In his memoir of his time in Auschwitz, Primo Levi describes Jewish prisoners bathing in freezing water without soap--not because they thought it would make them cleaner, but because it helped them hold on to their dignity. For poet and author Dwayne Betts, Levi's description of his fellow inmates' suffering, much like the novelist Ralph Ellison's portrayal of early twentieth-century black life in America, is much more than bearing witness to the darkest impulses of mankind. Rather, Betts tells ...
May 02, 2022•1 hr 24 min•Ep 839•Transcript available on Metacast Are tech giants such as Google, Amazon, or Facebook dangerous? Do they have too much power? Dive into the murky waters of antitrust as Michael Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about monopoly, antitrust policy, and competition in the 21st century.
Apr 25, 2022•1 hr 22 min•Ep 838•Transcript available on Metacast Intellectual omnivore Tyler Cowen of George Mason University and EconTalk host Russ Roberts talk about their reading habits, their favorite books, and the pile of books on their nightstands right now.
Apr 18, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Ep 837•Transcript available on Metacast What do crossing rivers and investing in stocks have in common? Real education is seeing the connection between things that seem very different. EconTalk's host Russ Roberts talks about education with Alex Aragona of the podcast, The Curious Task . Roberts argues that the ability to apply insights from one area to another with which we're unfamiliar is one of the ways that real education differs from the mere accumulation of knowledge. And when we combine insights from two areas into something c...
Apr 11, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Ep 836•Transcript available on Metacast Physician and careful reader Richard Gunderman of Indiana University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how Adam Smith and Leo Tolstoy looked at greed. Drawing on Tolstoy's short story, "Master and Man," and adding some Thomas Hobbes along the way, Gunderman argues that a life well-lived requires us to rise above our lower desires. Join Gunderman and Roberts for a sleigh ride into a snowy blizzard, where you won't find your way by following rules, but rather by recognizing what needs to...
Apr 04, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Ep 835•Transcript available on Metacast What is real education? What can colleges provide their students? Pano Kanelos, president of the new college-to-be in Austin, UATX, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the nature of education, what the Great Books can teach us, and how we should rethink college education in today's world.
Mar 28, 2022•1 hr 15 min•Ep 834•Transcript available on Metacast Economist Robert Pindyck of MIT talks about his book, Climate Future, with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Pindyck lays out what we know and do not know about climate change. He argues that because of the nature of greenhouse gases, adaptation must be part of the policy response to climate change.
Mar 21, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Ep 833•Transcript available on Metacast Stuff it, fluff it, stitch it, dress it: Build-a-Bear Founder and former CEO Maxine Clark built a retail-entertainment empire by letting people make their own furry friends. Two hundred million of them. What's the secret to her success? Listen as she tells EconTalk's Russ Roberts how she developed a customer-focused culture, why she sought to join (and not beat) her competition, and about some of the (seriously) strange things people have stuffed into their bears.
Mar 14, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Ep 832•Transcript available on Metacast Many people think schools are no place for teaching character. Psychologist Angela Duckworth of the University of Pennsylvania and founder of Character Lab, disagrees. She talks with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about the implicit curriculum for character, the critical role early education plays in shaping our adult values, and why the Marshmallow Test doesn't determine our destiny.
Mar 07, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Ep 831•Transcript available on Metacast What did author and Washington Post columnist Tamar Haspel learn from her quest to eat at least one thing she'd grown, caught, or killed every day? For starters, that just-caught fish always tastes better (unless you've caught a false albacore). That all it takes to build a coop is the will and the right power tools, and that when it comes to homegrown produce, you've got none until you've got way too much. But most of all, she tells EconTalk's Russ Roberts in talking about her book To Boldly Gr...
Feb 28, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Ep 830•Transcript available on Metacast Why do people eat too much even when they don't want to? Why are there so many bad managers? And why might anti-vaxxers be useful? Luca Dellanna, author of The Control Heuristic , thinks the answers to all of these questions are in our heads, or rather in our basal ganglia. Dellanna talks to EconTalk's Russ Roberts about why both brains and employees need immediate feedback, why we're wired to believe our best guesses, and why addiction is just our brain's way of making sure we survive....
