Great paper!

AEA Journals@aeajournals.bsky.social · 2w ago

Forthcoming in the AER: "Predictably Unpredictable Inspections" by Ashvin Gandhi, Andrew Olenski, and Maggie Shi.

*sharing a screenshot from an article that cites another article quoting one (1) “New York financier” who says his firm prefers humanities grads to STEM* this is because the humanities teaches you critical thinking

I joined @ericseufert.bsky.social on the Mobile Dev Memo podcast — one of my favorite shows — with coauthor @garjoh.bsky.social to discuss our PNAS paper (with Zhengrong Gu) on removing cookies and privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs) in digital advertising. mobiledevmemo.com/podcast-quan...

Podcast: Quantifying the advertising value of cookies (with Garrett Johnson and Shunto Kobayashi) | Mobile Dev Memo by Eric Seufert

Podcast: Quantifying the advertising value of cookies (with Garrett Johnson and Shunto Kobayashi)

mobiledevmemo.com

At this point, I’m not sure there are any human drivers on the road in LA after midnight

New working paper with Shunyao Yan Polarizing news content is great at capturing attention. But does it help publishers where it matters most: subscriptions? #mediaecon #polarization #subscriptions #digitalmarketing

NEW from me. My cover story in today's @thedispatchmedia.bsky.social steps back and provides a basic primer on why soaring federal debt matters for the economy and the federal budget. 🧵 thedispatch.com/article/debt...

Why Surging Federal Debt Matters

It’s an existential threat to the long-term American economy.

thedispatch.com

Our research on the value of cookies & Privacy Sandbox for online publishers with Zhengrong Gu, & @sjkobayashi.bsky.social is now published in PNAS 🎉🎉. Check out this thread for an overview 👇

Garrett Johnson @garjoh.bsky.social · last yr.

🧵1/ Google’s Privacy Sandbox promises to replace third-party cookies with privacy-preserving tech. But does it preserve publisher revenue? We partnered with @weareraptive to analyze 200M+ ad impressions across 5,000+ sites in the CMA-Google field experiment. Here's what we found 👇

"The legalization of mobile sports gambling in America was a policy mistake and that the evidence is now clear enough to say so."

"52 tenured professors — about a fifth of the school’s active, full-time faculty — raised questions about Garrett’s management of the school." lamaterial.com/p/usc-s-fame...

USC’s Famed Business School Is In Jeopardy, Faculty Say

Fifty-two professors at the Marshall School of Business penned a blistering letter demanding changes.

lamaterial.com

I wouldn't have guessed, but this is a must read.

The Atlantic@theatlantic.com · 4mo ago

What do a tiny lodge in the Tennessee backwoods, a three-Michelin-starred fine-dining destination in Las Vegas, and Red Lobster have in common? A claim on serving the best free bread in America, Caity Weaver writes. But which one is actually the best? theatln.tc/7c72x8iK

How it feels being on this app today

🤘🤘

The Athletic@theathletic.com · 4mo ago

A CHAMPION MADE HERE 🐻 UCLA WINS ITS FIRST WOMEN'S BASKETBALL NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP 🏆

As online betting has grown in popularity, a new report from the New York Federal Reserve builds on the troubling link between legal sports wagering and financial health. n.pr/4tqWJuL

When legal sports betting surges, so do Americans' financial problems

As online betting has grown in popularity, a new report from the New York Federal Reserve builds on the troubling link between legal sports wagering and financial health.

n.pr

And one final chart shows that so far AI tools haven’t led to an explosion of submissions to several of the top 5 economics journals.

found something rather baffling when researching my column this week… I wanted to see if there was any evidence that AI tools were helping economists to make their research more readable. So I analysed the text of NBER working paper abstracts…

How adopting an automated review monitoring system allows restaurants to translate consumer feedback into operational quality improvements, from Guangyu Cao, Shenghao He, and Ginger Zhe Jin www.nber.org/papers/w34934

The prediction markets have a very different view of nearterm gasoline prices than the futures market. I haven't done the full calculation with options prices, but it looks like there is probably an arbitrage opportunity. www.natesilver.net/p/gas-prices... www.wsj.com/market-data/...

