Game Theorist

Sorting out books

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 22:04:00 +0000

As part of our packing we are sorting out stuff like books. Conversation with my 8 year old son.

"2001. This book is 8 years old."

"Well, actually, that book is much older. It is so old that 2001 was, in fact, the far future."

"What is it about?"

"It is about a time where we could travel into space and to the moon base and beyond."

"Umm, I think that is still the far future. Maybe it should be called 2039 or 2040."

We'll see.

There is bad luck ...

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:40:00 +0000

.. and then there is this story. Read it in full to see that there are things worse than traveling on a plane with screaming toddler.

The second most intelligent life form

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 20:03:00 +0000

From The Guardian [HT: Jim Minifie]:

At the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies in Mississippi, Kelly the dolphin has built up quite a reputation. All the dolphins at the institute are trained to hold onto any litter that falls into their pools until they see a trainer, when they can trade the litter for fish. In this way, the dolphins help to keep their pools clean.

Kelly has taken this task one step further. When people drop paper into the water she hides it under a rock at the bottom of the pool. The next time a trainer passes, she goes down to the rock and tears off a piece of paper to give to the trainer. After a fish reward, she goes back down, tears off another piece of paper, gets another fish, and so on. This behaviour is interesting because it shows that Kelly has a sense of the future and delays gratification. She has realised that a big piece of paper gets the same reward as a small piece and so delivers only small pieces to keep the extra food coming. She has, in effect, trained the humans.

Her cunning has not stopped there. One day, when a gull flew into her pool, she grabbed it, waited for the trainers and then gave it to them. It was a large bird and so the trainers gave her lots of fish. This seemed to give Kelly a new idea. The next time she was fed, instead of eating the last fish, she took it to the bottom of the pool and hid it under the rock where she had been hiding the paper. When no trainers were present, she brought the fish to the surface and used it to lure the gulls, which she would catch to get even more fish. After mastering this lucrative strategy, she taught her calf, who taught other calves, and so gull-baiting has become a hot game among the dolphins.

That reminds me of someone from the 3rd most intelligent life form (post Number 1 on this blog, January 2003).

Coming to America

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 00:30:00 +0000

You may have noticed that blogging here has been light for the last couple of months. That is because the entire family is picking up an moving to the US for the whole of 2010. I'm spending a sabbatical year at Harvard (chief advantage: no one asks you why) and we are all going to arrive in Boston just in time for the whole Winter experience.

And an experience it will be. I can count on one hand the days I have seen snow, the two children who have seen snow can't remember it and the last one is still unconvinced. The one of us who has experienced snow through a thing called skiing (don't ask what that's all about) has never lived with anything more than a Melbourne winter.

Suffice it to say, moving the five of us is a non-trivial exercise. We have a place but no furniture, we have visas but no health insurance (yet and ouch!), we have made contact with a school but have not dealt with the pages of forms and we have bags but no clothes. On the clothes front our plan is "to buy stuff when we get there." That last one is contingent on the hypothesis that we can last one day in Boston without winter clothes. But I forecast a future bleg asking for advice about all of that.

The children's excitement is mixed. No one is happy about leaving friends behind but there they have identified things that they are definitely looking forward to. The top 3 are: Number Three -- that is where Hannah Montana lives. This is a true statement but it is also coupled with some notion that we are just going to bump into her. Rather than cause our youngest any further anxiety, we aren't ruling out that possibility at this stage.

Number Two -- no school uniforms. Apparently, the desire to rid themselves of the Australian (and I guess rest of the world) norm of a uniform is strong enough to be a major reason to move countries. I'll evaluate that whole debate when I get to see more of the other side.

Finally, reason Number One, and a topical one, is: Halloween. Australia doesn't have Halloween and this has always been a constant source of disappointment to my eldest daughter. That disappointment will continue this evening. But next year it will all be different.

"I guess you are looking forward to next year where we will be in a place where people understand Halloween."

"Yes. Although I don't really understand it."

"What do you mean?"

"You know I love the whole 'let's go dress up and go around the neighbourhood getting treats 'thing but I have no idea how this all happened."

"I guess that will be something else you'll find out next year."

"Can't wait."

Neither can I. For starters, I could use more material for the blog and maybe a forthcoming (and doomed to failure judging by most attempts at such things) book, Parentonomics in the USA.

Shock! Baby Einstein not educational

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 20:16:00 +0000

Bigger shock! Disney agrees and will refund any DVD purchases for the last five years! They had dropped claims these were "educational" but apparently that wasn't enough.

