Chicago Booth Review Podcast

The US federal government is suing Ticketmaster parent company Live Nation, in part over what it says are excessive or junk fees. One feature of these fees is that they're hidden – you only find out at the end what the true price is. There's an irony in the case, says Chicago Booth's Jean Pierre Dube, since government itself is a keen user of hidden fees. In this episode, we talk to Dube about how...

The US spends a lot more on healthcare than most other high-income countries. But the US doesn't have universal health coverage, and performs poorly on life expectancy, death rates for avoidable or treatable conditions, and maternal and infant mortality. Financial incentives shape the kind of healthcare that patients are offered, from the drugs they're prescribed to the procedures they receive. So...

In 2022, the number of displaced people in the world surpassed 100 million, according to the UN, meaning that over 1.2 percent of the global population have been forced to leave their homes. The numbers are only likely to grow, as climate change prompts further migration and displacement. In this episode, we bring you the second of two podcasts featuring Chicago Booth Adjunct Assistant Professor A...

If you found out that a coworker at the same level as you earned significantly more than you, what would you do? This episode is part of Business Practice series, where we asked people to script what they would say in a challenging workplace scenario. Chicago Booth's George Wu analyzes the results.

Why is being frugal a virtue? And where exactly do we draw the line between being "frugal" and being "cheap"? In this episode, Chicago Booth's John Paul Rollert traces the history of frugality from the 18th century to today, explaining why it continues to be relevant as a moral yardstick.

Many of us face snap decisions in which two of our core values come into conflict. We could get promoted, but only by spending less time with family, or be successful in the short term, but at the expense of long-term sustainability. Chicago Booth's Lucia Annunzio calls these difficult decisions leadership "moments of truth," and she advises executives that if they don't have a plan on how they wi...

In the US, 13 percent of refugees become entrepreneurs, compared to 9 percent of Americans born in the US. In this episode we hear from Andrew Leon Hanna, a Chicago Booth Adjunct Assistant Professor whose book 25 Million Sparks: The Untold Story of Refugee Entrepreneurs tells the stories of some refugees who started their own ventures. In the first of two podcasts about the book, he explained why...

Many of us think that our workplaces are not fair. Managers favor some employees over others, or give some people credit that's due to someone else. Chicago Booth's Lucia Annunzio warns that that can lead to resentment and even acts of sabotage. So how important is fairness, and how can you create an environment where people respect and understand decisions, even if they don't like or agree with t...

Nearly 20 percent of Americans have medical debt. A hospital stay in the US on average leads to about $6,000 in unpaid medical bills for the uninsured, and more than $18,000 for about one in ten uninsured patients. Why is US healthcare so expensive? In this episode, we hear from Chicago Booth's Matt Notowidigdo, in the first of two podcasts about his new book, Better Health Economics: An Introduct...

If you are married, you are statistically much more likely to report being happy than if you're unmarried. In fact, Chicago Booth's Sam Peltzman notes that the difference in terms of happiness is the same as either being in the top 10 percent of earners, or the bottom 10 percent. Having said that, his research also shows that the richer you are, the happier you are. In this episode, we talk with h...

Companies in the US have faced a new kind of pressure in recent years from 'stakeholder capitalism' or 'woke capitalism.' How should corporations respond? In this episode, we bring you a conversation between Alison Taylor, a Clinical Associate Professor at NYU's Stern School of Business and the author of the author of Higher Ground: How Business Can Do the Right Thing in a Turbulent World, and Chi...

AI promises to make us all be more productive, so what role does old-fashioned management play? Chicago Booth's Chad Syverson says management still matters, and even the best technology won't necessarily improve productivity if the right managers aren't in place. But what does good management even mean in the age of hybrid work and remote teams?

The market for services is global, and many of us are used to having our issues fielded by someone in India. For decades, big companies in the US and Europe have set up global capability centers in India to handle back-office operations. In this episode, we hear from Chicago Booth's Raghuram Rajan, who sees the future of India's economy as moving from the back office to the front-of-house. This is...

