The Vote-Cost of Scandal
The Lewinsky scandal, according to most public opinion scholars, actually increased Clinton's popularity. But even after Lewinsky, politicians have continued to resign or drop out of races in the face of similar scandals, and of course they did it for a long time before. What is going on? 1. The usual rules do not apply to Clinton - the public will punish other politicians for comparable actions. 2. Politicians systematically overestimate voters' reactions. 3. Public opinion has changed. Pre-Clinton, scandals mattered. Now they don't. Politicians are still learning about this regime change. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] The game of just supposing Is the sweetest game I know... And if the things we dream about Don't happen to be so, That's just an unimportant technicality. Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein, *Showboat*
Re: The Vote-Cost of Scandal
Steve Miller wrote: Maybe what angers voters is not the scandal, but hypocrisy. Someone who is perceived as liberal on social issues is less of a hypocrite for having an affair than is someone who runs on a family values platform. Gary Hart was a liberal in good standing, but he is the textbook case of a politician ruined by a scandal. Clinton is probably a bigger hypocrite given his effort to co-opt the family values stuff. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] But being alone he had begun to conceive thoughts of his own unlike those of his brethren. --J.R.R. Tolkien, *The Silmarillion*
Re: Health insurance for kids
Jeffrey Rous wrote: When I was in grad school, my wife's health insurance policy through work allowed an employee to add a spouse for $1000 per year (I cannot remember the exact numbers, but these are close) or add a spouse and children for $2000 per year. And it didn't matter whether you had 1 child or 10. Since she worked for UNC, I figured it was a political decision. I'm pretty sure that it's not. My wife's private insurance works the same way. Unless regulations make the private sector copy the public sector. How can this be rational? At least for male employees, it's plausible that those with more children are both older and therefore more experienced, and more responsible/stable holding age constant. A guy with five kids is going to be very concerned about remaining employed. -Jeffrey Rous -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] The game of just supposing Is the sweetest game I know... And if the things we dream about Don't happen to be so, That's just an unimportant technicality. Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein, *Showboat*
Kolko 40 Years Later
strongly suspect is accurate, like his revisionist account of the hysteria surrounding Upton Sinclair's *The Jungle*. But overall, it has all of the flaws you would expect in a work of economic history by an economically semi-literate socialist. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] The game of just supposing Is the sweetest game I know... And if the things we dream about Don't happen to be so, That's just an unimportant technicality. Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein, *Showboat*
[Fwd: A story of the Fed in Wonderland as Greenspan puts emphasis ongr owth - Economic View by Anatole Kaletsky]
the rule was winners and losers, all must have prizes. When US economic recovery becomes self-sustaining, Greenspan will suddenly blow the whistle - and the losers will be the Bigger Fools still holding long bonds. -- This message is intended only for the personal and confidential use of the designated recipient(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient of this message you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or copying of this message is strictly prohibited. This communication is for information purposes only and should not be regarded as an offer to sell or as a solicitation of an offer to buy any financial product, an official confirmation of any transaction, or as an official statement of Lehman Brothers. Email transmission cannot be guaranteed to be secure or error-free. Therefore, we do not represent that this information is complete or accurate and it should not be relied upon as such. All information is subject to change without notice. -- --- The information contained in this transmission and any attached documents is privileged, confidential and intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby directed not to read the contents of this transmission, and are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution, dissemination or use of the contents of this transmission, including any attachments, or the taking of any action in reliance thereon, is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify the sender and/or Citadel Investment Group (Europe) Ltd immediately by telephone at +44 (0) 20 7645 9700 and destroy any copy of this transmission. Citadel Investment Group (Europe) Ltd is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA Firm Ref No 190260). Registered in England. Registration No. 3666898. Registered Office: 10th Floor, 2 George Yard, Lombard Street, London EC3V 9DH _ This message has been checked for all known viruses by UUNET delivered through the MessageLabs Virus Control Centre. ** This e-mail, together with any attachments, is confidential to the addressee(s). If you are not the intented recipient of this e-mail you should not copy it or use it for any purpose or disclose its contents to any person: to do so maybe unlawful. Please notify the sender immediately by e-mail if you have received this e-mail by mistake and delete this e-mail and any attachments from your system without making any copies. Framlington Group Limited gives no warranty as to the security, accuracy or completeness of this e-mail, together with any attachments, after it is sent nor does it accept responsibility for any errors or omissions in the contents of this message which arise as a result of e-mail transmission. Any liability for viruses is excluded to the fullest extent permitted by law. ** -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] Infancy conforms to nobody: all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it. --Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance
