The Marginal Revolution Podcast
Episodes
America's Debt: Crisis or Calm?
02 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Can America afford $30 trillion in debt—or is the real question whether it wants to? In the final episode of Season 2, Alex and Tyler take on the ...
The Return of Tariffs - Unpacking incidence, retaliation, and the return of protectionism
18 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, Alex and Tyler tackle the resurgence of tariffs in American policy, a development neither saw coming after decades of trade liberaliz...
Compensating Differentials and Selective Incentives
04 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Why do butchers earn more than bakers even though they're typically less educated? What does Uber driver data reveal about wage gaps? In part three of...
The Baumol Effect
21 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Why are college tuition, healthcare, and car repairs eating up bigger shares of our budgets? Alex says it's all about the Baumol effect, a deep econom...
Favorite Models: Spence on Monopolies, Harberger on Incidence, Solow on Growth
07 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Alex and Tyler put three classic models through their paces. Alex starts with Spence on how a monopolist chooses quality and applies it to how the New...
In Praise of Commercial Culture
23 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Tyler and Alex revisit Tyler's 1998 book and trace how commerce disciplines and amplifies creativity. Great artists bargained hard because money buys...
The Quest to Price Options
17 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In the final episode of Season 1, Alex and Tyler explore one of the most consequential quests in the history of economics and finance: the decades-lon...
The New Monetary Economics
03 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this exploration of the "new monetary economics," Alex and Tyler revisit the ideas of thinkers like Fischer Black, Eugene Fama, and Robert Hall, wh...
The Economics of Insurance
19 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, Alex and Tyler dive deep into the fascinating and often misunderstood world of insurance, exploring how this trillion-dollar industry...
The 1970s Crime Wave
12 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this final installment of their series on the 1970s, Alex and Tyler turn to the social upheaval and crime wave that marked the decade as one of Ame...
Oil Shocks, Price Controls, and War
22 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this second installment of their three-part series on the 1970s, Alex and Tyler unravel the economic and geopolitical forces behind the oil shocks ...
The Economics Nobel: Predictions, Missed Opportunities, and Questionable Winners
08 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Alex and Tyler share their predictions for the upcoming Nobel Prize in economics, considering potential winners like Michael Woodford for monetary the...
1970s Inflation: The Economic Fever That Changed America
20 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome The Marginal Revolution Podcast! In the Season 1 premiere, Alex and Tyler kick off a 3-part series on the 1970s by exploring the decade's defi...