Tag Archives: Economics

Zeroing Out

Posted on November 5, 2017 by TheZvi

Related to (Eliezer Yudkowsky at Less Wrong): An Equilibrium of No Free Energy Related to (Satvik Beri at Less Wrong): Competitive Truth Seeking Follow-up to: Leaders of Men Markets Suppose you have an insight about Google. The efficient market hypothesis says you … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Rationality | Tagged , , , | 18 Comments

Book Review: Weapons of Math Destruction

Posted on June 4, 2017 by TheZvi

Epistemic Status: Minus One Million Points Shortness Status: Long (this is a proposed new norm I want to try out, in the sense of ‘apologies for writing a long letter, I did not have enough time to write a shorter … Continue reading →

Posted in Death by Metrics, Economics, Personal Experience, Reviews | Tagged , , , , | 16 Comments

Short Termism

Posted on March 4, 2017 by TheZvi

Epistemic Status: Metrics look good Original Post: Larry Summers: Case Still Out On Whether Short-Termism is a Problem There is a long-standing hypothesis that corporate America focuses too much on short-term results. Larry Summers looks at a new study by McKinsey (McKinsey’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Death by Metrics, Economics | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Book Review: How Asia Works by Joe Studwell

Posted on February 18, 2017 by TheZvi

How Asia Works has a theory about how development economics works: You must follow The Way. To the extent that you follow The Way, your country will prosper. To the extent that you fail to follow The Way, your country … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , , , , | 8 Comments

On Cutting Wages

Posted on December 24, 2015 by TheZvi

This post is a response to Bryan Caplan’s request that I share my experiences cutting wages. It was not fun. While I was CEO of MetaMed, we were continuously short of revenue. We started the company thinking we would be … Continue reading →

Posted in Personal Experience | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

The Thing and the Symbolic Representation of The Thing

Posted on June 30, 2015 by TheZvi

Let’s assume there is a thing that all would agree is, in context, a Good Thing(tm) that someone in your situation would want. Do you want the thing, or do you want the symbolic representation of the thing?* This sounds … Continue reading →

Posted in Death by Metrics, Impractical Optimization, Personal Experience, Rationality | Tagged , , , | 35 Comments

Self Service Roundup

Posted on June 11, 2015 by TheZvi

Follow-up to: Full Service Before moving on to other topics, I thought I would round out my thoughts on self/full service itself (for some good follow-up on the drugstores, see the comments of the previous post) about the History of Self-Service, … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

What If It Rains?

Posted on May 29, 2015 by TheZvi

Follow Up To: Full Service Gas stations in New Jersey do not have awnings to protect customers from the rain. Let us presume for the moment that due to some combination of inertia, regulations and initial costs, it is not … Continue reading →

Posted in Death by Metrics, Economics, Impractical Optimization | Tagged , , , | 9 Comments

Full Service

Posted on May 24, 2015 by TheZvi

New Jersey has a law that says that you are not allowed to pump your own gas. They have had this law for 70 years. This is, of course, absurd. But if it is so absurd, why do 63 percent … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

TPP is about as good as it is supposed to be

Posted on May 19, 2015 by TheZvi

Tyler Cohen stakes out quite a sensible position on whether or not we should approve the trade deal called TPP: What would convince me to oppose TPP if is somebody did a study showing the following: when you use a … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics | Tagged , | 1 Comment