Hawk Talk

Many college students seem baffled or even outraged by opinions that differ from their own. We hear phrases like safe spaces, trigger warnings, and virtue signaling. What’s going on? Has the same psychology that caused religious persecutions returned? Has it infected the majority of students and faculty across the country, or just a vocal few? Guest Donald Boudreaux joins hosts James Harrigan and Antony Davies to sift through the loudest arguments coming from our nation’s universities in this week’s episode of Words & Numbers. 

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Show Notes: 

Nuclear fusion

Artificial intelligence

Cancer cure

Longevity gene

Cure for bubble boy disease

Brian Lamb retiring

Foolishness of the week:

San Francisco: Poop in the streets

Washington DC: Homelessness

Seattle is dying

Topic of the week: Silencing Dissent

Donald Boudreaux

Donald Boudreaux on Brett Kavanaugh and GMU

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Words & Numbers Backstage

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Let us know what you think  at: [email protected]

 

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Getting paid for your blood—do you have any concerns? Many people are opposed to donors receiving compensation for ethical reasons. Should people only donate blood for altruistic reasons? Should we worry about exploitation? How much of America’s total exports are blood products? Join Antony Davies, James Harrigan, and their guest Peter Jaworski, co-author of the book Markets Without Limits, as they discuss the morality underlying the supply and demand of blood plasma around the world.

Win tickets to FEEcon 2019! Show Notes:

Deficit up 15% in 2019

Deficit up 17% in 2018

Tourism and Chernobyl

Foolishness of the week:

Illinois to raise smoking age to 21

Florida town makes it illegal to grow vegetables

State of Florida overrules Florida town

Topic of the week: Blood plasma sales:

Peter Jaworski

Letter to Senate of Canada regarding the ban on blood plasma sales

Canada needs blood plasma

We should pay for blood plasma donations

Bans on blood plasma sales 1

Bans on blood plasma sales 2

Don’t end NAFTA, Canada needs your bodily fluids

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Words & Numbers Backstage

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Peter Jaworski on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Let us know what you think at: [email protected]

 

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Wage gap myths, middle class success, and hate crime statistics are examined this week in order to dispel the calls for a new social contract. In a society where the majority makes the rules, how do minorities prosper? Is it because of a social contract, is it the result of people being rational, or is it just people being nice to each other? Listen to the conclusion of this two-part special as James Harrigan and Antony Davies use data to trace the prosperity of minority groups in America on this week’s episode of Words & Numbers.

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Show Notes:

13 year old buys his mother a car 

Cancer vaccine

Foolishness of the week

Illinois to raise smoking age to 21

Florida town makes it illegal to grow vegetables

State of Florida overrules Florida town

Topic of the week: Social Contract Nonsense (Part 2)

Households by race and income (1967-2017)

Income by gender (1960-2017)

Hate crime statistics

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Words & Numbers Backstage

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Let us know what you think at [email protected]

 

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Have you ever signed a contract without reading the terms and conditions? According to Elizabeth Warren, part of the “social contract” is to pay your fair share. But wait, what is the “social contract” that politicians and talking heads keep bringing up? Is it the consent of the governed? Is it written down? Did anyone actually agree to it? Enjoy the first part of a two-part special as Antony Davies and James Harrigan dig up the historical origins of the social contract.

Quick hits

Tversky & Kahneman, Rational Choice and the Framing of Decisions

Robots in grocery stores

FEEcon VIP Giveaway

https://info.fee.org/wordsandnumbers

Foolishness of the week

Special Olympics 1

Special Olympics 2

Topic of the week: Social Contract Nonsense (Part 1)

Locke’s Social Contract

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Words & Numbers Backstage

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Let us know what you think at [email protected]

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538 Electors. 270 votes. Winner-takes-all! Well, at least for now. Colorado recently became the twelfth state to join an effort to award the presidency to the candidate who wins the most individual votes. But should the popular vote replace the Electoral College? Originally intended as a safeguard for the separation of powers, has this election method failed Americans? Population vs. Geography. Urban vs. Rural. Democrats vs. Republicans; it’s a conversation that usually gets people all lathered up on both sides of the issue. Join James Harrigan and Antony Davies as they inform us about the reasoning behind the Electoral College and how it works.

