Marginalia

Grant Thornton did a photo-shoot and audio interview with me a few months ago about “My Big Decision”. I told them I don’t believe in big decisions, but for all three die-hard Tim Harford fans out there, here’s the interview.

Marketplace worked with me to produce this video about the economics of signalling in the workplace. They did a fantastic job, and you even get to hear my David Attenborough impression. The video is loosely based on one of the Dear Economist letters. Enjoy!

Cass Talks, courtesy of Cass Business School, London:

Here’s the hedgehog. Here’s the book. Thanks to NPR and Planet Money for inviting me on!

I am looking for a research assistant, or assistants. This could be a fun position for someone studying for a degree and the work would be flexible enough to accommodate that. The work would be freelance and would likely be a few hours a week on a flexible schedule. I’m based in London but the successful candidates need not be.

The job description is likely to evolve over time – the main aim is simply to take some workload off me, whether working on columns, speeches or my next book – but is likely to entail:

- Tracking down and summarising relevant research and statistics;

- Fact-checking, proofing or editing my articles and new book;

- Occasional work on slides.

The ideal candidate would have a strong grounding in economics, good writing skills and an attention to detail. Interest in the economics of innovation, climate change, development, conflict or banking would be an advantage, as would a knowledge of PowerPoint.

Please apply with CV and covering letter – contact details at the bottom of this webpage -  by 31 October 2009.

For those who haven’t been able to get tickets to my talks at LSE last week or Cass Business School tomorrow, here’s yet another chance! I’m speaking about the ideas in Dear Undercover Economist at One Alfred Place on Thursday, 6.30pm for 7pm.

One Alfred Place is normally members only, but they have agreed to open the talk to non-members.

To my astonishment, my talk at LSE next Tuesday is already a sell out.  But never fear. I am also giving a talk on “The Consolations of Economics” at Cass Business School in the City – please register before you go along – on Wednesday 14th October. The day after, I am speaking at One Alfred Place but it is not yet clear whether the speech is open to the public (an excellent reason to become a member, shurely). Finally, I’m giving a sermon on Frugality just before Christmas: 13 December at Conway Hall, under the auspices of the School of Life. Do please come along.

In all cases, the inspiration for the talks will be “Dear Undercover Economist“, my new book.

I have a guest post up on the Freakonomics blog, taking readers’ questions. Here’s a sample:

Q. If a reasonably intelligent young person today is looking to make as big a contribution to society as possible, is he or she better off making a small impact on something very large (like federal policy) or picking one particular problem and spending a lifetime attacking it (like curing a disease or improving public education in a country or even city)? — Matt

The answer, with several others, is here.

It occurs to me that despite various hints and publicity elsewhere, I have not actually announced the fact on ths blog that my new book, “Dear Undercover Economist”, is now out in English and Spanish. Other languages to follow! Details about the book on the Dear Undercover Economist page…

Next Wednesday, 10 June, at 7pm, I’ll be on home turf in Hackney, talking about “The Logic of Life” and perhaps a little about my forthcoming book too. Pages of Hackney is an intimate venue, which would be a big attraction if I were Mick Jagger. But it should be fun: I understand that if you buy a book, the wine and the talk are free. Otherwise, the wine and the talk are £3. Can’t be bad.

I am speaking at the Royal Institution on Monday 27 April, 7-8.30pm. Details avaiable here.

One of the least important but most enjoyable pieces of research reported in “The Logic of Life”.

Further reading here.

For readers in London:

Find reason in a crazy world: join Tim Harford a.k.a ‘The Undercover Economist’ discusses his newest book…
Tim Harford
The Logic of Life
WATERSTONE’S GOWER STREET
Thursday, 19 March 2009, 6:00PM
Tickets £3/£2 – redeemable against the promoted book on the night. Avalaible from the store.

In his bestselling new book, Undercover Economist,Tim Harford – author/prolific columnist and presenter of Radio 4’s ‘More or Less’ explains how there can be logic behind even the most irrational of behaviour. He will answer some of life’s mysteries including, Why is your boss overpaid? Why do people smoke? For more info or tickets call the store or events@gowerst.watertsones.co.uk.
Further details: 020 7636 1577

In other words, it’s a free talk if you buy the book. Do come and say hello.  I am also giving a talk in Bath on Friday, and so is Samuel Brittan. (Here for more details.)

I never realised how topical this was going to become when I wrote the chapter…

Further reading here.

I’ve been wanting to make a video explaining Thomas Schelling’s model of racial segregation for a long time. Here it is!

More about Thomas Schelling here in my “Lunch with the FT” piece shortly after he won the Nobel prize.

A little bird tells me that the paperback of The Logic of Life is now on the front table in Borders in the UK. Official publication date is Thursday 5th March, but don’t feel you have to wait! Do please consider buying a copy.

People who are interested in The Logic of Life but want to try before they buy could surf on over to the Milken Institute website and read a very generous extract from the book – most of chapter two, in fact, which is all about poker, addiction, war and the limits of rational choice. (Free, but registration required.)

Price-sensitive lovers of economics books may want to know that the paperback of “The Logic of Life” is now out in the US. (In the UK, one more month to wait.) You can buy it here; you can read discerning reviews from the New York Times, the Economist, and many others here – people of taste, all.

The book has been interpreted as the antithesis of Nudge or Predictably Irrational, an anti-behavioural-economics book, but it isn’t really that. It’s really a product of my love affair with economics, showing how it can usefully be applied to crime, marriage, poker and much else. Thumbing through the pages of the paperback reminds me how much I loved writing the book, so I’m glad that the collected book reviewers of America enjoyed reading it.

