How Busy People Make Time to Read – And You Can Too

HOW BUSY PEOPLE MAKE TIME TO READ—AND YOU CAN TOO

HAVEN’T FINISHED A BOOK SINCE COLLEGE? BETWEEN WORK, FAMILY, AND SOCIAL LIVES, TRYING TO FIND TIME TO READ CAN BE MORE EFFORT THAN RELAXING HOBBY. HERE’S HOW TO MAKE MORE TIME FOR YOUR FAVORITE PAGE-TURNERS. Read more of this post

Why Are Physicists Drawn to Economics?

MARCH 21, 2014 BY CHRIS HOUSE

Why Are Physicists Drawn to Economics?

Even before the financial crisis, there has always been a surprising number of ex-physicists who find their way to graduate study in economics. It could be that many of these math-physics people have simply concluded that they no longer like physics and are interested in economics instead. (Moreover, the job market for economics Ph.D’s is much better than the job market for physics Ph.D’s.) I suspect however that some of them are here because they have some incorrect perceptions about the field. A student with a mathematical-physics background could easily convince himself that he has superior mathematics abilities than typical economists and superior statistical and computational skills than most economists.[1] He might go on to conclude that, as a consequence of his superior mathematical and computational abilities, he should be able to enter economics and start contributing quickly and easily. He might also anticipate that he could easily adapt established models or techniques in physics to study economic phenomena and impress the profession. Read more of this post

Beware growing ‘parentocracy’ in Singapore: NIE don; He warns of students who get ahead thanks to parents with more resources, not merit

Beware growing ‘parentocracy’: NIE don

He warns of students who get ahead thanks to parents with more resources, not merit

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‘Card Factory has 16 years of unbroken like-for-like sales growth’; Richard Hayes, chief executive, says the retailer has opened a shop a week for the past decade; The average British person buys 30 greetings cards a year

‘Card Factory has 16 years of unbroken like-for-like sales growth’

Richard Hayes, chief executive, says the retailer has opened a shop a week for the past decade

Private equity group Charterhouse bought Card Factory for £350m in 2010 and is understood to be working with UBS and Morgan Stanley on an IPO Photo: PA

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Start-up advice from Innocent and Skype founders

Start-up advice from Innocent and Skype founders

Entrepreneurial trailblazers Niklas Zennström and Richard Reed help to mentor three start-ups as part of the Albion Startup Kitchen series

Cooking up a start-up storm: (from left) Jonathan Mulonson, Martin Johnson, Niklas Zennström, Skype’s founder; Richard Reed of Innocent Drinks; Ed Cowburn and Emily Brooke  Read more of this post

Business has the power to do immense good; Business leaders – and shareholders – need to be thoughtful about the kind of organisations they are trying to build over the long term

Business has the power to do immense good

Business leaders – and shareholders – need to be thoughtful about the kind of organisations they are trying to build over the long term

Sir Andrew says it is important to remember that the millions of people who work for businesses each have the potential to do good for the communities they are part of Photo: Bethany Clarke Read more of this post

Tom Erickson of Acquia, on the Philosophy of ‘Ready, Fire, Aim’; The chief executive of an open-source software company says he wants to hire people “who are going to jump in and own their work, who are going to risk something, and risk failing.”

Tom Erickson of Acquia, on the Philosophy of ‘Ready, Fire, Aim’

MARCH 29, 2014

By ADAM BRYANT

This interview with Tom Erickson, chief executiveof Acquia, an open-source software company, was conducted and condensed by Adam Bryant. Read more of this post

How to Think About the Risk of Autism

How to Think About the Risk of Autism

By SAM WANG

A STUDY published last week found that the brains of autistic children show abnormalities that are likely to have arisen before birth, which is consistent with a large body of previous evidence. Yet most media coverage focuses on vaccines, which do not cause autism and are given after birth. How can we help people separate real risks from false rumors? Read more of this post

Robert Shiller’s Nobel Knowledge; Robert Shiller on the art of stock-picking and the complex psychology of investors

Robert Shiller’s Nobel Knowledge

Yale University economics professor and Nobel laureate, Robert Shiller on the art of stock-picking and the complex psychology of investors

DAVID WESSEL

Updated March 26, 2014 11:02 a.m. ET

ROBERT SHILLER, A 67-YEAR-OLDYale University professor best known for his early, accurate prediction that U.S. house prices were a bubble just waiting to burst, has long worked at the intersection of psychology and economics. He recently shared the Nobel in economics for insights into why prices of stocks and houses fluctuate as they do, particularly work showing that markets move too much to be explained by rational investors responding to changing fundamentals. Read more of this post