~marginalrevolution | Bookmarks (546)

Here is the NYT announcement. I hope they consider Noah Smith as the obvious replacement… The post Paul Krugman retires as Times columnist appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.         CommentsIn reply to ABC. Noah's driveby style is perfect for Twitter, ... by StendellI'm laughing at all the Trump Poodles and Reactionary ... by Donald PretariNoah would not be a replacement; he would be a...

1. AI video for training embodied agents? 2. “She uses the hashtags “hemmaflickvän” and “hemmafru” (Swedish for stay-at-home girlfriend and housewife) and describes herself as a “soft girl” – an identity that embraces a softer, more feminine way of living rather than focussing on a career.”  Link here. 3. The firm as tax shelter. 4. […] The post Friday assorted links appeared first on...

New paper in Science, A single mutation in bovine influenza H5N1 hemagglutinin switches specificity to human receptors. If that isn’t clear enough, here is the editor’s summary: In 2021, a highly pathogenic influenza H5N1 clade 2.3.4.4b virus was detected in North America that is capable of infecting a diversity of avian species, marine mammals, and […] The post You Have Been Warned appeared first...

It was so much fun we ran over and did about ninety minutes instead of the usual hour.  Here is the audio, video, and transcript.  Here is part of the episode summary: Tyler sat down with Stephen to discuss the state of Russian Buddhism today, how shamanism persists in modern Siberia, whether Siberia might ever […] The post My excellent Conversation with Stephen Kotkin...

That is the theme of a new Substack by Pieter Garicano, here is one excerpt: These answers, according to a recent paper by Olivier Coste and Yann Coatanlem, two French investors, miss the point: the reason more capital doesn’t flow towards high-leverage ideas in Europe is because the price of failure is too high. Coste estimates that, […] The post Why are no trillion dollar companies...

1. A corporate comms joke. 2. These South Korean Catholic priests should be bloggers. 3. Zero-based regulation by James Broughel.  And from Alex Adams. 4. RLHF propaganda posters, funny stuff. 5. Scientific breakthroughs of 2024. 6. Weather forecasting breakthroughs with AI. 7. Scott Sumner on Cowen and Tabarrok on money.  The key I think is […] The post Thursday assorted links appeared first on...

Bahala says each of his calls at Concentrix is monitored by an artificial intelligence (AI) program that checks his performance. He says his volume of calls has increased under the AI’s watch. At his previous call center job, without an AI program, he answered at most 30 calls per eight-hour shift. Now, he gets through […] The post Before AI replaces you, it will...

That is the topic of my latest Bloomberg column, here is one bit: Fortunately, there is new research. We have entered the age where innovative methods of measurement, such as computer vision and deep learning, can reveal how American life has changed. Researchers at the National Bureau of Economic Research compiled footage of four urban public […] The post Using AI to analyze changes in...

This is very interesting, and I think a world first: a local government in China has just sold its sky, literally. This is the government of Pingyin County, Jinan, Shandong Province who sold for 924 million yuan (approximately $130 million) a 30-year concession to operate and maintain its low-altitude economic projects to a company called […] The post China markets in everything appeared first...

1. Acemoglu on liberalism. 2. These names are not amongst the nine billion names of God. 3. Russ Roberts podcast with the translator of Life and Fate. 4. The Baby Money Index.  Qatar is number three. 5. Lessons from working in an art gallery, excellent post recommended. 6. Korean martial law and trading opportunities. The post Wednesday assorted links appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION....

Info finance is Vitalik Buterin’s term for combining things like prediction markets and news. Indeed, a prediction market like Polymarket is “a betting site for the participants and a news site for everyone else.” Here’s an incredible instantiation of the idea from Packy McCormick. As I understand it, betting odds are drawn from Polymarket, context […] The post Info Finance has a Future! appeared...

A unilateral pause won’t be as helpful as Musk and Ramaswamy seem to think. Many businesses, especially big businesses, have to certify their legal compliance to government agencies—most notably via financial reports to the Securities and Exchange Commission, where false certifications can trigger criminal penalties under Sarbanes-Oxley. Few will feel comfortable ignoring rules that are […] The post Nicholas Bagley on DOGE appeared first...

