Marginal Revolution https://marginalrevolution.com/ Small Steps Toward A Much Better World Sun, 26 Jul 2026 23:46:14 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://marginalrevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/cropped-MR-logo-thumbnail-32x32.png Marginal REVOLUTION https://marginalrevolution.com/ 32 32 42693868 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/could-our-preoccupation-with-mental-health-be-part-of-the-problem.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=could-our-preoccupation-with-mental-health-be-part-of-the-problem Could our preoccupation with mental health be part of the problem? https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963528410/0/marginalrevolution~Could-our-preoccupation-with-mental-health-be-part-of-the-problem.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/could-our-preoccupation-with-mental-health-be-part-of-the-problem.html#comments Mon, 27 Jul 2026 07:38:40 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93479 Could our preoccupation with mental health be part of the problem? In some ways, encouraging people to think and talk more about their mental health is a good thing. There is now less stigma around mental illness, and more people who can benefit from professional help are getting it. But there is also reason to […]

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Could our preoccupation with mental health be part of the problem?

In some ways, encouraging people to think and talk more about their mental health is a good thing. There is now less stigma around mental illness, and more people who can benefit from professional help are getting it. But there is also reason to believe that efforts to bring attention to mental health struggles are inadvertently making us more vulnerable to psychological distress.

Start with our expanding conception of mental illness. The more fixated we are on mental health, the more sensitive we become to anything that might qualify as a symptom and the more we use clinical language to describe normal emotional experiences like grief, burnout and loneliness. This broadening of what we think counts as a disorder — known as concept creep — encourages us to pathologize ordinary life and see ourselves as mentally unhealthy.

Here is more from Clay Routledge at the NYT.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/could-our-preoccupation-with-mental-health-be-part-of-the-problem.html/feed 9 93479 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-decline-in-the-transmission-of-scientific-ideas.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-decline-in-the-transmission-of-scientific-ideas The Decline in the Transmission of Scientific Ideas https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963481163/0/marginalrevolution~The-Decline-in-the-Transmission-of-Scientific-Ideas.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-decline-in-the-transmission-of-scientific-ideas.html#comments Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:18:41 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93482 We document that the diffusion of new scientific ideas beyond their field of origin has declined substantially over the past four decades. This contraction is closely linked to increasing specialization in scientific language: research that employs more technical terminology tends to be adopted less broadly. We develop a theory of scientific discovery in which the […]

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We document that the diffusion of new scientific ideas beyond their field of origin has declined substantially over the past four decades. This contraction is closely linked to increasing specialization in scientific language: research that employs more technical terminology tends to be adopted less broadly. We develop a theory of scientific discovery in which the diffusion of new ideas depends on the degree to which potential adopters can understand and process them. When introducing their discoveries, scientists face a tradeoff between technical communication targeted at their immediate peers and more accessible language meant to reach broader audiences. As knowledge accumulates and research at the frontier builds on deeper layers of prior work, this tradeoff increasingly favors specialized language, limiting diffusion. Policy interventions that align scientists’ incentives can broaden adoption and increase the social value of scientific research.

That is from a new NBER conference paper by Enrico Berkes and Ruben Gaetani.

Image

Via this excellent thread by Juan Mateos Garcia.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-decline-in-the-transmission-of-scientific-ideas.html/feed 10 93482 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/in-relative-terms-maybe-children-do-not-cost-more-than-before.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=in-relative-terms-maybe-children-do-not-cost-more-than-before In relative terms, maybe children do not cost more than before? https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963405392/0/marginalrevolution~In-relative-terms-maybe-children-do-not-cost-more-than-before.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/in-relative-terms-maybe-children-do-not-cost-more-than-before.html#comments Sun, 26 Jul 2026 23:16:14 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93484 Despite rapid inflation in childcare and tuition prices, the goods-and-services CCI closely tracks adult prices, as these increases are offset by children’s lower exposure to shelter and by slower price growth elsewhere in the child basket. Households devote substantially more real resources to children than they did in 1990, but this increase parallels the growth […]

