EconTalk
Episodes
Richard Epstein on Regulation
20 Sep 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Richard Epstein of New York University and Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the current state of t...
Alain de Botton on the Pleasures and Sorrows of Work
13 Sep 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Author Alain de Botton talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his latest book, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work. How has the nature of work chan...
Arnold Kling on Knowledge, Power, and Unchecked and Unbalanced
06 Sep 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Arnold Kling of EconLog and author of Unchecked and Unbalanced, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the book and the relationship between know...
Daniel Pink on Drive, Motivation, and Incentives
30 Aug 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Daniel Pink, author of Drive, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about drive, motivation, compensation, and incentives. Pink discusses the implicat...
Michael Munger on Private and Public Rent-Seeking (and Chilean Buses)
23 Aug 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Mike Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about private and public rent-seeking. When firms compete for either private prof...
David Kennedy on the Great Depression and the New Deal
16 Aug 2010
Contributed by Lukas
David Kennedy of Stanford University and the author of Freedom from Fear talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the Great Depression and its poli...
Robert Laughlin on the Future of Carbon and Climate
09 Aug 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Robert Laughlin of Stanford University and the 1998 co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about energy use ...
David Brady on the State of the Electorate
02 Aug 2010
Contributed by Lukas
David Brady of Stanford University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the state of the electorate and what current and past political science...
Robert Service on Leon Trotsky
26 Jul 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Robert Service of Stanford University's Hoover Institution and the University of Oxford talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the life and death...
John Taylor on the State of the Economy
19 Jul 2010
Contributed by Lukas
John Taylor of Stanford University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the state of the economy. Is the economy recovering? What policies have...
Paul Gregory on Politics, Murder, and Love in Stalin's Kremlin
12 Jul 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Paul Gregory of the University of Houston and a Research Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts abou...
Arnold Kling on the Unseen World of Banking, Mortgages, and Government
05 Jul 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Arnold Kling of EconLog talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the weird world of banking. Why do mortgages look the way they do? What do banks c...
Bryan Caplan on Hayek, Richter, and Socialism
28 Jun 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Bryan Caplan of George Mason University and blogger at EconLog talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about two books: Eugene Richter's Pictures of the S...
Scott Sumner on Growth and Economic Policy
21 Jun 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Scott Sumner of Bentley University and the blog, The Money Illusion, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the last 30 years of economic policy ...
Johanna Blakley on Fashion and Intellectual Property
14 Jun 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Johanna Blakley of the University of Southern California talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the fashion industry and the role of intellectual...
Daniel Okrent on Prohibition and His Book, Last Call
07 Jun 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Daniel Okent, author of Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition, talks about the book with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. They discuss how the 18th A...
Louis Menand on Psychiatry
31 May 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Louis Menand of Harvard University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the state of psychiatry. Drawing on a recent article of his in the New ...
Gary Belsky on Journalism, Editing, and Trivia
24 May 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Gary Belsky, Editor-in-Chief at ESPN The Magazine, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his career path in journalism and the day-to-day life o...
Russ Roberts on the Crisis
17 May 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Russ Roberts, host of EconTalk, discusses his paper, "Gambling with Other People's Money: How Perverted Incentives Created the Financial Crisis.&...
Ed Leamer on the State of Econometrics
10 May 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Ed Leamer of UCLA talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the state of econometrics. He discusses his 1983 article, "Let's Take the 'Con' Out...
Nassim Nicholas Taleb on Black Swans, Fragility, and Mistakes
03 May 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Nassim Taleb, author of The Black Swan and Fooled by Randomness, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his latest thoughts on robustness, fragil...
Paul Romer on Charter Cities
26 Apr 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Paul Romer of Stanford University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about charter cities, Romer's idea for helping the poorest of the poor around ...
Michael Munger on Love, Money, Profits, and Non-profits
19 Apr 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Mike Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the world of profit, money, love, gifts, and incentives. What motivates peo...
Diane Ravitch on Education
12 Apr 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Diane Ravitch of NYU talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in her new book, The Death and Life of the Great American School System: Ho...
Yochai Benkler on Net Neutrality, Competition, and the Future of the Internet
05 Apr 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Yochai Benkler of Harvard University talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about net neutrality, access to the internet, and innovation. Benkler argues ...
Arthur De Vany on Steroids, Baseball, and Evolutionary Fitness
29 Mar 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Arthur De Vany, of the University of California, Irvine, and creator of Evolutionary Fitness, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about performance-...
Steve Meyer on the Music Industry and the Internet
22 Mar 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Steve Meyer, music industry veteran and publisher of the Disc and Dat Newsletter, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the evolution of the mus...
