Quotes of the day

The Economist does not understand marginal analysis.--Will Ambrosini

... most philosophies that frown on reproduction don't survive.--Darwin Catholic

... international labor standards and product boycotts may delay the ultimate eradication of child labor.--Matthias Doepke, Fabrizio Zilibotti

Students do not find professor-specific explanations to be very satisfactory.--Michael, an economics Ph.D. candidate

However, consideration of the ratings for "reward" (as opposed to pleasure) told a rather different story, with "work" now the top scorer, and "time with children" not far behind.--White & Dolan

Hard times whet the appetite for survival stories.--Judith Thurman

I keep saying that the sexy job in the next 10 years will be statisticians. And I’m not kidding.--Hal Varian

[Critics of high frequency trading have] an odd mix of views about the relevance of the short run. ... Even if you think HFT is bad, on an actual list of bad policies or practices in our world, would it be in the top million? Mostly it's a canvas on which to paint complaints about the continuing political and economic power of finance, but we shouldn't let that skew our judgment of the practice itself. ... When I read that HFT may give markets "a new, currently unknown set of emergent properties" I think buying opportunity.--Tyler Cowen

Rules matter because they determine whether we reach our collective potential. Bad rules divide us and diminish us. Good rules free us to collaborate and grow.--Paul Romer

[In the film The Tunnel] we see the tyranny of Communism in its most visceral form - "No one gets out of here alive."--Bryan Caplan

In fact, the entire mainstream economics profession is built around [experts controlling the economy]. When you write a paper, if you don't include a section on "policy implications" (i.e, how a benevolent technocrat would use the findings in your paper), the paper is considered incomplete.--Arnold Kling

The theory of aggregate output ... can nevertheless be much more easily adapted to the conditions of the totalitarian state ...--John Maynard Keynes

Transactions in the private sector are voluntary, but transactions with government are often not. So it seems to me that Progressives are at the totalitarian end of a totalitarianism continuum, and Libertarians are at the opposite end.--Les

Of course the Progressives are Totalitarian, and they don't really try to hide it. Afterall, the perfect society cannot be achieved without total control. At present they are constrained by what remains of liberal tradition, but they work constantly to remove the constraint, and this is what they mean by Progress.--Randy

The ad shows cartoons of everyone — from aliens to King Kong — urinating in the shower and ends with the slogan: “Pee in the shower! Save the Atlantic rainforest!”--Freakonomics

Aw, gee, I am sorry I described L[ibertarian], C[onservative], and P[rogressive] in terms of how each type thinks social problems should be addressed. That is such a "straw man" view of progressives. What progressives are all about is that unlike L's and C's who are cruel and mean, P's are really good people who really care. There, does that provide a description that the P's can relate to?--Arnold Kling

Harvard sent me admissions materials in Spanish along with a letter from their Hispanic union promising that I could be provided with inculturation opportunities and remedial English help if I came to Harvard. I didn't know any Spanish, so I had to get someone to read the letter to me. They never did send me any materials in English, even based on my SAT scores which were a fairly respectable 99th percentile. Apparently a 75th percentile Hispanic student was a lot more appealing to them than a 99th percentile white one.--Darwin Catholic