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Despite rapid inflation in childcare and tuition prices, the goods-and-services CCI closely tracks adult prices, as these increases are offset by children’s lower exposure to shelter and by slower price growth elsewhere in the child basket. Households devote substantially more real resources to children than they did in 1990, but this increase parallels the growth of real adult consumption rather than reflecting a child-specific rise in prices. A similar offsetting pattern appears for parental time: the rising value of women’s time is largely counterbalanced by declining motherhood penalties in earnings and work hours, so forgone market work adds little to relative cost growth. The main departure from this stability comes from the growing amount of leisure displaced by childcare; valuing that time raises the CCI, although the magnitude depends on the shadow value assigned to leisure.

A surprising and important result, from a new paper by Christina Patterson and Heather Sarsons.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/in-relative-terms-maybe-children-do-not-cost-more-than-before.html/feed 23 93484 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/further-progress-in-south-america.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=further-progress-in-south-america Further progress in South America https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963339656/0/marginalrevolution~Further-progress-in-South-America.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/further-progress-in-south-america.html#comments Sun, 26 Jul 2026 19:10:05 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93477 The share of people who are hungry has been decreasing faster in South America than anywhere else in the world. It is down by one-third since 2020, according to a report published on July 21st by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Just 3.5% of people in the region consume insufficient calories, the lowest […]

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The share of people who are hungry has been decreasing faster in South America than anywhere else in the world. It is down by one-third since 2020, according to a report published on July 21st by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Just 3.5% of people in the region consume insufficient calories, the lowest level recorded. Eliminating hunger by 2030 is one of the UN’s “sustainable development” goals. “If there is a region in the world that can potentially achieve that, it’s South America,” says Máximo Torero, the FAO’s chief economist.

Lula, as the president is commonly known, made food security a priority when he returned to office in 2023. By 2025 Brazil had made it off the UN’s Hunger Map, which tracks countries where more than 2.5% of the population suffers from chronic hunger. Chile and oil-rich Guyana were also removed. Argentina is almost there at under 3%. Colombia and Paraguay are approaching at 4%, while Peru and crisis-battered Venezuela are making inroads near 5%. Even Ecuador and Bolivia have improved a tad, to 11% and 20% respectively. Only Suriname is moving in the wrong direction.

This decline rests on sturdier foundations. The first is macroeconomic stability. South America’s central banks are far more independent and adept at managing inflation than they were two decades ago.

Here is more from The Economist.  If you are interested in further economic development, South America (plus Mexico and Panama and the DR) is really the place to look.  What is your other choice?  (Vietnam?)  Most of these countries will continue to grow, albeit at a modest pace.  Sooner or later they will get there.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/further-progress-in-south-america.html/feed 7 93477 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/sunday-assorted-links-577.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=sunday-assorted-links-577 Sunday assorted links https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963286937/0/marginalrevolution~Sunday-assorted-links.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/sunday-assorted-links-577.html#comments Sun, 26 Jul 2026 15:51:08 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93473 1. Deirdre economics reading list. 2. The 1878 entrance exam for the British India civil service. 3. How good is Opus 5 on biology? 4. “A linguistic “golden age” flourished between 1,000 to 3,000 years ago when tens of thousands of languages were spoken throughout the world, according to a new study coauthored by Yale […]

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]]> 1. Deirdre economics reading list.

2. The 1878 entrance exam for the British India civil service.

3. How good is Opus 5 on biology?

4. “A linguistic “golden age” flourished between 1,000 to 3,000 years ago when tens of thousands of languages were spoken throughout the world, according to a new study coauthored by Yale linguist Claire Bowern that traces trajectories in global language diversity over the past 12,000 years.” Link here.

5. Feline decentralized Italian mob fire attacks.

6. First Neuromancer trailer released.

7. Good Maureen Dowd review, the de-eroticized Homer (NYT).  Excellent piece, many of you underrate her.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/sunday-assorted-links-577.html/feed 48 93473 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/oriental-rugs-atlas-and-quiz.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=oriental-rugs-atlas-and-quiz The Rug Belt Atlas and Quiz https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963210614/0/marginalrevolution~The-Rug-Belt-Atlas-and-Quiz.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/oriental-rugs-atlas-and-quiz.html#comments Sun, 26 Jul 2026 11:18:30 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93475 I have an amateur interest in Oriental rugs but my eye is untrained. Thus, for fun and learning I created with Fable a Rug Atlas and quiz. The Rug Belt Atlas Check it out. Constructive comments welcome. P.S. The site is in fact safe! Working on getting it recognized.

