George Stigler Econ 490 fall 2019

I think that the two decisions to have non-required attendance and soft deadlines had impacts on myself and the class as a whole, both direct and indirect. Making attendance not required is almost guaranteed to change how certain students approach the class. For me personally, the decision to not have required attendance allowed outside circumstances (job interviews, meetings/appointments, etc.) to have a greater impact in my decision to attend. If attendance were required (therefore impacting my grade in the class), I would have had to plan these outside commitments around the 9:30-10:50 a.m. time slot. Since my schedule is already pretty full with my on-campus job, if it was convenient for me (and for the other party – i.e, those who were interviewing me) I would tend not to reschedule if they selected a time that overlapped with our class. This happened on a couple occasions, but I always made an effort to let you know beforehand. From the class perspective, obviously not having r...

This is an interesting situation to analyze, and I had the opportunity to witness (albeit in a minor form) a minor version of a triangle relationship during my internship this summer. It may not fit the mold exactly, but the relationship provides similar actions to the standard triangle-agent relationship we have discussed. I worked as an intern for a major institutional investor in Chicago. The office is run by the CIO, who has an obligation to manage the portfolio in the best of her ability. She also had to abide by recommendations by the institution’s board of directors, and it was possible that the two parties wouldn’t see eye to eye. So the CIO acts as the agent, and the two principals being the external fund managers in the portfolio and the board of directors of the employing institution. The CIO and the rest of the senior staff met regularly with external fund managers, prospective or current, and then would (less frequently) meet with the board of directors to present the st...

This conflict occurred in a work situation, although this time it was not between myself and a co-worker. Back working at the pool (the place I have been talking about in previous posts), I also was a swim coach. The club I worked at competed in a small, semi-competitive swim league that consisted of five other clubs from around the northern/western suburbs. I say semi-competitive because ultimately, we don’t care about winning and just want the kids to have fun, but there are two competitive championship meets at the end of the season where awards are given out. Some clubs (us, for example) didn’t really care about winning any of these awards, while others (usually those who have the better swimmers) will actively try to win these championship meets. Anyway, just for some background before I describe the conflict, I was the oldest coach (besides the head coach, who was also the club manager Matt), so I was viewed as the “senior” coach since I was the oldest and had been coaching...

It may be true that “draconian” punishments harden an individual. Those kinds of punishments, in most cases, tend to make the individual more severe and less sympathetic afterwards. When I think of these kinds of punishments, I immediately think of sports coaches. In that context, they have the goal of strengthening individuals, more so mentally than physically, and they (the coaches) gain from having the individuals (the players) having less sympathy as it helps them reach their objective – winning the game/contest/whatever they’re competing in. But in most contexts (work, group activities, etc), especially if the main goal is to strengthen the relationship and increase productivity, harsh punishments may not be the way to go. I’m thinking that draconian punishments are more of a short-term band aid to increase imminent production, but long-term it probably does more harm than help in terms of strengthening relationships and building mutual productivity and respect. I think that p...

I was immediately fascinated by the experiments that were done to assess the mindset of society when it comes to egalitarianism and general moral well-being. I was shocked at how these qualities are developed so early, and that they persist and are still present in most (if not all) adults today. The experiments in the first article made sense. Without altering the experiment, there was a strong sense of an egalitarian attitude, as they equalized the wealth 75% of the time. But when the conditions were altered, that mentality dwindled and the children didn’t feel any sense of collaboration. I found the collaboration aspect interesting, and the question of “Do Americans view the economy as a collaborative project” was interesting to think about. I have a feeling that when times were more adverse and the country (as a whole) faced some level of threat (the great depression, either world war, the cold war, etc.), society viewed the economy and the fiscal world as more of a group effort....

I think its interesting to analyze decisions in this fashion, debating whether it was for future risk protection or current utilization.   There are a couple decisions that I can turn to and take the current circumstances and future effects into consideration. Most notable is the collective decision to accumulate some student debt. I say collective because it was not a completely independent decision, I had the help of my parents. It initially seems like a choice being made because it seems good at the time, as I would not have to commit as much financially in the current year (and the couple years after). But, the intention all along was to be able to take advantage of financial aid opportunities to decrease the financial burden in the five or ten years after I graduate. So the financial aid discussion was definitely a long-term approach. In terms of the choice of college, that was more of a choice that sounded and seemed good at that time. This is in no way saying it was a bad ...

