomeness From My Boy Stringham

This is so, so great.  Last year's contest was tremendous. And I got to be a judge.  We are doing it again!   This was last year's winner.  Extremely catchy.  You'll be humming it.  "We can make whatever you LIIIIIIKE!"

I'll admit that in addition to working as a professor, working as a music/rap video star can be stressful, but it's worth it. John Papola is clearly the master.  

But in my own small way, I am glad to be one of the judge's of the Economics Music Video Contest sponsored by Edward Stringham at Fayetteville State University. Last year's contest on "Supply and Demand" was a blast and we'll have a new contest "Economic Value is Subjective" this year.

Stringham writes: The goal is to encourage students to make videos that convey economic concepts in an interesting way. The first year’s contest asked students to make videos on Supply and Demand and the theme of this year’s contest is: “Economic Value is Subjective.”

Watch (seriously, watch!) the growing list of current entries at:





"Karl Menger had an idea long ago.  That value's different to people, therefore subjective, yo!"  Now, THAT is poetry, economics fans!

The contest is open to all students and entries are due May 15, 2013. The winners gets $2,500 and the professor of the winner gets $500.

To see past entries and more details about how to enter visit: hackleychair.wordpress.com

We Get Letters!

An email exchange from today....

TP:   Dear Dr. Munger,  I enjoyed your video, "What Do Prices “Know” That You Don’t?"  The title reminds me of something that Bill Gates said to me.  I created the prediction markets project within Microsoft in 2003 and I was asked to brief Bill on them.  He immediately understood how prediction market prices work and then said that the reason they might help him was because [paraphrased], "If the market prices differ from my own beliefs, then either they know something that I don't know or I know something they don't know, and either of those may need remedy."   Cheers, TP

MM:  That's very cool, and an interesting difference between economists and entrepreneurs.  I assume you know the joke about the economist and the entrepreneur.

Economist and entrepreneur are walking down a street in San Francisco.  The entrepreneur sees a $100 bill, and generously offers to split the “found” value with the economist.

The economist refuses, saying that it’s not possible.  “After all,” the economist announces, if there had been a $100 bill in the street, someone would have picked it up.  In equilibrium, there are no arbitrage profit opportunities!”  

The entrepreneur shakes his head in scorn and pockets the full $100.

So, the economist sticks to the first part of your formulation.  For the economist, "they" always know everything, and that's embodied in price.  But entrepreneurs
know that prices are wrong, often, sometimes by a lot. 

That means the entrep's pick up the $100, and the economist turns out to be right after all.  But only because smart people go around looking for wrong prices.

UPDATE:  Scott Ainsworth writes.... A story from Georgia - When walking with economists in front of the econ/business buildings on the Georgia campus, I noted that there was a lot of money lying around the ground - pennies and dimes mostly. The obligatory equilibrium jokes followed. One of the economists said that picking up pennies was not worth his opportunity costs. I admitted that I still picked pennies up. More than one person looked askance at me - until I stated that I was the shortest person in the group. Opportunity costs survived and equilibrium was restored. For the economists, it was a very big day - and I was 23 cents wealthier.

The IDK Problem: New Learn Liberty!

The folks at Learn Liberty (and I do mean the lovely Elisabeth McCaffrey, among others), are SO great at taking a pretty bland idea and doing something wonderful with it.  This turned out WAY better than I had any right to expect.  I have ALWAYS wanted to blow up into a cloud of colored smoke at the end of a video.  It hurt, but only a little.


(UPDATE:  Since people have asked, "Al Trewis" is an altruist, not someone for whom all is true.  That would have been clever, since if everything is true, nothing is.  But I'm not that deep.  He's just an altruist.)

(UPDATE II:  A number of people have said, "But you didn't talk about ____!"  Especially farm subsidies that distort prices.  Well, first, yes I did.  I mentioned that the subsidy for ethanol was cut, and that that changed things.  And second, it's a four minute video.  The number of things I did NOT talk about is essentially infinite.)

Betty!

For more then 30 years, I have heard Angus call himself "Betty."  (Nope, no more details.  Just trust me here.)

So, in honor of Angus, I made a video about externalities in which Betty figures prominently.  I am not a very attractive man, but it turns out I am a genuinely repulsive woman.




A credit:  I had never recognized the centrality of manners, and "moral" social norms in controlling externalities.  But my main man Russ Roberts pointed it out in editing this piece, and then doing this podcast, years ago.  So, a big post Festival of Lights shout out to RR:  when I say "Manners," I always think of YOU, big man!

UPDATE:  Sam Wilson, yes, of COURSE the model for Art is the Dub-MOE.  I even tried to get that vacant Pooh-bear expression down.  As for Carl....well, a guy needs SOME secrets. 

UPDATE II:  I don't mean to claim there is anything intellectually novel here, folks.  My good friend John Nye had a very nice piece, years ago, that makes the "knowledge problem" point way better in print.  And this recent post by Steven Landsburg did a nice job summarizing the issues, and the problems, of an arbitrary "starting point."  Oh, and Mario Rizzo, too.  I could go on, but the point is that I am sumarizing what a lot of people already know, but rarely gets taught when the subject of externalities comes up in basic micro courses.

Holiday Videos!

Deck the Halls with Macro Follies (with thanks to PB)




And...the REAL Santa Claus is the US Government!
 

Why is there CORN in my Coke?

The lovely and talented Dr. Diana Thomas shares some extremely valuable info on sugar, and why there is corn in your co-cola.