The Economics of Self-Destructive Choices

The Economics of Self-Destructive Choices PDF Author: Shinsuke Ikeda
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 4431557938
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 204

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Book Description
Based on recent advances in economics, especially those in behavioral economics, this book elucidates theoretically and empirically the mechanism of time-inconsistent decision making that leads to various forms of self-destructive behavior. The topics include over-eating and obesity, over-spending, over-borrowing, under-saving, procrastination, smoking, gambling, over-drinking, and other intemperate behaviors, all of which relate to serious social problems in advanced countries. In this book, the author attempts to construct a bridge between the basic theory of time discounting, especially as of hyperbolic discounting, and empirically observed “irrational (non-classical)” behavior in the various contexts just mentioned. The empirical validity of the theory is discussed using unique micro data as well as public macro data. The book proposes prescriptions for individual decision makers, whether sophisticated or naïve, to make better choices in self-control problems, and also provides policy makers with useful advice for influencing people’s decision making in the right directions. This work is recommended not only to general readers who seek to learn how to attain better self-regulation under self-control problems. It also helps researchers who seek an overview of positive and normative implications of hyperbolic discounting, and thereby reconstruct economic theory for a better understanding of actual human behavior and the resulting economic dynamics .

The Economics of Self-Destructive Choices

The Economics of Self-Destructive Choices PDF Author: Shinsuke Ikeda
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 4431557938
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 204

Get Book Here

Book Description
Based on recent advances in economics, especially those in behavioral economics, this book elucidates theoretically and empirically the mechanism of time-inconsistent decision making that leads to various forms of self-destructive behavior. The topics include over-eating and obesity, over-spending, over-borrowing, under-saving, procrastination, smoking, gambling, over-drinking, and other intemperate behaviors, all of which relate to serious social problems in advanced countries. In this book, the author attempts to construct a bridge between the basic theory of time discounting, especially as of hyperbolic discounting, and empirically observed “irrational (non-classical)” behavior in the various contexts just mentioned. The empirical validity of the theory is discussed using unique micro data as well as public macro data. The book proposes prescriptions for individual decision makers, whether sophisticated or naïve, to make better choices in self-control problems, and also provides policy makers with useful advice for influencing people’s decision making in the right directions. This work is recommended not only to general readers who seek to learn how to attain better self-regulation under self-control problems. It also helps researchers who seek an overview of positive and normative implications of hyperbolic discounting, and thereby reconstruct economic theory for a better understanding of actual human behavior and the resulting economic dynamics .

Behavioral Economics

Behavioral Economics PDF Author: Masao Ogaki
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9811064393
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 219

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Book Description
This book is intended as a textbook for a course in behavioral economics for advanced undergraduate and graduate students who have already learned basic economics. The book will also be useful for introducing behavioral economics to researchers. Unlike some general audience books that discuss behavioral economics, this book does not take a position of completely negating traditional economics. Its position is that both behavioral and traditional economics are tools that have their own uses and limitations. Moreover, this work makes clear that knowledge of traditional economics is a necessary basis to fully understand behavioral economics. Some of the special features compared with other textbooks on behavioral economics are that this volume has full chapters on neuroeconomics, cultural and identity economics, and economics of happiness. These are distinctive subfields of economics that are different from, but closely related to, behavioral economics with many important overlaps with behavioral economics. Neuroeconomics, which is developing fast partly because of technological progress, seeks to understand how the workings of our minds affect our economic decision making. In addition to a full chapter on neuroeconomics, the book provides explanations of findings in neuroeconomics in chapters on prospect theory (a major decision theory of behavioral economics under uncertainty), intertemporal economic behavior, and social preferences (preferences that exhibit concerns for others). Cultural and identity economics seek to explain how cultures and people’s identities affect economic behaviors, and economics of happiness utilizes measures of subjective well-being. There is also a full chapter on behavioral normative economics, which evaluates economic policies based on findings and theories of behavioral economics.

Addiction

Addiction PDF Author: Gene M. Heyman
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674264436
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 213

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Book Description
In a book sure to inspire controversy, Gene Heyman argues that conventional wisdom about addiction—that it is a disease, a compulsion beyond conscious control—is wrong. Drawing on psychiatric epidemiology, addicts’ autobiographies, treatment studies, and advances in behavioral economics, Heyman makes a powerful case that addiction is voluntary. He shows that drug use, like all choices, is influenced by preferences and goals. But just as there are successful dieters, there are successful ex-addicts. In fact, addiction is the psychiatric disorder with the highest rate of recovery. But what ends an addiction? At the heart of Heyman’s analysis is a startling view of choice and motivation that applies to all choices, not just the choice to use drugs. The conditions that promote quitting a drug addiction include new information, cultural values, and, of course, the costs and benefits of further drug use. Most of us avoid becoming drug dependent, not because we are especially rational, but because we loathe the idea of being an addict. Heyman’s analysis of well-established but frequently ignored research leads to unexpected insights into how we make choices—from obesity to McMansionization—all rooted in our deep-seated tendency to consume too much of whatever we like best. As wealth increases and technology advances, the dilemma posed by addictive drugs spreads to new products. However, this remarkable and radical book points to a solution. If drug addicts typically beat addiction, then non-addicts can learn to control their natural tendency to take too much.

