605. What Do People Do All Day?

Existing drugs can sometimes be repurposed to treat rare diseases. But making that match can be hard — and the financial incentives are weak. Guest host Steve Levitt tries to solve the puzzle. SOURCES: Chris Snyder, professor of economics at Dartmouth College. David Fajgenbaum, c ...  Show more

When Richard Thaler first published Nudge, the world was just starting to believe in his brand of behavioral economics. In this 2021 episode, we ask: How has nudge theory held up in the face of a global financial meltdown, a pandemic, and other existential crises? SOURCES:Richard ...  Show more

David Autor took his first economics class at 29 years old. Now he’s one of the central academics studying the labor market. The M.I.T. economist and Steve dissect the impact of technology on labor, spar on A.I., and discuss why economists can sometimes be oblivious.

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Abby, Patrick, and Dan welcome writer, critic, and scholar Moira Weigel, co-founder of Logic magazine and co-editor with Ben Tarnoff of Voices of the Valley: Tech Workers Talk About What They Do And How They Do It. Moira introduces listeners to the history an ...

Stefanie Stantcheva’s approach seemed like career suicide. In fact, it won her the John Bates Clark Medal. She talks to fellow winner Steve Levitt about why she uses methods that most of the profession dismisses — and what she’s found that can’t be learned any other way.

Why does the U.S. use Fahrenheit when Celsius is better? Would you quit your job if a coin flip told you to? And how do you get an entire country to drive on the other side of the road?