Category - Race

Scientific American is reporting on a an article in the journal Neuron that describes brain scanning experiments intended to see if poorer people react differently than richer people to opportunities to gain a little extra money.

The microeconomic law of diminishing marginal utility states that while accumulating a good—pretzels, pencils, nickels, whatever—each successive unit of that good will be less satisfying to acquire than the one before it. Finding a shiny quarter on the street is a real thrill. But, if you are carrying around a bag of coins, acquiring another one does not seem nearly as exciting. In fact, would you even bother to pick it up?

That hesitation is what researchers at the University of Cambridge in England were banking on when they designed a study to see if the haves catch on more slowly than the have-nots when it comes to reward-based learning. Reporting in the current issue of Neuron, the scientists reveal that when a small sum of money is on the line, poorer people learn quickly how to maximize their profits, leaving their wealthier counterparts in the dust.

The 2006 Election(s)
By John J. Fitzgerald

The 2006 Election cycle has come and gone. Just like the 2006 Hurricane season it has not performed exactly as predicted, but it has left some changes in its wake. We might actually have experienced several different elections rather than just one. A lot of decision-making got formalized on the 7th of November.

Here are some of the highlights:

Dear Readers — the following is an email message I sent to all fellow faculty at Western New England College where I teach. I am including it here based on an invitation I received to share it with all readers of this Blog. I am reproducing it here without editing.

Mike Meeropol (econ Prof, Western New England College, Springfield, MA)

I am writing this e-mail because I am thoroughly disgusted with the effort to “Willie Horton” the candidacy of Deval Patrick for Governor of Massachusetts. I hope some of you inclined not to read this will force yourself to do so … Even people who were not inclined to support Mr. Patrick for Governor should respond to the vicious advertising campaign.

By Kiaran Honderich, CPE Staff Economist

(Reprinted from CPE’s newsletter, “The Popular Economist,” Spring, 2002.)

Over the last year activists have made important progress in the battle against global AIDS. Developing countries won a partial victory at the WTO ministerial meeting in Doha in November, affirming their right to produce affordable generic drugs in a health crisis. And the appalling mainstream consensus that treatment with antiretroviral drugs was too expensive and complex to be made available in poor countries–writing off literally tens of millions of lives at a stroke–is finally giving way to acknowledgement that treatment is possible in resource-poor settings, although it seems likely to be rolled out in a way that neglects rural populations. These battles are by no means finished–the WTO is still hashing out whether poor countries too small to produce their own generic drugs should be permitted to import them from another country; if Bush gains fast track authority then he will be able to take back the gains of Doha; and South Africa’s ANC government is being dragged kicking and screaming by activists towards the treatment programs that its country needs–but real progress is being made.

By Liz Stanton, CPE Staff Economist

1. You’ve Been Psychologically Conditioned To Want a Diamond. The diamond engagement ring is a 63-year-old invention of N.W.Ayer advertising agency. The De Beers diamond cartel contracted N.W.Ayer to create a demand for what are, essentially, useless hunks of rock.
2. Diamonds are Priced Well Above Their Value. The De Beers cartel has systematically held diamond prices at levels far greater than their abundance would generate under anything even remotely resembling perfect competition. All diamonds not already under its control are bought by the cartel, and then the De Beers cartel carefully managed world diamond supply in order to keep prices steadily high.