Has anyone in the class seen, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood?

If you have seen it (a description is here) I wonder whether you liked it and, if so, why.  I'd also be interested to know if you watched Mr. Rogers at all when you were a kid. 

This past weekend I've read several pieces that are related.  In the New York Times Magazine there was a long piece about The Mr. Rogers No One Saw.  Within that piece there is a link to another Magazine piece about Tom Hanks, who plays Mr. Rogers in the movie.  Apparently, Tom Hanks is a really good guy, off the screen as well as on it.  The article is called, This Tom Hanks Story Will Help You Feel Less Bad.   The there is the article from 1998 in Esquire Magazine on which the movie is based called Can You Say...Hero?   I'm guessing this is getting such a splash now because people are desperate for some good news.  I did find it heartwarming to read these pieces. 

Holiday Quiz

This one is about Star Trek, the Original TV Show, the Motion Picture,  and the various sequels.

Q: How many ears does Captain Kirk have?
A: Three.  The left ear, the right ear, and the final front ear.  ;-)

Happy Thanksgiving.

Excel Homework Due December 4 at 11 PM

This is the last Excel Homework. 

This homework is on extensions of the basic Shapiro and Stiglitz model, with a particular focus on making the monitoring intensity a choice variable. 

You should watch the video presentation of the basic model first. This is a full lecture on the math of the model. It takes about a half hour. (If you want the PowerPoint file, a link to it is in the description of the video.) 
 
The actual Shapiro and Stiglitz paper: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1804018 
The video that derives the equations from the paper: http://youtu.be/upUrdaLNIss 
xlsx file: https://uofi.box.com/s/cyuy1v6kfs8dfl3n43kopbp801n79sbo

Today's Quiz

Then there was the Bigger family with Mr. Bigger, Mrs. Bigger and baby Bigger.

Q: Who was bigger?
A: Baby Bigger, because she was a little Bigger.

Links for Today's Class Session - Nov. 21

In lieu of making a video, which I still might do later, I will talk through these links in class today.

Firm Reputations and Product Quality

Klein and Leffler - The Role of Market Forces in Assuring Contractual Performance

Name Brands - Peanut Butter, Vintage Skippy Commercial
Bleach,  Is store brand bleach different from name brand?

Price premiums and repeat purchases - name brands have established reputations.

Deferred Compensation - Seniority Component to Wages

Why Is There Mandatory Retirement? Edward Lazear

A Redrawn Figure 1

A Model of Efficiency Wages as a Signal of Firm Value Arvan and Esfahani

Today's Quiz

They are selling academic brains in Heaven.  Historian brains are $10/ounce.  Physicist brains are $8/ounce.  Economist brains are $1,000/ounce.

Q:  $1,000/ounce!  Why so expensive?
A: It takes a lot of economists to get an ounce of brains.

(Supply side humor.)

Some Links for Class Session on November 19

The video posted for the class last Thursday got very few views.  So rather than make another one, with quality content, I'm going to content myself with annotating the links below.  On Thursday we're going to look at a model of deferred compensation as a way to provide incentive, an alternative to pay for performance.  For that model, I will make a video.

Assessing Classroom Quality - This piece is very recent. I'm on the listserv for the Tomorrow's Professor and the email came this morning. You might read through this piece to assess yourself as a learner.  It's good to see others talking about the broad strokes learning goals, so you don't think I'm coming out of left field.

The Executive Mind and Double-Loop Learning by Chris Argyris - If you are on the campus network you should have access to this piece.  We will discuss this piece some in class, as an extension of Bolman and Deal Chapter 8.  What's made more evident in this piece is that executives maintain implicit assumptions about how the world works and they themselves may not be aware of those assumptions.  But those assumptions come out in analyzing a situation.  Double-Loop Learning can then be though of as identifying those implicit assumptions and asking whether they are accurate or not.  If not, they really need to be changed.  That's not easy to do, but being aware of this is surely a first step in the process.