Don Boudreaux on Public Choice
15 Mar 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Don Boudreaux of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about public choice: the application of economics to the political proc...
Katherine Newman on Low-wage Workers
08 Mar 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Katherine Newman, Professor of Sociology at Princeton University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Newman's case studies of fast-food worke...
Barry Ritholtz on Bailouts, the Fed, and the Crisis
01 Mar 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Barry Ritholtz, author of Bailout Nation: How Greed and Easy Money Corrupted Wall Street and Shook the World Economy, talks with EconTalk host Russ Ro...
Garett Jones on Macro and Twitter
22 Feb 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Garett Jones of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the art of communicating economics via puzzles and short provocati...
Edmund Phelps on Unemployment and the State of Macroeonomics
15 Feb 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Nobel Laureate Edmund Phelps of Columbia University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the market for labor, unemployment, and the evolution ...
Russ Roberts on Smith, Ricardo, and Trade
08 Feb 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Russ Roberts, host of EconTalk, does a monologue this week on the economics of trade and specialization. Economists have focused on David Ricardo's id...
Larry White on Hayek and Money
01 Feb 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Larry White of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Hayek's ideas on the business cycle and money. White lays out Hayek...
Michael Spence on Growth
25 Jan 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Nobel Laureate Michael Spence of Stanford University's Hoover Institution and the Commission on Growth and Development talks with EconTalk host Russ R...
Michael Munger on Many Things
18 Jan 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Mike Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about many things. Listeners sent in questions for Mike and Russ to talk about an...
Michael Belongia on the Fed
11 Jan 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Michael Belongia of the University of Mississippi and former economist at the St. Louis Federal Reserve talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about th...
Thomas Rustici on Smoot-Hawley and the Great Depression
04 Jan 2010
Contributed by Lukas
Thomas Rustici of George Mason University and author of Lessons from the Great Depression talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the impact of th...
Clifford Winston on Market Failure and Government Failure
28 Dec 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Clifford Winston of the Brookings Institution talks about the ideas in his book, Market Failure vs. Government Failure, with EconTalk host Russ Robert...
James Hamilton on Debt, Default, and Oil
21 Dec 2009
Contributed by Lukas
James Hamilton of the University of California, San Diego, and blogger at EconBrowser talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the rising levels of...
Arnold Kling on Prosperity, Poverty, and Economics 2.0
14 Dec 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Arnold Kling of EconLog and the author (with Nick Schulz) of From Poverty to Prosperity: Intangible Assets, Hidden Liabilities and the Lasting Triumph...
Megan McArdle on Debt and Self-Restraint
07 Dec 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Megan McArdle, who writes the blog Asymmetrical Information at The Atlantic, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about debt and the challenge of sel...
Peter Boettke on Elinor Ostrom, Vincent Ostrom, and the Bloomington School
30 Nov 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Peter Boettke of George Mason University and author of Challenging Institutional Analysis and Development: The Bloomington School (co-authored with Pa...
Carmen Reinhart on Financial Crises
23 Nov 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Carmen Reinhart of the University of Maryland talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in her book This Time is Different: Eight Centurie...
Richard Posner on the Financial Crisis
16 Nov 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Richard Posner, federal judge and prolific author, discusses the financial crisis with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Posner (despite the title of his re...
Scott Sumner on Monetary Policy
09 Nov 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Scott Sumner of Bentley University and the blog The Money Illusion talks with host Russ Roberts about monetary policy and the state of the economy. Su...
Michael Heller on Gridlock and the Tragedy of the Anticommons
02 Nov 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Michael Heller of Columbia Law School and author of The Gridlock Economy talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the book and the idea that fragment...
Charles Calomiris on the Financial Crisis
26 Oct 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Charles Calomiris of Columbia Business School talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the financial crisis. Calomiris argues that it is important ...
Munger on Shortages, Prices, and Competition
19 Oct 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Mike Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the limits of prices and markets, especially in the area of health. They ta...
Daniel Willingham on Education, School, and Neuroscience
12 Oct 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Daniel Willingham of the University of Virginia and author of the book Why Don't Students Like School? talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how...
Gary Stern on Too Big to Fail
05 Oct 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Gary Stern, former President of the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Stern's book, Too Big To Fail (co-au...
Willaim Cohan on the Life and Death of Bear Stearns
28 Sep 2009
Contributed by Lukas
William Cohan, author of House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Steet, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the life and ...
Paul Buchheit on Google, Friendfeed, and Start-ups
21 Sep 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Paul Buchheit, developer of Gmail and founder of FriendFeed, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the evolution of the Gmail project, how innov...