Well that doesn't help me too much. From 1998 to 2001, we must have purchased a ton of Baby Einstein DVDs and CDs, board books, toys (and maybe even videos). Our kids loved them and I loved the fact that the marketing was so cynically directed at the nervous (if I don't act the kids will suffer) yet optimistic (they could be Einstein) parent. The educational claims didn't motivate me. Indeed, similar claims seem to surround all kids toys and there is an entire campaign directed at selling books based on educational value.

Actually, there is a deeper point here: it seems to me that educational claims abound but only certain ones get scrutiny. For instance, the NYT's article on this news ends with:

“My impression is that parents really believe these videos are good for their children, or at the very least, not really bad for them,” Ms. Rideout said. “To me, the most important thing is reminding parents that getting down on the floor to play with children is the most educational thing they can do.”

Is it? Really? Getting on the floor and playing is the "most educational thing" a parent can do? This comes from the Kaiser Family Foundation. But where is the evidence for that bold claim? Looking at their site, there is a lot of statistics about children doing different things than they did in the past (including substituting TV for reading) but surely we cannot presume that various other things are "educational" any more than we can presume that DVDs might not be. A lack of evidence is always a lack of evidence.

Scrooge is an economist

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 02:30:00 +0000

and his name is Joel Waldfogel. Who is Scrooge? He is someone who hates Christmas and thinks that Christmas activities are a waste. Joel Waldfogel in his new book, Scroogenomics (will the onomics trend know no end?) tell us in a series of essays why you shouldn't buy presents for the holidays. Actually, he does better than that, he calculates it. It is around $12 billion per year made up of the money value of the total difference between what a gift is worth to someone versus just having the money. And that is not counting the whole hassle of the fruitless exercise of trying to make that value less by shopping and making the thoughts that count.

Scroogeonomics is an aptly titled 170 odd page presentation of the case against Christmas but more generally against gift giving. (Note to self: don't invite Joel to birthday parties). That said, it is completely compelling. You just can't read this book without thinking about how to get out of the whole gift giving mess. And the book doesn't even mention the classic Seinfeld episode about bringing stuff to dinner parties. So Joel is like George Castanza too.

But the book is not without hope. We can end the inefficiency yet preserve the 'social' value of gift giving. One way is to use gift cards or money rather than trying the 'thought' approach. Another is to give to charities in someone's name although that is still kind of complex as you can get that wrong too. One thing you should not do is do what I have said and encourage self-made gifts. That seems to only exacerbate the inefficiency.

And what of the book itself. It is published by Princeton University Press but if you excepting the usual academic sized affair that is not to be. Instead it is 'made for gifts.' A small little book that you might see as a last minute counter purchase at a Borders. In other words, Waldfogel is capitalising on the problem and potentially creating more inefficiency.

So let me help get out of this. Don't buy this book as a Christmas gift. Go out and buy it now and send it to one friend and ask them to read it and pass it on. That would be efficiency enhancing by the book's own metric. By the time we get to December, enough may have read it to have killed Christmas for good.

Much of Parentonomics online and for free

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 06:16:00 +0000

I was lamenting the lack of Parentonomics availability on the Australian version of the Kindle. Don't get me started on that. But in doing so, I discovered that much (maybe 2/3s) of the original Australian edition (which is written in a slightly different language to the Worldwide one by MIT Press) is on Google books. You can read it here.

Media debates on parenting

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 21:55:00 +0000

In the news today, Australian PM Kevin Rudd admits smacking his kids. The headline sounds different from the text though.

Weighing in to the debate, Mr Rudd said: "And the rule that's been applied in our family ever since they were tots is that if they're doing something dangerous they'll get a, you know, whack across the knuckles."

"The key thing is a gentle tap on the wrists which is usually, if you know anything about two and three-year-olds, the cause of the quivering bottom lip and the general collapse into tears."

That seems pretty different from a wooden spoon (the thing that sparked this current round in the corporal punishment debate). Indeed, check out this picture of Mrs Cunningham from Happy Days.

She is clearly slapping Richie (who is hardly a child but let's admit that is not the point). And she is hardly the poster child for bad parent. Don't believe me, watch the video at around 26 seconds in.

Now I don't want to say I'm condoning anything. But as I have written about elsewhere, punishment is a tough parental issue. What is clear is that it is very difficult to have a national discussion on this in the media. It looks like psychologists are attacking the PM too harshly. Who would care about a rap on the knuckles?

But then let me leave you with a thought on how difficult this is. Half way through writing this post, it occurred to me that it took all of 2 minutes for me to recall and then locate the picture above. This was something I watched 30 years ago and it only appears in one season of Happy Days intros. Yet, I remembered it. What does that tell you about a rap on the knuckles?

