Economic Rockstar

Master Joshway, better known as Josh Angrist, is the Ford Professor of Economics at MIT and a Research Associate in the NBER's programs on Children, Education, and Labor Studies. Josh received his B.A. from Oberlin College, spent time as an undergraduate studying at the London School of Economics and as a Masters student at Hebrew University. He completed his Ph.D. in Economics at Princeton.

Angrist's research interests include the effects of school inputs and school organization on student achievement; the impact of education and social programs on the labor market; the effects of immigration, labor market regulation and institutions; and econometric methods for program and policy evaluation.

Josh is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, The Econometric Society, and has served on many editorial boards and as a Co-editor of the Journal of Labor Economics. 

Josh is the author (with Steve Pischke) of Mostly Harmless Economics as well as Mastering 'Metrics.

Find out in this episode how Josh went from High School drop-out to Professor of Economics at MIT.

Paul Dolan is an internationally renowned expert on happiness, behaviour and public policy. He is currently a Professor of Behavioural Science in the Department of Social Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Paul has previously held academic posts at York, Newcastle, Sheffield and Imperial and he has been a visiting scholar at Princeton University, working with Daniel Kahneman.

Professor Dolan has over 100 peer-reviewed publications which cover many topics including behavioural science, subjective wellbeing, equity in health and health valuation. 

Paul is currently a Member of the World Economic Forum Panel on Behavioural Science, the Chief Academic Advisor on Economic Appraisal for the UK Government's Economic Service. He is also a member of National Academy of Sciences Panel on Wellbeing and of the Measuring National Wellbeing Advisory Forum for the Office for National Statistics in the UK.

Paul is the author of ‘Happiness by Design’.

Find Out:

For the shownotes visit www.economicrockstar.com/pauldolan

George Magnus is an independent economist, consultant and commentator. He has a distinguished career that started with some teaching assignments but was spent mostly in the financial services industry.

Before going solo in 2012, George was the Senior Economic Adviser at UBS Investment Bank having previously been the Chief Economist for 10 years. In almost 30 years of working experience in the City, he has held senior positions at SG Warburg, Chase Manhattan Bank and Bank of America. He is a well-known and highly regarded economist in the financial community and has won many accolades in professional surveys as one of the top global economists.

George is well known for his commentaries and interviews in newspapers, journals, TV and radio, most notably for the Financial Times, CNBC and Bloomberg.

George, gained widespread acclaim for declaring in early 2007 that we would face a Minsky Moment - or systemic banking crisis - and a decade of slow growth, has extensive experience of writing on, explaining and speaking about the global economy.

His first book, The Age of Ageing: How Demographics Are Changing The Global Economy And Our World was published in 2008. His latest book, Uprising: Will Emerging Markets Shape or Shake the Global Economy was published at the end of 2010, and assesses, in particular, whether China is set to dominate the world system.

Find Out: 

Visit www.economicrockstar.com/georgemagnus to view all the links mentioned in this episode.

You Are An Economic Rockstar!

Dr. Thornton has withdrawn himself from politics and concentrates now on education, primarily of the general public because the Austrian perspective says:

"the world works according to the ideology of the masses so we have to change that mindset of the masses before we’re ever going to get political reform of the type Austrians would like to see" - Dr. Mark Thornton.

This is the part 2 of an interview with Mark. Part 1 can be found as episode 18 on iTunes, Stitcher Radio or at www.economicrockstar.com/markthornton

Check out the competition to win a 1-year online course at the Mises Institute at www.economicrockstar.com/mises (Closing date is February 20th, 2015).

In the episode find out: 

To read the shownotes to this episode, please visit www.economicrockstar.com/markthornton2.

Don't forget to 'Like' Economic Rockstar on Facebook.

You Are An Economic Rockstar!

Dr. Mark Thornton is an economist who lives in Auburn, Alabama. Mark is Senior Fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute and serves as the Book Review Editor of the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics.

Mark’s publications include The Economics of Prohibition; Tariffs, Blockades, and  Inflation: The Economics of the Civil War (2004), The Quotable Mises (2005),The Bastiat Collection (2007), An Essay on Economic Theory (2010), and The Bastiat Reader (2014).

Dr. Thornton served as the editor of the Austrian Economics Newsletter and as a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Libertarian Studies. He has served as a member of the graduate faculties of Auburn University and Columbus State University. He has also taught economics at Auburn University at Montgomery and Trinity University in Texas.

Mark served as Assistant Superintendent of Banking and economic adviser to Governor Fob James of Alabama (1997-1999), and he was awarded the University Research Award at Columbus State University in 2002. Mark is a graduate of St. Bonaventure University and received his PhD in economics from Auburn University.

In this interview, Mark mentions and discusses: Competition, Entrepreneurship, comparative economic systems, economic history, business cycles, value theory, population policy, purchasing power, deflation, monetary policy and bitcoins.

In this interview, Marina mentions: Ludwig von Miss, Friedrich Hayek, David Hume, Israel Kirzner, Carl Menger, Richard Cantillon, Friedrich von Wieser, Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, Joseph Schumpeter, Fritz Machlup, Adam Smith, Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot, Irving Fischer, Milton Friedman, Ben Bernanke, Scott Sumner, George Soros, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Jim Rogers, Paul Krugman, Austrian Economics, Merchantilists, Physiocrats, French Liberals and Classical Economists.

Dr. Marina Adshade engages in original economic research in the area of women in the economy. She has a Ph.D. from Queen’s University in Ontario Canada and currently teaches economics at the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Columbia.

In 2008, Marina developed a unique specialization in the economics of sex and love  and launched an undergraduate course titled ‘Economics of Sex and Love’, which invited her students to approach questions of sex and love through an economist’s lens. The class was an immediate hit with students and, by the time the first term started, had generated international media attention.

