Freakonomics Radio

Justin Trudeau, facing record-low approval numbers, is doubling down on his progressive agenda. But he is so upbeat (and Canada-polite) that it’s easy to miss just how radical his vision is. Can he make it work?

• SOURCE:
  • Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada.

• RESOURCES:
  • 2024 Canadian Federal Budget.
  • "Canada to Set First-Ever Cap on Temporary Residents," by Nadine Yousif (BBC News, 2023).
  • Common Ground, by Justin Trudeau (2014).

• EXTRAS:
  • "Why Is Everyone Moving to Canada?" by Freakonomics Radio (2024).

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So you want to help people? That’s great — but beware the law of unintended consequences. Three stories from the modern workplace. 

• SOURCES:
  • Joshua Angrist, professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
  • Zoe Cullen, professor of business administration at Harvard Business School.
  • Marina Gertsberg, senior lecturer in finance at the University of Melbourne.

• RESOURCES:
  • "Is Pay Transparency Good?" by Zoë Cullen (Journal of Economic Perspectives, 2024).
  • "DP18969 Economics Coauthorships in the Aftermath of MeToo," by Noriko Amano-Patino, Elisa Faraglia, and Chryssi Giannitsarou (CEPR Discussion Paper, 2024).
  • "The Underground Economy of Company Reviews," by Shikhar Sachdev (Career Fair, 2023).
  • "Why Did Gender Wage Convergence in the United States Stall?" by Peter Q. Blair and Benjamin Posmanick (NBER Working Paper, 2023).
  • "The Unintended Consequences of #MeToo: Evidence from Research Collaborations," by Marina Gertsberg (SSRN, 2022).
  • "Outsourcing Tasks Online: Matching Supply and Demand on Peer-to-Peer Internet Platforms," by Zoë Cullen and Chiara Farronato (Management Science, 2021).
  • "Equilibrium Effects of Pay Transparency," by Zoe B. Cullen and Bobak Pakzad-Hurson (NBER Working Paper, 2021).
  • "How Much Does Your Boss Make? The Effects of Salary Comparisons," by Zoë Cullen and Ricardo Perez-Truglia (NBER Working Paper, 2018).
  • "Wall Street Rule for the #MeToo Era: Avoid Women at All Cost," by Gillian Tan and Katia Porzecanski (Bloomberg, 2018).
  • "A Comprehensive Analysis of the Effects of US Disability Discrimination Laws on the Employment of the Disabled Population," by Patrick Button, Philip Armour, and Simon Hollands (NBER Working Paper, 2016).
  • "Consequences of Employment Protection? The Case of the Americans with Disabilities Act," by Daron Acemoglu and Joshua Angrist (Journal of Political Economy, 2001).

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The psychologist Daniel Kahneman — a Nobel laureate and the author of Thinking, Fast and Slow — recently died at age 90. Along with his collaborator Amos Tversky, he changed how we all think about decision-making. The journalist Michael Lewis told the Kahneman-Tversky story in a 2016 book called The Undoing Project. In this episode, Lewis explains why they had such a profound influence.

• SOURCE:
  • Michael Lewis, writer.

• RESOURCES:
  • The Undoing Project, by Michael Lewis (2016).
  • Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman (2011).
  • The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, by Michael Lewis (2010).
  • Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness, by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein (2009).
  • Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis (2004).
  • “Who’s On First,” by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein (New Republic, 2003).
  • “The Framing of Decisions and the Psychology of Choice,” by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky (Science, 1981).
  • “Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk,” by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky (Econometrica, 1979).
  • “Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases,” by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky (Science, 1974).
  • “Subjective Probability: A Judgment of Representativeness,” by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky (Cognitive Psychology, 1972).

• EXTRAS:
  • "Remembering Daniel Kahneman," by People I (Mostly) Admire (2024).
  • "Why Are People So Mad at Michael Lewis?" by Freakonomics Radio (2023).
  • "Did Michael Lewis Just Get Lucky with 'Moneyball'?" by Freakonomics Radio (2022).

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People who are good at their jobs routinely get promoted into bigger jobs they’re bad at. We explain why firms keep producing incompetent managers — and why that’s unlikely to change.

• SOURCES:
  • Nick Bloom, professor of economics at Stanford University.
  • Katie Johnson, freelance data and analytics coach.
  • Kelly Shue, professor of finance at the Yale University School of Management.
  • Steve Tadelis, professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley Haas School of Business.

• RESOURCES:
  • “People Management Skills, Employee Attrition, and Manager Rewards: An Empirical Analysis,” by Mitchell Hoffman and Steven Tadelis (Journal of Political Economy, 2021).
  • “Promotions and the Peter Principle,” by Alan Benson, Danielle Li, and Kelly Shue (The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2019).
  • “Bosses Matter: The Effects of Managers on Workers’ Performance,” by Kathryn L. Shaw (IZA World of Labor, 2019).
  • “The Value of Bosses,” by Edward P. Lazear, Kathryn L. Shaw, and Christopher T. Stanton (Journal of Labor Economics, 2015).
  • The Peter Principle: Why Things Always Go Wrong, by Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull (1969).

• EXTRAS:
  • “The Secret Life of C.E.O.s” series by Freakonomics Radio.
  • “What Does a C.E.O. Actually Do?” by Freakonomics Radio (2018).

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Fareed Zakaria says yes. But it’s not just political revolution — it’s economic, technological, even emotional. He doesn’t offer easy solutions but he does offer some hope.

• SOURCES:
  • Fareed Zakaria, journalist and author.