Real life maths

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 06:35:00 +0000

A conversation:

"I hate real life maths."

"Why? Real life sounds interesting"

"But it is not real life. We had to design a theme park."

"That sounds real."

"Maybe if it was that. But who looks for angles after designing a park?"

"I am not sure what you mean. Angles are important to designers."

"But do designers do a whole design and then just circle two right angles and two acute angles? I mean what is the point?"

"I guess that doesn't sound too real."

"Right."

She has a point.

Paying to sit next to your children

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 22:08:00 +0000

Apparently, British Airways will now introduce a fee that allows you to specify your preferred seat on a flight in advance. This will be the only way you can be assured of sitting next to your family. Hmm. You know, normally when you set a price it is for something valuable. I have often fantasised about what might happen if I couldn't sit next to my children on a flight. Sure, they might be traumatised but still ...

Anyhow, guilt (particularly the costs on airline staff) has always kept those fantasies from becoming reality. But if the airlines are making it difficult with a charge, then surely all bets are off. Oh dear, I forgot to pay the fee. I guess you'll just have to take care of my child. Hard to imagine paying to stop that!

Up with Pixar

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 06:36:00 +0000

You know when we take the kids to see an animated movie, I'm not expecting to have my emotions manipulated. A few chuckles is a good outcome. A plot that makes sense leaves me satisfied. And avoiding of positions or morals that make me cringe can top it off. I am not looking for anything more.

Well, Up! -- this year's Pixar flick -- finally arrived in Australia this weekend and I can only warn parents out there: don't expect to come out of it with your emotions unscathed. It has sad, dare I say it, tear jerking moments, that make Bambi's mother getting shot a comparatively delightful event. You can't walk out of the theatre and leave this movie behind.

That said, apparently that view of the movie kicks in at around age 9. In our family discussion thereafter as to whether the movie was happy or sad (overall), the 5 and 8 year old saw it as completely happy while the 10, 39 and 41 year old called it anything but an upper. So this is a rare movie that gives adults and adult-response and leaves children thinking that it was just another, albeit very amusing -- let's face it, talking dogs are always going to be a winner -- animated movie. How Pixar did it, I have no idea. But I won't be going into any of their films so unprepared again.

The class matching problem

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 01:09:00 +0000

In Slate, Emily Bazelon talks about the class assignment problem. This is the annual task schools face in allocating students to classes. They need to do it on the basis of getting a good mix on classes and avoiding relationships with problematic external effects; for instance, separating out would-be bullies. The problem is that parental (and indirectly, child) preferences intervene. They have preferences for friends but also, and this is where it gets much stickier, for teachers. And that makes the whole class assignment problem far more complex.

Bazelon examines the moral issues here -- should a parent engage in what is essentially a zero-sum game? If you push to have your child in a class with a particular teacher, that pushes another out.

The school rules evolve as a response to this. One of my favourite games, is to "guess the incentive problem" when I see some sort of rule. For instance, in our school, class assignments for the next year are sent out on December 23rd (this is Australia, so the school year is the calendar year). This makes it impossible for anyone to actually receive them until well into the summer holidays when there is no one to complain to. Why this policy? It is clearly designed to put a lid on parental complaints and also it prevents aggregation of information as to who got into other classes.

But this is not to say that there is no input of parental and child preferences. This occurs earlier where children are invited to list four others they would like to be in a class with next year. They must include at least one child outside of their current class. They are not allowed to place a preference for children they would like to avoid. And then the list is sent home and must be signed off by their parent. This system is fine with us and we have not engaged in 'out of the game' lobbying.

I have long tried to implement a scheme when allocating students to syndicate groups for assignments. It looks pretty much like the one my school uses but on a smaller scale. I hadn't thought of getting parental sign-off for MBAs though. Next time perhaps.

It is interesting to see the diversity of approaches that are put in place across schools. For instance, from Slate,

At Orangewood Elementary, a public school in Phoenix, Ariz., parents are invited to request a class assignment ahead of time, so long as they follow an established set of rules. The principal, Andree Charlson, explained to me that she asks parents first to sit in on the class they think they want, to see whether the teacher's instructional method really appeals to them rather than going on vague hearsay. She honors requests only when they jibe with her own and her teachers' sense of what makes for a good class mix. That includes balancing the number of boys and girls, including a range of ability levels, and not putting too many kids with behavioral problems in the same classroom.

Ha! They impose signaling costs on the parents as to how serious they are. Not a bad approach but it is costly on the school too.

