Heterodox
Earlier this summer, four economists released a working paper suggesting that part of the decline in male labor-force participation can be attributed to the increased quality of video games. You can see an article about it here, and you can also see a non-technical summary of the paper as part of the NBER digest.Conceptually at least, this makes sense- better leisure activities increase the opportunity cost of working, which decreases the net benefit of working, and generally we do less of...
Read More »Where Have All the Unions Gone and Where Are All the Jobs?*
Economics is a simple field. Just about everything can be described in terms of supply and demand. If the supply of something is scarce but the demand for it is strong, its price rises. On the other hand, if there is a lot of supply but little demand, its price will go down. Now, buyers and sellers can engage in certain strategies to weight the scales. For example, sellers of a product can band together (perhaps by buying each other out) to achieve some...
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