Re: Greider
Robert A. Book wrote: Greider also has interesting material on the Democrats' connection to the SL industry. I'd never heard about any of this, but he seems to have his facts straight on this point. Wrong hasn't been so much fun in years! -- Bryan, if he's wrong about the material you know a lot about, what makes you think he has his facts straight on the subjects you know less about? Shouldn't his obvious errors on cost/benefit, risk analysis, and corporate accountability reduce the prior probability (to you) that he's right on anything? Good question. Sure, errors in one area raise the probability of errors in other areas. But he's a journalist. I expect him to be weak on analytics. The 5 W's of who-what-when-where-why are what he's trained to get right. --Robert Book -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] Infancy conforms to nobody: all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it. --Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance
list changes
As I announced earlier, the GMU listserv system is changing. Starting August 15th, [EMAIL PROTECTED] will be renamed: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yes, I know the longer name sucks, but what can you do? -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] Infancy conforms to nobody: all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it. --Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance
Re: MVT and policy portfolios
alypius skinner wrote: Related to this is the question of whether there really is a median voter. Let's take 10 issues--abortion, gun control, gay rights, trade policy, tax rates, immigration, middle east policy, racial preferences, CO2/global warming policy, and SDI/star wars missile defense. What percentage of the electorate is in the middle quintile (if we could quantify these issues) on all 10? The General Social Survey is online and has a lot of information on public opinion, though not all of these exact topics. At least on a crude measure of do you want more/less/the same level of spending or regulation, the median position is usually the same. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] But being alone he had begun to conceive thoughts of his own unlike those of his brethren. --J.R.R. Tolkien, *The Silmarillion*
Re: Real wages constant since 1964?!
Really? Every undergraduate class I can remember listed the failure to adjust for quality as one of the main problems with the CPI. And I don't think they just said it was inadequate. William Dickens wrote: This is completely wrong. The CPI-u is, and the CPI-x was, adjusted for quality changes (see http://www.bls.gov/cpi/home.htm ). The CPI-X doesn't exist anymore. So what price statistic wasn't adjusted for quality changes? They all are. No one (who knew what he was talking about) has ever claimed that they are not adjusted. The common claim is that the adjustments (which are quite complex and differ across different types of goods) are inadequate. - - Bill William T. Dickens The Brookings Institution 1775 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20036 Phone: (202) 797-6113 FAX: (202) 797-6181 E-MAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED] AOL IM: wtdickens -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] Infancy conforms to nobody: all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it. --Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance
Re: Economist IQ?
Do you have a cite for that, Zach? [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: A far cry from perfect, but if you use the GRE as a test of intelligence, economics PhD students are the fourth most intelligent behind physicists, mathematicians, and computer scientists - according to the ETS in 2002. Mean scores for engineering (in some forms) are not much lower - but anthropology, archaeology, history, political science, theology, sociology, and communications are all fields with significantly lower scores. I suspect intuitively, due to a number of reasons - mostly the analytical nature of the field and the mathematical rigor - that economists are significantly more intelligent than PhDs in many other fields. But probably not all fields, and maybe not even most. - Zac Gochenour [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Original Message - From: Stephen Miller [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Monday, December 15, 2003 10:40 am Subject: Economist IQ? I doubt anyone has hard data on this, but I'm wondering what people on this list would guess is the average IQ of Ph.D. economists? Would it be much different from the average IQ of Ph.D.s in general? -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
Me at the AEAs
Shameless self-promotion: I'll be subbing in for none other than Gary Becker this Saturday at the AEA meetings in San Diego. It will be at the 10:15 1/3 session on Competition chaired by Andrei Shleifer. Hope to see you there. Topic: Systematically Biased Beliefs About Cultural Competition, co-authored with Tyler Cowen. --Bryan
Oscar Political Business Cycle
The Political Business Cycle story has not fared well empirically in recent years (though Kevin Grier has done interesting work on Mexico's PBC). But it seems overwhelming in the Oscars. It seems like roughly half of the big nominees get released in December. What gives? Is there any way to explain this other than Academy voters' amnesia? I guess there is a small intertemporal benefit - if you could win Best Picture of 2004 with a January 2004 release, or Best Picture of 2003 with a December 2003 release, the present value of the latter prize would presumably be higher. But can that one year's interest (presumably adjusted for a lower probability of winning due to tighter deadlines) explain the December lump?
