Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Feminism

Our Monday Gender Issue: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Nigerian writer, former MacArthur genius, National Book Critics Circle Award winner, author of the book, Half of a Yellow Sun on which a new movie is based, and the person who has given so many…

A Gender Gap in Looks

Our Monday Gender Issue: Good looking men get more start-up dollars than less attractive men. However, all men get more money than women. They receive 93% of all venture capital funding: Hoping to discover why, researchers from Harvard, Wharton and MIT…

Tall and Short Populations

Princeton economist Angus Deaton estimates that it will take 500 years for Indian women to reach the height of English women. In The Great Escape, Dr. Deaton explains that a population could be short because of nutrition or disease. When babies…

The Plight of the Night Owl

I must start with my bias. I am a night owl. So too were Winston Churchill and Charles Darwin, James Joyce and Glenn Gould. In one interview, Ann Beattie said, “I really think people’s bodies are on different clocks. I…

A Big Problem for Libraries

Several weeks ago, I had the huge pleasure of attending the final hour of the marathon reading of Moby Dick at the Nantucket Public Library. The stacks that surrounded me were filled with books and almost everyone had a copy…

Problems With Grade Deflation

The number of hours we study is down and our grades are up. Between 1961 and 2003, full time college students diminished their study time from 40 to 27 hours a week. And yet, they have been getting higher grades.…

The Reason That Certain Quarterbacks Earn More

A 3.2 difference in a facial symmetry score can mean an extra $378,000 in  pay for a quarterback. According to research from economist David Berri on salaries from 1995-2009, if a quarterback is better looking, his salary will exceed others…

The Revolution That Grandma Started

The NYC Miss Subways competition was about a lot more than pretty “girls” (as they were called). To become Miss Subways for a month, applicants had to submit a picture to the John Robert Powers Agency. From perhaps 1000 applicants,…

Which College Grads Have Unemployment Problems?

With a 6.7% unemployment rate and 74,000 jobs created for December, are you okay if you have a bachelor’s degree? I discovered some answers in a new paper from the NY Fed. Unemployment and underemployment for recent college graduates have been…

Do You Live in a Popular State?

Listening to Bloomberg news the other morning, I heard that Atlas Van Lines just came out with their annual migration study. The radio report said New Jersey had the most departures while Oregon had the arrivals. (No, people from NJ…