One suspects that there might be an actual solution to the class assignment problem. In economics, Al Roth and others have studied matching problems -- for instance, how interns are allocated to hospitals when the interns and hospitals have their own rankings. And New York schools are trying to work this out with respect to getting siblings into the same school. My guess is that this might be of use in coming up with a mechanism for class assignment.

Fairy Tale Economics

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 21:58:00 +0000

Ed Glaeser contemplates what fairy tales can teach children about economics. It turns out that they are not likely interested in economic nuance as opposed to what the authors likely intended.

Anyhow, if you want books where an economic message is tied in more explicitly, go no further than Anno's Magic Seeds. This book teaches the value of saving and compound interest without the need for subtlety.

Links of the day

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 23:16:00 +0000

A couple of links of interest today:

Children and texting: this NYT article looked devices that got kids into texting. This provoked the inevitable discussion of when is young, too young? Here is my 2 cents: texting is a form of communication. We teach children to speak and write, what's wrong with getting them to write short messages at an early age? My kids get to text with abandon. The other day I saw my 5 year old doing something with a device. "I'm messaging." "Who?" "Mummy." Turns out that she was playing with a calculator but the experience of communication was invaluable. When she is a teenager we will long for the days she was willing to communicate by calculator.
Evidence-based guilt: Andrew Leigh points to two research papers in economics that indicate that the competitive college admissions environment is driving parents to spend more time with the kids in the hope of giving them an advantage. The flip-side implication is that if you aren't doing that you are sabotaging your kid's future. Usual caveats about correlation and causation apply.

The demand and supply of guilt

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 23:10:00 +0000

In the NYT today, an article by John Tierney on guilt and childhood behaviour. It's worth the read. Basically, it argues that there is a demand for guilt in that it assists in developing good social behaviour later on and there are some issues in expanding the supply of guilt from your children.

It is an interesting read; especially, the important distinction between shame and guilt. It also picks up a theme that I wrote about in Parentonomics regarding installing guilt in the utility function to ensure good eating behaviour.

Build a house with Lego

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 23:34:00 +0000

Lego fans are devoted. This article by Damian Whitworth demonstrates just how devoted. But let me just hit on this one bit:

And therein lies the crucial truth about Lego. Parents don’t just buy it for their kids, they buy it for themselves. Or rather, dads buy it with themselves in mind.

The first sentence is definitely true. The second one, not so much. Well, at least for us. The flood-gates on Lego were unleashed when both parents argued over who was going to build the set with the child. This was solved by getting two sets and some extra children.

Whitworth then goes on to imagine building houses -- yes, real ones -- with Lego. One thing is for sure, it will make rearranging things relatively easy.

The War on Bullies

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 08:50:00 +0000

In Slate this week, an article by Alan Kazdin and Carlo Rotella about how do deal with bullies. It starts by telling you that all of your instincts about what to do when you child is bullied at school are wrong.

Option 1 is to get your kid to stand up to the bully. Wrong. Selection is at work here. Your sophisticated bully has already selected your kid on the basis that they are unlikely to be effective in standing up to them. The bully has more knowledge about this than you as a parent so don't try this one.
Option 2 is to ignore it. Wrong. Apparently this could put your child on a path that leads possibly to suicide.
Option 3 is to take care of it yourself. May be effective but wrong. To quote:

Some parents are tempted to kick the bully's ass themselves. Taking matters into your own hands might be satisfying while it lasted (to the extent that you find pleasure and honor in beating up kids), but it's illegal and wrong, and it would probably do more harm than good.

Option 4 is to leave it to the teachers. Wrong. Once again your discerning bully is an expert in avoiding teacher scrutiny and that is unlikely to change. Get them once and you only make them stronger.

So what do you do? Apparently, quite a lot. You have to gather information, not blame your child, problem solve with your child, and mobilise an entire army of people -- the child, teachers, peers, the Muppets -- to launch a coordinated strategy the planning of which would leave the D-Day landings to shame but is, when it comes down to it, less dependent on weather conditions. You may recall that Bart and his friends adopted this strategy to great effect in The Simpsons against Nelson and his bullying co.

Of course, that reminds me of other episodes of The Simpsons where Bart decides to become a bully himself but while the Slate writers don't put that down as an option I am pretty sure they will find some reason that is bad.

Looking at the whole shebang here made me see bullies and the pure social costs they seem to engender and wonder if a disproportionate and unjustified jail term might be in order. It just seems like a crappy problem all up.

