Reflections on the intersection of economics, history, politics, psychology and science

How our country came to be a boiling frog and what we can do about it.

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Latest Podcasts

26: Jimmy Hoppa

This podcast is all about labor unions – why they exist, their history in the U.S., a brief comparison with unions in other countries, the

25: Jump for Joy

Building off the prior podcast on learning from the past, this discussion is all about success and failure. We all know the common wisdom that

24: The Toad Not Taken

We all spend a lot of time thinking about the past, often when we’re trying to make a decision in the present. Sometimes that reflection ends up complicating our decision-making. Why is that? And if we want to avoid repeating past mistakes while also not

23: Polliwog Polymath

What makes someone an expert? And how is expertise different from intelligence? This podcast is all about expertise, how we acquire it, how do people view others’ expertise, and the notion of expertise transference from one domain to another. We touch on

22: It’s Not Easy Paying Green

This podcast is the sequel to Greenbacks, where we discussed why we have taxes, the different types of taxes, and the pros and cons of each type. In this podcast, we delve into the evolution of the tax system and look at the debates surrounding the level

21: Greenbacks

“In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.”
Benjamin Franklin

This podcast is the first in a two-part series on taxes. This episode is meant to be an overview of why we have taxes, the landscape of both taxing agencies a

Blog

The Community Is Critical

There was an interesting op ed in the journal Science recently, talking about how, even in something as objective as the pursuit of scientific insights,

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Honoring MLK

I’m embarrassed to admit that, like I suspect many White Americans, when I think about “Martin Luther King” and “speeches” I only come up with

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Prisoner Voting Rights

One of our listeners contacted us to comment on our recent podcast, Toad to the White House, where we discussed, among other things, why both

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