Course timing and readings
We spend a few weeks or more on our Economic Evolution – I try to break it up into two pieces, first the historical record and second a consideration of the ideas that have contributed to it. You can read through BOTH Sections B and C of the reading list at your leisure, we are soon headed into the “How Did This All Happen” part of the material.
You should NOT be memorizing the data we put up, that is not the purpose of our exploration.
Assignments and due dates
You have your AI Superforecaster research assignment, and your “F&ck the Poor” rumination assignment this Sunday the 21st.
You DO also have homework due for exam week, but it is ONE single assignment that will count for both your research and rumination assignment. We will be exploring protest via the medium of music, I very much enjoyed thinking about and writing that one too, I hope you try to work on it.
Exam information
Exam: Please see the Blackboard Website and the Course Syllabus for additional information
The exam will be given in HOYT Auditorium from 2:00pm to 5:00pm on Friday the 26th.
If you have special accommodations from ODR, you will work directly with them on the timing and location of the exam.
If you have a class conflict, and have completed the Google Doc that is on Blackboard, the make-up exam will be on Friday morning, September 26th, from 7:30am to 10:15am in Harkness 115. Students who have not filled out the Google Doc will not be admitted to the room.
We DO HAVE CLASSES on the day of the exam.
The exam will be open note, open book, open Google, open ChatGPT, etc. You may use any resource you wish, including lectures that you recorded from the class. The only restriction is that you may NOT communicate with other people about the exam, it must be done completely “on your own.”
NOTE: We will be checking to see if you are on emails, social media, text or any other app that enables you to communicate with others. You may not communicate with others. If you are suspected, we will refer your case directly to the Academic Honesty Committee.
Make sure you have your Student ID on you, you will not be permitted to turn the exam in without it.
Make sure you know the name of your recitation TA, as you need to include this information on the exam, and you will lose two points for not including this information on your exam.
The exam materials will cover everything I do through the final seconds of class this upcoming Wednesday, September 24th. All exam policies can be found on Blackboard under the exam section. It is your responsibility to have read and understood them. Be well rested as the exam will require considerable reading, and require you to write out your answers. Yes, “it is on the test,” and be prepared to explain your thinking in clear, concise writing. I will be posting some example questions to blackboard as I begin my preparations to write it. We will not be running a formal review session for the exam, there are non-trivial reasons, including pedagogical ones, for why we have made that decision.
Recitation information
You do NOT have a recitation during exam week. HOWEVER, please read Katherine’s announcement on Sunday, as we are going to be staffing SOME of the recitation slots to be used as an opportunity to ask questions as you prepare for the exam, and the TAs will have with them one or two examples of exam questions from previous years.
Other class admin, TA hours
Some Advice
Read through your notes casually once per week – this makes
exam preparation go much more smoothly.
TA Office Hours: Look for an announcement from Katherine!
CETL Study Help: One of our former TAs is also working with our Teaching Center this term to offer a weekly study group for Econ 108. While personally I like to work alone, many people find it helpful to talk things out in groups. Martin Trpceski will be running a session from 2 to 3:15 PM each week in Meliora 219. He is a great person, and of course did extremely well in our classes. To connect with Martin, please contact him at: mtrpcesk@u.rochester.edu
My Availability: I am going off of electronics from Friday nights until Monday mornings. Call or text me then if you would like to chat as I will not be on my computer. I can be reached at 585-478-2677.
For the most up to date info on my office hours availability, and campus whereabouts and other ways (possibly) to meet and get in touch with me, check this announcements page each week and/or subscribe to my Office Hours Blackboard page at tiny.cc/RizzoHours. I update my calendar weekly on that page, and include other sometimes useful information on it for you.
Thanks to those of you who dropped by for our outdoor lunch discussions this week.
COURSE Questions and Workflow:
Our syllabus and weekly announcements are likely to have answers to almost all questions you have about course policies. Please consult them first.
We have a talented and dedicated staff of 14 TAs here to help you with all aspects of the course. We offer office hours and contacts throughout the week and they have prepared lots of resources to help you. Use them.
If you have course administrative questions, such as, “how do I submit, etc.” please direct them to your TAs. Obviously feel free to contact them about course material questions as well.
If you have questions about economics, the lectures, the ideas, the course materials, books, articles, news, - i.e. about academic content, then please find me. If you send me emails about admin questions, they are almost surely addressed in something we have written for you, and I will simply forward those questions onto our staff – this way we can have a better ability to engage the material student questions.
