Mario Rizzo’s Graduate Course in Behavioral Economics

17 February 2011 at 9:57 am Peter G. Klein 2 comments

| Peter Klein |

Check out the syllabus and join the discussion at ThinkMarkets. I appreciate boat-rocking as much as anyone but am personally in what Mario terms (in his syllabus) the “classical” camp. Still, this is a course I would definitely take. If he’s an easy grader.

Entry filed under: - Klein -, Austrian Economics, History of Economic and Management Thought, Law and Economics, Management Theory, Methods/Methodology/Theory of Science, Public Policy / Political Economy, Teaching.

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2 Comments Add your own

1. Michael E. Marotta | 18 February 2011 at 8:59 am

I read that and posted there about the very similar problem in criminology: we do not know motive. Here, I point to the known disparities between the National Crime Victimization Survery and the Uniform Crime Report. For economists the problem is that the subjectivity of values for rational actors must be accepted; and so people are “black boxes.” We do not care why they act, only that they do. That then removes from economics its ability to show how individual choices bring general social improvement. For example, given the obvous utilities, why were the first video recording products unsuccessful in the marketplace? Why were the first “vitamin waters” of the 1980s failures in the marketplace? Why do people accept fiat money?

We cannot ask. The problem addressed in the Think Markets piece from Prof. Rizzo was specifically about the gap between what people say they want and how they ultimately act.
2. David Hoopes | 18 February 2011 at 12:03 pm

Somehow I doubt Mario is an easy grader Pete. Maybe if you complain and whine enough you can persuade him to give you a good grade just to get you out of his office.

Does this mean Ollie was an easy grader? That wouldn’t have been my first guess.