In November 2021, I wrote a post called ‘The Truth About Inflation’. At the time, inflation fears were heating up. And as usual, mainstream economists were missing the bus. Sure, economists pointed to the consumer price index and said, “Look, it’s going up!” But they didn’t look...

If an unmarked package arrived at your door, how would you figure out what was inside? The catch is that you cannot open it. As a social scientist, I deal with this ‘black-box’ problem all the time. I (metaphorically) watch people go to work at firms. And I see them come home with income....

There’s nothing like waking up to a boatload of Twitter scorn. It’s refreshing, in a masochistic sort of way. Some backstory. After most of my blog posts, I put the charts on Twitter, usually with a provocative caption. (It’s more fun that way.) So after last week’s review of Cory...

Economists are not known for their literary imaginations. Flip through any economics textbook and you’ll find a barrage of terms like the ‘Philips curve’ and the ‘Fisher effect’. The jargon is simple enough — empirical relations are usually named after the person who discovered them....

Think of this question as a sword — a sharp piece of steel that cuts through bullshit. In this post, we’ll use it to slice through business-press bullshit about the stock market. You know the stuff — the ubiquitous puff pieces that gush about rising stock prices, as though they benefit...

Have you ever wondered what it takes to become a billionaire? Do you need rare genius? Exceptional acumen? Miraculous foresight? An uncompromising work ethic? On all four counts, the answer is no. It turns out that to become a billionaire, what you really need is the right social setting. You...

There’s an old joke that economics is too important to be left to economists. In the same vein, I think rich people are too important to be left to the self-help industry. Yes, the popular appeal of you-can-get-rich-too books is obvious. But what’s not obvious is why so few social scientists...

The rich get richer. It’s a phrase that packs a lot of punch. It’s potent rhetoric, yet surprisingly accurate at describing how rising inequality plays out. Of course, there’s nothing inevitable about the rich getting richer. We just happen to live in an age of growing corporate despotism....

During the pandemic, the world’s billionaires increased their net worth to unprecedented historical heights. This was an impressive feat for the world’s richest, who took to celebrations by launching themselves into outer space, hosted factory mega-raves, and perhaps more prudently sailed...

Within the context of the recent financial crisis, the causes and implications of mounting levels of household indebtedness have begun to be examined from a variety of angles: Why have nations differed so drastically, historically speaking, in terms of the level of debt that their citizens...