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]]> I have an amateur interest in Oriental rugs but my eye is untrained. Thus, for fun and learning I created with Fable a Rug Atlas and quiz.

The Rug Belt Atlas

Check it out. Constructive comments welcome.

P.S. The site is in fact safe! Working on getting it recognized.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/oriental-rugs-atlas-and-quiz.html/feed 23 93475 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-demand-for-human-enhancement-technologies.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-demand-for-human-enhancement-technologies The demand for human enhancement technologies https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963192488/0/marginalrevolution~The-demand-for-human-enhancement-technologies.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-demand-for-human-enhancement-technologies.html#comments Sun, 26 Jul 2026 07:12:48 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93474 When a new technology promises large private benefits but may impose social costs that markets do not price, demand need not reveal how citizens want it governed. We examine this using a nationally representative U.S. survey experiment (N=5,556) on human enhancement technologies (HET). The experiment randomizes benefit domain, mechanism, heritability, purpose, and risk across vignettes; […]

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When a new technology promises large private benefits but may impose social costs that markets do not price, demand need not reveal how citizens want it governed. We examine this using a nationally representative U.S. survey experiment (N=5,556) on human enhancement technologies (HET). The experiment randomizes benefit domain, mechanism, heritability, purpose, and risk across vignettes; for each respondent’s assigned vignette, we elicit stated adoption, preferred regulation, and ethical and societal concerns. Overall, about 53% would adopt. Framing the technology as enhancing rather than restorative lowers adoption by about five percentage points, as much as a severe side-effect profile. About 28% would not adopt at any benefit. This refusal is driven overwhelmingly by the enhancing framing rather than by risk, consistent with a non-compensatory constraint for a substantial subgroup. Most who would adopt still favor strict regulation, and most who would never adopt do not wish to forbid others from doing so. Productivity enhancement generates the most ethical concern of any attribute but attracts the least regulation, and respondents favor subsidizing rather than taxing its adoption, consistent with a concern about access rather than safety. Private demand is therefore an unreliable guide to the governance citizens want, and the divergence we document provides a basis for regulators seeking to align the direction of technical change with societal values and priorities.

That is from a new NBER working paper by Giovanni Immordino, Mario Macis, Immacolata Marino & Fabrizio Panebianco.  And I will repeat this segment: “Productivity enhancement generates the most ethical concern of any attribute…”  Do note of course that the last sentence of the authors is completely unwarranted, and is a classic example of underidentified political bias in academic reasoning.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-demand-for-human-enhancement-technologies.html/feed 22 93474 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-common-sense-of-fareed-zakaria.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-common-sense-of-fareed-zakaria The common sense of Fareed Zakaria https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963183701/0/marginalrevolution~The-common-sense-of-Fareed-Zakaria.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-common-sense-of-fareed-zakaria.html#comments Sun, 26 Jul 2026 04:56:48 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93471 This is one of the best Op-Eds you will read this year, though it deliberately deemphasizes the personal (no one is attacked) in a manner that will result in less attention.  Better to write the truth!  Excerpt: Why has this [voter discontent} happened? Some of it is economic. Expensive housing, stagnant incomes and widening inequality have fueled public […]

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]]> This is one of the best Op-Eds you will read this year, though it deliberately deemphasizes the personal (no one is attacked) in a manner that will result in less attention.  Better to write the truth!  Excerpt:

Why has this [voter discontent} happened? Some of it is economic. Expensive housing, stagnant incomes and widening inequality have fueled public anger. But economics is only part of the story. America has enjoyed stronger growth than most other advanced economies. France under President Emmanuel Macron has lowered unemployment, and it has attracted more foreign investment projects than any country in Europe for seven straight years, according to an Ernst & Young analysis. South Korea is an economic success story. Japan was experiencing a comeback. Yet democratic governments almost everywhere are unpopular.