Re: Oscar Political Business Cycle
But this wouldn't explain the clustering of *plausible prize-winners* (many of which are not big grossers) around Xmas. - Original Message - From: William Dickens [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Saturday, January 3, 2004 9:55 am Subject: Re: Oscar Political Business Cycle I thought the explanation for the grouping of releases around holidays was that that was when the box office was biggest. Why release movies at any other time? If you have a movie that isn't that great you release it at another time when the competition won't be as strong for first run box office. - - Bill Dickens William T. Dickens The Brookings Institution 1775 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20036 Phone: (202) 797-6113 FAX: (202) 797-6181 E-MAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED] AOL IM: wtdickens Bryan Caplan [EMAIL PROTECTED] 12/31/03 02:07AM The Political Business Cycle story has not fared well empirically in recent years (though Kevin Grier has done interesting work on Mexico's PBC). But it seems overwhelming in the Oscars. It seems like roughly half of the big nominees get released in December. What gives? Is there any way to explain this other than Academy voters' amnesia? I guess there is a small intertemporal benefit - if you could win Best Picture of 2004 with a January 2004 release, or Best Picture of 2003 with a December 2003 release, the present value of the latter prize would presumably be higher. But can that one year's interest (presumably adjusted for a lower probability of winning due to tighter deadlines) explain the December lump?
Women Don't Ask
I just read the well-reviewed *Women Don't Ask* by Babcock and Laschever. Main thesis: Women should bargain harder. It is frankly kind of silly. The whole book makes it sound like aggressive bargaining is a strictly dominant strategy, so women will definitely be better off if they do more of it. It never considers the obvious possibility that women will price themselves out of a job. Nor does it explore the interesting possibility that one reason female employees are doing so well in spite of obvious child-related drawbacks is precisely that employers know that they are less likely to demand more money. The book also tries to get women to bargain more aggressively in relationships. I think this is another case where feminist norms are likely to function as a price control - some women will get a better deal, but a lot of others will be unable to get married because their standards are too high. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
Excite Poll
I'm not the least surprised by these results: http://poll.excite.com/poll/home.jsp?cat_id=1 -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
divided government
Many smart libertarians I've talked to lately have embraced the view that divided government (especially Dem president and Rep Congress) yields the least un-libertarian outcome. Are they right, and if so, what's the theoretical explanation? -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
farm subsidies
I vaguely remember an earlier debate about farm subsidies and public opinion. A new study just came out finding that farm subsidies are equally popular in farm and non-farm states: A striking finding is that the public in farm states was not significantly different in their attitudes about farm subsidies. The poll included an oversample of the 17 states that receive the largest amounts of farm subsidies, excluding the metropolitan areas of California, Illinois and Texas. For more details: http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Economics/FarmPress_01_04.pdf http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Economics/FarmQnnaire_01_04.pdf -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
new paper
My new paper on the economics of mental illness, entitled The Economics of Szasz can now be downloaded from my webpage at: http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/bcaplan/szaszjhe.doc -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
Re: Siberia and Canada
Can any Canada experts weigh in? That includes all Canadians. Eric? fabio guillermo rojas wrote: Yes - evidence: the population of Canada is highly clustered around the border. I have hunch they would bolt the second the border was opened. Fabio On Thu, 8 Apr 2004, Bryan Caplan wrote: Question: If there were free migration between the U.S. and Canada, would Canada lose a lot of population to California, Florida, and other more desirable locations? Prof. Bryan Caplan -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
piece debunking growth-education link
Tyler Cowen at www.marginalrevolution.com alerted me to the following very interesting piece debunking the supposed causal connection between education and growth: http://www.spiked-online.com/Printable/000CA640.htm -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope this has taught you kids a lesson: kids never learn. --Chief Wiggum, *The Simpsons*
personal finances survey
There is a press release about high school students' low scores on this survey of personal finances, but I'm impressed by how well they did. Unlike beliefs about the economy, at least the modal answer on this survey is usually right! -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] But we must deplore and, so far as possible, overcome the evils of habitual newspaper reading. These evils are, chiefly, three: first, the waste of much time and mental energy in reading unimportant news and opinions, and premature, untrue, or imperfect accounts of important matters; second, the awakening of prejudices and the enkindling of passions through the partisan bias or commercial greed of newspaper managers; third, the loading of the mind with cheap literature and the development of an aversion for books and sustained thought. --Delos Wilcox, The American Newspaper (1900)
more on personal finances
The modal answer (given four choices) was right on the 31 substantive questions 74% of the time. The first or second most common answer was right 97% of the time. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] But we must deplore and, so far as possible, overcome the evils of habitual newspaper reading. These evils are, chiefly, three: first, the waste of much time and mental energy in reading unimportant news and opinions, and premature, untrue, or imperfect accounts of important matters; second, the awakening of prejudices and the enkindling of passions through the partisan bias or commercial greed of newspaper managers; third, the loading of the mind with cheap literature and the development of an aversion for books and sustained thought. --Delos Wilcox, The American Newspaper (1900)
Re: personal finances survey
Robert A. Book wrote: What's up with question 32? 52% male and 52% female? I think you have to look at the second column of numbers, the ones not in bold. Those add up, though I am confused about the first column. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] But we must deplore and, so far as possible, overcome the evils of habitual newspaper reading. These evils are, chiefly, three: first, the waste of much time and mental energy in reading unimportant news and opinions, and premature, untrue, or imperfect accounts of important matters; second, the awakening of prejudices and the enkindling of passions through the partisan bias or commercial greed of newspaper managers; third, the loading of the mind with cheap literature and the development of an aversion for books and sustained thought. --Delos Wilcox, The American Newspaper (1900)
the answer is...