• RESOURCES:
  • Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present, by Fareed Zakaria (2024).
  • "The Ultimate Election Year: All the Elections Around the World in 2024," by Koh Ewe (TIME, 2023).
  • "The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism," by Vanessa Williamson, Theda Skocpol, and John Coggin (Perspectives on Politics, 2011).
  • The Post-American World, by Fareed Zakaria (2008).
  • The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad, by Fareed Zakaria (2003).

• EXTRAS:
  • "Is the U.S. Really Less Corrupt Than China?" by Freakonomics Radio (2021).

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The political debates over immigration can generate a lot of fuzzy facts. We wanted to test Americans’ knowledge — so, to wrap up our special series on immigration, we called some Freakonomics Radio listeners and quizzed them.

• SOURCES:
  • Zeke Hernandez, professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

• RESOURCES:
  • The Truth About Immigration: Why Successful Societies Welcome Newcomers, by Zeke Hernandez (2024, available for pre-order).

• EXTRA:
  • “The True Story of America’s Supremely Messed-Up Immigration System,” series by Freakonomics Radio (2024).

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As the U.S. tries to fix its messy immigration system, our neighbor to the north is scooping up more talented newcomers every year. Are the Canadians stealing America’s bacon? (Part three of a three-part series.)

• SOURCES:
  • Zeke Hernandez, professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
  • William Kerr, professor of business administration at Harvard Business School.
  • David Leonhardt, senior writer at the New York Times.
  • Sindhu Mahadevan, creator of This Immigrant Life newsletter.
  • Marc Miller, Member of Parliament and Minister of Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship of Canada.
  • Mike Savage, Mayor of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

• RESOURCES:
  • The Truth About Immigration: Why Successful Societies Welcome Newcomers, by Zeke Hernandez (2024, available for pre-order).
  • "The Border Where Different Rules Apply," by Seth Freed Wessler (The New York Times Magazine, 2023).
  • "Last Year, Canada Became My Home. Feeling Like a Canadian Will Take a Bit Longer," by Sindhu Mahadevan (CBC News, 2023).
  • "Canadians Are Starting to Sour on Migration," (The Economist, 2023).
  • The Gift of Global Talent: How Migration Shapes Business, Economy & Society, by William Kerr (2018).

• EXTRAS:
  • “The True Story of America’s Supremely Messed-Up Immigration System,” series by Freakonomics Radio (2024).
  • "Is the American Dream Really Dead?" by Freakonomics Radio (2017).

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The U.S. immigration system is a massively complicated machine, with a lot of worn-out parts. How to fix it? Step one: Get hold of some actual facts and evidence. (We did this step for you.) (Part two of a three-part series.)

• SOURCES:
  • Zeke Hernandez, professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
  • David Leonhardt, senior writer at the New York Times.
  • Sindhu Mahadevan, creator of This Immigrant Life newsletter.

• RESOURCES:
  • The Truth About Immigration: Why Successful Societies Welcome Newcomers, by Zeke Hernandez (2024, available for pre-order).
  • "Illegal Immigration Is a Bigger Problem Than Ever. These Five Charts Explain Why," by Andrew Mollica, Alicia A. Caldwell, Michelle Hackman, and Santiago Pérez (The Wall Street Journal, 2023).
  • Ours Was the Shining Future: The Story of the American Dream, by David Leonhardt (2023).
  • The Economic and Fiscal Consequences of Immigration, by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (2017).

• EXTRAS:
  • “The True Story of America’s Supremely Messed-Up Immigration System,” series by Freakonomics Radio (2024).
  • "And the New Six-Word Motto for the U.S. Is …," by Stephen Dubner (Freakonomics blog, 2008).

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She arrived in the U.S. as an 11-year-old refugee, then rose to become Secretary of State. Her views on immigration, nationalism, and borders, from this 2015 interview, are almost strangely appropriate to the present moment. 

• SOURCE:
  • Madeleine Albright, U.S. Secretary of State under President Bill Clinton and former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.

• RESOURCES:
  • "Madeleine Albright, First Woman to Serve as Secretary of State, Dies at 84," by Robert D. McFadden (The New York Times, 2022).
  • "The Case for Getting Rid of Borders — Completely," by Alex Tabarrok (The Atlantic, 2015).

• EXTRAS:
  • "The True Story of America's Supremely Messed-Up Immigration System," series by Freakonomics Radio (2024).
  • "Is Migration a Basic Human Right?" by Freakonomics Radio (2015).

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How did a nation of immigrants come to hate immigration? We start at the beginning, sort through the evidence, and explain why your grandfather was lying about Ellis Island. (Part one of a three-part series.)

• SOURCES:
  • Leah Boustan, professor of economics at Princeton University.
  • Zeke Hernandez, professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
  • Roger Nam, professor of Hebrew Bible at Emory University.

• RESOURCES:
  • The Truth About Immigration: Why Successful Societies Welcome Newcomers, by Zeke Hernandez (2024, available for pre-order).
  • "The Refugee Advantage: English-Language Attainment in the Early Twentieth Century," by Ran Abramitzky, Leah Platt Boustan, Peter Catron, Dylan Connor, and Rob Voigt (NBER Working Paper, 2023).
  • Streets of Gold: America's Untold Story of Immigrant Success, by Leah Boustan and Ran Abramitzky (2022).
  • "If Liberals Won't Enforce Borders, Fascists Will," by David Frum (The Atlantic, 2019).

• EXTRAS:
  • "Is Migration a Basic Human Right?" by Freakonomics Radio (2015).
  • "Who Are the Most Successful Immigrants in the World?" by Freakonomics Radio (2013).

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