A brand new series of More or Less has now started. We’re now on the air (Radio 4) at Fridays at 1.30pm GMT and Sundays at 8pm GMT. You can also listen online, subscribe to a podcast, and read more at the More or Less website here.

“”But that’s rational!” spluttered one venerable journalist, when I told him about this. Well, yes–it seems so, doesn’t it?”

An extract from my debate with Dan “Predictably Irrational” Ariely.  It’s the first debate to be hosted by Amazon’s “Omnivoracious” Blog – check it out.

Here’s a sample:

The book surveys shelf after shelf of the economics literature but in such skilful hands it does not feel like a dutiful trip to the library. Economists are often too beguiled by elegant theories, but Mr Harford wisely confines himself to ideas that have been carefully tested against real life. Only thorough research could discern that residents of high-rise buildings are more likely to be victims of crime, because stacked tenants make for poor monitors of the surrounding streets. Even the excellent chapter on game theory has a practical hero: the card player, Chris “Jesus” Ferguson, who applied its lessons to win the poker world championship in 2000.
Mr Harford, who works at the Financial Times, is an amiable guide for the non-specialist reader, neither too lofty nor dumbed-down. The book’s tone is breezy, but his command of the subject is such that even a well-schooled economist will discover much that is new.

The whole thing is here; I’m collecting reviews here.

I have a new video section on the site; notable links include a serious talk at Google and a not-so-serious appearance on The Colbert Report. More reviews are coming in, too.

I was due to appear at The Gladstone Hotel Gallery, 1214 Queen St West, Toronto Thurs Jan 31; 7:30 pm (doors 7pm), but sadly not. The event is cancelled and I’m very sorry about this. I’ve been routed back to New York to do TV there instead & will arrive in Toronto too late for the planned event. I apologise.

While I have been on tour, my UK publishers decided to publish “The Logic of Life” early and not tell me. Do please consider buying a copy.

The New York Times has reviewed The Logic of Life. I’m pleased:

The world is a crazy place. It makes perfect sense only to conspiracy theorists and economists of a certain stripe. Tim Harford, a columnist for The Financial Times and the author of “The Undercover Economist,” is one of these, a devotee of rational-choice theory, which he applies ingeniously and entertainingly to all kinds of problems in “The Logic of Life.”…
Mr. Harford has a knack for explaining economic principles and problems in plain language and, even better, for making them fun.

You can read other reviews here.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be touring the US, Canada, Ireland, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand, and will also be giving talks in several UK cities. Please drop in and say hello! Public events, many of them free, are now listed here.

Update: More talks added in Washington DC, Wellington and Singapore.

In late February I am visiting Singapore, Australia and New Zealand to talk about “The Logic of Life”. Here are some of the Australian events. Further details to follow as I have them:

PERTH Friday 22 February

Read the rest of this entry »

Late last year, Neill Denny of The Bookseller wrote a nice profile of me. You can read it all if you’d like, or here is an extract:

“Rational choice theory is the way most economists see the world; the interesting bit is when they use that and they say: ‘Let’s talk about drugs, let’s talk about marriage’, in the same way that they would talk about buying a cup of coffee,”he says.

The chapters have alluring titles such as “The Dangers of Rational Racism”and “Is Divorce Under-rated?”Each is pretty self-contained, stuffed full of some big ideas, but they link together to form an overall whole.

At long last, the moment has arrived. The Logic of Life should be available in bookshops across the US and Canada with a few days, and shipping from online retailers. The book tour starts next week – wish me luck! You can also order it here, read early reviews here, and find out more here.

“Financial Times and Slate.com columnist Harford (The Undercover Economist) provides an entertaining and provocative look at the logic behind the seemingly irrational. Arguing that rational behavior is more widespread than most people expect, Harford uses economic principles to draw forth the rational elements of gambling, the teenage oral sex craze, crime and other supposedly illogical behaviors to illustrate his larger point. Utilizing John von Neumann and Thomas Schelling’s conceptions of game theory, Harford applies their approach to a multitude of arenas, including marriage, the workplace and racism. Contrarily, he also shows that individual rational behavior doesn’t always lead to socially desired outcomes. Harford concludes with how to apply this thinking on an even bigger scale, showing how rational behavior shapes cities, politics and the entire history of human civilization. Well-written with highly engaging stories and examples, this book will be of great interest to Freakonomics and Blink fans as well as anyone interested in the psychology of human behavior.”

I’ll try not to post too often about The Logic of Life, but since it’s published in mid-January in the US and early February in the UK, there may be a post or two. You can find out more here.

Here’s a (less than) one-minute video of me talking about the new book.

In today’s programme (4.30pm GMT on BBC Radio 4, and podcast thereafter) we’ll be looking at silly “scientific” results commissioned by public relations companies, at the row over immigration statistics, and an international dispute over how heavy a kilogram should be. Check it out.

You can’t have missed the fact that this is a new website design! Many thanks to the brilliant Wolfango Chiappella and please bear with us while we iron out technical hitches. This site’s RSS feed is different from the old one, but don’t delete your old subscriptions just yet. We’re trying to plug the new feed into the old one. Please do email with any comments or concerns.

Update: I think subscribers to the old feed are now getting updates. Posting this update is my way of finding out!