Feb 21, 2022•1 hr 18 min•Ep 829•Transcript available on Metacast Michael Eisenberg, venture capitalist and the author of The Tree of Life and Prosperity talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the secret of the Start-Up Nation, the role of principles in investing, and why he's optimistic about technology's contribution to humanity.
Feb 14, 2022•1 hr 12 min•Ep 828•Transcript available on Metacast What's so bad about rising inflation? Why should we aim for a rate of 2 percent? Why is it a problem if interest rates are too low--and what do we mean by inflation, anyway? Stanford University's John Taylor talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about these questions, the Taylor Rule, why inflation is rising, and what the Fed should do about it. At the end of the conversation, Taylor discusses whether stimulus stimulates and the dangers of the national debt.
Feb 07, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Ep 827•Transcript available on Metacast Traditions and norms can seem at best out-of-touch and at worst offensive to many a modern mind. But Israeli computer scientist and Talmud scholar Moshe Koppel argues that traditions and norms--if they evolve slowly--create trust, develop our capacity for deferred gratification, and even, in the case of how we prepare cassava, protect us from poisoning. Listen as the author of Judaism Straight Up: Why Real Religion Endures talks with EconTalk Russ Roberts about tradition, religion, tribalism, re...
Jan 31, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Ep 826•Transcript available on Metacast Love it or hate it, but you've definitely heard it: the so-called "smooth jazz" of saxophonist Kenny G. Filmmaker Penny Lane talks about her documentary, Listening to Kenny G with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. They discuss the pursuit of perfection, the power of vulnerability in art, and why Kenny G is loved by the people and reviled by the critics.
Jan 24, 2022•1 hr 25 min•Ep 825•Transcript available on Metacast Can Israeli society survive the loss of universal military service? Will the deregulation of Israel's kosher supervision spell the end of its Jewish character? And, speaking of Israel, what is it that makes its television dramas so good? Tyler Cowen discusses these and other subjects with EconTalk host Russ Roberts, new immigrant to Israel and unabashed fan of the Prisoners of War miniseries and Homer's Odyssey .
Jan 17, 2022•1 hr 17 min•Ep 824•Transcript available on Metacast In the race for a COVID vaccine, how did a couple of companies who had never produced a successful vaccine make it to the finish line so quickly? Gregory Zuckerman talks about his book, A Shot to Save the World , with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about the daring, deranged, and damaged visionaries behind one of science and medicine's great success stories.
Jan 10, 2022•1 hr 23 min•Ep 823•Transcript available on Metacast When we see Michaelangelo's David or the design of the Apple Store, we assume a genius with a predetermined vision was the key to the outcome. Yet as Lorne Buchman, author of Make to Know , tells EconTalk's Russ Roberts, great art is more about embracing the process of exploration and the results that emerge in the process of creating. Buchman makes the case for embracing uncertainty in both leadership and life.
Jan 03, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Ep 822•Transcript available on Metacast After being stranded with a bunch of Brits for eight hours at a German airport in 2016, journalist Megan McArdle felt that Brexit was going to happen. The giveaway? Not the concerns over economics or politics. Rather, it was about something far more elemental: in whom they could place their trust. Join the journalist and Washington Post columnist for a discussion with EconTalk host Russ Roberts of the late British philosopher Roger Scruton's poetic exploration of home and nation, Where We Are: T...
Dec 27, 2021•1 hr 21 min•Ep 821•Transcript available on Metacast More than we need rules, argues Michael Munger, we need rules about the rules. So does the United States need a new Constitution? Listen as the Duke University economist and political scientist talks to host Russ Roberts about public choice, consenting to coercion, and whether constitutions matter.