That said, I remember when Child No.1 was in 1st Grade and she was upset because all of the children were giving her a nickname that was a natural rhyme for her name. Now just as you start speculating on what that might be, let me help by assuring you that the name was not dirty and in fact not derogatory at all. Quite innocent in fact. It was also a name that we had realised she would be called when we named her. We got lots of "you do know that rhymes with ..." etc. So there was a sense that I knew this was a day that was coming.

So how did I deal with this? First, I gathered information and sure enough it was your garden variety teasing based on some low hanging fruit. Then I didn't blame her and moved on to problem solving. So far so good. I had actually fallen on the expert's suggestion.

It is in the problem solving stage that the path differed from the evidence-based wisdom. I told her the old saying, "sticks and stones may break my bones but names would never hurt me." As I said it that just didn't seem to cut it in the comforting/solution stakes as the names were clearly hurting her -- at least right then.

But they I thought about it. Hey "names don't hurt children." Isn't that interesting?

OK, so I am not really proud of the next part of the story. No crap. I am just a bit proud of it. Sue me.

Here is what I did. We went through every person in her class -- whether they were a name-caller or not -- and I helped her invent rhyming names for each of them to use should she be assaulted by a name-caller. Basically, I armed my daughter. The point being that that was OK as the names would hurt them, right?

Suffice it to say, that was a fun activity and to the best of my knowledge she never used any of them. But knowing that rhyming names -- some of them far more troubling than her own one -- existed was a comfort. I never heard of it again although I do know she remembers those names to this day.

No coordinated attack, no nothing. Another parenting problem solved.

Jail4Kids

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 21:12:00 +0000

In Slate, Tom Vanderbilt writes about the 'playpen' and what became of them. This may be a cultural thing or just the circles he keeps but I didn't realise they had gone. I have been in many a house where a 'formal lounge room' has been transformed into the 'formal playroom' with the addition of a play pen where a coffee table might be. There, parents gather to talk -- literally over their children -- while their children sit in what would be considered the centre of attention.

What is interesting about the playpen is that after a century of product design, they couldn't improve upon the basic 'look and feel' of a jail. There are bars. The area is rectangular. And there is a single door with a lock that invites the would-be prisoner to try and break out; only being thwarted by a lack of coordination and strength. (During certain times there even is a potty!) It is the same principle when we confine our kids to cots. (Of course, my kids did manage an escape.) In many respects, this is surprising. You would think that toy manufacturers could design a confined space that looked -- to anyone other than children -- like something different.

In our house, we didn't go the playpen route but it wasn't out of any philosophical or parenting logic. We just didn't have a natural space of a rectangular contraption that we wouldn't be tripping over all of the time. After all, it is all about convenience. Instead, we attempted to gate off rooms and stairwells with a general strategy of containment. In terms of the potential for neglect, our solution was not that much different than the playpen.

In other houses, I have seen the playpen used in slightly different ways. For instance, there was one place where the television sat inside the playpen. The logic being that it was not about the children getting hurt but the TV and DVD player. I guess they wouldn't be going anywhere any time soon but then I am also sure they would still get plenty of attention.

Recessed toileting

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 20:59:00 +0000

I guess this post in the NYT is something I could hardly let go.

This year, it seems, the sagging economy may now be having an unexpected effect on methods and timing of training. Disposable diapers are not cheap (an average of 42 cents each); neither are training pants (68 cents a piece), which, while convenient, do not rise to the level of necessary. Sales of the latter are falling ...

The theory is simple. Pull-ups are, at least at the margin, a substitute for putting more effort into toilet training but come at two costs -- it may take longer and it definitely costs more money. When money is tight, you cut back on pull-ups and faced with mess but in more effort so training occurs at a faster rate. (Technically, theory is that toilet training is rare example of an inferior or Giffen good). The post provides an anecdote to back this up.

But I would be remiss if I didn't point out that it could move in another way. It is unclear whether the fall in sales (usually revenue) is quantity -- number of pants/nappies -- or price -- people switching to cheaper brands. Our now 5 year old is not yet trained at night. It might be that she isn't ready but I'll tell you that there ain't much parental effort going into it this time around. (Regular readers will understand why we might have just given up after Child No.2).

Anyhow, if she was just going to wee in them, we moved away from Pull-Ups to a much cheaper no-name brand which does the job. So our expenditures on this are way down this year. The problem is that with cheaper 'units' we have even less incentive to make a push to get her out of her training pants. So if this is the case, then the recession may not lead to accelerated toileting. Toilet training could be a normal good that happens quicker when income rises.

So there you go. I've matched the NYT anecdote with a countervailing one and resolved nothing. I wonder what brave economist is going to collect the data to resolve the issue of whether toileting training is a normal or Giffen good?

