Very Quick Reviews

My older son and I saw Zero Dark Thirty over the weekend.  Great movie.  On par with Argo.  Much better than Lincoln, which seems to be the Oscar favorite.

By the way, I have heard that the revival of Pippin I saw and loved is moving to New York after its Boston run is over.  Highly recommended.

A Reading for the Pigou Club

And also about the Pigou Club, from the NY Times.

How much are your taxes going up?

The Tax Policy Center has a calculator to answer that question.

ASSA Humor Session

Many of the world's professional economists are spending the next few days in San Diego for the annual ASSA meeting, where economists network, get some publicity for themselves, and learn what other economists are up to. I am skipping this year's meeting to spend more time with family.  You might think that is lazy of me.  But heck, my marginal tax rate just went up.  A bit of extra laziness is optimal.

If I were there, one event I would certainly attend is the annual humor session.  Here is some information about it, in case you are interested:  It is 8 pm on Saturday January 5 in the Manchester Foyer of the Manchester Grand Hyatt. Unlike most of the sessions at the meeting, the humor session is free and open to the public. And best of all: the benefit of attending is entirely nonpecuniary, so it won't be reduced by the new higher tax rates!

The Dearth of Bestselling Economists

Last October, Amazon introduced a new feature: a list of bestselling authors, aggregating across all books an author has written. Here is the list of the top 100 authors.

For an economist, perusing the list is a humbling experience. As far as I can tell, not a single member of our profession made the list.  I wonder whether Galbriath might have made it in his day, as he had written a large number of books accessible to general audiences. But these days, not a single one of us has wide enough readership to make it onto the list. The next time you are tempted to lament the sad state of the public discussion of economic policy, remember that we economists are probably not doing enough to educate the public. We just don't write things that people want to read.

If you want to know what economists come closest, you can look at this list of bestselling authors in business and investment, a category that includes economics. Several of us make this less selective list.

Tax Progressivity: Update

Here are the effective federal tax rates (total taxes as a percentage of income) for 2013 under the new tax law, as estimated by the Tax Policy Center, for various income groups:

Bottom fifth: 1.9
Second fifth: 9.5
Middle fifth: 15.6
Fourth fifth: 19.0
Top fifth: 28.1

80-90 percentile: 21.5
90-95 percentile: 23.4
95-99 percentile: 26.3
Top 1 percent: 36.9

Top 0.1 percent: 39.6

Anne Pringle

All ec 10 students know David Johnson, the course's charismatic head teaching fellow.  What they likely do not know is that David's lovely wife, Anne Pringle, is also on the Harvard faculty.  Today's NY Times has an article about Anne and her research.