Show Notes:

Adidas making sneakers out of waste plastic

China stops taking the world’s trash

No place for US recyclables

Nuclear energy better than renewables

Foolishness of the week

Police shoot teachers

Milgram experiment

Topic of the week

Electoral College

Contract Clause

Federalist 68

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Words & Numbers Backstage

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Let us know what you think at: [email protected]

 

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The dominating online presence of Facebook, Google, and Amazon has often been called monopolistic. Government-enforced monopolies, such as Western Union and Ma Bell, have fallen before, but is Big Tech anything like those old companies? Presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren has even started a petition calling for the breakup of big tech companies, which may include Apple among others. How would the digital world look if she succeeds? Should politicians get to decide whether Facebook meets the same fate as MySpace or should the consumer? Join us this week as James Harrigan and Antony Davies thwart the misconceptions about monopolies and discuss the fates of tech products like Netscape and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

Show Notes:

Buying your way into college

New York City wants to ban “unfair” firings

Foolishness of the week

Missouri wants to require residents to own AR-15s

Topic of the week

Elizabeth Warren wants to break up Facebook

Join the conversation

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Words & Numbers Backstage

Let us know what you think at: [email protected]

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Live from Scottsdale, Arizona! James Harrigan and Antony Davies contend that the median income in the US puts Americans in the top 1 percent in the world. What does that mean? Only that these people can afford stuff that, roughly a century ago, had been considered luxuries: air conditioning, running hot and cold water, ovens, refrigerators, stainless steel, and even sweet potatoes. The standard of living for even minimum wage earners today has remarkably improved in spite of burdensome regulations, but can this trend continue? Join us this week as our hosts suss out the reasons for the improvements in worldwide wealth and search for the “Goldilocks Zone” of government intervention.

Show Notes:

Measles outbreak at Midway airport

Gap, JC Penny, Foot Locker closures

Montgomery Ward

Foolishness of the week

Sanders: Government can’t go too far

Topic of the week

Where did Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez get her sweet potatoes?

World median income

Are you a 1-percenter?

Donald Boudreaux on insider trading

What would our GDP be if we had less unnecessary regulation?

Join the conversation

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Words & Numbers Backstage

Let us know what you think at

[email protected]

 

 

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This week’s guest, David Beito, professor of History at the University of Alabama, discusses the functions, benefits, and undoing of mutual aid societies. These private safety nets, like tontine funds and Masons, once widely provided services such as health and unemployment insurances, hospitals, housing for the elderly, and care for orphans. So what happened? Did beneficiaries dry up these funds? Did scandals, state bans, and the Great Depression lead to the disappearance of benefit societies? Are they still around? Join James Harrigan, Antony Davies, and professor Beito as they answer these questions and more on Words & Numbers.

Show Notes:

Male-only draft unconstitutional

Humanity’s backup plan

Foolishness of the week

AOC says people shouldn’t reproduce

Topic of the week

Mutual aid societies

Tontine insurance

David Beito

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Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Words & Numbers Backstage

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[email protected]

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This week, economist and theorist Warren Mosler joins James and Antony to explain the details of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). With 40 years of experience in finance and monetary operations, Mosler is a leading expert on MMT, is a co-founder of AVM—a brokerage, trading, and administrative services firm—and lectures on monetary economics around the world. He covers the important ramifications stemming from the adoption of MMT and how coercive shifts of resources benefit public infrastructure, and responds to criticisms of MMT. With supporters in Washington such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders, MMT is quickly gaining a strong following, and Warren, James, and Antony discuss the important points on this winding theory and more.

Show Notes:

People killed in armed conflicts

People killed by mosquitoes

Genetically modified mosquitoes

Foolishness of the week

TSA smuggling ring

Topic of the week

Modern Monetary Theory

Warren Mosler

Join the conversation

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Words & Numbers Backstage

Let us know what you think at:

[email protected]

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Discrimination happens every single day. Every human, in some way, makes a judgment about other humans and uses that judgment to discriminate, whether that be who they date, who they do business with, and, yes, who they hire and fire. Most discrimination is fine—necessary, even. But sometimes it crosses a line. Where is that line? How does it affect people’s careers? When is litigation the right option? Antony Davies and James Harrigan with special guest Vince White as they discuss this and more on Words & Numbers.

Show Notes:

Online dating is changing society

Amazon paid no federal taxes

Foolishness of the week

Amazon took its ball and went home

Topic of the week

Federal employment discrimination laws

Join the conversation

Antony Davies on Twitter

James R. Harrigan on Twitter

Antony Davies on Minds.com

James R. Harrigan on Minds.com

Words & Numbers Backstage

Let us know what you think at:

[email protected]

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