John Nye on the Great Depression, Political Economy, and the Evolution of the State
14 Sep 2009
Contributed by Lukas
John Nye of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the Great Depression, the evolution of the State, and attitudes people...
Tyler Cowen on Culture, Autism, and Creating Your Own Economy
07 Sep 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Tyler Cowen of George Mason University and author of Create Your Own Economy talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his recent book....
Michael Munger on Cultural Norms
31 Aug 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Michael Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about cultural norms--the subtle signals we send to each other in our daily in...
David Brady on Health Care Reform, Public Opinion, and Party Politics
24 Aug 2009
Contributed by Lukas
David Brady of Stanford University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about American public opinion on changing the health care system. Brady discu...
Christopher Hitchens on George Orwell
17 Aug 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Christopher Hitchens talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about George Orwell. Drawing on his book Why Orwell Matters, Hitchens talks about Orwell's ...
Eric Hanushek on Test-based Accountability, Federal Funding, and School Finance
10 Aug 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Eric Hanushek of Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the current state of education and education pol...
Paul Graham on Start-ups, Innovation, and Creativity
03 Aug 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Paul Graham, essayist, programmer and partner in the y-combinator talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about start-ups, innovation, and creativity. G...
Peter Henry on Growth, Development, and Policy
27 Jul 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Peter Blair Henry of Stanford University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about economic development. Henry compares and contrasts the policy and...
John Taylor on the Financial Crisis
20 Jul 2009
Contributed by Lukas
John Taylor of Stanford University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the fundamental causes of the financial crisis of 2008. Taylor argues t...
Justin Fox on the Rationality of Markets
13 Jul 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Justin Fox, author of The Myth of the Rational Market, talks about the ideas in his book with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Fox traces the history of th...
Paul Collier on Democracy and Violence
06 Jul 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Paul Collier of Oxford University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his new book, Wars, Guns, and Votes, a study of democracy a...
Mark Helprin on Copyright
29 Jun 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Novelist Mark Helprin talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about copyright and the ideas in his book, Digital Barbarism. Helprin argues for an extens...
Michael Munger on Franchising, Vertical Integration, and the Auto Industry
22 Jun 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Michael Munger, of Duke University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about franchising, particularly car dealerships. Munger highlights how the d...
Charles Platt on Working at Wal-Mart
15 Jun 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Charles Platt, author and journalist, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts what it was like to apply for a job at Wal-Mart, get one, and work there. ...
Riccardo Rebonato on Risk Management and the Crisis
08 Jun 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Riccardo Rebonato of the Royal Bank of Scotland and author of Plight of the Fortune Tellers talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the challenges...
Richard Epstein on the Rule of Law
01 Jun 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Richard Epstein of the University of Chicago and Stanford University's Hoover Institution talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the rule of law....
Dan Klein on The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Episode 6--A Discussion of Parts VI and VII, and Summary
27 May 2009
Contributed by Lukas
This is the sixth and concluding podcast in the EconTalk Book Club discussion of The Theory of Moral Sentiments by Adam Smith. In this episode, Dan Kl...
Peter Leeson on Pirates and the Invisible Hook
25 May 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Peter Leeson of George Mason University and author of The Invisible Hook talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the economics of 18th century pir...
Michele Boldrin on Intellectual Property
18 May 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Michele Boldrin of Washington University in St. Louis talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about intellectual property and Boldrin's book, co-written...
Dan Klein on The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Episode 5--A Discussion of Parts III (cont.), IV, and V
13 May 2009
Contributed by Lukas
This is the fifth podcast in the EconTalk Book Club discussion of The Theory of Moral Sentiments by Adam Smith. In this episode, Dan Klein of George M...
Alan Wolfe on Liberalism
11 May 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Alan Wolfe, Professor of Political Science at Boston College and author of The Future of Liberalism, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about liber...
Ed Leamer on Macroeconomic Patterns and Stories
04 May 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Ed Leamer, of UCLA and author of Macroeconomic Patterns and Stories, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how we should use patterns in macroec...
Dan Klein on The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Episode 4--A Discussion of Part III
29 Apr 2009
Contributed by Lukas
This is the fourth podcast in the EconTalk Book Club discussion of The Theory of Moral Sentiments by Adam Smith. In this episode, Dan Klein of George ...
Ricardo Reis on Keynes, Macroeconomics, and Monetary Policy
27 Apr 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Ricardo Reis of Columbia University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Keynesian economics in the classroom and in research. Reis argues that...
