Freakonomics Radio

  • EXTRA: Why Quitting Is Usually Worth It

    Stephen Dubner appears as a guest on Fail Better, a new podcast hosted by David Duchovny. The two of them trade stories about failure, and ponder the lessons that success could never teach.   SOURCES:…

  • The University of Impossible-to-Get-Into (Update)

    America’s top colleges are facing record demand. So why don’t they increase supply? (Part 2 of our series from 2022, “Freakonomics Radio Goes Back to School.”)   SOURCES: Peter Blair, professor of education at Harvard…

  • What Exactly Is College For? (Update)

    We think of them as intellectual enclaves and the surest route to a better life. But U.S. colleges also operate like firms, trying to differentiate their products to win market share and prestige points. In…

  • EXTRA: Here’s Why You’re Not an Elite Athlete (Update)

    There are a lot of factors that go into greatness, many of which are not obvious. As the Olympics come to a close, we revisit a 2018 episode in which top athletes from a variety…

  • 600. “If We’re All in It for Ourselves, Who Are We?”

    Tania Tetlow, a former federal prosecutor and now the president of Fordham University, thinks the modern campus could use a dose of old-fashioned values.   SOURCE: Tania Tetlow, president of Fordham University.   RESOURCES: “Not…

  • 599. The World’s Most Valuable Unused Resource

    It’s not oil or water or plutonium — it’s human hours. We’ve got an idea for putting them to use, and for building a more human-centered economy. But we need your help.   SOURCES: Nathan…

  • EXTRA: Why Rent Control Doesn’t Work (Update)

    A new proposal from the Biden administration calls for a nationwide cap on rent increases. Economists think that’s a terrible idea. We revisit a 2019 episode to hear why.   SOURCES: Tommy Andersson, professor of…

  • 598. Is Overconsolidation a Threat to Democracy?

    That’s the worry. Even the humble eyeglass industry is dominated by a single firm.  We look into the global spike in myopia, how the Lemtosh got its name, and what your eye doctor knows that…

  • 597. Why Do Your Eyeglasses Cost $1,000?

    A single company, EssilorLuxottica, owns so much of the eyewear industry that it’s hard to escape their gravitational pull — or their “obscene” markups. Should regulators do something? Can Warby Parker steal market share? And…

  • EXTRA: People Aren’t Dumb. The World Is Hard. (Update)

    You wouldn’t think you could win a Nobel Prize for showing that humans tend to make irrational decisions. But that’s what Richard Thaler has done. In an interview from 2018, the founder of behavioral economics…