Subject
21 entries
Economics
Bookmarks
Dynamic Programming: QuantEcon textbook
QuantEcon's open-source Dynamic Programming textbook teaches the mathematical foundations of sequential decision-making with Python and Julia implementations. Covers Bellman equations, value function iteration, and stochastic control — the tools behind modern RL and macro models alike.
Millennials, Spending, and Happiness (CNBC, 2019)
CNBC article on a study finding that millennials who spend less and save more report higher life satisfaction — bookmarked with a snarky comment critiquing the framing as ignoring structural economic disadvantage. Worth noting for the critique more than the study.
The Cost of Training NLP Models: A Concise Overview
AI21 Labs' 2020 overview of the financial and compute cost of training large NLP models, tracing the exponential growth in training expenditure from BERT through GPT-3. An early quantitative lens on the economics of scale in language model development.
Theoretical Advances in AMM Understanding
A technical deep-dive on theoretical advances in understanding automated market makers (AMMs) — covering impermanent loss, concentrated liquidity, and how AMM design choices create different economic tradeoffs for liquidity providers. Essential reading for DeFi protocol design.
Genius of the Modern World — Karl Marx (BBC Documentary)
BBC documentary on Karl Marx from the 'Genius of the Modern World' series. Three-part series covering Marx's life, his theory of historical materialism, and the contested legacy of his ideas in capitalism, communism, and labor movements.
DSHR's Blog — David Rosenthal
David Rosenthal's DSHR blog covers digital preservation, storage economics, and internet infrastructure with rare depth and rigor. One of the few places where long-run storage cost trends, blockchain critique, and library science intersect.
The Ponzi Career
Dror Poleg's essay arguing that knowledge worker careers resemble Ponzi schemes — each generation depends on the next to maintain asset values, and the winners are those who got in early on the right credentials and networks. A sharp structural critique of meritocracy narratives.
Ergodicity: What's It Mean
Avoid Boring People's explainer on ergodicity — the distinction between time-average outcomes and ensemble-average outcomes. Core to Ole Peters's critique of expected utility theory and why average returns can be misleading for individual decision-making.
Your AI Skills Are Worth Less Than You Think
Ryszard Szopa's contrarian take on the AI skills premium — arguing that ML expertise is overvalued relative to domain knowledge and problem formulation skills, and that most ML work is commodity engineering that will commoditize further. A useful corrective to 2021 ML hype.
Education By The Numbers
Union Square Ventures uses enrollment and revenue data to argue that US higher education's financial model is under stress, while online learning is reshaping what 'school' means. A VC framing of the EdTech investment thesis.
The Source of the Student Debt Crisis Is Not Expensive Tuition
The student debt crisis is driven by for-profit colleges and community college dropouts, not expensive elite university tuition — a counterintuitive finding that reframes the policy debate entirely. The median borrower isn't the Stanford grad with $200K in loans; it's the person who attended a for-profit and never finished.
Quantitative Economics (quant-econ.net)
quant-econ.net is Thomas Sargent and John Stachurski's free online course in quantitative economics using Python — covering dynamic programming, stochastic processes, and economic modeling. Nobel laureate-authored open curriculum before that was common.
The San Francisco Rent Explosion
Priceonomics analysis of San Francisco's rent surge in 2013, showing SOMA as the most expensive neighborhood for a 1BR. Documents the housing cost inflection that accompanied the tech industry's concentration in the city.
San Francisco Zoning: Needs More Density and Tall Buildings
Slate Moneybox arguing San Francisco should build more density and tall buildings — that zoning restrictions are the root cause of the city's affordability crisis. A 2013 piece that anticipated the YIMBY movement's core argument before it had that name.
Quandl — Intelligent Search for Numerical Data
Quandl is a search engine for numerical data — financial series, economic indicators, and alternative datasets unified behind a single API. In 2013 it was the go-to free source for quantitative researchers who needed structured time-series data without Bloomberg Terminal access.
Class-Divided Cities: San Francisco Edition
Atlantic Cities (now CityLab) analysis of San Francisco's class divide in 2013 — Richard Florida's data showing SF as one of the most economically bifurcated cities in America, with a shrinking middle class squeezed between a booming tech elite and a large low-wage service sector.
In Praise of Idleness
Bertrand Russell's 1932 essay arguing that four hours of work per day is sufficient for a good society, and that the cult of work is a moral holdover from a class structure that needed laborers to stay busy. One of the clearest critiques of the work ethic ever written.
Hard Drive Shipments Recover from Thailand Floods
Engadget reports hard drive shipments recovering to record highs after the 2011 Thailand floods that destroyed major HDD manufacturing capacity — a supply chain crisis that drove SSD adoption and revealed the geographic concentration risk in disk manufacturing.
What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?
Priceonomics investigation into what actually happens to stolen bicycles — using Craigslist data and stings to map the informal market. One of the early data journalism pieces that made Priceonomics a destination for data-driven takes on everyday questions.
The Top 10 Fastest-Growing U.S. Industries (Hint: Think Hot Sauce)
Washington Post Wonkblog's 2012 list of the fastest-growing US industries, headlined by hot sauce and other food products. A data snapshot of American economic growth patterns in the early 2010s recovery.
Hemp Is Not Pot: The Economic Stimulus and Green Jobs Case
Alternet's 2009 argument that industrial hemp — banned in the US through association with marijuana despite being a different plant with negligible THC — represents an untapped agricultural and industrial opportunity. Written during the Obama stimulus debate when green jobs were politically salient.