Dan Klein on The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Episode 3--A Discussion of Part II
22 Apr 2009
Contributed by Lukas
This is the third podcast in the EconTalk Book Club discussion of The Theory of Moral Sentiments by Adam Smith. In this episode, Dan Klein of George M...
Russ Roberts on Wealth, Growth, and Economics as a Science
20 Apr 2009
Contributed by Lukas
EconTalk host Russ Roberts talks with reporter Robert Pollie about the basics of wealth and growth. What happens when the stock market goes down or th...
Dan Klein on The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Episode 2--A Discussion of Part I
15 Apr 2009
Contributed by Lukas
This is the second podcast in the EconTalk Book Club discussion of The Theory of Moral Sentiments by Adam Smith. In this episode, Dan Klein of George ...
Don Boudreaux on Macroeconomics and Austrian Business Cycle Theory
13 Apr 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Don Boudreaux, of George Mason University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the microfoundations of macroeconomics and the Austrian theory ...
Dan Klein on The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Episode 1--An Overview
06 Apr 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Dan Klein, of George Mason University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Adam Smith's lesser-known masterpiece, The Theory of Moral Sentimen...
Brink Lindsey on the Age of Abundance
30 Mar 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Brink Lindsey, of the Cato Institute and author of The Age of Abundance: How Prosperity Transformed America's Politics and Culture, talks with EconTal...
Nassim Nicholas Taleb on the Financial Crisis
23 Mar 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Nassim Taleb talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the financial crisis, how we misunderstand rare events, the fragility of the banking system, ...
Dan Klein on Truth, Bias, and Disagreement
16 Mar 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Dan Klein, of George Mason University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts on truth in economics, bias, and groupthink in academic life. Along the w...
Jimmy Wales on Wikipedia
09 Mar 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the birth and growth of Wikipedia. He talks about the role of Hayek's i...
Todd Zywicki on Debt and Bankruptcy
02 Mar 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Todd Zywicki, of George Mason University Law School, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the evolving world of consumer debt and how instituti...
Allan Meltzer on Inflation
23 Feb 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Allan Meltzer, of Carnegie Mellon University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the current state of monetary policy and the potential for i...
Amar Bhide on Outsourcing, Uncertainty, and the Venturesome Economy
16 Feb 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Amar Bhide, of Columbia University and author of The Venturesome Economy, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the role of entrepreneurship and...
Daron Acemoglu on the Financial Crisis
09 Feb 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Daron Acemoglu, of MIT, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the financial crisis and the lessons that need to be learned from the crisis. He a...
John Cochrane on the Financial Crisis
02 Feb 2009
Contributed by Lukas
John Cochrane, of the University of Chicago, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the financial crisis. He talks about the origins of the crisi...
Russ Roberts (and Robin Hanson) on Truth and Economics
26 Jan 2009
Contributed by Lukas
EconTalk host Russ Roberts talks about the role of empirical evidence and bias in economics and why economists disagree. Roberts talks about how his i...
Eric Raymond on Hacking, Open Source, and the Cathedral and the Bazaar
19 Jan 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Eric Raymond, author of The Cathedral and the Bazaar, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in the book--why open source software deve...
Steve Fazzari on Keynesian Economics
12 Jan 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Steve Fazzari, of Washington University in St. Louis, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Keynesian economics. Fazzari talks about the paradox...
Peter Boettke on the Austrian Perspective on Business Cycles and Monetary Policy
05 Jan 2009
Contributed by Lukas
Peter Boettke, of George Mason University, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the Austrian perspective on business cycles, monetary policy an...
George Srour on Education, African Schools, and Building Tomorrow
22 Dec 2008
Contributed by Lukas
George Srour, founder of Building Tomorrow, a non-profit that builds schools in Uganda, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his experience sta...
Robert Higgs on the Great Depression
15 Dec 2008
Contributed by Lukas
Robert Higgs, of the Independent Institute, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the Great Depression, the New Deal, and the effect of World Wa...
Steven Lipstein on Hospitals
08 Dec 2008
Contributed by Lukas
Steven Lipstein, President and CEO of BJC HealthCare--a $3 billion hospital system in St. Louis, Missouri--talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about...
Eric Rauchway on the Great Depresson and the New Deal
01 Dec 2008
Contributed by Lukas
Eric Rauchway of the University of California at Davis and the author of The Great Depression and the New Deal: A Very Short Introduction, talks with ...
Thomas Hazlett on Telecommunications
24 Nov 2008
Contributed by Lukas
Thomas Hazlett of George Mason University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about a number of key issues in telecommunications and telecommunicati...