This was an interesting exercise, seeing how not only my writing has changed, but how the content of the blog posts have changed over these first seven weeks of the semester. Re-reading my prior posts, there were definitely some themes that were present throughout multiple posts (or at least themes that should have been evident, based on the prompts). A theme that seemed to reappeared seemed to be costs, and how they mattered in the context of the prompt. Transaction costs were discussed in the organizational change post, and the costs of taking advantage of certain circumstances were present in the opportunism post. On a smaller scale, there was some talk of costs in the Illinibucks context, maybe in more of an opportunity cost format (the next-best alternative to using Illinibucks for a certain function). For me personally, the connections were clearer after I read your responses to the post. Whether it was me not understanding a concept or connecting the dots the wrong way, I ...

This is an interesting hypothetical to analyze. One of the first questions I had reading this prompt was ‘would all students receive the same allocation of Illinibucks’? If so, then this puts everyone at a level playing field, and it is up to the students to effectively use their allocation, as everyone has the same amount and people can’t just overpay (if they had more than others) even if they don’t value it at that price. The administered prices would have to be high enough so everyone can’t buy everything so easily. Some of the things that the Illinibuck system could work for would be class registration, advisor meetings, housing selection, and others. Using a single “currency” system for these different factors would force students to prioritize these. They may value housing more than course selection, or vice-versa. This would only work if these things had the same administered price. If a student is forced to choose between having first selection of a class or a dorm at a simi...

I have been in groups and teams that have been mildly successful, and some that have not been. By far, the most successful team that I was a part of was my high school Water Polo team, specifically my Junior and Senior year (2015 and 2016). What made the success even more meaningful was a period of under-performance during my Sophomore year, when we failed to reach the Sectional Final for the first time in a while (not sure on the exact year, must have been since at least 2008). For the next two, quite successful years, we had some added motivation due to previous “failure”. In 2015 we won the Sectional Championship against our rival school (who we had lost to three times earlier in the year). In 2016 we finished 3 rd in the state which at the time was the highest finish in school history. What I enjoyed about the structure of our team, specifically my senior year in 2016, was that we didn’t really have a single standout player or two, rather a larger group of good players to wo...

It does take a decent amount of discipline to not act opportunistically. It may seem rather easy to take advantage of circumstances without regarding any sort of principles or consequences. As the prompt states, being a good citizen, realizing the unethical implications, or having patience as a virtue can all be reasons why people don’t engage in opportunism. Opportunism is also driven by self-interest, so people who don’t hold others in high regard may be more susceptible to taking advantage of certain circumstances. When self-interest is involved, people may not even be thinking of others when taking advantage and acting opportunistically, but their actions inadvertently cause some scale of harm to other individuals. I will give two examples, because this first one does not need to be analyzed as much in detail, but is a simple example of opportunism (and lack thereof) in action. Driving back to school on I-57 south towards Champaign can result in some merging down into one lan...

During the summers of 2016 and 2017 I was a lifeguard at a small, private club in my hometown. This place has a pool, a clubhouse, a playground, a large field and nine tennis courts. The club had recently introduced a new Manager, parting ways with the guy who had been there for at least ten, or even twenty years (I can't exactly remember). The Assistant Manager, at the time, did not change, as she remained under the new manager for the next two summers (the assistant had also been there for around fifteen years). For this blog's sake I will call the new manager Mike and the assistant manager Katie. Mike and Katie had very differing personalities, and the fit was already a little awkward since she was working under someone who did not hire her. Mike is a very nice, outgoing, positive personality who is always putting the employees' needs first. The two summers that they worked together, there were always moments of friction when they didn't agree (which was more of ...

George Stigler graduated with a B.A. from Washington University in 1931 obtained his M.B.A. from Northwestern the following year. The climax of his studies were at the University of Chicago, where he obtained his Ph.D and initiated an extremely successful academic career. He taught at Iowa State College, Minnesota, and spent a year at Brown, while working the duration of WWII doing statistical research at Columbia University. His early career interests included price theory, linear programming, vertical integration, delivered price systems, and more. He was also on Staff at the National Bureau of Economic Research, where he studied the service industries and the behavior of industrial prices. Although, arguably his most notable field of study was public regulation. He concluded that public regulation has little influence and is usually detrimental to consumer interests. He is also known for developing his Theory of Economic Regulation (sometimes called Stigler's theory). He wrote...