Archives for Austan Goolsbee



Some Links Worth Following

1. President Obama is reading The World America Made, which downplays the America-is-in-decline meme; meanwhile, Latin America pushes the America-is-in-decline meme.

2. Austan Goolsbee is on Twitter, and has lots to say. (This will surprise no one who read this.)

3. If you have a Godfather-obsessed kid, as I do, you may want to read The Godfather Effect. (Good WSJ review here.)

4. “Is economic repugnance closely related to biological disgust?” Yes, this is from our friend Al Roth. More here on disgust and food. Read More »



How Much Did Americans’ Financial Illiteracy Contribute to the Great Recession?

We’re working on a new Freakonomics Radio podcast about financial illiteracy, a topic we’ve visited a few times on this blog. Two guests you’ll hear from in the episode have held the same title: chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisors.

First up is current chairman Alan Krueger, whom I asked what would improve if Americans were more financially literate:

KRUEGER: I think first and foremost, we’d probably have greater savings. People are often in a situation where they have to live paycheck to paycheck. That’s something I think we need as a country to work to improve. Most importantly I think we can improve income growth for the broad middle class. But many people who seem to have the wherewithal to save for the future find it difficult to save.

Read More »



Who Is Alan B. Krueger?

President Barack Obama nominated a new chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisors on Monday: Princeton labor economist Alan B. Krueger will replace outgoing chair Austan Goolsbee. Krueger, 50, is known as a strict “empiricist” with a broad range of economic knowledge, having researched topics as diverse as subjective well-being to the relationship between the minimum wage and employment.

His 2007 book, What Makes a Terrorist, explores the economic roots of modern-day terrorism. Which Levitt has blogged about here on several occasions. Krueger was also presented Freakonomics with an award in 2006 at the National Council on Economic Education.

Krueger’s biggest asset in the job will likely be his expertise as a labor economist, as the Obama administration is desperate to reduce unemployment heading into the 2012 election. Read More »



Austan Goolsbee on Austan Goolsbee

Want to know a bit more about Austan Gooslbee, the newly appointed chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers? Straight from the horse’s mouth, here’s a Q&A we ran with him in July 2009. There are a lot of interesting answers, including several that are perhaps more interesting now than they were then. Read More »



Next Page »