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Jeremy Horpedahl's entries
Affordable Housing: The Free Market Way
2008.07.18 Friday 1:10 A GMT-05
In Arlington County, one of the major political parties has proposed allowing property owners more discretion over what they do with their own property. The proposal in question involves allowing home owners to rent out part of their property, in spi
The Price of Milk: It's Udderly Unchanged (Actually Down a Little)
2008.07.15 Tuesday 11:40 P GMT-05
Dr. Horwitz links to a local news story on rising food prices for which he was interviewed. As one would expect from local consumer reporting, there is much talk about how people are suffering and having to cut back, but the story is light on facts.
Comments/Trackback (2-0)
Airlines and Oil Speculation
2008.07.10 Thursday 9:47 A GMT-05
I think I've figured out why the major airlines never seem to turn a profit for very long: they don't understand how markets work. Specifically, how oil futures markets work. I just received an email from Northwest Airlines titled "Help
Target Audience Fail
2008.07.05 Saturday 12:24 P GMT-05
The ACLU really seems to have missed the mark with their stance on the 2nd Amendment. Many posts on their blog have zero comments, with basically none having more than 10 comments. Except for their post on the recent Heller decision, which has so fa
Killer Tomatoes, Or Maybe Not
2008.07.01 Tuesday 4:50 P GMT-05
In the tradition of last week's post on news items, the NY Times (and many other sources) are reporting on that the great tomato salmonella outbreak of 2008 may have nothing to do with tomatoes. What is the real culprit? Well, no one really knows
News Items That Do Not Surprise Me
2008.06.24 Tuesday 8:33 P GMT-05
In light of the Tom Chalko affair last week (among many other news items), I am not shocked by the following two retractions. First, the "lost tribe" of the Amazon that wasn't so lost (via LRC). They do exist, but the back story was n
Rounding Bias, and Some Nudges
2008.06.19 Thursday 11:24 A GMT-05
Is there a cognitive bias regarding round numbers? A quick search turns up nothing, but maybe someone can help me out. I am referring to the uncertainty created by denoting numbers in a round fashion, typically ending with a zero or sometimes five. H
Is Global Warming Causing More Earthquakes, or More Earthquake Recording Stations?
2008.06.18 Wednesday 9:47 A GMT-05
It is sometimes claimed that economists have nothing to add to the climate change (formerly known as "global warming") debate. After all, what do they know about climate science? Well, I think I found one position for them: fact checker for
Category: Science Journalism
Regulatory Capture Becomes "Market" Failure: 1908 and 2008
2008.06.14 Saturday 11:15 A GMT-05
Alex Tabarrok links to and criticizes a recent article by Paul Krugman on food safety. Krugman claims we are "back in The Jungle," while Tabarrok disagrees. Neither provides convincing evidence to support their claims, but it is not clear
Just Declare Victory: The Mueller Effect
2008.06.13 Friday 5:39 P GMT-05
I'm about ready to just declare victory on the whole public opinion research debate (hey, it worked fine for Bush). Today Caplan discusses a recent Gallup poll on gas prices. When asked if they wanted price controls, a slim majority (53%) of Am
I Get Email: Decisive Vote Edition
2008.06.09 Monday 3:53 P GMT-05
One of the consequences of being a local delegate for one of the major parties is that you get put on everyone's email list. But I did get something beneficial out of this: I think I've figured out why Republicans have been losing a lot of el
Category: Politics Philosophy
Empiricism in Economics vs. Medical Science: The Case of Marijuana
2008.06.04 Wednesday 10:50 A GMT-05
My last post concerned the confusion between correlation and causation, and this one does as well.First, a few sentences on methodology in economics. While I think Milton Friedman went too far in his influential writings on positive economics, I also
Does Your Neighborhood Make You Fat?
2008.06.03 Tuesday 10:29 A GMT-05
The wrong way to answer it - correlation (seen on Freakonomics):The study found a strong and direct relationship between the RFEI of the area ["bad" food sellers / "good" food sellers] in which someone lives and their likelihood o
Are Immigration Trends New? The Use and Abuse of Data
2008.05.19 Monday 9:58 A GMT-05
Radley Balko points to a column by Kathleen Parker on "Full-Blooded Americans." The implication seems to be that "full-blooded Americans" (whoever they may be) should vote for McCain over Obama, apparently because Obama doesn'
Undergrad Public Choice, Summer 2008
2008.05.15 Thursday 5:29 P GMT-05
Starting next week, I will be teaching a month-long course on Public Choice. Any comments on the syllabus would be appreciated (the sooner, the better). It can be found at:http://jeremy.horpedahl.googlepages.com/PublicChoice_Summer2008.pdf For the fi
What Does the Public "Really Want"?
2008.05.14 Wednesday 10:57 P GMT-05
Can we, as social scientists, know what the voting public really wants in terms of public policy? Can public opinion surveys enlighten this line of research? I answer these questions respectively as "uhhh, maybe" and "yes, to a limited
Confirmation Bias on Sports Analogies
2008.04.13 Sunday 12:28 P GMT-05
For those familiar with one my minor research areas, this will make perfect sense. Or, at least, my amusement will: Rawls was a big baseball fan [via MR].
Category: Philosophy Culture
Would Adam Smith Want His House Saved?
2008.04.10 Thursday 11:35 A GMT-05
Even economists are a special interest: "Top economists call on city chiefs to save Adam Smith's house" [via DoL].
A Simple, Stupid Solution to the "Torture Question"
2008.04.02 Wednesday 12:47 P GMT-05
Should government officials be allowed to torture people in order to obtain crucial information? A common hypothetical example is a terrorist allegedly knowing the location of a nuclear bomb in a major metropolitan area. If he indeed has the informat
The Orange Line: Pointing Out the Obvious
2008.03.31 Monday 5:23 P GMT-05
Today, Lew Rockwell links to a post by "Former Beltway Wonk" on the Orange Line of the DC Metro. FBW has covered the Orange Line before (note the context). While Rockwell is kind enough to say that everything is not evil along the OL, &q
Category: Politics Philosophy
Pet Public Choice: Special Interests or Rational Irrationality?
2008.02.27 Wednesday 12:32 P GMT-05
The City of Los Angeles has now passed a law forcing pets to be sterilized at four months of age. I guess it's about externalities from irresponsible pet owners and the horror over pets being euthanized (apparently it's better that they wer
Smoking Bans May Increase Drunk Driving Fatalities
2008.02.11 Monday 12:05 P GMT-05
The paper is called "Drunk driving after the passage of smoking bans in bars" and is forthcoming in the Journal of Public Economics. The authors, Adams and Cotti, find a link between smoking bans and drunk driving fatalities that is robust
Allies in the War on "The War on Earmarks"
2008.02.06 Wednesday 1:57 P GMT-05
Apparently, President Bush declared another war recently, this time on earmarks. I've also declared my own war on porkbusting. Thankfully, I have a few allies in the fight. Ramesh Ponnuru has been one such ally. Now I can add the editorial board
Stephen Colbert: Anarcho-Capitalist
2008.01.26 Saturday 6:58 P GMT-05
Here's a sports analogy I can go along with, from Stephen Colbert's I Am America (And So Can You!) (p. 73):RULES OF THE GAME: Sports contain a lot of rules, and I'm not a big fan of "rules," especially when it comes to sports. T
Category: Politics Philosophy
Why Don't They Hate Luxembourg?
2008.01.22 Tuesday 1:54 P GMT-05
You might say, it is the question. Do "they" hate the United States because we are the "freest nation in the world"? Well, according to the 2008 Index of Economic Freedom, the United States is not the freest nation in the world. W