The Reflective Practitioner by Donald Schon -  This is a good read and worthwhile for you during the winter break.  I like the description of the book, where the emphasis is on intuition, not technique per se.  The question is, how does intuition develop and as a learner are you in tune with developing your own intuition.

MBTI Basics - While I've learned recently that Myers-Briggs personality typing is not completely up to snuff regarding current social science standards, I do think it useful in understanding that people truly are different (not better or worse, just different) in how they go about solving a practical problem. For example, some people like to make lists.  I'm somebody who does not like this.  Sometimes it is easier to get along with people who are the same type as you, but the group can benefit from having diverse types, to get different perspectives on a problem.  For the record I was tested back in 2003 and learned then that my type is INTP.  One of the issues with this typology is whether it is stable over time.  If I were tested now, would I turn out the same way?  The problem is compounded by the fact that knowing your type you can guess as to how your type would answer the questions, which might not be the same as how you'd answer the questions without applying this criterion.

The Second Moodle Quiz Starts Tuesday

It will be based on the Excel homework since the first quiz.  I'm seeing that quite a few students haven't yet done the Principal-Agent Excel homework.  I encourage you to get that done before taking the quiz.

Today's Quiz

In France they make an omelette with only one egg.
Q: Do you know why?
A: Because in France one egg is un oeuf.

Considering the Principal-Agent Model

This is the video I promised in the previous post.   It is intended for you to watch after you have completed the Excel homework on the principal-agent model which, in turn, expected you to watch a different video, on the algebra of the model.  The only reason I'm posting it now is that some students have already completed that homework.  If there are questions about the homework after having done it, or questions about this video, that is a reason to come to class tomorrow, to pose those questions and hear the responses to them.

Note that the Powerpoint on which the video is based is unlike those I posted at the beginning of the semester.  There are no images, only text.  And there is no content in the Notes pane.  This enabled me to make the presentation quickly.

PowerPoint file

My Moral Compass and Some Observations about Our Class

Today in class in discussing ideas behind the blog posts on punishment and getting an under-performing employee back up to speed, we briefly discussed the notion of moral compass.  If a person is guided that way, what interventions might then make sense, as the person likely will punish himself for the poor performance.   I'm going to do a bit of that in this post.

First, you might listen to this video, a famous song by B.B. King.  It captures my current mood about teaching our class.

The explanation for why I feel this way is simple enough.  I don't see connections that students in the class should be making to what I'm trying to teach.  The metaphor is the lightbulb going off in your head.  Evidence of that happening might be found in your blog posts or in your comments in class.  But it largely doesn't seem to be happening, as far as I can tell.

I'm quite willing to accept the blame for this outcome.  A younger teacher, one more in tune with the issues that are important in your lives, almost certainly would cast the course quite differently - both subject matter and method of instruction.   That said, I would be interested to know whether you are connecting well with the material in some of your other courses.  I'd appreciate a comment on this post or in an email if that's the case for you.

Also, in some ways I'm a pretty stubborn person.  The previous offering of the course, in 2017, did have some incentive built in for students to attend class which was there for about 3/5ths of the course.  After the incentive was taken away, attendance dropped off precipitously.  So, in some sense that many students in the class have made it essentially a distance learning course is not a surprise.  My stubbornness fits in here in that I really did want you to grasp the importance of working in a collegial environment - what we have been referring to as gift exchange - and learn this not just cognitively but experientially as well.   And in my view of how you should learn, your experiences precede my interventions, which are mainly about your reflections on those experiences. For our class the biggest gift you could offer would be to attend regularly and then participate in class discussion.  Wanting that as a goal, I focused only on it, and not at all on how to get from here to there.  If I got you to attend class by requiring it and taking attendance, it no longer would be a gift.  It would just be another hoop you'd have to jump through. So I simply hoped the lesson could be learned without providing the incentive.  It's quite apparent now that was wishful thinking.

