Cornell economist Robert Frank's short and brilliant Falling Behind is the most illuminating and important book I've yet read on inequality. It's altered how I view the economy in almost all particulars, and I highly, highly recommend that you all pick it up. Over in The New York Times, Daniel Gross has a very clear and concise explanation of its arguments and implications. Well worth a read.
Gross also evaluates Frank's The Economic Naturalist, which compiles homework assignments from his students examining everyday occurrences through an economic lens. That was a somewhat less useful book, and seemed more an example of cute-o-nomics paired with a really smart business plan (his students, after all, wrote most of it). But since you all know how I love examples of collective action problems, here are two from that book:
“If women could decide collectively what kind of shoes to wear, all might agree to forgo high heels,” he writes. “But because any individual can gain advantage by wearing them, such an agreement might be hard to maintain.” And why do Frank's humanities colleagues across Cornell's idyllic quad, who are supposed to be good at writing, use so much jargon? It's an arms race of erudition.