My colleague Gideon Rachman wants to know what you think of Bono. He’s not a fan. I think Gideon’s being harsh. Of course, Bono is no Tom Waits. But then, neither is Gideon.

I recently made a radio program about Al Roth’s concept of “Repugnant Markets”, with the excellent Richard Vadon as producer. The transcript stays up permanently.
The show includes Al Roth, Virginia Postrel, Bishop Lee Rayfield, Tom Shakespeare, Robin Hanson, Naomi Pfeffer and Andrew Oswald. I’m very pleased with it.

The dismal science keeps crashing through those boundaries, and I am now offering dating advice to the readers of Esquire (UK). Unfortunately they don’t have a proper website, so you’ll need to buy it if you want to read the article.

Here’s a taster:

If there’s one thing that economists understand, then it’s supply and demand. No matter how attractive a dating proposition you are, you can always put yourself in a stronger position by making sure that you’re in a place where there aren’t enough men to go around. In other words, you need to live in a seller’s market.
Carrie Bradshaw, the lead character in Sex in the City, grumbled “that there 1.3 million single men in Manhattan and 1.8 million women” but she didn’t stop to wonder why.
New York-based economist Lena Edlund (whose research includes “A Theory of Prostitution” and “Hermaphroditism: What’s not to Like?”) argues that the reason cities have an excess supply of young women is that they offer them two bites at the cherry: good jobs, and rich husbands.
In case you doubt this explanation, Edlund looked carefully at the situation in Sweden. She found that the richer the men, the larger the supply of available women in the local area. I think it’s pretty clear what is going on here. So if you want to be surrounded by unattached young women, live in an area full of wealthy guys.
Most big cities provide well-stocked hunting grounds for men but in the UK, the top locations include leafy stockbroker-belt towns in Hertfordshire (between the ages of 20-35, there are 113 women chasing every 100 men), Berwick-on-Tweed (112 young women per 100 young men) and Kensington and Chelsea (108 – and you thought all those girls on the King’s Road were shopping for shoes). Mews houses in SW6 don’t come cheap, of course, but if there’s one thing economics tells us it’s that there’s no such thing as a free lunch.

Note: if you are reading this magazine in Rutland, Oxford or Cambridge, the deck is stacked against you. And with three young guys for each girl, the Isles of Scilly have all the demographic desirability of a North Sea oil rig.

Bryan Caplan, GMU economist, superb blogger and author of “The Myth of the Rational Voter“, is appearing at the Cato Institute at Washington DC on 17 July. If you’re in the area, check it out – the book has been attracting attention from The Economist to The New Yorker.

I was in Barcelona on Thursday to promote the Spanish edition of The Undercover Economist, which has to my surprise been making frequent visits to the bestseller lists since its launch in February. Here are my minders, Ruth and Felipe of Spanish publishers Temas de Hoy.

Undercover Economist has now sold 500,000 copies worldwide. I thought that was pretty good, although of course someone is doing even better – congratulations, chaps!

The UK paperback of The Undercover Economist is now shipping; the official publication date is 3 May. I love the cover.

I recently wrote about provocative tax ideas (choose from the UK version or the US version), including taxing the middle-aged.

Now Greg Mankiw and Matthew Weinzierl suggest taxing tall people, while Alberto Alesina and Andrea Ichino believe women should pay less tax than men. The interesting thing is that Alesina and Ichino seem to be deadly serious while Mankiw and Weinzierl clearly think they’re showing that such taxes are daft.

I’ve been shortlisted for “Best Communicator” at the Business Journalist of the Year awards. Last year’s winner was the wonderful Evan Davis (who has a new blog). This year’s winner may well be the equally wonderful Hamish McRae. I’ll just enjoy being on the shortlist for now.

After a rather odd delay, the hardback-paperback hybrid of Undercover Economist is available from Amazon.co.uk. Its the size of a hardback but with a soft cover. The small-format paperback is due in May.
Meanwhile the North American paperback is on the bestseller lists in the US and Canada too!

I’ve been reading an early copy of Tyler Cowen’s hugely enjoyable “Discover Your Inner Economist“. Full of small steps towards a much better life. Here’s Tyler in an art gallery:

In every room ask yourself which picture you would take home — if you could take just one — and why. This forces us to keep thinking critically about the displays. If the alarm system was shut down and the guards went away, should I carry home the Cezanne, the Manet, or the Renoir?

And on self-deceit:

How many of us would enjoy hearing a two-hour debate — Oxford style with formal rules — on the relative prominence of our virtues and flaws? Let’s say – just to be generous – that the “Virtue” side would win the debate.

Marvellous. He doesn’t get it all right, though:

A pure “hard to get” strategy fails to satisfy what signaling theorists call – forgive the nerdspeak – “a separating equilibrium.” In other words, it does not sort (or “separate”) the winners from the losers. “Hard to get” is too easy for the losers to mimic… I’ve played “hard to get” with Salma Hayek for years, yet this reticence paid few dividends, not even a courtesy email or party invitation.

No, Tyler. “Hard to get” isn’t a signal, it’s a screen. When Salma finally turns up on your doorstep, you’ll know for sure that she’s serious about you.

The UK International Development Secretary, Hilary Benn, has argued that Valentine’s Day flowers can be flown in from Africa with a clear conscience because it’s less energy intensive to do that than grow them in Dutch greenhouses. Given my own research on the subject I am not surprised.
This is one reason why we need a carbon tax: our intuitions about what is and is not environmentally damaging are just awful.