Gas prices are set to go vertical

It's not exactly a bold prediction to suggest this will be bad for Trump's political standing.

natesilver.net

Excellent article on branding and design, told through the history of the Swiss/luxury watch industry: paulgraham.com/brandage.html

Some good coverage of my working paper on housing filtering in The Atlantic today. The paper itself, The Downmarket Impact of New Multifamily Housing: Evidence from a Honolulu Condo Tower, is available here: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

The Atlantic@theatlantic.com · 5mo ago

A common refrain of progressive urban politics is that “new, ‘luxury’ housing will not help solve the housing shortage,” Henry Grabar writes. But, according to a new study, “more housing supply of all kinds leads to lower prices in general terms”:

This is your annual reminder that if you aren't listening to the world's greatest radio station WWOZ on this Mardi Gras day, you are doing it wrong. www.wwoz.org/listen/player/

I'm listening to WWOZ New Orleans' live streaming radio. Tune in to WWOZ now:http://www.wwoz.org/listen/player/

Listen live online to WWOZ: volunteer-powered, listener-supported community radio in New Orleans.

wwoz.org

Trump administration drops its appeal of court order blocking $1.2-billion UCLA settlement

Trump administration drops its appeal of court order blocking $1.2-billion UCLA settlement

The Trump administration dropped its appeal of a major higher education case in which a federal judge blocked its $1.2-billion settlement proposal to UCLA over alleged civil rights violations. But it will continue to fight the ruling on the matter in a lower court.

latimes.com

Very cool how productive everyone is getting with new AI tools, I think, as I listen to Brownsville Girl for the fourth time in a row.

Has financial literacy been declining or are smartphones changing the way we answer surveys? I was on Marketplace yesterday to talk about how smartphones are making it more challenging to gauge knowledge on surveys. Longer thread coming soon! Check out our full study here: lnkd.in/guiqHmKW

Stephanie Hughes@hughesstephanie.bsky.social · 6mo ago

When we use smartphones to respond to surveys, compared to a laptop or tablet, we're more likely to answer incorrectly, or say we don't know. Economist @carlyurban.bsky.social is calling this "the smartphone penalty" in a new working paper. www.marketplace.org/episode/2026...

As States Permitted Online Sports Gambling, Citizens’ Personal Financial Health Suffered anderson-review.ucla.edu/as-states-pe...

As States Permitted Online Sports Gambling, Citizens’ Personal Financial Health Suffered - UCLA Anderson Review

Half a trillion dollars wagered — and counting

anderson-review.ucla.edu

Tour de force on just exactly what has gone on at Texas A&M for so many years from Chris Hooks in @texasmonthly.bsky.social: www.texasmonthly.com/news-politic...

What’s the Matter With Texas A&M?

Five presidents in five years. Firings of “woke” professors. Crackdowns on Plato. Inside state leaders’ efforts to remake a great university.

texasmonthly.com

Honestly, tons of academics who I greatly respect don't realy understand AI including - what it does, how it's evolving, how it's affecting research. That's bad.

Brendan Nyhan@brendannyhan.bsky.social · 7mo ago

Prof: AI is "very, very bad" at writing. Same prof: Also I've never used it. Come ON. I'm as worried as anyone about how to teach writing but you should at least, you know, understand what it is you are condemning. And undergrad cheating =/= the best AI can do. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/17/n...

This year's Empirical Management Conference is at Stanford, May 27-29! Send us your best papers! Details and submission form here: worldmanagementsurvey.org/emc2026/ JOIN US!! It's fun, I promise! @raffasadun.bsky.social @johnvanreenen.bsky.social @renatalemos.bsky.social @nickbloom.bsky.social

Despite the negative framing in this article, this sounds like a very promising set of moves by the EU Commission on reforming some harmful and failed digital regulations.

Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO)@corporateeurope.org · 7mo ago

🎁 Just before the holidays, the EU Commission granted Big Tech its Christmas wish-list: an unprecedented attack on our digital rights. Together with @lobbycontrol.bsky.social we have mapped how the Digital Omnibus closely matches Big Tech lobby demands. 👉 corporateeurope.org/en/2026/01/a...

Our train conductor just broke in over the PA system to announce this news live, in four languages. www.latimes.com/california/s...

An amateur codebreaker may have just solved the Black Dahlia and Zodiac killings

Two retired LAPD homicide detectives say that both notorious cases are solved -- with a single culprit -- thanks to the work of a novice sleuth.

latimes.com