Tag: order

Social Desirability Bias vs. Tourism

Bryan Caplan

Economically speaking, there’s a straightforward win-win case for these Mexican resorts: Not only do they make the tourists happier; they make the Mexicans happier by providing them with better opportunities than they have elsewhere in the Mexican economy. If you reconsider this verdict through the distorted lens of Social Desirability Bias, though, a radically different picture appears before your eyes.  Once you forget economics, you could easily describe the resort experience in the following sordid way.

Aphorisms in Honor of Liberty, Part Nine (24m) – Episode 441

Skyler J. Collins (Editor)

Episode 441 has Skyler giving his commentary on the following aphorisms written by Jakub Bożydar Wiśniewski: “A good economist believes that the ones best suited to deal with the problem of scarcity are entrepreneurs. A bad economist believes that it’s the economists.”; “A fool believes that individual liberty can be established by means of political power. A person of reason believes that political power can be abolished by means of individual liberty.”; “A ‘just tax’ is something akin to an ‘affectionate rape’.”; “If the best thing you can say about something is that it is a “necessary evil”, then it is as obviously evil as it is unnecessary.”; “Border: the geographical expression of tribal parochialism.”; “A wise person is someone who is grateful for being called a fool when he’s wrong, indifferent to being called a fool when he’s right, embarrassed at being called a sage when he’s right, and troubled by being called a sage when he’s wrong.”

Patrick’s Journey, Harassing People, & Peaceful Parenting University (51m) – Episode 439

Skyler J. Collins (Editor)

Episode 439 welcomes Patrick Smith to the podcast to chat with Skyler on the following topics: growing up in the Dallas area, his Corvette and run-ins with cops; training to be a voluntary police officer in order to keep the cops off his back, and learning on ride-alongs that cops mostly just harass peaceful people all day long; studying the American founding fathers to answer the question of authority; delving deeper into Judge Napolitano and (old) Stefan Molyneux; his Not Governor campaign; creating Peaceful Parenting University; why communism even at the home/family level doesn’t work; why child dependency on their parents creates a positive obligation; spanking as a protective use of force; Walter Block’s evictionism theory of abortion; his search for practical peaceful parenting tools; was homeschooled for a year as a youth and always wanted that for his own kids; how he “unschooled” himself after hours as a youth; his unique experiences of raising separate sets of kids both traditionally and peacefully; responding to tantrums; how authoritarian parenting creates the expectation of authoritarianism; and more.

The Truly Educated & This is The Way (24m) – Episode 048

Skyler J. Collins (Editor)

Episode 048 looks at two Stoic topics: the first from Epictetus who wrote, “The beautiful and good person neither fights with anyone nor, as much as they are able, permits others to fight . . . this is the meaning of getting an education—learning what is your own affair and what is not. If a person carries themselves so, where is there any room for fighting?”; and the second from artwork by mjhiblenart involving a character from The Mandalorian, a television series on Disney+. The episode begins with sad news about Carl Watner (RIP), the person who introduced Skyler to Stoicism.