If you are watching in RSS and the site seems to be going crazy, apologies. My trusty assistant Sophy is posting all the old Dear Economist columns so that they are available in one place and on one RSS feed.

The US paperback edition of The Undercover Economist is out on January 30th, and to celebrate the event, my publishers are flying me all over North America.

If you would like to avoid me, please steer clear of the following venues. If you would like to attend, snoop around and find out more, because some events require tickets:

• Tuesday 30 January – Seattle
  5:30 PM
  Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce
• Thursday 1 February – New York City
  6.30 PM
  Barnes & Noble, Citigroup Center
  160 E 54th Street (at 3rd Avenue)
• Friday 2 February – Chicago
  11:30 AM
  Union League
  65 West Jackson Blvd.
• Monday 5 February – Washington DC
  11.30 AM
  Library of Congress
  Washington, D.C. 20540
• Tuesday 6 February – Toronto
  12 Noon
  Toronto CFA Society
  Toronto Hilton

The Spanish edition of “The Undercover Economist” is now out – one of 21 translations currently in progress.

After the success of Freakonomics, 2007 looks like being a bumper year for popular economics books. Five to look out for:

• Immigrants: Your Country Needs Them by Philippe Legrain (UK)
• The Soulful Science by Diane Coyle (UK US)
• More Sex is Safer Sex by Steven Landsburg (UK US)
• (As yet untitled) by Tyler Cowen

and, um,

• The Undercover Economist, paperback edition (UK US)

With the exception of Tyler’s book, which I expect to be excellent but have not read, I have enjoyed them all. I won’t say too much more here because I hope the FT will ask me to review a few of them. But read, and enjoy – the publication dates are even spread across the year to assist you in delaying your gratification without the need for a commitment mechanism.

Merry Christmas to all!

Just back from a trip to New York where, I’m delighted to report, a distinguished panel of judges agonized over whether to give the Bastiat Prize for journalism to me or to the excellent Jamie Whyte for so long that they had to give it to us both. Check out some fantastic essays byJamie, Ila Patnaik, Gabriel Rozenberg and the other shortlisted writers.

The FT forgot to post this piece online, so here it is in full:

Dear Economist,
Bikini waxes: boyfriends seem to like the results, but they hurt. What would you say were the costs and benefits?
Yours,
Sylvia, via email

Dear Sylvia,
Thank you for sharing your concerns. I have never had a bikini wax myself and prefer not to comment on the aesthetic qualities of the practice. Nevertheless I believe there is an important economic insight to take on board: you are making what economists would call a “relationship-specific investment”, and such investments have consequences.
Admittedly, getting a bikini wax is not as serious a business as having a child, or indeed a prominent tattoo reading “Sylvia for Tim”.
Still, it is something that only one boyfriend is likely to enjoy; should he prove insufficiently appreciative, your depilation is not something you will be able to advertise to other admirers unless you have an unusually frank flirtation technique, or a career as a pole dancer.
When businesses install equipment or learn techniques to satisfy the requirements of a particular customer, they usually do so only when protected by cost-sharing arrangements or a long-term contract; sometimes the client will even merge with its supplier. Those who do not risk being exploited: once the one-sided commitment has been made and the costs have been sunk, they find the other side reneging on the deal.
You should learn the same lessons. Cost-sharing might be a fancy weekend away; a long-term contract might specify that your boyfriend does the washing up. (Get it in writing.) And as for a merger? Marriage, of course, or an engagement assured by a suitably expensive rock.
Whatever it is you want from your boyfriend, make sure you get it before you make your own painful investment. You need to understand when your bargaining power is waning or – ahem – waxing.

This will be the last reminder for a while: Undercover Economist columns are now available free on the FT site, with an RSS feed here. I’ll continue to post other articles here.

The latest Dear Economist column is about how to successfully extort money for withdrawing from a job interview, but I won’t post it here because the FT is now posting my columns (both Undercover Economist and Dear Economist), free of charge. There is even an RSS feed, to which I urge you to subscribe.

Quite a few kind souls have written to ask about DVDs of “Trust Me, I’m an Economist“. Alas, there is no official DVD and probably will not be unless a second series is commissioned. Lobby the BBC at once!
There may, of course, be illicit downloads floating around on the internet but I am not aware of them.

Few readers of this site will need convincing, but here is a short video interview with the BBC in which I talk about the new show, “Trust Me, I’m an Economist” and argue the case for the economics of everyday life.

Tim Harford is one of a new breed of economists who promise to solve everyday problems with the power of economic theory. He claims to be able to show people when and where they’re being ripped off and so learn how to get a better deal…

read more.

The BBC 2 TV series, “Trust Me, I’m an Economist”, begins at 7pm on August 18th

It is, I admit, an implausible piece of casting. I am ungainly, balding, bespectacled and rather shy. I make an unlikely television presenter. But I bluffed my way past the front door of a production company called Tiger Aspect, which makes successful children’s cartoons and sitcoms but is not famous for economic analysis. Then it bluffed its way past the front door of the BBC.But the BBC, rather unexpectedly, called those bluffs, so we had to make a television show. I moved my family across the Atlantic to London, abandoned my wife among the packing cases and tried to keep bluffing my way all the way through to the final product: Trust Me, I’m an Economist. The show’s concept is simple: an economist uses his theories to solve problems for ordinary people, finding them dates or new jobs, and explaining a little bit of economics along the way. This is the story of how it all happened.

February 15

I am already discovering things I like about being a television presenter.