The larger explanation is that we are living through one of history’s great technological revolutions. And these transformations always produce deep anxiety and fear.

The last technological transformation on this scale came between roughly 1880 and 1920. Electricity, the telephone, railroads, the automobile and movies overturned entire industries and ways of life. Millions left farms for cities. Global trade disrupted local economies. New fortunes appeared overnight, while old occupations disappeared. In this turmoil, frustration and anger found political pathways. The left turned to communism, the right to fascism. What followed were new mass movements, cultural upheavals and world war.

Do read the whole thing.  You can be a victim of these processes, or keep your wits about you.  The choice is yours.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-common-sense-of-fareed-zakaria.html/feed 111 93471 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/odysseus-notes.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=odysseus-notes Odysseus notes https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963073505/0/marginalrevolution~Odysseus-notes.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/odysseus-notes.html#comments Sat, 25 Jul 2026 18:34:27 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93470 The subsection of the Georgi Gospodinov novel runs like this: The Shortest Novel About Odysseus After His Return Home One night, now old and flabby and starting to forget, he leaves his home secretly. He’s sick of everything, so he heads back one last time to see the places, women, and wonders he had once […]

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]]> The subsection of the Georgi Gospodinov novel runs like this:

The Shortest Novel About Odysseus After His Return Home

One night, now old and flabby and starting to forget, he leaves his home secretly. He’s sick of everything, so he heads back one last time to see the places, women, and wonders he had once encountered. To go back again into his draimed memory to see how it had been and who he had been. Because thanks to the bitter irony of old age, he has begun to transform into the Nobody, the name he had once cleverly used when introducing himself to the Cyclops.

Telemachus finds him in the evening, collapsed by the boat, only a hundred yards from home, with no idea what he is doing there and where he had been heading.

They take him back to a house with some woman he no longer remembers.

The novel is Time Shelter, and the premise is that refuges are built for people with Alzheimer’s, reflecting life from past decades, for instance the 1960s.  But then people from the present start wanting to live in them.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/odysseus-notes.html/feed 13 93470 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/saturday-assorted-links-571.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=saturday-assorted-links-571 Saturday assorted links https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/963043085/0/marginalrevolution~Saturday-assorted-links.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/saturday-assorted-links-571.html#comments Sat, 25 Jul 2026 16:38:10 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93465 1. The 1991 Project’s oral history collection (led by Shreyas Narla and Shruti) with ~50 hours of interviews with policy reformers and witnesses to India’s market  liberalization, is now available. 2. Mini Cities. 3. The new Claude, on Mondrian. 4. More on cybersecurity and cyberdefense.  And Simon Willison on The Incident.  And early AI fears were not about LLMs, […]

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]]> 1. The 1991 Project’s oral history collection (led by Shreyas Narla and Shruti) with ~50 hours of interviews with policy reformers and witnesses to India’s market  liberalization, is now available.

2. Mini Cities.

3. The new Claude, on Mondrian.

4. More on cybersecurity and cyberdefense.  And Simon Willison on The Incident.  And early AI fears were not about LLMs, and that makes a big difference.

5. Critique of the new 76ers.

6. Anthropic economic research futures allocating $200 million to RCTs.

7. Interview with Emily Wilson.  Excellent piece, many of you underrate her.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/saturday-assorted-links-571.html/feed 41 93465 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/a-natural-experiment-in-economics.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=a-natural-experiment-in-economics A natural experiment in economics https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/962854127/0/marginalrevolution~A-natural-experiment-in-economics.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/a-natural-experiment-in-economics.html#comments Sat, 25 Jul 2026 05:02:26 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93466 To study whether and how academics respond to political pressure, we exploit a natural experiment: the publication in early 2025 of a “blacklist” of words flagged by the U.S. government. We find that the release of this list led to a sharp reduction in the use of these flagged words among economists at universities that […]

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To study whether and how academics respond to political pressure, we exploit a natural experiment: the publication in early 2025 of a “blacklist” of words flagged by the U.S. government. We find that the release of this list led to a sharp reduction in the use of these flagged words among economists at universities that rely heavily on federal funding, relative to scholars from institutions that are less dependent on federal funding or based in the UK. The drop is driven by content related to gender, race, and environment. We show that changes are not simply semantic but reflect actual paper content and that neither the individual funding status nor time-invariant author characteristics are driving the effects. We also document interesting heterogeneous effects by department quality and author gender and ethnicity. Our findings are consistent with the idea that scholars respond strongly to political pressure.

