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Essays

Long reads on how we actually think, decide and live.

Ideas

Rationality is a human endeavour

What economics, psychology and everyday life can teach us about making better decisions.

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Ideas

The memory of the group chat

The cost is obvious, the benefit is diffuse, and so the benefit loses.

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Essays

A short history of the borrowed book

The story we tell afterwards is tidier than the choice we made at the time.

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Ideas

Envy is a social bet on the future

The mind is built for a different world. It copes remarkably well with this one.

Illustration of a bare tree over a faint grid, overlaid with rust-red, pale blue and black-spotted circles
Ideas

Restraint is a expensive argument

It looks like a flaw in the person. Mostly it is a feature of the situation.

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Rationality

A short history of the honest mistake

The story we tell afterwards is tidier than the choice we made at the time.

A lone figure climbing a pale stone staircase towards an arched window filled with light
Ideas

Envy is a small kind of hope

The cost is obvious, the benefit is diffuse, and so the benefit loses.

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Ideas

What the shortcut teaches us about regret

Economists have a model. The rest of us have a Tuesday.

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Ideas

In praise of the deadline

What feels like a preference is often just a default nobody questioned.

A lone figure climbing a pale stone staircase towards an arched window filled with light
Ideas

Why we keep score

Economists have a model. The rest of us have a Tuesday.

Illustration of a bare tree over a faint grid, overlaid with rust-red, pale blue and black-spotted circles
Ideas

The loyalty of the weather forecast

The mind is built for a different world. It copes remarkably well with this one.

Illustration of a head in profile facing two overlapping rust-red circles and a cluster of thin vertical lines
Psychology

Doubt is a slow habit

We are far better at explaining our choices than at making them.

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Ideas worth reading. Every week.

Essays, data and ideas on economics, rationality and why we do what we do.

No spam. Just thoughtful ideas.