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This mea culpa leads to an obvious question - how should the course play out for the remainder of the semester.  Let me note that the Syllabus is a kind of contract.  Also, I signed an Offer Letter about teaching the class that the Econ Department sent me.  That is also a contract.  I will honor these contracts as best as I can, but I do want to make some changes that seem fitting under the circumstances.

1.  Since so many students are missing class discussion and thus not connecting the homework to the subject matter in a way I'd hope to see, I will instead make a video before each class, I hope no more than 15 minutes, maybe less, which will present the ideas as presentation, not as dialogue as I've been trying to do in class.  The video will be available to everyone, so in that sense the incentive to come to class will be even less.

2. I'm planning on Thursday to treat the live class session like office hours.  In office hours, the students drive.  If they have questions about the Excel homework, we'll review that.  If they have questions about the video, those can be addressed.  And if they have questions about anything else in the course, for example, the next Moodle quiz is next week, we'll talk about that.   We'll go as long as students have questions they want to have answered.

3.  I'm going to take a wait and see approach after that.  If the session seems effective, we might repeat the approach.  I would also be willing to entertain other suggestions of how to conduct class sessions, recognizing that we are now well into the semester.

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We talked in class today somewhat about emotions and people underperforming because they feel aggrieved in some way.  The last few weeks I've been alternating between being sad about our class and being angry about it.  I used to think that my unusual methods (at least for teaching economics) were sufficient to address the various issues you face as students.  Now it is clear that the methods are not enough, are possibly wrong headed, and further that I simply lack the energy I had a few years ago, where that might have been an important factor in pulling this off.   The truth is that now I want the semester to be over and to focus on other things.  Let's try to get there as best as we can.

Links and Ideas for Class Session on November 12.

Definition of punishment from Dictionary.com

Paper topic from Philosophy of Law class (fall 1975)  - Is punishment necessary for the Law?

In general students argued for mild punishment or no punishment and a discussion instead of a harsher discipline as an alternatives.  Let's reconsider this post as a test of this view.  Does a mild message really work?  What sort of batting average does it have?

Main reasons given for why somebody was disciplined given in the blog posts

1.  The job was boring or otherwise tiresome.  The person started to shirk as a consequence.

2.  The person was incompetent at the job, perhaps because of a lack of experience.  So the person made mistakes.

3.  The person had some character flaw and didn't seem to care about the work.

Many students were against singling out an employee in a group work setting.  Very few students talked about disciplining one employee as sending a message to everyone else.

Also, many students didn't distinguish an angry manager who was disciplining as an expression of that anger from a manager who had calmed down, thought it through, and was disciplining as part of the employee's education.  This begs the question, how does one manage one's own anger at work?

Progressive Discipline

Konrad Lorenz On Aggression

Nurse Ratched One of the main characters in One Flew Over A Cuckoo's Nest

Google's Ideological Echo Chamber James Damore - Are big tech companies hostile places for women to work?  Is the brogrammer culture actually productive or is it simply fraternity life on steroids?  (Damore was fired from Google for publishing this document.  He is suing them for wrongful termination.)

The Fear of Emasculation - One of my blogs posts that analyzes some of Damore's argument, and gives it a larger context.  Tying this back to the topic of student blog posts - the issue is whether these fears have productivity consequences by making the work environment uncomfortable for co-workers.

Grades Uploaded Into Moodle Nov. 12, 2019

The upload includes two Excel homeworks, insurance under adverse selection and bargaining, the last two blog posts, and the concept quiz on procurement.

I am planning on having class tomorrow

If our class was scheduled for this afternoon, I would cancel it.  The snow seems to be sticking now, but with water underneath that is probably partly ice.  This is just the type of weather I'd like to avoid.

The forecast for tomorrow is for much colder temperatures.  It won't be fun, to be sure, but it shouldn't be slippery.  So we're on as usual. 

I hope you stay warm and bundled up in the meantime.

