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Giving Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving to all! In between cooking, eating, football and moaning about how full you are, if you happen to sit down at your computer, here are a few things I read recently that you might find interesting...
  • Tim Harford suggests that gift cards might not solve the problem of the deadweight loss of Christmas presents.
  • If you brave the crowds on Black Friday, this post about price discrimination will give you something to think about while you're in line (hat tip to Mark Thoma).
  • Alex Tabarrok describes a fun activity for illustrating gains from trade. I'll add that you can do this in a large class if you use a subset of students - I've done this with a group of 10-15 students at the front of the 500-seater (once the other students see that the activity involves candy, there tends to be a lot more students who want to volunteer).
  • Rob Pitingolo has one of the clearer explanations of why popcorn is so expensive at the movies that I've ever seen.
  • If you send actual cards for the holidays, Cards that Give is a great resource, providing links to over a hundred charitable organizations that sell cards to raise funds.

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