That is from a new paper by Dominic Rohner, Oliver Vanden Eynde, and Philine Widmer.  I should note that the authors frame their results in terms of “Science under threat,” which indeed is in the title of their paper.  I do see some of that in operation, but I also see a lot of “removing incentives for pandering.”  Your own weights here may vary.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/a-natural-experiment-in-economics.html/feed 53 93466 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/crypto-markets-in-everything.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=crypto-markets-in-everything Crypto markets in everything? (moo) https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/962847446/0/marginalrevolution~Crypto-markets-in-everything-moo.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/crypto-markets-in-everything.html#comments Sat, 25 Jul 2026 04:40:55 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93469 Farmers in Parana, Brazil, struggling to get banks to loan them cash, became the first to tokenize livestock and place 10 dairy milk cows’ tokens for trade on the country’s B3 national stock exchange. They generated nearly $20,000 in credit backed by their cattle, signaling the potential of tokenizing RWAs as a financing tool. The […]

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Farmers in Parana, Brazil, struggling to get banks to loan them cash, became the first to tokenize livestock and place 10 dairy milk cows’ tokens for trade on the country’s B3 national stock exchange. They generated nearly $20,000 in credit backed by their cattle, signaling the potential of tokenizing RWAs as a financing tool.

The dairy cow tokenization in Brazil is a world first and serves as a test in a real-world scenario in which farmers are facing increasingly stringent lending limits imposed by local banks on small agricultural businesses.

“We take the cow, which is a real and tangible asset, and transform it into a digital asset backed by a unique code monitored in real time,” Thiago Martins of Cowmed, a Brazilian Agtec company, told CNNBrasil recently.

…“This digitization allows for formal registration with B3 as a movable asset,” Martins added. “The process is simple and gives the producer an advantageous opportunity to finance themselves, opening a new alternative for collateral at a time of strong credit restrictions in agribusiness.”

To turn cattle into trusted financial guarantees or collateral without requiring inspectors to visit the property, Cowmed equips cows with an AI-powered Smarty Collar. These collars constantly monitor health, behavior, and location. The raw data is then converted into an encrypted digital identity tied directly to the B3 credit agreement.

Continuous tracking of cattle prevents farmers from double-pledging the same cattle across multiple loans. It also includes built-in safeguards that allow the farmer to swap one dead cow for a live one.

Cowmed already tracks about 100,000 dairy cows across more than 1,000 farms. The herd is worth over $395 million. The company expects up to 20% of its network to adopt this tokenized financing model, unlocking $77.6 million in fresh credit for the agricultural sector.

Here is the full story.

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/crypto-markets-in-everything.html/feed 24 93469 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-decision-the-sequel.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-decision-the-sequel The Decision, the sequel https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/962703128/0/marginalrevolution~The-Decision-the-sequel.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-decision-the-sequel.html#comments Fri, 24 Jul 2026 19:34:26 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93467 Imagine your career were coming to a close, how would you want it to end?  By earning an especially large sum of money?  Publishing a final wonderful paper?  With an amazing act of mentorship? When it comes to Lebron, had he wanted to finish his career with the guys he enjoys playing with the most, […]

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]]> Imagine your career were coming to a close, how would you want it to end?  By earning an especially large sum of money?  Publishing a final wonderful paper?  With an amazing act of mentorship?

When it comes to Lebron, had he wanted to finish his career with the guys he enjoys playing with the most, he would have opted for Golden State (Steph and Draymond).