1. You get called “the talent”.
2. Other people pay for your sandwiches.
3. You get to take a lot of taxis.
4. You get free clothes, chosen by the producer, who is fresh from producing What Not to Wear. This makes her dangerous. The disgust with which she looks at my existing wardrobe is humiliating. But for a free sandwich, I can cope with this. I could get used to being a television presenter.

February 17

Practice day. I am to spend an hour or two filming at a branch of Coffee Republic. I do the walking-and-talking thing while the cameraman and director walk backwards into lampposts. I enjoy whispering to camera that Coffee Republic has a “secret cappuccino” that is cheaper than its other drinks and is widely available but never advertised. This is going to be dynamite!

The manager’s face wrinkles with concern, and she seeks reassurance from the director that nobody will ever see the footage.

Coffee Republic later confirms that we will not be allowed to film the series on their premises. Oops.

March 2

The first day of proper filming is at Harrods. I have no idea what I’m doing, but saunter through the menswear department caressing the designer suits as the director requests. We film some semi-scripted discussions with the sales assistant, who has more experience on camera than I do.

Harrods is an auspicious place to begin filming, but the day quickly nose-dives as we head to the Harlequin shopping centre in Watford, a mall of epic proportions.

The unpromising trajectory continues as I climb into a small green plywood booth advertising “FREE ADVICE ABOUT ANYTHING”. It is then my role, for the next three hours, to offer witty and incisive advice, soundly based on economic principles, in response to whatever questions the good people of Watford care to throw at me.

Twelve-year-old boys run up to ask:

How can my friend sort out his tiny knob?

and run away again without waiting to hear my wisdom.

A bruiser in a shell suit wanders past, surveying the booth much as a rhinoceros ponders an offending Land Rover. The booth does not feel very sturdy, and I look anxiously around for the assistant director, who is half my size, but I would back in a fight against a rhinoceros any day.

Then a lisping black man in tap shoes and a waistcoat approaches.

I understand that you will answer any question?

Of course.

Excellent. You may know the film Easter Parade, starring Judy Garland and Fred Astaire. But Astaire was given the role after the first-choice actor broke his ankle. Who was the role originally intended for?

I blink. Surely Milton Friedman never had to cope with this.

March 14

The day begins with the producer tearing strips off me for not delivering scripts on time. (Silently, I blame television’s fuzzy deadlines. You know where you are with the printing press.) I am so discombobulated by this that I then fluff my lines dozens of times while walking along Upper Street in Islington. It’s an impossibly difficult set-up anyway, with the camera 200 yards away and plenty of opportunity for people to get in the way, walk behind me making daft faces, or try to sell me the Big Issue mid-shot. I can feel my carefully cultivated facade of serenity crumbling, but after completely losing my cool I do then buy a copy of the Big Issue and feel a bit better.

Afterwards we drive to an organic farm, where I chase organic turkeys until I fall spectacularly into a pile of distinctly organic turkey guano.

March 16

I am starting to realise that film crews exploit people all the time. It’s not the desperate exploitation of the sad cases who would do anything to get on television – although there is plenty of that – but the vampiric drain on the goodwill of everyone we encounter. The assistant producer will persuade a shop owner to let us film for five minutes, and then the crew will scare away the customers for the next four hours. It makes me uncomfortable, but I catch on eventually. If you told the truth, you’d never be allowed to start; if you kept your promises, you’d never finish. Fortunately, we’re never going to see any of these people again.

March 22

This is one of the more surreal shoots. At 9am at a casino on Piccadilly, I am surrounded by handsome men in expensive shirts and beautiful women in strappy party dresses, all of whom have shown up to pretend to play roulette for a couple of hours, with no prospect even of travel expenses. Where do they come from? What jobs have they abandoned for this unparalleled opportunity to do nothing in particular?

We also have a heroic contributor, Andy, who has agreed to look for love with the eyes of the world upon him, guided only by an economist. Within a minute of sitting down at the roulette table with him, I understand why: he’d like to be a television presenter and he wants to know how to get into the business.

“Well, I don’t really know,” I offer. “How did you get into the business?” he presses eagerly. “I wrote a book about economics, but that might not work for you.”

This is the feeblest career guidance of all time, but Andy manfully conceals his disappointment. I promise that, armed with economics, I will find him love. He doesn’t flinch. Good man.

The evening is even more surreal. I meet Andy in a Soho bar for his promised date. He is showing rather a lot of chest hair and a medallion, but despite the sartorial expertise of the producer, this isn’t What Not to Wear, and I am forced to limit myself to advice based solidly on economic theory.

It’s a speed date, and Andy is to pick his moment to move in on his favourite lady, armed with a pair of tickets to a top West End musical, and the economic insight that will allow him to prove that he is a sensitive, loyal man rather than a playboy. A minor problem is that we forgot to bring the tickets with us. A more substantial problem becomes apparent only after Andy is putting the moves on the lovely Brooke from Perth. My fault, no doubt, but it turns out that Andy does not actually understand the economic advice I gave him and proceeds to bungle the whole thing. The only question now is whether Brooke will notice Andy’s mistake. bastardised economics, dubious flirting, great television.

March 24

My kind of filming: I deliver the first lines of the entire series staring up at the camera from the comfort of my own bed. I need a few takes, but that suits me very well.