It is now plausible to envision scenarios in which global demand for crude oil falls to essentially zero by the end of this century, driven by improvements in clean energy technologies, adoption of stringent climate policies, or both. This paper asks what such a demand decline, when anticipated, might mean for global oil supply. One […] The post The end of oil? appeared first...

Stanford Review: …Several freshmen I have talked to have bemoaned their mandatory COLLEGE classes that are contract graded, meaning that students will receive an A if their work is turned in on time regardless of quality. One frosh even told me that all of her first quarter classes are contract graded. How does this set students up […] The post Interview with Jonathan Levin, economist and...

1. Are humble scientists trusted more? 2. I thought this was hilarious (you won’t), that just shows how far gone I am. 3. The labor market regulatory culture that is Belgium. 4. FBI markets in everything. 5. Without weight loss drugs, Danish gdp growth would be about zero. 6. Chicago’s state capacity crisis. 7. The […] The post Tuesday assorted links appeared first on...

Today on the MR Podcast Tyler and I discuss the “New Monetary Economics”. Here’s the opening TABARROK: Today we’re going to be talking about the new monetary economics. Now, perhaps the first thing to say is that it’s not new anymore. The new monetary economics refers to a set of claims and ideas about monetary economics […] The post Marginal Revolution Podcast–The New Monetary Economics!...

Definitive, this is by far the best biography of Mondrian we have or are likely to get.  I am a longstanding Mondrian fan, and have read much about him, but learned new things on virtually every page.  The book is also fun, here is one excerpt: Initially Mondrian did not respond at all [to a […] The post The Nicholas Fox Weber biography of...

Poor Things The Delinquents [Los Delincuentes], from Argentina, tragicomedy The Teacher’s Lounge All of Us Strangers Anselm The Zone of Interest Smoke Sauna Sisterhood You Can Call Me Bill Lynch/Oz Miracle Worker, that is a very old Arthur Penn movie, about Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan.  Interesting throughout, and some parts were stupendously good, especially […] The post Best movies of 2024 appeared first...

The most dismal stockpickers in the cabinet included the minister for health, labour and welfare, the arm of government ultimately responsible for the $1.45tn Government Pension Investment Fund, the world’s largest pool of retirement savings. Here is more from the FT, via the excellent Samir Varma. The post Japan fact of the day appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.         CommentsIn reply to EdR. How...

1. I am usually loathe to turn MR space over to negative attacks on others, but every now and then I feel there is a real contribution to be made.  I have been saying for years that Michael Pettis flat out does not understand international economics, and yet somehow he is treated as an authority […] The post Monday assorted links appeared first on...

The case is straightforward: Google pays firms like Apple billions of dollars to make its search engine the default. (N.B. I would rephrase this as Apple charges Google billions of dollars to make its search engine the default–a phrasing which matters if you want to understand what is really going on. But set that aside […] The post Some Simple Economics of the Google...

After six games the match is tied.  Observers agree that the games have been of low quality and mostly not very interesting.  Both players have been reluctant to exploit potential opportunities.  If you don’t already know, Ding has been suffering from some version of “mental illness” (by his own account), and Gukesh, while extremely talented, […] The post The show so far, Ding vs....

John Ma, Polis: A New History of the Ancient Greek City-State from the Early Iron Age to the End of Antiquity.  I didn’t read much of this book, mostly because it is too good for me to understand just how good it is.  Que triste!  It is like those GPT “advanced reasoning” answers that also […] The post What I’ve been reading appeared first...

What to see, what to do, and where to eat?  I thank you all in advance for your suggestions… The post Cochin (Kochi) bleg appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.         CommentsI have nostalgia of the great coffee I had at the canteen ... by VictorIn reply to commentor. As of August 2024, news reported that ... by SalimVisit Vallarpadathamma (the Basilica), which celebrated its...