Dealing with tough stuff

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 01:48:00 +0000

This is one of those posts that might conform more to the traditional weblog version of blogs (that is, a personal account or journal) than something that might suit general consumption. As I am want to write here all about difficult parenting issues (well, at least those that are fit to print), I didn't want to shy away in this post even though the subject matter is difficult. As hinted at last year, my wife's mother, my children's Grandmother Helena has been ill for sometime. She was diagnosed some time ago with breast cancer and years of treatment did not turn it around. She passed away last week.

As you can imagine, our children were prepared for this as it was some time coming. Throughout the whole process our philosophy was to set out the truth and the probabilities of recovery as we knew them throughout. Last year, it was apparent that that probability had fallen to zero. The children knew it and they knew it during the several visits to their grandmother after that. They were able and free to talk openly about it all with all and sundry and this, we think, ultimately helped them understand and work through it all.

Two bits of background. Helena was relatively young (61) but also lived in another city, Sydney. So she wasn't a part of day-to-day lives but there were regular visits. It took her a few years to work out how to be a grandmother but when she did a solid relationship, particularly with our eldest, was built up. She taught her to play chess and to knit. When she visited, she shrewdly brought enough cheap toys so there were presents each day. The relationship was cherished and we knew that her passing would be mourned.

To a great extent the mourning began a year ago when the visits stopped and the illness took over. She was no longer the same person. But my daughter still worked towards the days of old. She took over the role of knitting her niece and nephew scarves and she built a chess set for her grandmother. I was proud of the way she tried to make the best of all of this.

Inevitably, philosophical issues took hold. I recognise that for many our approach would not be their way but we were strictly of the "when you are dead you are dead" variety. And, again, by way of information, the children did not appear distressed at that notion. A pet had died before and somehow the thought of finality was consistent with their view of the world. As of today, they do not expect to see their grandmother again.

Similarly, we did not shield the two eldest from the funeral and ceremonies. My 8 year old son joined me as a pall-bearer and both of them took their place in shovelling dirt into the grave. To them, there was intense curiosity at the whole process, in particular, at the open grief from adults especially, Helena's husband and also both of her parents who outlived her.

Perhaps the major issue with something like this is that there is a need for parenting resources and attention at precisely a time when those are in scarce supply. The children's mother was understandably occupied, and away during the final weeks, and I could have used her in discussions with the children. But we had had time and so the issues that needed to be sorted out were given time (especially with the help of the whole Michael Jackson thing that provided a warm up. That said, during the precise moment I was need most immediately I was out of the country, a calculated risk at the time, and had to rush -- only took 20 hours! -- back after just one day abroad.

Helena died of breast cancer; a disease both her mother and grandmother had. You won't be surprised when I tell you that the first time I heard about it my immediate thoughts were for the my three women and girls in the direct genetic line of fire of this. But there are actually four sisters and so currently seven in total who face the high probability of this occurring during their lives. And what is more, it is of a currently unknown gene. Diligence in early detection is our treatment now but hopefully for my children, the progress of science might yield something more comforting.

To complete the story, my wife gave an outstanding eulogy for her mother. It was perhaps the best speech I had ever heard at a funeral and prior to the fact I didn't know she had it in her. I was both amazed and proud to hear it and it moved so many of the 150 people there. Perfection.

She wrote the speech out and I'm going to post it now (with permission) to complete the log of these events. Two of the children were long asleep when it was given but I hope one day they will read it and see it for what it is. It says so much about the strength of their own mother.

In celebration of our mother’s life, I’d like to talk about what Mum left behind. There is a huge Mum-shaped hole in our lives. And I think a huge Helena-shaped hole in all our lives.
I’m going to talk about three things: our memories of Mum, the values she left us with and finally the people she left behind.
We remember our mother as a wonderful and unique person. She was caring and patient when we were young and provided us with a good model for us with our children. She always wanted to hear the truth and always valued and respected our opinions. She didn’t always listen to our opinion, but she wanted to know what it was.
She wanted what was best for her children and when we were growing up there was never a dull moment. We never quite knew what was going to happen next.
I shall remember Mum every day as I read to my children, as I hear her voice in my own and see her hand when I look at mine. Those hands taught us how to tie our shoelaces and how to win at chess in three moves.
She did not suffer fools, a trait which she shared with us. Which brings me to the values she gave to us.
The strongest value she gave to us was the importance of family. She was the most doting and beloved grandmother imaginable.
She taught us the value of independence and this is an aspect that we all hold very dear.
She had a high regard for intellect, which we are passing on to our children.
Although I’m sure she did not intend it, she taught us the very importance of integrity.
Finally the people she left behind:
It’s very difficult to know how to thank the person who gave you life. Because as my 8 year-old son tells me: “there is nothing I like more than my life”. Well, actually there IS something I love more than my life and that is his life and that of his sisters. My mother gave to me the things I love and cherish most. She gave me my sisters and she by extension gave me my children. And for that I’m eternally grateful.

