‘Nudging’ Goes to College

Classical economics went wrong at its first turn, say Cass Sunstein and Richard Thaler. Man is not homo economicus, the rationally calculating actor that the dismal scientists from Adam Smith down through Milton Friedman supposed our species to be. No, we are emotionally driven, contextually influenced, socially conditioned: Humans, not Econs.
Sunstein and Thaler famously lay out their Human vs. Econ divide in Nudge, their 2008 bestseller that popularized a new sub-discipline, behavioral economics. Behavioral economists recognize that people make hasty decisions for non-rational reasons, relying on rules of thumb, heuristics, and past experiences that bias their judgment and prevent them from maximizing their gains. “Unlike Econs,” say Sunstein and Thaler, “Humans predictably err.” And if you can predict what errors they will make, you can wall off temptations and set Humans up to succeed.


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Millennials: Obama Thinks You’re Stupid

We interrupt the collapse of the U.S. health insurance system to announce that Colorado’s health exchange did something dumb. ✧ Granted, the Front Range brain trust has set a low bar for itself, what with the shivering co-eds they paid to walk around Denver in their skivvies. And who could forget last month’s Brosurance ad featuring the dumbest, whitest seventh-year undergrads in the state keg-standing their nation to insolvency? ✧ One would think that the Colorado Consumer Health Initiative would have watched a few Mad Men eps before trying their hands at another campaign. Au contraire. ✧ Worried that the bro-only focus left out the ladies, the site DoYouGotInsurance.com (actual name) decided to make young women look dumb too.

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U.S. Rep. David Wu loses staffers, political team amid complaints

OREGONLIVE.COM (The Oregonian), 1/18/2011 by Janie Har (Hat tip: D'Ann Mathews) - Since the November election, U.S. Rep. David Wu, D-Ore., has lost at least six staffers plus the leadership of a veteran campaign team that guided him to a seventh term amid complaints about his public behavior. Read more at Oregon Live... Read More......