Hypothetical Bias

TimesSelect

Last year about this time I purchased TimesSelect for $29.95. How do I know? My access to TimesSelect articles (e.g., today's John Tierney) have been blocked. I go to the membership center and find that my subscription has run out -- no e-mails from the NYTimes telling me this is about to happen, etc. I then look into renewing and find that the cost is now $49.95/year.

Now, searching my preferences, are Krugman and MoDo worth $49.95/year? Probably.

New Hypo-blogger

David Gulley, UK class of ... same year as me/I (i.e., a longish time ago):

Current research focuses on the UK national lottery, financial markets, and health care markets. Fields of interest include macroeconomics, monetary economics, financial economics, and public finance. Has presented papers at numerous national and international conferences. Publications have appeared in Economic Inquiry, National Tax Journal, Journal of Macroeconomics, and Applied Financial Economics, among others.

Although Gulley has studied games of chance for the past 13 years, he is our official Fed-watcher. That's just what this blog has been missing.

I emailed Pete McEntegart, author of SI.com's The Ten Spot

From #9:

Wrote Chris in New York: "I have a good one. Ban bitter, wish-they-were-athletes middle-aged writers from whining about what they would do if they were involved in sports in a real, tangible way or lecturing athletes on morality and how the game 'should' be played. That means shutting down all but like three Sports Illustrated writers, but oh well."

I said this:

Hey, in reply to Chris in New York, I'm an economist and used to thinking about trades. So, in professional sports the sellers (i.e., teams and players) sell the product to the consumers (i.e., paying customers, er, fans/writers/etc). Isn't that "a real, tangible" way to be involved in sports?

Isn't that witty?

Natural experiment time?

Minimum wage hike likely in '07:

The minimum wage in North Carolina probably will go up $1 in January, to $6.15 an hour, and more than 100,000 workers will get a raise.

The increase would make North Carolina one of nearly two dozen states with a minimum wage higher than the federal floor of $5.15 an hour. Florida is the only other Southeastern state with a minimum wage higher than the federal standard now.