Tag: EconTalk

Dana Gioia on Learning, Poetry, and Studying with Miss Bishop

EconTalk | 15 February 2021 | 1h 35m | Listen Later | iTunes
Interview with Dana Gioia about his book Studying with Miss Bishop. Discusses the craft of being a poet, the business world, mentorship, loss, why poetry no longer seems to matter, and how it might begin to matter again.

Lamorna Ash on Dark, Salt, Clear

EconTalk | 8 February 2021 | 1h 14m | Listen Later | iTunes
Interview with Lamorna Ash about her book Dark, Salt, Clear. Ash leaves London and moves to the small fishing village of Newlyn, near where her mother grew up on the Cornish coast. In Newlyn, everything revolves around fishing. Ash gets herself a bunk on a trawler and quickly learns how to gut fish with sharp knives on a rocking boat in the middle of the night. And so much more.

Sowell on Economic Facts and Fallacies

EconTalk | 28 February 2008 | 1h 06m | Listen Later | iTunes
Interview with Thomas Sowell about the ideas in his book Economic Facts and Fallacies. Discusses the misleading nature of measured income inequality, CEO pay, why nations grow or stay poor, the role of intellectuals and experts in designing public policy, and immigration.

Gary Shiffman on the Economics of Violence

EconTalk | 18 January 2021 | 0h 59m | Listen Later | iTunes
Interview with Gary Shiffman about his book The Economics of Violence: How Behavioral Science Can Transform our View of Crime, Insurgency, and Terrorism. Shiffman argues that we should view terrorism, insurgency, and crime as being less about ideology and more about personal expression and entrepreneurship. He argues that framing these problems with economics gives better tools for fighting them.

Michael Blastland on the Hidden Half

EconTalk | 28 December 2020 | 1h 14m | Listen Later | iTunes
Interview with Michael Blastland about his book The Hidden Half: How the World Conceals its Secrets. Argues that the deeper you delve into science, medicine, astrophysics – pick a topic – the more you realize there is a lot we don’t understand and can’t explain. Suggests we would all do well to stop pretending that everything is knowable and every problem solvable.

Katherine Levine Einstein on Neighborhood Defenders

EconTalk | 14 December 2020 | 1h 02m | Listen Later | iTunes
Interview with Katherine Levine Einstein about her book Neighborhood Defenders: Participatory Politics and America’s Housing Crisis. Focuses on the ability of local residents to use the zoning and permit process to prevent development of housing or to reduce the amount of housing that can be built, which lifts house prices.

While presented as a discussion about American housing it applies just as much to New Zealand and other countries where planning processes throttle supply.

Walter Williams on Life, Liberty and Economics

EconTalk | 16 October 2006 | 1h 03m | Listen Later | iTunes
Walter E. Williams has died at 84 (NY Times obituary). This 2006 interview discusses his early days as an economist, his controversial view of the Civil War, the insights of Adam Smith and Friedrich Hayek, and some deep but simple economic principles.

Virginia Postrel on Textiles and the Fabric of Civilization

EconTalk | 16 November 2020 | 1h 06m | Listen Later | iTunes
Interview with Virginia Postrel about her book The Fabric of Civilization and How Textiles Made the World. Tells the fascinating story behind the clothes we wear and everything that goes into producing them throughout history. The history of textiles, Postrel argues, is a good way of understanding the history of the world.