All's fair in love and purchasing.

One of the big take-aways from a lot of economic theory is that people should engage in consumption smoothing.

Economics works great for planning your life when you don't have a work passion, since we tend to assume that your job delivers only money and you trade off job hours with leisure hours. If you think your job will just be a job, pick one that pays well per hour and leaves you some time off, even if the activity of the job is boring.

Prenatal testing is a complicated decision for many women, forcing us to confront concerns about a disabled child and risks of miscarriage.

In short, humans are programmed to get bored.

When I meet people on airplanes and they find out I'm an economist, they usually ask about stock tips.

The key to good decision making is evaluating the available information - the data - and combining it with your own estimates of pluses and minuses. As an economist, I do this every day.