Dec 20, 2021•1 hr 6 min•Ep 820•Transcript available on Metacast Once it was The Shadow radio show; now it's the podcast Serial . Is every old storytelling medium new again? Frank Rose, author of The Sea We Swim In , concedes that some things remain sacred--from the power of a great hook to the hope that great stories never end. But he also thinks the Internet has led to new kinds of stories, ones that are not just entertaining, but immersive, and whose worlds are more richly imaginative than ever--even as they leave increasingly little to our imagination....
Dec 13, 2021•1 hr 9 min•Ep 819•Transcript available on Metacast Economic theory teaches that people make choices that provide them with the greatest benefit. So why not extend this idea to the realm of charity? Economists and social entrepreneurs Michael Faye and Paul Niehaus of GiveDirectly argue that giving people cash with no strings attached is the most cost-effective means of helping the poorest people in the world and their communities.
Dec 06, 2021•1 hr 14 min•Ep 818•Transcript available on Metacast We undervalue our sense of hearing and we under-appreciate the impact sweet sounds and disturbing noises have on our well-being. Neuroscientist Nina Kraus of Northwestern University talks about her book, Of Sound Mind . Kraus argues that our listening affects our minds and brains in ways we ignore at our peril.
Nov 29, 2021•1 hr 12 min•Ep 817•Transcript available on Metacast Stuntman and action designer Eric Jacobus joins EconTalk host Russ Roberts for a no-holds-barred discussion of the biological basis for violence and how to avoid the worst of it, the value of violence as spectator sport, and the vast superiority of duels to feuds--Alexander Hamilton notwithstanding.
Nov 22, 2021•1 hr 27 min•Ep 816•Transcript available on Metacast Author and economist Emily Oster of Brown University talks about her book, The Family Firm , with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Oster argues that running your family life the way you'd run your own business makes for a better family in today's crazy world. And where possible, the myriad of decisions you make should be based on hard data, at least when it's available.
Nov 15, 2021•1 hr 2 min•Ep 815•Transcript available on Metacast Of all the scenarios that keep astrophysicist Sandra Faber up at night, it's not the Earth's increasing volcanism, the loss of photosynthesis, or even the impact of a massive asteroid. Rather, it's the collapse she's certain will result from the unbridled growth of the world's economies. Join Faber and EconTalk host Russ Roberts as they explore what the most inexorable law of physics has to do with economics and whether the world's growing economies pose a problem or provide the solution for the...
Nov 08, 2021•1 hr 29 min•Ep 814•Transcript available on Metacast Philosopher Jennifer Frey of the University of South Carolina talks about the state of the university in American education. Frey urges a stronger focus on virtue and human flourishing and a reduced focus on career preparation. Roberts, despite his sympathy with the examined life, challenges the virtue of philosophical enquiry. At the end of the conversation, both guest and host defend philosophy.
Nov 01, 2021•1 hr 6 min•Ep 813•Transcript available on Metacast Author and psychologist Paul Bloom of the University of Toronto talks about his book, The Sweet Spot , with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Bloom argues that suffering is underrated--suffering is part of happiness and meaning. This is a wide-ranging discussion of popular culture, religion, and what we hope to get out of life.
Oct 25, 2021•1 hr 9 min•Ep 812•Transcript available on Metacast Journalist and author Rowan Jacobsen talks about his book Truffle Hound with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. This conversation has nothing to do with chocolate. It's about the strange world of underground fungi, found in the forest by specially trained dogs and used by chefs and home cooks around the world. You will learn about truffle oil, cooking with truffles, truffle hounds, and the economics of all of the above.
Oct 18, 2021•1 hr 8 min•Ep 811•Transcript available on Metacast Author and journalist Sam Quinones talks about his book, The Least of Us , with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Quinones focuses on the devastation caused by methamphetamine and fentanyl, the latest evolution of innovation in the supply of mind-altering drugs in the United States. The latest versions of meth, he argues, are more emotionally damaging than before and have played a central role in the expansion of the homeless in tent encampments in American cities. The conversation includes an explora...
Oct 11, 2021•1 hr 22 min•Ep 810•Transcript available on Metacast 