Upcoming Special Events
Department of Economics Special Undergraduate Lecture
Who: Lorenzo Caliendo of Yale University
When: Tuesday, September 23rd
Time: 5:15pm
Where: Goergen 101
What: US-China Trade Relations
Department of Economics Engerman Lecture
Who: Robert Margo of Boston University
When: Wednesday, October 15th
Time: 5:00pm
Where: Morey 321
What: From the Artisan Shop to the Mechanized Factory: Inanimate Power and the Transformation of American Manufacturing, 1820 to 1900
The Politics and Markets Project, Hosted by Professor David Primo
Title: Topic TBD (this will be a moderated panel discussion, likely on immigration)
Date: Wednesday, November 5th
Time: 7:30pm to 8:30pm
Location: Wegmans Hall, 1400.
The Department of Economics will be hosting several additional events this fall, TBA, coming soon!
Expected Guests/Topics: Paul Bloom on Empathy/Compassion; David Livingstone-Smith (philosopher); Victor Haghani (money manager)
Some Items That Caught Our Attention
For the love of the game only? What do you think? ““Sport is all about moving the body and having a purpose,” said Mr. Jornet, who is from Spain and now lives in Norway with his wife, Emelie Forsberg, a former skyrunning world champion, and their three young daughters. “I’m interested to see how we can optimize our performance as humans.”
Gen Z and Birding
I Thought the Key to Appreciation of “Reality TV” like Love Island is precisely because it is NOT REALITY … but this sorta depresses me, and I don’t fancy myself a Luddite. I should have known, the Wondery Podcasts are always overproduced and have way to much frippery.
When Donald Won’t Let Them Come Here … our firms just go out and meet them where they are
Touch Grass (or Pavement), It is Fantastically Good for Your Mental Health: “I say all of that without the least bit of ironic “slumming it”, but with a genuine admiration and affection. The uber-normality of Michigan City has been especially appreciated this week, when keeping a balanced perspective has been harder. A kind of log off and Touch Grass thing, or more precisely, a log off and a Touch Bespoke Die Tools for Corrugated Cardboard thing. … This week I've only checked the internet in the early morning and then again before going to bed, and the contrast between what I see online and what I see and hear walking around Michigan City couldn't be more pronounced. Nobody, and I mean that literally as in not a single person, has spoken to me about what everyone online is fighting and talking about.”
The Threats to College Grads Continue Apace: Long-term unemployment edition, “But employers also appear to have less need for college-educated workers, driven by technological change, automation and, most recently, President Trump’s cuts to federal workers and funding, which have disproportionately affected the college educated.”
How Much Time Do We Spend on Screens? “In their first two years, Desmurget shows, kids spend, on average, nearly 50 minutes daily on screens. Screen time reaches two hours and 45 minutes between the ages of two and eight, four hours and 45 minutes between the ages of eight and 12, and an astonishing seven hours and 15 minutes between the ages of 13 and 18. That represents 20 percent, 32 percent, and 45 percent of kids’ waking time, respectively.”
Why Don’t Many People Get the Flu Vaccine? Folks seem to not think it is very effective, and they worry a lot about side effects
Education Dog Bites Man, Again: It’s Not the Money, and It’s Not the Schools: Excellence gaps between kids with and without college-educated parents emerge by 3rd grade and persist through high school. Income and school quality explain only about a third, the real driver is parental education itself.
The Tortures (Most Work is Not “Real” Work):
Only 39% of the workday is spent on core job duties. The rest is emails, meetings, and admin.
Knowledge workers spend 57–60% of their time coordinating and communicating.
Developers write new code just 10–16% of their week. Most of their time is debugging, planning, or searching for context.
Meetings alone consume 14.8 hours per week, about 37% of working hours, costing nearly $30,000 per employee each year.
No wonder org charts look the way they do. They’re pyramids: leaders at the top, doers at the bottom, and a thick middle band of human translators carrying information up and down.”
The Polarization and Profit Death Loop: “Firms’ profits are higher when they cater to workers with extreme preferences. In a competitive assignment equilibrium, firms become polarized and not only reflect but also amplify the polarized preferences of the general population. More polarized sectors exhibit higher profits, lower average wages, and a reduced labor share of value added. Sustainable investing amplifies firm polarization.”
* * * * *
Chart of the Week
It must be the phones! (HT: Tyler Cowen)
Photo of the Week
Skillz. Three dogs in the front seat AND texting on the I-590 this week. And y’all think climate change is the biggest threat we face!
Film, music, cultural item of the Week
Since 1945, more than
2,000 nuclear bombs have been detonated on Earth. The US conducted 1,032
tests, the USSR 727. The largest was the Tsar Bomba in 1961 over the
Barents Sea: a 50-megaton hydrogen bomb that produced a mushroom cloud
seven times taller than Everest and shattered windows 900 km away.
Trinity: Visualization of nuclear detonations from 1945 to
present is worth
a watch.
They Said It
“That is just the way with some people. They get down on a thing when they don’t know nothing about it.”
Huckleberry Finn