Five years ago, if you’d asked me the most likely cause of the next US recession, I’d have said commercial real estate. From industry professionals’ insights at places like SIEPR to anecdotally seeing thinned storefronts and mall closures across the country, the sky-high valuations of commercial real estate seemed like a bubble ready to pop. … More The Commercial Real Estate Cliff

It’s almost election day in the US, and most states remain single-vote systems. Maine and Alaska, however, have authorized ranked-choice voting (RCV), where voters indicate ordinal preferences (rank in order: 1, 2, 3, …) for the slate of candidates. Cities across the US, like San Francisco, New York, and Minneapolis, are also experimenting with this … More The Impossibility of a perfect voting system

RealPage is a private equity-owned company that helps landlords set rents for apartments. Recent antitrust litigation puts the company right at the intersection of economics, data science, public policy, and whether the rent is too damn high. RealPage has been accused of price collusion, specifically rent-fixing. The company website states that it offers its users … More RealPage and the rise of algorithmic collusion

In June 2024, NVIDIA eclipsed Microsoft to rise to the #1 most valuable company in the world. Let’s take a brief look at the 30+ year story of NIVIDA, how it skyrocketed to preeminence amidst the latest AI wave, and where its story might go from here. NVIDIA started in 1993 with cofounders Jensen Huang … More NVIDIA in the moment

Some companies sell products that barely break even, or even sell at a loss. These “loss leader” products even enter into pop culture, like the famous $1.50 Costco hot dog. Beyond offering a “good deal”, loss leaders are the result of deeper economic incentives and serve as a reflection of the societies in which they … More The Iconography (and Economics) of Loss Leaders

It’s been about 7 years since I last wrote about the economics of solar eclipses. A lot has changed since then, but one thing remains constant: eclipses are a big deal. This year, an estimated 5 million people will travel in the US to see the April 8th, 2024 total solar eclipse, and that number … More Solar Eclipse 2024 Dynamics

In a recent segment of NPR’s “Wait, Wait… Don’t Tell Me!”, Nobel Prize-winning economist Claudia Goldin was asked half-jokingly if all economists marry other economists. Not exactly, she responded: “It’s not all economists married to other economists; there are very few female economists in a various age groups, and a disproportionate number of those are … More Proportional Statistics

I’m a fan of zero-based budgeting because of its simplicity: Income – Expenses = 0. This means you account for everything, saving and spending, when setting your budget. As a result, you make sure savings is a key priority for your long-term goals instead of becoming an afterthought. What goes into a zero-based budget? The … More Zero-Based Budgeting

There were a lot of notable bankruptcies in 2023. This ranged from the biggest bank failures since the Great Recession (Silicon Valley Bank) to former startup titans (WeWork), longstanding American brands (Bed Bath & Beyond, Yellow), and US subsidiaries of massive international companies (Evergrande). To wrap up the year, let’s dive into some of the … More 2023 and Bankruptcies