You know it's time to subsidize household computational power in your model when . . .

[T]he agents in the model need to rationally think through all the consequences of different tax choices, and these consequences extend into the infinite future. (from Krusell and Rios-Rull, "On the Size of US Gov't: . . .", AER DEC 1999)

On Charlie Rose tonight, Robert Shiller:

"Macro Securities Research will make untradable risks tradable": The problem is, when you ask people if they're interested in it, they say, ‘At what price?’ That's exactly what we can't tell them with any confidence because there's no market for it.

and

"The new financial order": Fundamental innovations will help us to deal with major risks to our livelihoods, our homes, our cities, and our nations, at a time of rapid change in the world economy.

I can't wait to get my hands on some hurricane futures! What will be the relative price between mold destroying houses in two weeks versus Mexico's economy growing by five percent in two years?

(Never did political theorists misunderstand the wisdom of their claim that states will determine the next millenium.)

NOTE: As I advance through my graduate cirriculum, I understand why Eric posts in the format he does. It makes sense, and so as I have before, I copy him.

A la Eric: The case against intellectual monopoly:

All of this brings us to what intellectual property law is really about - a reality that is simply obscured by analogies to other types of property. Intellectual property law is not about your right to control your copy of your idea - this is a right that we have just pointed out, does not need a great deal of protection. What intellectual property law is really about is about your right to control my copy of your idea.

Would you like a model with that?

To quote K-Dawg, "Brian Lamb is dreamy.":
[My interviewing style is] kind of an evolutionary thing that again came out of my early days of not liking the fact that so many interviewers get in my way when I watch television. They are giving me their views, and I don't want their views. They are also either confronting the guest in a negative way or agreeing with them in a positive way, and what I'm trying to do is not have you look at me when I'm doing the interview. I don't care that you notice that I'm there, but I don't want you to keep saying to yourself, "Why won't he get out of my way" I want to get a chance to watch the author talk about the book, discuss why they wrote the book, all the little questions that I've asked over the last ten years.

Can I get a "Thank you for C-SPAN!"?

More of the homage:
You get the impression that if Brian Lamb were called in to interview Jesus the first questions out of his mouth would be: "It's said you fed the multitudes with loaves and fish. What kind of fish was that? How many people does it take to make up a multitude?"

Indeed, when you step back far enough you begin to appreciate that C-SPAN is so far out of tune with the times that it has become an intellectual counterculture. Especially on the weekends, the people who fill its screens seem quaintly and bravely out of step: the historian who has devoted her career to researching Pickett's Charge, the auctioneer who specializes in rare 18th-century books, the biographer who has spent years describing John Adams. C-SPAN is factual in a world grown theoretical. It is slow in a world growing more hyper. It is word-oriented in an era that is visually sophisticated.