Q: In 2012, you and Yvon Chouinard co-authored The Responsible Company: What We’ve Learned from Patagonia’s First 40 Years. Now, you have released The Future of the Responsible Company: What We’ve Learned from Patagonia’s First 50 Years. Why the new book? So much of what is going on in the world is heartbreaking and scary. But there’s also so much learning going on. We now have the potential to…
The Horatio Alger Myth has resurfaced in headlines this summer in political controversy that shows little insight into the true character behind this myth of American success. Alger was a scandalized failure whose recreated image was later manufactured by publicity seeking publishers in the 1920s several decades after his death. Is that really something partisans of either persuasion should celebrate? The failed writer Horatio Alger of the 19th century…
On average, women earn 79 cents on the dollar compared to men—a figure that has been repeated by economists and politicians for years. It has proven a simple way to underscore a persistent and complex problem in the United States. Although factually correct, the finding that women make less than 80% of what men do doesn’t tell the full story about gender in the workplace. Mushfiq Mobarak, professor of economics,…
The last time we talked about returning to the office, you suggested that we take this opportunity to think about the workplace—not just how to organize workers and cubicles, and whether we mask, and what the hybrid policy is, but to assess how our organization works, and how we‘re working together as a team. Now it’s 2023. Do you think that those conversations are still needed? Absolutely. For the most…
Why did the Chinese central bank cut rates? The modest monetary easing of mid-August—just 10 to 15 basis points off short-term repo rates —is a limited response to a Chinese economy that is under serious downward pressure. Most, including myself, were expecting sustained momentum in the economy in 2023 to be driven by a snapback from the COVID-related lockdowns of late 2022. While there was evidence of such a bounce…
In early 2020, as restrictions imposed to contain the coronavirus swept across the world, concerns about “lockdown fatigue” followed closely in their wake. As early as spring and early summer in the U.S., media commentators worried that lockdown policies were chafing, and that a critical mass of weary rule-breakers could render such policies ineffective. But were the fears about the diluting effects of lockdown fatigue warranted? After all, it was…
Many current TV shows and movies are reboots of existing franchises. Why has this one been so culturally omnipresent? The marketers at Warner Bros are being touted as geniuses, credited with the blockbuster success of the Barbie movie. The movie has already grossed $1 billion in box office sales, with a marketing spend estimated at $150 million and a similar cost for the movie. It’s a great ROI but there…
Cynics often know the price of everything but the value of nothing. Remember how, just months ago, leading economic voices were predicting a catastrophic “Category 5 economic hurricane” this year? The astounding 2.4% GDP growth revealed this week, with plunging inflation, historically low unemployment, and corporate profit reports soaring past expectations, have knocked the wind out of the fact-free cynics. It’s been said that cynics sound smarter than optimists because…
Harlan Krumholz: Welcome to Health & Veritas. I’m Harlan Krumholz. Howard Forman: And I’m Howie Forman. We’re physicians and professors at Yale University. We’re trying to get closer to the truth about health and healthcare. We have an exciting interview coming up with Dr. Alan Friedman of Yale New Haven Hospital and Yale School of Medicine. But first, in keeping with a podcast that is sponsored by a school of…
Q: What are the core values that led you to the work you do? Passion and compassion drive me professionally and personally. I have a fervency for service to others that comes out of my roots in Judaism: You don’t have an obligation to perfect the world, but you do have a responsibility to keep trying to make things better. I come from a community that has been marginalized in…
For more than a decade, the World Happiness Report—a collaboration among several top universities in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada—has published annual data on the happiest countries in the world; Finland has held the top spot for six years in a row. Part of a vast body of literature that examines people’s subjective well-being and the factors that contribute to its improvement or decline, the report calculates…
Harlan Krumholz: Welcome to Health & Veritas. I’m Harlan Krumholz. Howard Forman: I’m Howie Forman. We’re physicians and professors at Yale University. We’re trying to get closer to the truth about health and healthcare. This week, we’ll be speaking with Dr. Melissa Davis. But first, we’d like to check in on hot topics in health and healthcare. And Harlan, I know there’s a topic that got you really interested, and…
Q: Are there key questions that have guided your career? All my research looks at judgment and decision making. I’ve done work on couples’ financial behavior. I’ve looked at how emotion influences our perception of risk. I’m quite interested in our moral intuitions and how they align with our actual behavior. Right now, I’m doing research on how people evaluate moral transgressions. But, over the course of my career, the…
In the summer of 2015, a woman named Dawn Dorland donated a kidney to a stranger. She set up a private Facebook group to update her friends about the surgery and her recovery. Unbeknownst to Dorland, some group members decided that sharing the news of her generosity was a form of virtue signaling and began mocking her behind her back. One of those so-called friends eventually incorporated an earnest letter…
The headlines are full of grand and sometimes terrifying speculation about the potential of artificial intelligence. At Yale SOM’s CEO Summit recently, Prof. Jeffrey Sonnenfeld asked business leaders for some real talk about how their companies are using the technology. Jeffrey A. Sonnenfeld Senior Associate Dean for Leadership Studies & Lester Crown Professor in the Practice of Management Steven Tian Director of Research, Chief Executive Leadership Institute Amidst all the…
Cryptocurrencies are notoriously volatile. But listening carefully to social media chatter can help identify winning short-term investments in crypto, according to a new Yale study carried out as the crypto bubble expanded and finally popped. The methodology in the study, co-authored by Prof. Tauhid Zaman and PhD student Khizar Qureshi, could also be used to translate online buzz into predictions in other domains. Written by Dylan Walsh As cryptocurrency soared…
Yale SOM’s Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and Steven Tian write that the exchange-traded funds that boycott companies taking action on social issues are underperforming the market and struggling to find investors. In commenting on Bob Iger’s defence of Disney’s values and brand in the face of threats from Florida Governor DeSantis, Nike CEO John Donahoe said, “I think Bob’s doing a great job at this. If it’s core to who you…
Studies of developed economies have suggested that rapid job turnover is linked with economic growth, perhaps because workers are more efficiently re-allocating their labor to where it will be most productive. But for a new study, Yale SOM’s Kevin Donovan and his co-authors took a broader view, incorporating data from 49 countries, including developing economies. They found that high labor flows are actually negatively correlated with GDP per capita. …