Archive of stories published by Economism: Bad Economics and the Rise of Inequality

Further Reading

One of the central themes of Economism is the idea that the competitive market model taught early in Economics 101 (the one that…


How Not to Invest

Forty years after John Bogle launched the Vanguard 500 Index Fund, passive investment funds now account for about one-third of the mutual fund and ETF market. You would think this would pose a threat to traditional asset managers that charge hefty fees for actively managed mutual funds, and this…


A Change Is in the Air

There was one moment, when I was finishing up the manuscript of Economism, that I thought someone had already said what I was trying to say in the book. This is what I read:

“The beauty and the simplicity of such a theory are so great that it is easy to forget

Economism and Arbitration Clauses

As banking scandals go, Wells Fargo opening millions of new accounts for existing customers so that it could pump up its cross-selling metrics for investors is about as clear-cut as it gets. It’s up there with HSBC telling its employees how to get around U.S…


The Smugness of Unintended Consequences

This is perhaps the first version, posted to my blog in October 2011, of what eventually became a whole book on economism.

After my post on Corey Robin’s new book, a friend recommended Albert O. Hirschman’s Rhetoric of Reaction. As the…

These were the top 10 stories published by Economism: Bad Economics and the Rise of Inequality; you can also dive into yearly archives: 2010, 2011, 2016, 2017, 2020, and 2021.

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Economism: Bad Economics and the Rise of Inequality
A history and analysis of the Economics 101 ideology and its impact on contemporary politics and society, by James Kwak. Available now from Pantheon.
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