Misbehaving
by Richard H. Thaler · first published 2015
80% recommend20% neutral
Nobel laureate Richard H. Thaler has spent his career studying the radical notion that the central agents in the economy are humans―predictable, error-prone individuals. Misbehaving is his arresting, frequently hilarious account of the struggle to bring an academic discipline back down to earth―and change the way we think about economics, ourselves, and our world. Traditional economics assumes rational actors. Early in his research, Thaler realized these Spock-like automatons were nothing like real people. Whether buying a clock radio, selling basketball tickets, or applying for a mortgag
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Has any company ever tried being non-irrational? I highly recommend Misbehaving by Richard Thaler, particularly the chapter of the American football draft in this instance.
on “How Subtle Class Cues Can Backfire on a Resume (2016)” ↗Entrepreneurship Negotiation by Dinnar and Susskind covers some of the most fundamental topics anyone wanting to become an entrepreneur must know. I also find Richard Thaler work (Nudge, Misbehaving) very helpful particularly if you are in the B2C domain. The Black Swan by Taleb is another book I find myself going back to often; it's been of great help for decision making under lots of uncertainty.
on “Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?” ↗sounds like someone read Misbehaving by Richard Thaler, which I'm about halfway through right now. Great book on behavioral economics, and Thaler's academic career, for anyone who hasn't read it.
on “China's stock market crash: A red flag” ↗Misbehaving by Richard Thaler. It's like Thinking, Fast and Slow except more hilarious.
on “Ask HN: What book have you given as a gift?” ↗Modern microeconomics. I could elaborate, when I get to a better keyboard, but I suggest you read Misbehaving by Richard Thaler.
on “Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds” ↗…theory that didn't have some hand-wavy aspect to it." Steven Keen's Debunking Economics has some arguments that might make you revisit microeconomics (although much of the book is bad). Also, check out Misbehaving by Richard Thaler.
on ““Eurocentric modernist” thinking is exploding” ↗References: Steve Keene, Debunking Economics. Ignore everything but the actual arguments. Richard Thaler, Misbehaving.
on “The AI Misinformation Epidemic” ↗For more in a similar vein, see * Debunking Economics by Steve Keen. It's rhetoric aside, it provides strong arguments that the basics of economics are simply...wrong. * Misbehaving by Richard Thaler. A history of and introduction to behavioral economics, it has many amusing stories about interactions with economists behaving badly.
on “How economics became a religion” ↗…separates a good investment from the pack. As for the social science side, there is no better place to start than the "Neuroeconomics" work of this year's Nobel Laureate Richard Thaler. Start on "Nudge" and "Misbehaving". True game-changers. And then onto Daniel Kahneman's "Thinking Fast and Slow". And do give credence to the classic that kicked it all off: Adam Smith and "The Wealth of Nations". As important as Descartes,…
on “Ask HN: How much economics as an entrepreneur should i know?” ↗…a proof of what a rational actor would do in a given situation. When it's pointed out that no one does that, the theorist responds that he is uninterested in the economics of stupid people. Check out Misbehaving by Richard Thaler for the entertaining details.
on “Post-crash economics: have we learnt nothing?” ↗…expected value] in nature. What behavioral economics has done is started to provide intellectual foundations for observed behavior that isn't explained by traditional economic models. Richard Thaler's Misbehaving is a good read on how this developed. I had Thaler as a professor for a couple of classes in the early 80s and I found some of the insights from early-on behavioral economics some of the more useful things…
on “Why Is Behavioral Economics So Popular?” ↗…deeper - moonwalking with Einstein: this will seem unrelated, but really listen for how The author ends up falling in love with this weird hobby. Can you find that love for anything in your life? - Misbehaving (Richard Thaler): A young economist bumbles around for years until it starts to come together into a coherent research direction. - The age of Wonder (Holmes): biographies of romantic scientists, know…
on “Ask HN: How to find what I am really good at?” ↗It was Richard Thaler's Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics book that finally broke through my thick, anxiety ridden skull and convinced me to stop reading economic news everyday and just forget the the retirement accounts existed.…
on “Nevada’s public employee pension fund invests passively and beats peers (2016)” ↗One of the things Richard Thaler points out in Misbehaving (on behavioral economics) is that traditional economics cannot decide whether out is descriptive or normative. Descriptive economics would be the science of how people actually engage in economic activity.…
on “NCTA Agrees Title II Virtuous Cycle Is Working” ↗> One of the things Richard Thaler points out in Misbehaving (on behavioral economics) is that traditional economics cannot decide whether out is descriptive or normative. That's because "traditional economics" doesn't actually exist as an entity, it's a strawman.…
on “NCTA Agrees Title II Virtuous Cycle Is Working” ↗