March 29

We’re filming in a pool hall in Notting Hill, so that I can demonstrate an odd piece of economic psychology by concealing pool balls inside champagne buckets: Paul Daniels without the good looks and gravitas. The patient contributor sounds exactly like Ricky Gervais and looks quite like him too, which is disconcerting. I keep studying his eyes for the twinkle that would reveal a deliberate impersonation, but to no avail.

I have an embarrassing admission here. There is absolutely no point in this experiment. It is interesting and has a wonderful history involving the economist and Vietnam dissident Daniel Ellsberg, but it does not remotely advance the economic ideas in the show. It looks great. It stays in. I think it’s the only time we include a camera-friendly non sequitur – with dozens of scenes and examples in the series, I suppose that is forgivable.

31 March

A nightmare shoot. On Friday night we drive to Essex and seek nourishment in the most bizarre restaurant I’ve ever encountered – at one point a live lobster, faced with being flambeed, rolls off the table and makes a break for freedom. Shortly afterwards we are served with lobster pizza, complete with half lobster in the shell. I feel trapped in a Terry Gilliam movie.

We then move to the shoot itself, in which we film six unsuspecting couples, all expecting a baby within a few weeks, enjoying yoga and pre-natal advice. I stand with the yoga class in the background explaining why economics predicts divorce for some of them. I try to speak sotto voce so that the camera can hear, but the yoga class cannot. By take 20 the camera still hasn’t heard but the yoga class has a pretty good idea.

April 3

A better day. I advise a primary-school teacher who wants to change careers and become a maitre d’ at a top London restaurant. A spot of optimal contract theory and she has a chance, serving at lunch but bearing all the performance risk herself. The restaurant is beautiful. She is beautiful. The manager is beautiful. Even the economics are beautiful. She gets the job.

April 11

Just when I thought all the humiliations were complete, I show up to the shoot wearing, as requested, black trousers and a long black leather jacket. The black is useful for the special effects on the shoot – although we’re not talking Jurassic Park here – but so appalling is the fashion blunder that the production assistant spends half an hour on the phone to the producer seeking advice. I can’t hear much but I do catch a shrill “You didn’t let him wear his own clothes, did you?” I wouldn’t mind, but it’s my favourite outfit.

April 12

Finally, I get to watch something resembling a finished version of the “love” show, our flagship. And. it’s pretty good. I mean, there’s me blundering around in the middle of it, pulling odd faces and speaking in a funny voice. But apart from that, it’s not bad at all. It’s funny, there is some economics in it and it mostly makes sense. The camera work is gorgeous. The music is fun. Andy’s quest for a date is as rich in tragicomedy as it is in economic theory. I can actually imagine somebody watching this. Trust me.

First published in FT Magazine

“The Undercover Economist” is a Sunday Times bestseller. Naturally, I’m delighted and slightly surprised…

Sorry about the slow updates; I have been in Ireland taking a break, along with a spot of publicity for ‘Undercover Economist‘. I returned to find the book number one on Amazon. Thanks to everyone who helped to put it there.

Stephanie Flanders writes in the Financial Times,

I take my hat off to Harford for producing 276 pages of lucid prose aimed at convincing a general reader that economics is more useful – and certainly more interesting – than you might have thought.

D. Murali in The Hindu Business Line calls it

an ideal read to start the new fisc. with.

The British, Australian and Indian editions are being published in the next few days.

Reason Magazine, March 2006 – Extract from ‘The Undercover Economist‘

They call Douala the “armpit of Africa.” Lodged beneath the bulging shoulder of West Africa, this malaria-infested city in southwestern Cameroon is humid, unattractive, and smelly. On a torrid evening in late 2001, I was guided out of the chaotic Douala International Airport by my friend Andrew and his driver, Sam, who would have whisked us immediately to the cooler hillside town of Buea if Douala were at all conducive to being whisked anywhere. It isn’t. Douala, a city of 2 million people, has no real roads.

A typical Douala street is 50 yards wide from shack to shack. It’s packed with street vendors, slouched beside a tray of peanuts or an impromptu plantain barbecue, and with little clusters of people, standing around a motorbike, drinking beer or palm wine, or cooking on a small fire. Piles of rubble and vast holes mark unfinished construction or demolition work. Along the middle is a strip of potholes that 20 years ago was a road.

Continued at Reason Magazine – no subscription required.

On Sunday the New York Times reviewed The Undercover Economist, starting:

A funny thing seems to be happening to economics writing: it’s getting better,

and ending with

For those of you, even now, still stuck in the bookstore cafe, this is a book to savor.

You can read the whole review, including the ‘quibbles’.

The Toronto Globe and Mail says:

The Undercover Economist is dulcet stuff. It should interest both economists and schmoozers at Starbucks. Brief, chatty and digestible, the book should refute the old canard that economics is dismal.

In a Washington Times op-ed, William H. Peterson writes:

Mr. Harford’s fetching book is part a field guide to economics in action and part an expose of Economics 101 principles lurking beneath the action. As he says in the introduction, he is out to convert his reader into a more savvy consumer, no matter how hard advertising puffs, and into a more savvy voter able to dig out the truth behind the tall stories that politicians may tell.

If you missed it, you can hear my brief interview with NPR’s Marketplace.

Marta Salij opines in the Detroit Free Press:

Best of all, Harford can clarify how economics is a science that deals with human behavior, especially when it goes wrong. “The Undercover Economist” has the human touch to make econ fun.

Martha Lagace writes for the Harvard Business School:

As a well-rounded practitioner of the dismal science, Tim Harford has emerged as one of those rare creatures: an economist for Everyman, a person who can set “oligopoly market” and “probability theory” in harmony with everyday conundrums without making you wrinkle your brow even once.

