Sound Economics

During a lecture about food, my French professor mentioned that Metropolitan Market’s displays make it difficult for her to avoid spending more than necessary at the grocery store. I too am guilty of purchasing many impulse buys at the Met, especially if I shop while hungry. The bakery greets guests at both doors, the cheese aisle sits against the entrance wall, and customers must pass the hot foods and already prepared meals in order to reach the produce, meat, and seafood. The Met creates the perfect atmosphere for impulse buys. Grocery stores lay out products in configurations that optimize consumer Continue reading Metropolitan Market, Supermarket Layouts, and Impulse Purchases→

While taxation would be a key tool in enabling the government to curb the carbon emissions of the US, there will be lots of pushback. History shows that Americans are always resistant to new taxation, so the process of creating successful pollution controls could take some time. For some, time is of the essence and alternatives to taxes are being employed. For the Ski industry, climate change is the biggest threat to their ongoing profitability. It has been projected that the climate will change so significantly that skiing will no longer be possible in the Colorado Rockies as soon as Continue reading The Key to Ending Climate Change: Making it Profitable→

Recently I logged onto Facebook to be greeted with a new page named, “Boycott Magoo’s.”  Magoo’s is a local college bar, famous for five dollar pitchers of beer that University of Puget Sound students would flock to go buy on Thursday nights.  Recently however, Magoo’s has decided to increase their prices by $1.50 so that a pitcher now costs a hefty $6.50. Students appalled by this stormed to social media to take action and posts followed such as the following which was found on the Facebook page by a fellow student, “Magoos has begun what will be their long reign Continue reading The Economics of Magoo’s→

While it’s been 6 years since the Governor of Kansas, Sam Brownback, embarked on what is now known as the “Kansas Experiment”,  its impact is still being felt by the economy and politics of Kansas today. Given the outcome, the real question is, was Kansas moving in a downward economic trend before the tax cut or was the tax cut the cause? The answer is: it was. I wish I could have drawn it out to a surprise conclusion or at least had some ambiguity to work with, but it is clear from the downgrading of the state credit rating Continue reading The Kansas Experiment: Was Kansas Going to Fail Anyway?→

The choice to vote can be seen as a voluntary contribution mechanism.  This isn’t a perfect perspective, but it hold the basic concept. The payoff would be amount of democracy or a leader that accurately depicts their representatives.  From this perspective our voting system could be considered very successful. Convincing a little less than half a nation to contribute to a VCM game is impressive. clarification: the nash equilibrium isn’t zero.  As less and less people vote the more your vote matters, eventually surpassing the cost of going out and voting. Why do so many people vote?  In the recent Continue reading The Paradox of Voting (part 1)→

With a little more than a month until the Brexit deadline, and without a British exit plan in place, the world has its eyes set on Britain, the European Union, and how this whole situation is going to play out come march 29th. Britain is historic for maintaining the largest banking sector in Europe, home to banks such as HSBC and Standard Chartered, which influence over 5 trillion pounds. Since Britain announced Brexit in 2014 nearly 1 trillion pounds have flowed from the banking headquarters in the UK to other countries in the EU for the purpose of spreading the Continue reading Na Trioblóidí “The Troubles” that come with Brexit→