ECONned: How Unenlightened Self Interest Undermined Democracy and Corrupted Capitalism

ECONned: How Unenlightened Self Interest Undermined Democracy and Corrupted Capitalism PDF Author: Yves Smith
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 0230114563
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 370

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Book Description
ECONned examines the unquestioned role of economists as policy-makers, and how they helped create an unmitigated economic disaster. Why are we in such a financial mess today? There are lots of proximate causes: over-leverage, global imbalances, bad financial technology that lead to widespread underestimation of risk. But these are all symptoms. Until we isolate and tackle fundamental causes, we will fail to extirpate the disease. Here, Yves Smith looks at how economists in key policy positions put doctrine before hard evidence, ignoring the deteriorating conditions and rising dangers that eventually led them, and us, off the cliff and into financial meltdown. Intelligently written for the layman, Smith takes us on a terrifying investigation of the financial realm over the last twenty-five years of misrepresentations, naive interpretations of economic conditions, rationalizations of bad outcomes, and rejection of clear signs of growing instability. In eConned, author Yves Smith reveals: --why the measures taken by the Obama Administration are mere palliatives and are unlikely to pave the way for a solid recovery --how economists have come to play a profoundly anti-democratic role in policy --how financial models and concepts that were discredited more than thirty years ago are still widely used by banks, regulators, and investors --how management and employees of major financial firms looted them, enriching themselves and leaving the mess to taxpayers --how financial deregulation enabled predatory behavior by Wall Street towards investors --how economics has no theory of financial systems, yet economists fearlessly prescribe how to manage them

Public Finance and Public Policy

Public Finance and Public Policy PDF Author: Arye L. Hillman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108667732
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 657

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Book Description
This new edition restructures and updates the political economy view of the responsibilities and limitations of government. Public-choice and behavioural concepts are prominent. Gender issues are included. Technical concepts are explained from first principles. Economic theory is rigorously applied. Excessive technicality is avoided. The book integrates traditional public finance topics - taxation, public goods, externalities, and income redistribution - with political self-interest, bureaucracy, voting, rent seeking, corruption, and the common-pool problem of public spending. Social justice is viewed as income equality, equality of opportunity, or the right to benefit from one's own effort. Public policies studied include the environment, education, health insurance, welfare payments and entitlements under moral hazard, unemployment insurance, paternalistic impositions, and defence and public safety. This book is ideal for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses that combine economic theory with a real-world perspective on the politics of public finance and public policy. A broad scope makes the book suitable for students in all countries.

Addiction

Addiction PDF Author: Shahram Heshmat
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317684737
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 363

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Book Description
Addiction: A Behavioral Economic Perspective focuses on the behavioral economics of addiction to explain why someone decides and act against her own well-being. It answers the questions of what accounts for self-defeating behavior patterns and how do we best motivate individuals to act according with their long-term goals. A better understanding of decision processes will lead to an improved knowledge of why people engage in self-destructive behaviors and better policy interventions in areas of addiction and obesity. The approach also promises to be valuable as a framework for understanding decisions for an addict’s professional and business life. This book will be of particular use to clinicians, students, and researchers in the fields of addiction, public health, and behavior therapy.

Exotic Preferences

Exotic Preferences PDF Author: George Loewenstein
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199257078
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 688

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Book Description
George Loewenstein analyses how individual preferences are formed, whether they can be predicted and the extent to which they are influenced by emotion rather than reason. These writings include the author's most influential papers on this intriguing topic.

The Crisis of Global Youth Unemployment

The Crisis of Global Youth Unemployment PDF Author: Tamar Mayer
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351247638
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 202

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Book Description
Since the economic and financial crisis of 2008, the proportion of unemployed young people has exceeded any other group of unemployed adults. This phenomenon marks the emergence of a laborscape. This concept recognizes that, although youth unemployment is not consistent across the world, it is a coherent problem in the global political economy. This book examines this crisis of youth unemployment, drawing on international case studies. It is organized around four key dimensions of the crisis: precarity, flexibility, migration, and policy responses. With contributions from leading experts in the field, the chapters offer a dynamic portrait of unemployment and how this is being challenged through new modes of resistance. This book provides cross-national comparisons, both ethnographic and quantitative, to explore the contours of this laborscape on the global, national, and local scales. Throughout these varied case studies is a common narrative from young workers, families, students, volunteers, and activists facing a new and growing problem. This book will be an imperative resource for students and researchers looking at the sociology of globalization, global political economy, labor markets, and economic geography.

The Korean Wave in a Post-Pandemic World

The Korean Wave in a Post-Pandemic World PDF Author: Geon-Cheol Shin
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 9819936837
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 755

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Book Description


Economics 101 for Senators and Representatives

Economics 101 for Senators and Representatives PDF Author: Wallace Hoffman
Publisher: Covenant Books, Inc.
ISBN: 1685265146
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
The mission of this book is to inform all American citizens how their senators and representatives vote in Washington. Do your senators and your representative fulfill the responsibilities of government in the Constitution and vote in your favor? If that is true, they are your friends. Or do your senators and your representatives violate the Constitution and vote against your best interest? If that is true, they are your enemies. If you vote for and reelect your enemies, they will be your enemies the next two or six years. President Obama's legacy of deficit spending is characterized by average deficit spending of more than a trillion dollars annually. During those eight years, every American household went to bed each evening fifty dollars deeper in debt, regardless of how hard they worked or whether they spent any money. The national debt more than doubled during President Obama's eight years in office. Each person's share of debt increased from $30,000 to $70,000.