The stock index “point” is a focal component of financial news reports. While much attention is paid to changes in stock index point totals, few people realize that the value of a stock index “point” varies (and has recently declined). We call this perceptual phenomenon “point...

Analysts make competing claims about when and how politicians can use fear to gain support for suboptimal policies. Using a model, we clarify how common attributes of fear affect politicians’ abilities to achieve self-serving outcomes that are bad for voters. In it, a politician provides...

Many attempts to increase civic competence are based on premises about communication and belief change that are directly contradicted by important insights from microeconomic theory and social psychology. At least two economic literatures are relevant to my effort to improve matters. One is the...