While at Tech Central Station, Arnold Kling writes:

The substance of UE is so strong, that I am tempted to review it as if it were a textbook. Not because it resembles the freshman textbooks that are commonly used today, but because it resembles what I believe such books ought to be. In fact, it is not far from the book that I argued for five years ago. If the Ivy League economics courses were designed for the benefit of students rather than the convenience of professors, then Harford, not Greg Mankiw, would be the $1.4 million man.

Given Dr Kling’s expertise, that review is particularly heart-warming.

You can see me on C-Span 2, Book-TV, at 10.30pm on Saturday 3rd (Eastern Time).
For those of you with better things to do of a Saturday evening, why not listen to a PodCast with 800-CEO-READ – or read an article about the book by Used Car News.

Update: Interview with Marketplace on Tuesday 6 December – listen here.

Fast Company have a piece on the boom in economics books, including a brief interview with yours truly (as well as the relevation that SuperFreakonomics is on the way…).

Meanwhile, The San Diego Union Tribune’s reviewer damns all economists, economcs and economics books. It is comforting that he concedes that I have

produced an engaging, fast-paced, well-written and witty volume that affords the reader a quick, and in many ways useful, insight into the ways in which modern economics dissects and interprets many contemporary issues. His summaries of abstruse economic ideas, such as the concept of “moral hazard” in insurance markets and the notion of market “externalities,” are clear and well informed.

In the Agora’s reviewer says:

If you read only one pop economics book this year, The Undercover Economist should be it. Harford, a columnist for the Financial Times among other distinctions, has written a book that could almost serve as a textbook for an Economics 101 course. But it’s emphatically not dry or dull. Instead, what Harford has done is convey the excitement, the power, and the often counter-intuitive results of economic thought. In so doing, he has written more or less the economic equivalent to The Selfish Gene.

Finally, one blogger thinks my Undercover Economist columns from the Financial Times magazine (also published here) are extracts from the book. Not so – they’re all brand new stuff.

Patri Friedman, the high-stakes-poker-playing-anarchist, has a big interview with me up at Catallarchy. Thanks, Patri!

In other news, Amazon have sold out of copies of ‘The Undercover Economist‘. I am assured they’ll be offering 24-hour shipping again any day now.

For reasons explained here, I have the first ever signed copy of the million-selling Freakonomics in my possession. I’m selling it on eBay and will donate the proceeds to Steve Levitt’s preferred charity, ‘Smile Train’. Go and bid… it’s for a good cause, and it could be worth a fortune in years to come!

Update: Sold for $610, and Steve Levitt has thrown in another $610 of his own money. That’s a lot of smiles…

News from ‘The Undercover Economist’ this week:

The AEI-Brookings joint center was kind enough to sponsor a launch of ‘The Undercover Economist’ on Wednesday 9th November, and the video is now available here (top right). If addicted to internet video you can also see me on WCNC, giving advice on cheaper shopping.

Several reviews this week, too.

The Washington Post believes the book is “A good Christmas gift for that college student who’s been avoiding economics — or, even better, for that economics prof who hasn’t come up with an interesting enough curriculum.” They thought I talked about coffee too much, though.

The Wall Street Journal’s reviewer loved the book so much he forgot the title… “‘The Underground Economist’ distinguishes itself from the pack with a lively and insightful discourse on global poverty and what can be done about it.”

The Houston Chronicle liked the book too: “Harford takes the basic underlying ideas of economics to demonstrate how they can be applied to every aspect of the world. Seems like a stretch, but Harford shoehorns in many freewheeling discussions with much wit and wisdom.”

Here’s a brief interview from NPR Boston’s ‘Here and Now‘.

RadioEconomics is hosting a second podcast (the first is an interview) of me reading the introduction to The Undercover Economist. Short and – I hope – sweet.

Why things cost what they cost
Gumshoe economics

Nov 3rd 2005
From The Economist print edition

MOST economists are nine-to-fivers. Calculating rationalists during the working day, they are much like the rest of us when they are at home with their boots off. But Tim Harford, who works at the World Bank and writes a regular newspaper column, never seems to take off his boots at all. He sees the fingerprints of supply and demand everywhere he looks: at work and at play, sipping coffee, shopping for groceries, even playing poker with friends.
His new book, “The Undercover Economist”, is a playful guide to the economics of everyday life, and as such is something of an elder sibling to Steven Levitt’s wild child, the hugely successful “Freakonomics”, which came out earlier this year.
While Mr Levitt wanders freely among sumo wrestlers, game-show contestants and other inhabitants of the outer fringes of economics, Mr Harford takes care of the home turf—scarcity, competition, taxes and trade. He is happy to learn from his elders, which is all to the good. The best stuff is not always the latest stuff, after all. As far back as 1817, David Ricardo explained why the best farmland often makes money for the landlord, not the farmer. And his analysis serves perfectly well to explain why today’s coffee companies don’t make much money from a high-priced latte in Waterloo railway station.
That said, Mr Harford does not take himself too seriously. He is at his best illuminating the economics of small things. He rehearses some of the familiar arguments in favour of globalisation and mounts a spirited defence of competitive markets, on the grounds that they discover the “truth” about our wants, and how much it costs to meet them. (Taxes, which make some things more costly than they truly are, in order to make other things cheaper, are a kind of “lie”, he says, though often a white one.) He also makes some impish forays into charged issues, such as environmentalism, which he thinks too important to be left to the moralists. But in general, as befits a covert operative, his tone is quizzical and low-key, rather than bombastic and judgmental.
For anyone schooled in blackboard economics, “The Undercover Economist” succeeds in taking the chalkdust out of the subject. But does it also serve the reader who has no economics at all? The difficulty is to avoid talking over readers’ heads, without talking down to them either. It is a trick Mr Harford carries off well, for the most part, though he can sometimes seem almost too anxious to entertain. The best detective stories are usually told straight.

Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk are now shipping ‘The Undercover Economist’.

James Reese of Radioeconomics has a half-hour ‘podcast’ interview with me about ‘The Undercover Economist’. Radioeconomics has some excellent interviews – Gary Becker, Richard Posner, and Jeff Sachs coming up. To listen to the interview itself, you need to click on the title of the post (or here).

Oxford University Press is ‘introducing its brilliant authors to the blogosphere’ at the new OUP blog. Apparently that includes me, but you can also check out Philip Pullman on Paradise Lost, and Kerry Emmanuel has a great Q&A on the links – or otherwise – between hurricanes and global warming.

“Nattily packaged—the cover sports a Roy Lichtensteinesque image of an economist in Dick Tracy garb—and cleverly written, this book applies basic economic theory to such modern phenomena as Starbucks’ pricing system and Microsoft’s stock values. While the concepts explored are those encountered in Microeconomics 101, Harford gracefully explains abstruse ideas like pricing along the demand curve and game theory using real world examples without relying on graphs or jargon.
The book addresses free market economic theory, but Harford is not a complete apologist for capitalism; he shows how companies from Amazon.com to Whole Foods to Starbucks have gouged consumers through guerrilla pricing techniques and explains the high rents in London (it has more to do with agriculture than one might think).
Harford comes down soft on Chinese sweatshops, acknowledging “conditions in factories are terrible,” but “sweatshops are better than the horrors that came before them, and a step on the road to something better.” Perhaps, but Harford doesn’t question whether communism or a capitalist-style industrial revolution are the only two choices available in modern economies. That aside, the book is unequaled in its accessibility and ability to show how free market economic forces affect readers’ day-to-day.”

The Undercover Economist takes you from your immediate surroundings: bookstore cafe, drinking (overpriced?) coffee and looking at this hardcover (why not paperback?) book, and explains from there how quirks and failures of the market can cause your latte to cost four dollars and global problems like poverty and starvation. This is a very entertaining and enlightening book about our world from an economic perspective.

No ordinary run-of-the-mill book on business and economics, this is the work of a very talented communicator, able to put across the economics of everyday life, making it stimulating reading and even, dare I say it, fun.

The Undercover Economist will be published in November – pre-order here.

Harford writes like a dream – and is also one of the leading economic thinkers of his generation. From his book I found out why there’s a Starbucks on every corner, what Bob Geldof needs to learn to make development aid work properly, and how not to get duped in an auction. Reading The Undercover Economist is like spending an ordinary day wearing X-ray goggles.

-David Bodanis, Author of E=mc2 and Electric Universe

The World Bank’s first blog is up and running, thanks to yours truly and my wily colleague Pablo Halkyard. Wish us luck!

The NPR show ‘Here and Now’ interviewed me about the Dear Economist column. Listen here to my five minutes of fame.

“The Undercover Economist is a rare specimen: a book on economics that will enthrall its readers. Beautifully written and argued, it brings the power of economics to life. This book should be required reading for every elected official, business leader, and university student.”
- Steven D. Levitt, Professor of Economics, University of Chicago; author of Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

If you need to be convinced of the ever-relevant and fascinating nature of economics, read this insightful and witty book by Tim Harford. Using one interesting example after another, The Undercover Economist demonstrates how economic reasoning — often esoteric and dull, but totally accessible in Harford’s hands — helps illuminate the world around us. Indeed, Harford’s book is a tour de force.

Jagdish Bhagwati, Professor of Economics, Columbia University; author of In Defense of Globalization

Most people think economics is boring, difficult and irrelevant. In fact, economics is fascinating, comprehensible and highly relevant. As Tim Harford demonstrates brilliantly in this enjoyable book, the powerful underlying ideas of economics can, in the hands of the right person, illuminate every aspect of the world we inhabit.

Martin Wolf, Chief Economics Commentator, Financial Times; author of Why Globalization Works

In the United States, The Undercover Economist will be published by Oxford University Press in November; in the UK, by Little, Brown in early 2006.

Sebastian Mallaby, columnist for the Washington post and author of The World’s Banker will be joining Steven Radelet, senior fellow at the Center for Global Development, and Michael Klein, IFC’s Chief Economist, at a book launch for The Market for Aid on Thursay 16th June.
Venue: IFC Auditorium, 2121 Penn Avenue Washington DC (K-street entrance)
Time: 2pm – 3pm Thursday 16th June

Some initial publicity material for ‘The Undercover Economist’ has now appeared on the Oxford University Press website.

The Doing Business project, led by Simeon Djankov and Caralee McLiesh, provides objective measures of business regulations and their enforcement. The Doing Business indicators are comparable across 145 economies. They indicate the regulatory costs of business and can be used to analyze specific regulations that enhance or constrain investment, productivity and growth.

I helped to edit the latest report on the project’s findings, Doing Business in 2005.
http://rru.worldbank.org/DoingBusiness/