Festival of Ideas: Richard Thaler - Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioural Economics

Richard Thaler - Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioural Economics

part of Festival of Ideas 2016

Talk

Please note: This event took place in May 2016

Whether buying an alarm clock, selling football tickets or applying for a mortgage, we all succumb to biases and make decisions that deviate from the standards of rationality assumed by economists. In other words, we misbehave.

Why are we more likely to forgo the opportunity to sell a £100 bottle of wine rather than actually taking money out our wallet to pay for it, when ultimately the 'opportunity cost' of doing so is the same? Why would the 'endowment effect' mean that we value a free ticket worth hundreds of pounds more than the money we would get from selling it?

Coupling recent discoveries in human psychology with a practical understanding of incentives and market behaviour, Richard Thaler exposes the irrational tendencies in our thinking and shows us how to avoid making costly mistakes in life.

Speaker biography:

Richard H Thaler is the Ralph and Dorothy Keller Distinguished Service Professor of Behavioral Science and Economics and the director of the Center for Decision Research at the University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business. He is the author of Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness. Follow him on Twitter @R_Thaler


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