This culminated in the publication of her first book in 2013, ‘Dollars and Sex: How Economics Influences Sex and Love’. Marina converts economic theory into a sexy science by applying the principles of supply and demand and other market forces to matters of love, courtship, sex, intimacy, and marriage. 

who makes a better saver: men or women?

how Orgasms can be used to explain Game Theory.

how the market for sex and love is like a barter economy.

the similarities between Economics and Biology.

if you met somebody that had a variety of qualities that you valued but didn’t love, would you still marry that person?

about the Big Mac Index and the Blow Job Index.

Jack Schwager, author of Market Wizards, is a recognized expert in the futures and hedge fund industry.  He is the co-portfolio manager for the ADM Investor Services Diversified Strategies Fund and is a Co-Founder and Director of Trader Development at FundSeeder.

Jack has previously spent 22 years as a director of futures research at some of Wall Street’s leading firms and 10 years as a partner in a hedge fund advisory firm.

Jack’s name is synonymous with futures and trading, due to his compelling books that are frequently cited by the trading community. Perhaps Jack is best known for his Market Wizards series books in which he interviews some of the greatest hedge-fund managers. Altogether, his books have sold nearly 2 million copies worldwide. He is credited by many traders as being instrumental in the launch of their trading career.

Jack is a frequent seminar speaker and has lectured on a range of analytical topics including the characteristics of great traders, investment fallacies, hedge fund portfolios and technical analysis.

Jack holds a BA in Economics from Brooklyn College and an MA in Economics from Brown University.

In this interview, Jack mentions and discusses: chartists, technical analysis, fundamentals, futures, normal distribution curve, options, Black-Scholes Options Pricing Model, option warrant trading, efficient market hypothesis, probability, negative externalities, fiscal responsibility, Keynesianism, deficits and demand.

Niels Kaastrup-Larsen is Managing Director of Dunn Capital (Europe). He  is a trend follower with more than 20 years experience in the hedge fund industry, working for some of the largest CTAs or Commodity Trading Advisors in the world, including Chesapeake Capital. Niels co-founded, built and managed three businesses within the alternative investment space, including Rho Asset Management.

Niels trades futures markets in a systematic and highly-automated way. He is the founder and host of the popular podcast 'Top Traders Unplugged', where he uses his experience and contacts in the industry to deliver insightful, engaging and passionate interviews with the most successful hedge fund managers and traders.

Economic and Finance Themes:

In this interview, Niels mentions and discusses: Trend following, futures markets, gold, anomalies, confirmation bias, efficient market hypothesis, fixed-income securities, treasuries, bonds, the Great Depression, stock market portfolio, diversification, equities, systematic trading, stop-losses, technical analysis.

Find out:

• about trend following and how to spot a trend.

• what is a trend following strategy.

• two ways in which we can take on market risk - one good and the other not so good.

• how emotions can lead to losses.

• why trend followers use computers with built-in trend following rules to make trades.

• why we are more likely to buy a bar of soap that is reduced by 50% in a retail store than buy a stock that has fallen 50%.

• how you should diversify a portfolio.

• why Niels believes that global markets will be in turmoil within the next 5 years.

• why Niels believes the economic cycle will turn by October 2015.

• why events will unfold just like 1929.

• if the Swiss and Germans should take back their gold reserves from the United States.

• about whether there are job opportunities in the trading industry today.

• and much more. 

You can find all the links and book recommendations by Niels at www.economicrockstar/niels

Support the show by subscribing to the podcast or by becoming a patron of Economic Rockstar at www.patreon.com/economicrockstar. 

Shoshana Grossbard is Professor of Economics at San Diego State University and founding editor of the Review of Economics of the Household. 

Shoshana obtained her Phd from the University of Chicago where she developed an interest in the New Home Economics from its founders, the late Nobel Laureate Gary Becker and the late Jacob Mincer. The main focus of Shoshana’s research is household economics, family economics and the economics of marriage.

Shoshana has published 5 books and more than 50 articles on the determinants of marriage, consumption and labor supply and on the law and economics of household decisions. She is fluent in English, French, Hebrew, Spanish, and Dutch and has presented her work at many universities in more than 13 countries.

Economic Themes:

In this interview, Shoshana mentions and discusses: household economics, family economics, economics of the household, household decision-making, sex-ratios, the economic and social impact of polygamy, determinants of marriage, opportunity cost, consumption and labor supply, immigration, population, marriage, price discrimination, government intervention and elasticity.

Find out:

To get the shownotes to this episode and all the books and links mentioned by Shoshana, please visit www.economicrockstar.com

The personal habits and advice of the Economic Rockstar guests of 2014 are highlighted in this epic and exciting episode. I explore each episode and find, what I believe, are invaluable nuggets of information. These may not necessarily be related to economics and finance, but given that it's a New Year, I'd like to share with you their habits and advice. I'll be personally adopting most of these for 2015. I hope that at least one will resonate with you.

Thanks for listening and enjoy. 

The Personal Habits and Advice of the Economic Rockstar Guests of 2014

1) The Importance of Being Mentored

2) Help Others

3) Talk to People

4) Network and Build Your Community

5) Create a Vision and Take Risks

6) Take Responsibilty For Your Actions

7) Give Yourself Permission to Fail and Challenge Yourself

8) Work Hard and Be Disciplined

9) Don't Settle, Choose Adventure and Fulfill Your Potential

10) Be Careful Who You Listen To

11) Read - Education Is Important

12) Laughter Can Help You Learn

13) Pay Yourself First and Clear Your Debts

To find out more, visit http://www.economicrockstar.com/review2014