Harry Potter's Uneasy Relationship with Academia

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 01:46:00 +0000

Last weekend marked the launch of the 6th in the now 8 part movie saga that is Harry Potter. As is surely apparent by now, the movies sit not as a substitute for the books but a complement to them. They succeed where they can visualise magic that cannot be done in words -- the creatures, the castle and a large part of the action. But they fail where the books have their most significant: in the complex characters and the deeper moral issues.

But in Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince one of those deeper but unstated moral issues arose neatly and somewhat humorously in the movie: the role of academia. It came in the form of Professor Slughorn, a marvelously imagined character who is a teacher who cares only about the best in the class and seeks them out to the exclusion of all others. He, in turn, is a character that is perhaps the most instrumentalist of at least the 'good' guys in the saga. Slughorn at various points commits self-interested acts claiming 'academic purposes.' For instance, he is caught removing valuable leaves from a plant, claiming their scientific merit but we know being motivated by the black market value.

That, however, is not where this issue comes to the fore. It is hard to describe it without giving away too much of the plot but Slughorn cites the very same 'academic' disclaimer when handing over clearly dangerous knowledge to a young Voldemort. Slughorn later clearly realises his error and attempts to cover his tracks but the message is clear: there is a danger to the academic shield.

Now I am not going to opine about that dilemma although being an economist who routinely puts research into the public domain, I have faced Slughorn's choice and have worried about it. But what is more interesting is the entire subtheme in Harry Potter of an anti-academic bias. This might seem funny with so many respected characters being affectionately and authoritatively titled 'Professor' but let's look at the evidence.

First, why is a High School education considered enough in the wizarding world. It would seem to me that having to learn magic as well as standard fare would put a greater premium on a longer period of education. Where is the secret college at Oxford that surely must come next for the academically-gifted Hermione? Can a secondary education really be enough for the career paths the students started choosing early on?

Second, dropping out of high school is something not treated with concern. Fred and George fly away on brooms out of school and into a flourishing retail business. But by the seventh book, and I am not giving too much away here, all three main characters have dropped out of school -- yes, to pursue the greater good -- but what other childrens' novels would have ever contemplated such a message?

And then finally, there is an underlying current of what all that magical knowledge is good for. Wizards know how to cure the ill, repair efficiently, and also a variety of psychological enhancements we need not go in to. But somehow, all that knowledge remains tightly held apparently to protect the Muggles from greater disruption but surely some leakage could do a world of good.

Standing back, there is an uneasiness with academia and knowledge throughout the series. But unlike other issues they remain unstated as an undercurrent. One wonders whether the apparatus of the saga could actually have been put to good use opening them up to debate.

By the way, we took all of our kids -- ages 5 - 10 -- to the latest movie. All enjoyed it. No really scary bits.

Moon shot

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 21:20:00 +0000

I was alive but I was too young to remember the first moon landing. But as I was growing up, and definitely before I turned 10, there was a sense that more was to come. A moonbase in 1999 depicted on TV seemed plausible. Casual space travel by 2001 seemed almost under-stating what could be done. Even The Economist feared Europe dropping out of having a role contributing to advancement. Yet here we are. People went to the moon and then did not return for 34 odd years and counting. I do not recall that prediction being made even if there were constant voices against the expense of all of this space travel.

This hit home as I showed my 10 year old daughter this terrific website: wechoosethemoon.org. It is tracking in 'real time' the whole moon expedition. At any point in time you can see what was going on exactly 40 years ago.

"What's this?"

"It is showing where the lunar lander is. You see, here it is in orbit around the moon. They are about to land."

"What? There are people up there now? Is that possible?"

"No, it is just showing what happened 40 years ago."

"Oh, yes. That's what I thought. We don't do this anymore."

And there you have it. It is hard to have these conversations and feel that somehow we have failed. The current generation believe what is true, that such space travel is as much as a dream as it was prior to the 1960s. I know that some will say that was all well and good given the cost. But the cost of the entire space program over that time, in today's dollars, was $176 billion. And yes, that, in retrospect was too costly. Not because of the resources it took but because the expense surely had value in knowledge created that would built up and lead to greater things. To not have reinvested on the back of that achievement was to erode the capital value of the initial expense. Almost impossible to conceive at the time, the moon landings were a short-term policy and not a serious commitment to the future. It will leave us and the next generation wondering what could have been.