I made a mistake in the class calendar

This Tuesday we will talk about the issue of a worker who is not performing up to standard and what might be done about it.  We will take varying approaches - philosophical, learning, and the experiences that students posted about.  We will also talk about progressive discipline - the recommended practice.  A few people hinted at this, but nobody really worked it through.

A week from this Tuesday we will talk about conflict in the workplace and about leadership.  I mistakenly had that for this Tuesday.  My bad.  Some people did the concept quiz early, as a result.  I hope that is not a big deal.

Excel Homework Due Nov. 13 at 11 PM

Please watch this video first. It gives the algebra of the principal-agent model and will make you comfortable with the notation and the basic ideas.  The PowerPoint on which the video is based can be downloaded from the description of the video.

Then do the Excel homework, which does the same analysis but this time with a graphical approach.

Some Links for Class Session on Nov. 7

The elements of monopoly pricing under linear demand and constant marginal cost.

The Bargaining Problem John Nash

The Diffeq From Hell

Some Possible Lessons for Us from Movies and TV

Recently I've been watching a series on Netflix called The Kominsky Method.  The lead character, played by Michael Douglas, is a former well-known movie actor, who now runs his own school for fledgling actors to teach them their craft.  He's also quite an old man.  And his agent, played by Alan Arkin, is even older.  The show is a comedy, which a mixture of old-man humor and the humor in teaching students when there is such a large age difference between them and the teacher, also humor about acting in particular and the need to be original rather than simply to a remake of what somebody else had already done. I found all of this interesting and somewhat related to our class.  It occurred to me that we should turn our class into a comedy or make a comedy about our class?  If anyone has ideas on this score you can write them in a blog post rather than write to the current prompt.  If you do this, have fun with it.  I think we all need some levity now.

The other item is an opinion piece by Martin Scorsese in today's New York Times.  Scorsese is a very well known director.  Recently, he had given an interview where he commented, "Marvel movies are not cinema." That caused quite a stir.  The opinion piece explains and defends that comment. While Scorsese is 12 years my senior, we both grew up in Queens, New York, and quite likely have similar sensibilities on a variety of matters as a consequence.  If you read this piece, you might find it remarkably similar to what I argued in class on October 29, that blockbusters have crowded out the more interesting movies.  I will say there is one part of Scorsese's argument that I don't buy into.  He says that movie makers want to have audiences watch their movies on the big screen in theaters.  If I were half my age, I might agree with that.  For me, however, I want to be physically comfortable when I'm watching something that might interest me.  That often doesn't happen when I'm at a theater.  I'd rather be sitting in my own furniture and on my own screen, so I can be comfortable.  And dare I say this, it matters to me that I can pause the movie when I need to, for whatever reason.  That caveat notwithstanding, the rest of what he wrote gave me a sense of deja vu.  If you read his piece and you were in class on October 29, I wonder if you experience a similar sensation.

Some Links for Class Session on Nov. 5

Review of Second Worksheet on the Adverse Selection Excel Homework

Does Studying Economics Make You Selfish?  (NPR Morning Edition)

Does Studying Economics Inhibit Cooperation (article by Robert Frank, et. al.)

Evidence of a Toxic Environment for Women in Economics (NY Times piece)

Is Giving the Secret to Getting Ahead? (NY Times Magazine piece by Adam Grant, a psychologist)

What Straight-A Students Get Wrong (Another piece by Adam Grant)

A schlub in a business school  (A blog post I wrote back in 2008, when I was an Associate Dean in the College of Business and in the then new Business 101 class they were trying to teach professional responsibility.)

The Fear of Emasculation . (A more recent blog post written in the wake of the James Damore memo at Google and the protests in Charlottesville.)

For Submitting The Key in the Bargaining Homework

If you've already done the assignment but it sent you to a form for 2017, that was the old link, which I failed to update.  This is where you should submit the homework.
https://forms.gle/VXtUikFkcvJ1TnQ46

I will update the Excel Homework now so students who have yet to download it will get the correct link.

Sorry for my absentmindedness.  It's what happens as you get old when there are too many different points of stress.