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The New Bazaar

Latest episodes

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Feb 17, 2022 • 55min

The housing dilemma

Logan Mohtashami is the lead analyst at Housingwire, where he writes about the housing market and the US economy. And before that, he spent a few decades as a senior lending officer at a real estate company. Well before the pandemic, Logan was arguing that during the years 2020 to 2024, housing prices in the US would climb to troubling levels, the result of various coinciding trends in the economy. And that is exactly what's happened. In his chat with Cardiff, Logan explains the forces that have been driving up home prices, and what might happen in the next few years. And he and Cardiff also talk about the ways that housing is such a different, even unique, kind of asset -- and why policies towards housing are so often full of contradiction. Related links: Logan Mohtashami's author page at Housingwire Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Feb 10, 2022 • 58min

The borders between us

Tara Watson is an economist and the co-author, with Kalee Thompson, of a new book, “The Border Within: The Economics of Immigration in an Age of Fear”. The "border within" refers to how immigration laws are applied to undocumented residents already living inside the country. And it also refers to how immigration laws, and how these laws are applied and enforced, can also create borders between people. Between neighbors. Between residents. Even between husband and wife, between parents and their children. In her chat with Cardiff, Tara explains why policies that affect undocumented immigrants also affect the places where they live and the economies in which they work. And since most undocumented residents have lived inside the country for more than a decade, these policies also have big consequences for the families and communities in which they are rooted. Tara also surveys what the economics literature shows about the economics of immigration -- bringing needed clarity and nuance to a conversation that so often features little of either.Links: The Border Within: The Economics of Immigration in an Age of FearTara Watson's home page Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Feb 3, 2022 • 1h 2min

Tech we want but don't deserve

Shira Ovide writes the excellent On Tech newsletter at the New York Times. On this episode of The New Bazaar, Shira tells Cardiff about the technology she wants to see in 2022, and whether the potential for technology to better connect the world was oversold. And they chat about the metaverse -- as Shira says, "What if we just called the ‘metaverse’ ...the internet?" -- and the lingering questions about its future. Also on the show: Do "bits" technologies like social media get too much attention relative to "atoms" technologies that directly influence the physical world? What's the latest on gaming? What are the psychology lessons of the government's approach to sending out free Covid tests? How do online creators make a living? Related links: On Tech newsletter (main page)"The Tech I Want in 2022""With Activision, Microsoft Bets on the Future""Why Not Copy YouTube’s Good Idea?""Why Free Covid Tests Went Viral" Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Jan 27, 2022 • 1h 13min

Markets, growth, and the arts

More than two decades ago, economist Tyler Cowen published "In Praise of Commercial Culture" -- his first in a series of books about the relationship between the economy and culture. The book's thesis was simple, but at the time controversial -- that markets and commerce offer the best societal arrangement for promoting creativity and cultural novelty. The book was initially resisted by popular and academic presses and nearly didn't get published, threatening to undermine its own arguments.In the book, Tyler argues that markets are not just good for artists themselves and how they make a living, but for the quality and the originality of their work. He responds to right-wing critics who argue that a culture rooted in the artistic creations of markets becomes too permissive, and to left-wing critics who say that the profit motive inherent to markets is bad for artistic purity and integrity. Tyler argues that if you really care about creativity – and about diverse groups having access to becoming creators and artists – then markets are better than previous systems based on patronage, or on the direction of the state or the church.In his chat with Cardiff, Tyler revisits his original arguments, considering them anew to account for all that's happened in the time since the book was published in 2000. What have been the effects on creativity of the dominance of streaming, the ubiquity of smartphones, and more recently the rise of Tiktok and NFTs? Also on the show: Why were the Medici overrated and rap musicians underrated? Does the easy reproducibility of historically significant artistic works, made possible by new technologies, threaten to cannibalize emergent artists? Is there a meaningful distinction between high-brow and low-brow art? Where has Hollywood gone wrong? How have sports, cooking, amateur photography and other domains of life become more artistic and creative in recent decades? Finally, Tyler and Cardiff discuss why it can be seductive and easy to become cultural pessimists -- and why both nonetheless remain cultural optimists.LINKS:-- In Praise of Commercial Culture (Harvard University Press) -- Marginal Revolution (Tyler's blog with Alex Tabarrok) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Jan 20, 2022 • 36min

The monopoly on MONOPOLY

This week, we're sharing a special episode of a podcast we think you might like. It's called Cautionary Tales, and it's made by Tim Harford and the team at Pushkin Industries. You may remember Tim from our recent episode on economic storytelling. On his podcast, Tim draws on history and social science to vividly retell the stories of great crimes, accidents and disasters of the past - pointing out valuable lessons for us all from the dithering, death and destruction.In this episode, Tim tells the story of Lizzie J. Magie (voiced by Helena Bonham Carter!), who should be celebrated as the inventor of what would become Monopoly - but her role in creating the smash hit board game was cynically ignored, even though she had a patent.Discrimination has marred the careers of many inventors and shut others out from the innovation economy entirely. Could crediting forgotten figures such as Lizzie Magie help address continuing disparities in the patenting of new inventions?You can hear more episodes of Cautionary Tales at https://link.chtbl.com/newbazaarcautionary. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Jan 13, 2022 • 1h 7min

