Category: 3-EconSometimeCommentary

In the past few months, the price of gold has gone way up – even hitting a new high last month at just over $2,400 per troy ounce.

Gold has long had a shiny quality to it, literally and in the marketplace. And we wondered, why is that?

Today on the show, we revisit a Planet Money classic episode: Why Gold? Jacob Goldstein and David Kestenbaum will peruse the periodic table of the elements with one goal in mind: to learn which element would really make the best money.

This classic Planet Money episode was part of the Planet Money Buys Gold series, and was hosted by Jacob Goldstein and David Kestenbaum.

This rerun was hosted by Sally Helm, produced by Willa Rubin, edited by Keith Romer, and fact-checked by Sierra Juarez. Alex Goldmark is our executive producer.

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On this episode of the Hayek Program Podcast, we continue the Living Better Together miniseries, featuring select authors of Living Better Together: Social Relations and Economic Governance in the Work of Ostrom and Zelizer (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023) and hosted by its coeditor, Stefanie Haeffele.

Joining us today are Carolina Dalla Chiesa and Crystal Dozier. Together, they mesh Ostrom and Zelizer’s approaches and highlight the importance of using interdisciplinary methods to better understand economic exchanges. Carolina focuses on the symbolic meanings of money and economic governance, while Crystal explores archaeological studies of non-market societies. They both articulate how their unique backgrounds and research focus contribute to a richer dialogue between economic sociology and institutional economics.

Carolina Dalla Chiesa is Assistant Professor of Cultural Economics and Organizations in the Department of Arts and Culture at Erasmus University Rotterdam. She is currently a Mercatus James Buchanan fellow. Check out her chapter, “‘Circuits of Commons’: Exploring the Connections Between Economic Lives and the Commons.”

Crystal Dozier is Associate Professor and Archaeologist in the Fairmount College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Wichita State University. She is an alum of the Mercatus Adam Smith Fellowship. Check out her chapter, “Testing Circuits of Commerce in the Distant Past: Archaeological Understandings of Social Relationships and Economic Lives.“

References: Virgil Henry Storr’s Understanding the Culture of Markets, Daniel K. Richter’s Facing East from Indian Country: A Native History of Early America, and Hans Abbing’s Why Are Artists Poor?: The Exceptional Economy of the Arts

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A fraternity’s budget includes broken windows, liability insurance, chili dog breakfasts, and the occasional $40,000 DJ. Zachary Crockett crashes the party.

 

• SOURCES:
  • Anthony Anderson, member of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity.
  • Danielle Logan, owner of Fraternity Management.
  • Charlie O’Neill, member of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity.
  • Stephen J. Schmidt, professor of economics at Union College.

 

• RESOURCES:
  • "If Student Deaths Won't Stop Fraternity Hazing, What Will?" by Ben Kesslen (NBC News, 2021).
  • "Social Animal House: The Economic And Academic Consequences Of Fraternity Membership," by Jack Mara, Lewis Davis, and Stephen Schmidt (Contemporary Economic Policy, 2018).
  • "How Fraternities Exacerbate Inequality," by Jillian Berman (MarketWatch, 2017).
  • "18 U.S. Presidents Were in College Fraternities," by Maria Konnikova (The Atlantic, 2014).
  • Inside Greek U.: Fraternities, Sororities, and the Pursuit of Pleasure, Power, and Prestige, by Alan D. DeSantis (2007).

 

• EXTRAS:
  • "Freakonomics Radio Goes Back to School," series by Freakonomics Radio (2022).

Karen McDonough of Quincy, Mass., was enjoying her tea one morning in the dining room when she saw something odd outside her window: a group of people gathering on her lawn. A man with a clipboard told her that her home no longer belonged to her. It didn't matter that she'd been paying her mortgage for 17 years and was current on it. She was a nurse with a good job and had raised her kids there. But this was a foreclosure sale, and she was going to lose her house.

McDonough had fallen victim to what's called a zombie second mortgage. Homeowners think these loans are long dead. But then the loans come back to life because they get bought up, sometimes for pennies on the dollar, by debt collectors that then move to collect and foreclose on people's homes.

On today's episode: An NPR investigation reveals the practice to be widespread. Also, what are zombie mortgages? Is all this legal? And is there any way for homeowners to fight the zombies?

You can read more about zombie second mortgages online at: npr.org/zombie

Correction: An earlier version of this episode description misspelled Karen McDonough's last name as MacDonough.

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Why do video game workers offer labor at a discount? How can you design a video game for blind and sighted players? Does that design have lessons for other industries?

These and other questions about the business of video games answered in todays episode. The Indicator just wrapped a weeklong series decoding the economics of the video game industry, we're excerpting some highlights.

First, we meet some of the workers who are struggling with the heavy demands placed on them in their booming industry, and how they are fighting back.

Then, we check in on how game developers are pulling in new audiences by creatively designing for people who couldn't always play. How has accessibility become an increasingly important priority for game developers? And, how can more players join in the fun?

You can hear the rest of our weeklong series on the gaming industry at this link, or wherever you get your podcasts.

This episode was hosted by Wailin Wong, Darian Woods, and Adrian Ma. Corey Bridges produced this episode with help from James Sneed. It was edited by Kate Concannon, fact-checked by Sierra Juarez, and engineered by Robert Rodriguez with help from Valentina Rodríguez Sánchez. Alex Goldmark is Planet Money's executive producer.

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How does bail work — and who's really paying? Zachary Crockett follows the money.