WSJ Bloglist

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 23:15:00 +0000

While the review of Parentonomics in the Wall Street Journal was mixed, it looks like someone there likes this blog. While it didn't make the list of 25 top economics blogs, there was this:

We also left off some fun blogs, like Ecocomics or Parentonomics that are specialized and primarily focused on entertainment.

I guess that is appropriate although not everything here is that entertaining but I am happy for the mention. So to anyone new here today because of that feel free to browse although I'd be remiss not to point out that a tidier version of all that is here (pre-2007) is in the book (sans embarrassing spelling errors).

And just in case you didn't think I had a serious side, here is the link to my general economics blog. I guess I versioned myself!

BBC World Service

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:07:00 +0000

You know, as an economist and especially one who is researching and thinking about serious public policy constantly, to be interviewed by the BBC World Service and access its 40 million odd sophisticated listeners would seem like a triumph to get my ideas out there.

Last night that interview took place but instead of 40 million hearing about innovation or financial reform or something like that, they heard about toilet training. Click here to listen (it is about 2/3 of the way through). And, yes, it's my own fault!

The Greatest Gift

noreply@blogger.com (Joshua Gans) — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 01:08:00 +0000

In the New York Times, Nicholas Kristof lists the "best kids books ever." Now I am not sure what criterion he was using for his list but 'best' didn't seem to describe it. I think he was using a criterion of "books your kids can read so that their IQ does not drop over summer." With the list including The Hardy Boys and Little Lord Fauntleroy I can just imagine my kids, upon being handed these, going "gee wilakers, thanks Dad. That's swell" and asking me again why adults get all funny about the notion of a good book burning. If there is one thing I have learned about chapter books is, that unlike movies, TV shows and picture books, what you liked when you grow up rarely translates into a similar joy across generations. In Kristof's list Harry Potter stands out as the exception that proves the rule and is perhaps, indeed, one reason to have kids. I am about to give you a better one.

In his blog, Kristof sensibly asked his own kids what they would recommend. It should come as no surprised that none of his list that he had presumably subjected his kids too made the cut. Most were recent (that is, a decade old) but the top of the list was Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events. Those kids have taste.

I have reviewed some other books by Snicket before (here and here). My exuberance would not have been lost on anyone. But those were a side show to the 13 volume series that I began reading to my kids about 6 months ago.

Actually, that is not true, I began reading them 5 years ago and loved it. Sadly, my eldest at 5 years old wasn't so interested and so we stopped half way through the second book. And then I waited. And waited. And waited until finally I could convince the two eldest to sit down and listen to me read it to them. Unlike Harry Potter, these were books that had to be read aloud to a kid so given that I had several I figured it was my right to force it on them.

The forced event last only a few minutes before they saw what I saw. Pretty soon they were requesting readings over watching TV and video games. But we paced ourselves with a chapter a night for 169 nights (give or take some missed for various reasons).

This is a set of books that is pretty well impossible to review because to say too much would be to give too much away. What is more, the movie starring Jim Carey (who is perfect for the role of the villain, Count Olaf) while doing the spirit of the books justice is best consumed after reading the complete wreck. So there is no luck there. You basically have to pick up The Bad Beginning and go with it.

But I would be remiss (the word "remiss" here meaning failing in my duty as an informative parenting blogger to warn about potential harm to your children) in pointing out that some people might consider this book as causing potential harm to your children. The book involves the story of the Baudelaire orphans who become orphans before the first few pages are out which, I'm sorry to say, is by far the high point for them over the entire 13 books. (And, just in case you are thinking it, they adored their parents and life so there is no twist there).

To say that their lives were unfortunate is really to stretch the meaning of the word unfortunate away from its usually comforting nuance. Disastrous is another word that might describe their lives if it was true that the disasters were, in fact, the most painful experiences they go through. They are not. If I had to point to anything it would be the naked exposition and confrontation with the realistic bitter truths about people that will likely cause the most horror. For adults, we will recognise them in our own day-to-day experiences usually involving someone at the end of a telephone line in "billing" before the days where they were a pleasant but more empathic person who grew up in far less fortunate circumstances than yours. But for children, they are a window into the lives that follow and the perplexities they face now in understanding human behaviour will likely never retreat and they will live forever in their grip.

So consider yourselves warned but also recognise that these books, their genius and their relentless consistency will be among the more satisfying reading experiences of your parenthood. Get them now and read it out loud before it is too late. Also, ask some French person how to pronounce 'Baudelaire.' I apparently mispronounced it for 13 books.