The correlation between per-capita state income and Kerry vote percentage is +.70. That makes Bill by far the most accurate of our guessers. If you do a bivariate regression, every +$1000 of per cap income is associated with +1.48 percentage points of Kerry share. Scatter plot with regression line is attached. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] But we must deplore and, so far as possible, overcome the evils of habitual newspaper reading. These evils are, chiefly, three: first, the waste of much time and mental energy in reading unimportant news and opinions, and premature, untrue, or imperfect accounts of important matters; second, the awakening of prejudices and the enkindling of passions through the partisan bias or commercial greed of newspaper managers; third, the loading of the mind with cheap literature and the development of an aversion for books and sustained thought. --Delos Wilcox, The American Newspaper (1900) inline: kervote.jpg
blogging
For the next month, I am going to be guest blogging at Econlog, the Liberty Fund website's blog. Expect to see me post three times per week. The URL is: http://econlog.econlib.org -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] But we must deplore and, so far as possible, overcome the evils of habitual newspaper reading. These evils are, chiefly, three: first, the waste of much time and mental energy in reading unimportant news and opinions, and premature, untrue, or imperfect accounts of important matters; second, the awakening of prejudices and the enkindling of passions through the partisan bias or commercial greed of newspaper managers; third, the loading of the mind with cheap literature and the development of an aversion for books and sustained thought. --Delos Wilcox, The American Newspaper (1900)
blogging
FYI: I'm going to be a regular blogger on Econlib http://econlog.econlib.org/ for at least a year. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] [M]uch of the advice from the parenting experts is flapdoodle. But surely the advice is grounded in research on children's development? Yes, from the many useless studies that show a correlation between the behavior of parents and the behavior of their biological children and conclude that parenting shapes the child, as if there were no such thing as heredity. --Steven Pinker, *The Blank Slate*
Re: Laffer Curve
There are lots of reasonable objections to raising taxes. You can decide that you don't think that tax revenue is put to good uses. You can believe that ethically taxation is theft. But there is no reasonable argument (at least none that I've seen) that tax increases in any range we've seen in this country don't raise revenue. - - Bill Dickens I'll bite. I completely agree with Bill in the short-term. Higher taxes raise revenue. But I also have a sneaking suspicion that higher tax rates in the long run may hurt growth so much that the present value of taxes would be higher if rates were lower. Just talking to people who grew up in Scandinavia, they frequently tell me that high taxes had no effect on the older generation. But (combined with the welfare state) they raised a generation of shiftless, no-ambition slackers. If the U.S. had Swedish-level taxes during the 80's, I suspect it would have been a far less entrepreneurial and innovative economy in the 90's. Econometric evidence? As far as I know, there's none either way, and for obvious reasons. But it makes sense to me. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://econlog.econlib.org [M]uch of the advice from the parenting experts is flapdoodle. But surely the advice is grounded in research on children's development? Yes, from the many useless studies that show a correlation between the behavior of parents and the behavior of their biological children and conclude that parenting shapes the child, as if there were no such thing as heredity. --Steven Pinker, *The Blank Slate*
Dickens on the Laffer Curve
I think Bill accidentally sent this to me privately instead of the list. Subject: Re: Laffer Curve From: William Dickens [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Wed, 20 Apr 2005 16:31:33 -0400 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] I'll bite. I completely agree with Bill in the short-term. Higher taxes raise revenue. But I also have a sneaking suspicion that higher tax rates in the long run may hurt growth so much that the present value of taxes would be higher if rates were lower. And I have a sneaking suspicion that more equitable distributions of income lead to less social conflict and rent seeking and lead to higher growth. Unlike you I can point to some theoretical and empirical studies that back my suspicion up (though I wouldn't bet my life on it being true). My point is that any of us can have sneaking suspicions. Dueling sneaking suspicions aren't going to bring us any closer to agreement. Just talking to people who grew up in