 

• SOURCES:
  • Joshua Page, professor of sociology and law at the University of Minnesota.
  • Steven Zalewski, criminal defense attorney and co-owner of Affordable Bails New York.

 

• RESOURCES:
  • "Does Bail Reform Increase Crime in New York State: Evidence from Interrupted Time-Series Analyses and Synthetic Control Methods," by Sishi Wu and David McDowall (Justice Quarterly, 2023).
  • "Profit Over People: The Commercial Bail Industry Fueling America’s Cash Bail Systems," by Allie Preston and Rachael Eisenberg (Center for American Progress, 2022).
  • "All Profit, No Risk: How the Bail Industry Exploits the Legal System," by Wendy Sawyer (Prison Policy Initiative, 2022).
  • "A Debt of Care: Commercial Bail and the Gendered Logic of Criminal Justice Predation," by Joshua Page, Victoria Piehowski, and Joe Soss (RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, 2019).
  • "The Economics of Bail and Pretrial Detention," by Patrick Liu, Ryan Nunn, and Jay Shambaugh (The Hamilton Project, 2018).
  • "Selling Off Our Freedom: How Insurance Corporations Have Taken Over Our Bail System," by Color Of Change and ACLU’s Campaign for Smart Justice (2017).
  • "Inside the Wild, Shadowy, and Highly Lucrative Bail Industry," by Shane Bauer (Mother Jones, 2014).

 

• EXTRAS:
  • "To Catch a Fugitive," by Freakonomics Radio (2011).

Today on the show, the story of the modern consumer movement in the U.S. and the person who inspired it: Ralph Nader. How Ralph Nader's battle in the 1960s set the stage for decades of regulation and sparked a debate in the U.S. about how much regulation is the right amount and how much is too much.

This episode was made in collaboration with NPR's Throughline. For more about Ralph Nader and safety regulations, listen to their original episode, "Ralph Nader, Consumer Crusader."

This Planet Money episode was produced by Emma Peaslee and edited by Jess Jiang.

The Throughline episode was produced by Rund Abdelfatah, Ramtin Arablouei, Lawrence Wu, Julie Caine, Anya Steinberg, Casey Miner, Cristina Kim, Devin Katayama, Peter Balonon-Rosen, Irene Noguchi, and fact-checking by Kevin Volkl. The episode was mixed by Josh Newell.

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(Note: This episode originally ran in 2021.)

Millions of American workers in all sorts of industries have signed some form of noncompete agreement. Their pervasiveness has led to situations where workers looking to change jobs can be locked out of their fields.

On today's episode: how one man tried to end noncompete contracts in his home state of Hawaii. And we update that story with news of a recent ruling from the Federal Trade Commission that could ban most noncompete agreements nationwide.

This episode was hosted by Erika Beras and Amanda Aronczyk. The original piece was produced by Dave Blanchard, edited by Ebony Reed, and engineered by Isaac Rodrigues. The update was reported and produced by Willa Rubin. It was edited by Keith Romer, fact-checked by Sierra Juarez, and engineered by Josephine Nyounai.

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On this episode, we’ll hear a book panel discussion on Timur Kuran’s book, Freedoms Delayed: Political Legacies of Islamic Law in the Middle East (Cambridge University Press, 2023). In his comments, Timur provides an overview of his book, highlighting the Middle East's struggle with repressiveness, the challenges of fostering a liberal civil society, and the historical role of Islamic legal institutions. The panel is moderated by Peter J. Boettke, and they are joined on the panel by:

• Mark Koyama,* Associate Professor of Economics at George Mason University, Senior Fellow with the F.A. Hayek Program for Advanced Study in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at the Mercatus Center, and co-author of How the World Became Rich (2022) and Persecution and Toleration (2019).
• James Robinson, Professor of Political Science at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago, The Reverend Dr. Richard L. Pearson Professor of Global Conflict Studies, Institute Director at the Pearson Institute for the Study and Resolution of Global Conflicts, and he has numerous books including The Narrow Corridor (2019) and Why Nations Fail (2013).
• Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, Founding Director of the Center for Governance and Market and Professor at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, and co-author of Land, the State, and War: Property Institutions and Political Order in Afghanistan (2021).

Timur Kuran is a Turkish-American economist and political scientist. He is a Professor of Economics and Political Science and the Gorter Family Professor of Islamic Studies at Duke University. He has published multiple books including The Long Divergence: How Islamic Law Held Back the Middle East (2011) and Private Truths, Public Lies: The Social Consequences of Preference Falsification (1997).

*Mark Koyama's comments were recorded separately

If you like the show, please subscribe, leave a 5-star review, and tell others about the show! We're available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and wherever you get your podcasts.

Virtual Sentiments, our new podcast series from the Hayek Program is now streaming! Subscribe today and listen to season two, now releasing!

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So many vehicles on the road today are white, black, or gray — but automotive designers find that consumer preferences may be changing lanes. Zachary Crockett surveys the lot.

 

• SOURCES:
  • Tom Crockett, classic car enthusiast.
  • Mark Gutjahr, global head of design at BASF.
  • Nikkie Riedel, carline planning manager at Subaru of America.

 

• RESOURCES:
  • BASF Color Report 2023 for Automotive OEM Coatings.
  • "Beige on an S.U.V. Will Cost You, but for Pickups It’s Golden," by Roy Furchgott (The New York Times, 2021).
  • "A Brief History Of Car Colors — And Why Are We So Boring Now?" (Consumer Reports, 2018).
  • "The Link Between the Colour of Cars and the Economy," (The Economist, 2018).

 

• EXTRA:
  • "Car Washes," by The Economics of Everyday Things (2023).