New York Times columnist David Brooks' latest book, How to Know a Person is about our ability to know others, and to make them feel valued and understood. In this episode, Brooks talks to Chicago Booth's Nick Epley about how seemingly small, everyday interactions can significantly shape our lives. Their conversation was part of the Think Better series, organized by Chicago Booth's Roman Family Cen...

Most US companies have a toxic culture, according to Lucia Annunzio, Adjunct Associate Professor of Executive Education at Chicago Booth. The hallmarks are a lack of transparency, short-termism, and top-down leadership. As a result, employees feel micromanaged, stressed, and disengaged. So what can managers do to stop the toxicity and create a healthy work culture?

With a population of 1.4 billion, India is the world's biggest democracy and already one of the world's leading economies, but it still has huge potential to grow its economy. So how should India grow? And what does the country need to realize the potential of its human capital? In this episode, we speak to Chicago Booth's Raghuram Rajan, who served as Governor of the Reserve Bank of India from 20...

Political folk wisdom tells us that people become more conservative as they get older. But does the evidence back that up? And is the political divide between older and younger voters getting bigger? In this episode, we speak with Chicago Booth's Sam Peltzman about his research on political ideology.

For the past 20 years, the growth in US productivity has been sluggish at about 1.2%, compared to the 3% pace at which it grew from the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s. Chicago Booth's Chad Syverson says that if US productivity hadn't slowed, the US economy would be bigger to the tune of $25,000 per person. So what's happening to productivity, and is it finally about to turn the corner?

Climate change is a global problem, so it can't be solved by a limited number of countries acting alone. But can we develop and enforce global rules? In this episode, we hear from Chicago Booth's Christian Leuz, an accounting professor who advocates for companies to report their carbon emissions. This is our second podcast with Leuz about emissions reporting and climate change. We released the fir...

The ancient Greeks thought a lot about strategy, which is why strategists in business, politics, and the military still draw on their wisdom today. So what business lessons can we learn from the heroes of the Iliad and the Odyssey? In this episode, we hear from Chicago Booth's Greg Bunch, who teaches new venture strategy to MBA students and executives. When he's advising entrepreneurs, when does h...

If you want to lose weight, you first need to know how much you weigh, how many calories you're eating a day, and how many minutes of exercise you're getting. Now imagine you post all that information on your social media page and ask your contacts to hold you accountable. Could that same idea help us tackle global warming? In this episode, Chicago Booth's Christian Leuz says the same transparency...

Most workers in the US say they are feeling angry, anxious, and disengaged from their jobs. Why is that, and what can be done? In this episode, we hear from one of the world's leading researchers on motivation, Chicago Booth's Ayelet Fishbach, who calls this "a crisis of motivation" whose roots lie in how we work, and how we think about work. The motivation crisis has consequences for both employe...

Some people say that you don't help the poor by giving them money, but by giving them opportunities to earn money. This is behind the periodic campaigns to limit welfare benefits in order to encourage work. But is a handout necessarily different from a hand-up? In this episode of the Chicago Booth Review podcast, Chicago Booth's John Paul Rollert reflects on how we think about helping the poor and...

Would you speak up at work if one colleague said something that unintentionally discriminated against another? And if you did, what would you actually say, and when and how would you say it? In this episode, we continue our Business Practice miniseries, where we ask people to script what they would say in a challenging workplace scenario. Chicago Booth behavioral science professor George Wu analyz...

The movie "Gone with the Wind" depicts a genteel, harmonious world torn apart as the old way of life comes to an end. Behind that gentility was the inhumanity of slavery, whose end transformed the economy of the American South. Morally, that was a good thing, but, contrary to the depiction in the movie, was it also positive for the economy? In this episode, we talk to Chicago Booth's Rick Hornbeck...