Based on: Natalia Emanuel, Emma Harrington, Amanda Pallais, The Power of Proximity to Coworkers, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 141, Issue 3, August 2026, Pages 1825–1870, The short version: Economists analyzed five years of data from software engineers…

Based on: Dubé, Jean-Pierre, and Sanjog Misra. “Personalized pricing and consumer welfare.” Journal of Political Economy 131, no. 1 (2023): 131-189, The short version:  What happens when businesses use machine learning to set personalized prices based on your data? Economists…

Based on: Stefano DellaVigna, Matthew Gentzkow, Uniform Pricing in U.S. Retail Chains, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 134, Issue 4, November 2019, Pages 2011–2084, The short version: Most major food, drugstore, and mass-merchandise chains in the U.S., charge essentially…

What economists found when they gave kids puzzles instead of math, and what it reveals about every student who has ever faded in the second half of a test.  The short version: The gap between struggling students and their peers…

What economists found when they tracked 1,676 students, their homework, and their hidden barriers to learning. The short version: The gap between struggling students and their peers is not about effort. It is about learning speed. And learning speed responds…

A new study tracks 6,430 students, their phone records, and their starting salaries. The finding that will surprise you isn’t about your own phone.  Based on: Panle Jia Barwick, Siyu Chen, Chao Fu, Teng Li, Digital Distractions with Peer Influence:…

Economists find that two children from the same family income can face vastly different futures based solely on which side of town they grew up on. Based on: Chetty, Raj, John N. Friedman, Nathaniel Hendren, Maggie R. Jones, and Sonya…