If he had wanted to choose his favored organization, he would have signed with Miami.

Furthering the NBA prospects of his son Bronny, and having more time with family, would have meant staying in Los Angeles.

The hometown, sentimental choice would have been Cleveland.

As it turned out, he wanted to maximize his chances of winning a title, and with a team that did not just win a title (which rules out OKC, NYC).  That meant signing with Philadelphia. Which is what he did.

What will your final major career decision look like?

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/the-decision-the-sequel.html/feed 48 93467 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/friday-assorted-links-582.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=friday-assorted-links-582 Friday assorted links https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/962648852/0/marginalrevolution~Friday-assorted-links.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/friday-assorted-links-582.html#comments Fri, 24 Jul 2026 16:37:53 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93459 1. How global was “antiquity”? 2. Why the Clarity Act is mired in muck (NYT). 3. Jim Olds on the new science plan. 4. Cyber capabilities of Kimi 3? 5. “Following a standard workplace safety check, I have just received an email from a university administrator in which my custom of keeping books on the […]

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]]> 1. How global was “antiquity”?

2. Why the Clarity Act is mired in muck (NYT).

3. Jim Olds on the new science plan.

4. Cyber capabilities of Kimi 3?

5. “Following a standard workplace safety check, I have just received an email from a university administrator in which my custom of keeping books on the shelves in my office is described as “the unnecessary storing of combustible materials”.” Link here.

6. Are current science books for children demotivating?

7. Brazilian murder rate is down 40% from its 2017 peak.

8. Is the number of words we speak each day dropping by 300 each year?

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]]> https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/friday-assorted-links-582.html/feed 51 93459 https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/talk-therapy-is-speech.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=talk-therapy-is-speech Talk Therapy is Speech https://feeds.feedblitz.com/~/962551355/0/marginalrevolution~Talk-Therapy-is-Speech.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/07/talk-therapy-is-speech.html#comments Fri, 24 Jul 2026 11:17:27 +0000 https://marginalrevolution.com/?p=93460 IJ: On Wednesday, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia struck down a D.C. law that barred therapists from other jurisdictions from doing online teletherapy visits with clients in D.C. The decision comes nearly six years after Virginia-based counselor Elizabeth Brokamp teamed up with the Institute for Justice (IJ) to file a lawsuit arguing the law violated the First Amendment. “This decision is […]

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IJ: On Wednesday, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia struck down a D.C. law that barred therapists from other jurisdictions from doing online teletherapy visits with clients in D.C. The decision comes nearly six years after Virginia-based counselor Elizabeth Brokamp teamed up with the Institute for Justice (IJ) to file a lawsuit arguing the law violated the First Amendment.

“This decision is a victory for anyone who speaks for a living,” said IJ Deputy Director of Litigation Robert McNamara. “Elizabeth’s victory here confirms that the First Amendment protects useful speech, including counseling, and that licensing boards can’t censor speech simply because someone doesn’t have their permission to talk.”

Congrats to the IJ! Now, we need to get rid of all the other bans on patients hiring physicians from other states. As I wrote last year:

During the pandemic, many restrictions on telemedicine were lifted, making it far easier for physicians to treat patients across state lines. That window has largely closed. Today, unless a doctor is separately licensed in a patient’s state—or the states have a formal agreement—remote care is often illegal. So if you live in Virginia and want a second opinion from a Mayo Clinic physician in Florida, you may have to fly to Florida, unless that Florida physician happens to hold a Virginia license.

The standard framing says this is a problem of physician licensing. That leads directly to calls for interstate compacts or federalizing medical licensure. Mutual recognition is good. Driver’s licenses are issued by states but are valid in every state. No one complains that Florida’s regime endangers Virginians. But mutual recognition or federal licensing is not the only solution nor the only way to think about this issue.

The real issue isn’t who licenses doctors. It’s that patients are forbidden from choosing a licensed doctor in another state. We can keep state-level licensing, but free the patient. Let any American consult any physician licensed in any state. That’s competitive federalism—no compacts, no federal agency, just patient choice.

Hat tip: Joel Selanikio.

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