Scandinavia, they frequently tell me that high taxes had no effect on the older generation. But (combined with the welfare state) they raised a generation of shiftless, no-ambition slackers. If the U.S. had Swedish-level taxes during the 80's, I suspect it would have been a far less entrepreneurial and innovative economy in the 90's. Two thoughts. First, the empirical studies on the effects of distribution of income on growth suggest no such effect. But I have no idea how robust those results are and wouldn't be at all surprised if they allowed for some range of results if properly done. Personally I have little doubt that the various forms of welfare (not progressive taxation) do tend to destroy initiative among some parts of the population. I've had too much personal experience with smart, talented people getting caught up in welfare programs and not going anywhere not to suspect that this is a serious draw back of such programs. That's why I very much like to tightly time limit any generous welfare program. However, I have to admit that I don't know that there just aren't slackers in the world (some talented and bright) who would find parents, friends or some other less desirable way to support themselves if there weren't welfare programs. I don't know of any cross national study of long term welfare participation (OECD might have some aggregate study of this). The European Community Household Panel could be combined with the GSOP and the PSID or SIPP to good end to do such a study. Any graduate students out there looking for a thesis topic? - - Bill Dickens William T. Dickens The Brookings Institution 1775 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20036 Phone: (202) 797-6113 FAX: (202) 797-6181 E-MAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED] AOL IM: wtdickens -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://econlog.econlib.org [M]uch of the advice from the parenting experts is flapdoodle. But surely the advice is grounded in research on children's development? Yes, from the many useless studies that show a correlation between the behavior of parents and the behavior of their biological children and conclude that parenting shapes the child, as if there were no such thing as heredity. --Steven Pinker, *The Blank Slate*
Re: Dickens on the Laffer Curve
Yes. It suffers a bit from the historians' If you don't have a document, it didn't happen bias, but it's good. Anton Sherwood wrote: Speaking of Communism, is The Black Book worth having? I saw several copies yesterday at a secondhand store in San Leandro, marked about $8 if memory serves. -- Anton Sherwood, http://www.ogre.nu/ -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://econlog.econlib.org [M]uch of the advice from the parenting experts is flapdoodle. But surely the advice is grounded in research on children's development? Yes, from the many useless studies that show a correlation between the behavior of parents and the behavior of their biological children and conclude that parenting shapes the child, as if there were no such thing as heredity. --Steven Pinker, *The Blank Slate*
Szasz prize
I must gleefully report that I am one of the winners of the 2005 Thomas S. Szasz Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Cause of Civil Liberties, largely for my article The Economics of Szasz: Preferences, Constraints, and Mental Illness. The other prize-winner is individualist feminist Joan Kennedy Taylor. There will be an award ceremony at the Cato Institute on September 21, 6:00-7:30 P.M. The event is open to the public, and a lot of my friends will be coming - probably including some of your favorite bloggers. If you live in the D.C. area, it would be great chance to meet in person. Hope to see you there! -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://econlog.econlib.org [M]uch of the advice from the parenting experts is flapdoodle. But surely the advice is grounded in research on children's development? Yes, from the many useless studies that show a correlation between the behavior of parents and the behavior of their biological children and conclude that parenting shapes the child, as if there were no such thing as heredity. --Steven Pinker, *The Blank Slate*
ATTENTION: Szasz Prize Change of Venue
I was just notified that the Szasz Prize ceremony has been moved from the Cato Institute in D.C. to the Harper Library at the GMU Law School in Arlington. The day and time remain the same: September 21, 6 PM. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://econlog.econlib.org [M]uch of the advice from the parenting experts is flapdoodle. But surely the advice is grounded in research on children's development? Yes, from the many useless studies that show a correlation between the behavior of parents and the behavior of their biological children and conclude that parenting shapes the child, as if there were no such thing as heredity. --Steven Pinker, *The Blank Slate*