Trust me, I’m an economist

Ben Ho’s latest book is called Why Trust Matters: An Economist’s Guide to the Ties that Bind. His chat with Cardiff is about exactly that: How the concept of trust applies to all kinds of different economic interactions that we experience throughout our lives. And the research that helps us understand why trust so often breaks down, and potentially how to build it back up. For example, how do you write a contract between two people or two companies that enhances trust rather than erodes it. When do prenuptial agreements enhance trust, and when don’t they? What about religion and its role in fostering the kind of trust that matters for the economy? Why is gossip actually good for trust? When can we trust our economic policymakers? What affect does social media and tools to monitor online reputations have on our trust in each other? All this and much more on today’s episode. Links from the episode:Ben Ho's website (https://bit.ly/3thfViO)Cardiff and Aimee are on Twitter at @CardiffGarcia and @AimeePKeaneSend us an email! You can write to us at hello@bazaaraudio.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Dec 30, 2021 • 43min

Listener Q&A episode

To wrap up 2021, The New Bazaar answers questions sent in by listeners. The episode also features, for the first time in front of the mic, executive producer Aimee Keane! Aimee and Cardiff take questions about pricing strategies, how they choose topics and guests for the show, the tricky tension between wonky and accessible, the Canadian vs the US economy, why the US economic growth has been weak since the 1970s, and more. Thanks so much to everyone for listening to us this year! We are taking a short break, and we will be back with the next episode on Thursday, January 12th. Happy New Year!Links: "Some NYC Restaurants Tire of Forking Over Delivery-App Fees" (WSJ) "Pricing of Digital Products" (Deloitte) "A deluge of data is giving rise to a new economy" (The Economist)"Is It Fair to Tax Capital Gains at Lower Rates Than Earned Income?" (WSJ)"Life after quitting: What happened next to the workers who left their jobs" (WaPo)"Why it's not really a labor shortage" (Insider) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Dec 24, 2021 • 23min

BONUS: Three econ stories

Having guided Cardiff through the craft of economic storytelling in the prior episode, Tim Harford returns to explain the lessons of three economic stories from his own podcast, Cautionary Tales.Links: -- "The Truth about Hansel and Gretel"-- "Buried by the Wall Street Crash"-- "Florence Nightingale and her Geeks Declare War on Death" Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Dec 23, 2021 • 55min

The craft of economic storytelling

Tim Harford is the author of numerous terrific economics books and the host of two great podcasts: “Cautionary Tales”, about what we should learn from big mistakes; and “More or Less”, about statistics. He also writes columns and essays for the Financial Times. And what sets Tim apart in all these different mediums is his exceptional storytelling. And when it comes to telling economic stories – stories that are meant to grab your attention, and keep you in suspense, and then ultimately land on a message or a lesson that really stays with you – I’m not sure there’s anyone better. And Tim’s latest book, The Data Detective, is no different: there’s a lot of great stories in it. But what I really loved about it is that it’s very much also about the craft of storytelling itself. And that’s what today’s conversation with Tim is also about: What are the ingredients of a captivating story? Why is it that stories are so necessary for fighting back against misinformation? (Why aren’t the facts themselves enough?) And how do you wield the power of storytelling responsibly? Links from the episode:Cautionary Tales, hosted by Tim Harford, from Pushkin Industries (https://bit.ly/3eopqDX)"The Problem with Facts", by Tim Harford (https://bit.ly/3Fpvjg2)The Data Detective, by Tim Harford (https://bit.ly/3EoekcG)Cardiff and Aimee are on Twitter at @CardiffGarcia and @AimeePKeaneSend us an email! You can write to us at hello@bazaaraudio.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Dec 16, 2021 • 46min

How we choose

Vicki Bogan is an economist who specializes in financial economics, household finance, and behavioral finance – in other words, a specialist in how people make investment decisions. Whether to invest in the stock market or the bond market; how much; and other kinds of investing too, like whether to pursue a graduate degree.And the things she has found that influence our investment decisions are often things we don’t really consider. Like the kinds of households we live in, our health, or even things like the gender of our children. And as you’ll hear in the chat with Cardiff, she is interested in figuring out what is really going on. Not how people should make choices, but how they actually do make choices – and why those choices matter.Links from the episode:Vicki Bogan’s web site Cardiff and Aimee are on Twitter at @CardiffGarcia and @AimeePKeaneSend us an email! You can write to us at hello@bazaaraudio.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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