EconTalk

Incentives Are for Losers (with Adam Mastroianni)

Incentives matter, sure. But what should you do when following the incentives means quietly participating in something wrong? Psychologist Adam Mastroianni argues that ob

Meritocracy, Exams, and the Knowledge That Matters (with Daisy Christodoulou)

What does a failed 19th-century Chinese civil exam and one of the deadliest wars in history have to do with how we hire, educate, and test people today? In this EconTalk

Hamas and the Future of Gaza (with Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib)

He lost his childhood homes, dozens of family members, and most of his hearing in his left ear to Israeli bombs, yet Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib insists that Palestinians must a

Are We Alone? Cosmic Loneliness and the Longing to Believe (with Adam Kirsch)

Has the earth been visited by extraterrestrials? Are we alone? Despite no formal evidence for conscious life outside of earth, the belief that we are not alone has become

The Hidden Cause of the Industrial Revolution (with Ben Southwood)

What if the Industrial Revolution wasn't sparked by the steam engine, but by a quiet legal revolution in how England handled property rights? Ben Southwood of Works in Pr

Ben Sasse on Faith, Family, and Facing Death

Six months into a stage-four pancreatic cancer diagnosis that gave him 90 days to live, Ben Sasse sits down with EconTalk's Russ Roberts for a conversation that refuses e

The Political Economy of Palestine (with Hussein Aboubakr Mansour)

Most discourses about Israel or Palestine are morality plays of good guys vs bad guys. Egyptian-born Hussein Aboubakr Mansour takes a different approach, seeing the confl

Savage Landscapes (with Cal Flyn)

What is wilderness when seven billion people share the planet and nowhere remains truly untouched? Author and journalist Cal Flyn discusses her book The Savage Landscape

Dwayne Betts on the Iliad

What happens when a poet who survived prison sits down with the world's oldest war story--and reads it in three sleepless, wandering days? In this second episode of the E

From Sawdust to Paw Patrol: The Spin Master Story (with Ronnen Harary)

A nylon stocking filled with sawdust that grows grass for hair launched one of the most successful toy companies in the world. Ronnen Harary, co-founder of Spin Master an

EconTalk Book Club on the Iliad (with Ido Hevroni)

Ego, pride, wrath, fear, gods, superheroes, mortals, and lots of killing. Welcome to Homer's Iliad, which reads at times like a script for a Tarantino film or the latest

Do Less, Heal More: The Case for Medical Conservatism (with John Mandrola)

What if the surgery that fixed your knee did no better than fake surgery? EconTalk host Russ Roberts speaks with Dr. John Mandrola about a striking clinical trial in whic

Can a Phone Be a Cow? (with Philip Auerswald)

Can a phone be a cow? It could in 1990s Bangladesh. This was the insight of a small number of mobile phone market pioneers who helped catalyze the spread of the greatest

The Case for Sunshine (with Rowan Jacobsen)

Skin cancer comes from the sun. But so do many good things, according to author Rowan Jacobsen. Jacobsen talks with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about the health benefits of s

The Self, the Crowd, and Social Contagion (with Luke Burgis)

Finding community can be difficult. But author Luke Burgis thinks the real challenge begins once we've found it and we're subject to social pressures to conform. Listen a

Making Your 80,000 Hours Count (with Benjamin Todd)

If you want to change the world, how you spend your 80,000 working hours may be the most important decision you can make. Benjamin Todd, founder of 80,000 Hours, joins Ec

Facing Death (with Sebastian Junger)

What does a lifelong atheist do when his dead father appears above him in the emergency room? Author and war reporter Sebastian Junger nearly bled to death in 2020 from a

Tom Cruise's Body of Work (with Aled Maclean-Jones)

What can Tom Cruise's last impossible mission teach us about usefulness in the digital age? Aled Maclean-Jones argues that dangling from cargo planes, soldering hard driv

Thinking Inside the Box (with David Epstein)

What do the inventor of the periodic table, the novelist Isabel Allende, and the almost-creators of the iPhone have in common? Join author David Epstein and EconTalk's Ru

Golfing Alone (with Gary Belsky)

No rush, no noise, no one else on the golf course: solo golf is an entirely different game, offering physical, mental, and spiritual benefits that playing with others can