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What gift would you give an economist? It’s the time of year when I discuss a few ideas.

This is not easy to answer because economists are highly individualist. But there are a few guidelines I go by. All else equal, I feel economists prefer three things. First, they prefer practical gifts over stylish but empty. Second, economists can always enjoy a popular and expensive item, if only for the purpose of being able to resell it for a profit. And finally, economists prefer gifts praising the subject of economics and how it is the best way to explore everything from markets to dating behavior.

This is the second gift giving list on this topic. Last year’s gift guide was immensely popular and it garnered several hundreds of comments over at the Freakonomics blog. I have read through every comment and I have tried my best to top that list.

Last year’s guide
I should mention the 2008 gift list still offers many great and timeless gifts. In fact many of the items have dropped in price and are now even better values. A few worth mentioning are:

Arrested Development
Right now all three seasons are a mere $45 (might even drop)! I bought this series a few years ago, and it has been one of my favorite purchases. As a bonus I occasionally watch the show while running treadmill. Two episodes are a nice 40 minute run.

The Economist Magazine
This is still one of the best economic publications, and I might say even one of the best publications–without qualification to subject. Yes, it is an expensive magazine, topping over $100 per year. You can get it at the Economist website, or for one penny more get it via Amazon.com (in case you need to use up a gift certificate)

Freakonomics paperback
It’s selling for under $10! Finally, the paperback version of this best-selling, greatly written book is available. I still revisit reading Freakonomics as a good writing model and to get inspiration on the wide range of economics. I’m also excited about the follow-up SuperFreakonomics (my copy is on the way).

Amazon.com gift cards
Perhaps the closest thing to cash. And Amazon knows how to do gift cards. You can print it from home. You can send it via mail, with a free greeting card. Or you can email it instantly for fast delivery.

Gifts for 2009

Economic T-shirts
There are some really funny t-shirts relating to economics. On Zazzle’s economics collection, you can find a T-shirt that bears the highly suggestive sentence: “Economists do it with models”, complemented with a graph of market equilibrium.

Or you might consider the collection at CafePress that offers items like a mug bearing the classic equation “MC = MR” relating marginal costs and marginal revenue in equilibrium.

GPS units
This is about as good a time to get a GPS unit. Prices have dropped and there are many reliable units. My personal picks are the Garmin nüvi 260W (no traffic) and the Garmin nüvi 765/765T (this has free traffic for the life of the device!)

HD Projectors
Home entertainment is a great way to have fun without going anywhere. While LCD TVs are still the most popular option, there is a nice trend towards home theater and projectors. There are decent ones for less than $1,000, some even less than $700. If you have the room and budget, I say by all means go for the projector. For me, there is nothing quite like watching a movie on a big screen, from a leather couch, while sipping a nice glass of wine. Now that is true luxury.

Nintendo Wii
I can’t believe it. The Wii which used to sell for upwards of $400 on resale is now a mere $199, thanks to price competition and reasonable supply. Any economist would love this gift.

And forget those bundles peddled on home shopping channels, full of crap you’ll never use. The most important accessories are Wii Remote Controller and a few choice games, For my money’s worth, New Super Mario Brothers cannot be beat. Also worth checking out is Metroid Prime.

Sony PlayStation 3
While I am usually a Nintendo fan, I am ready to admit the awesomeness of the PS3. In addition to its game play, its capability as a good blu-ray player makes it a great deal.

Electronic Catch Phrase
This is among my favorite board games, though technically there isn’t a board. If you haven’t played it, catch phrase is a mix of Taboo and hot potato, and a lively party game. For some reason I have not seen it in any of the bookstores holiday board game selections. The best places to get it are Target and Amazon.

Can Opener
This is a suggestion from the last year’s gift guide. Can openers are tremendously useful and you only need to be without one to see their value. As a matter of trivia [via The Evolution of Useful Things], cans were invented as a great preserving process for about a hundred years before the first can openers. And even then, those can openers were more those abysmal openers you’d find on a Swiss army knife. I think about the Civil War when soldiers would bust cans open with bayonets or guns. So do yourself or someone else a favor and make sure they have a good can opener.

Electricity Usage Monitor
A gift for the truly numerical, investigative, and perhaps obsessive. Find out how much power your devices are using so you can save on electricity and make better purchases. It’s an inexpensive item too, at around $20.

A meal
There might not be a such thing as a free lunch, but there surely are many discounted meals to be had. One of the deals I enjoy is getting a gift certificate from the website restaurant.com which offers a collection of discounted gift certificates. Many restaurants, even pretty good ones, offer $25 gift certificates for $10. There are usually a few catches, like dine-in only, but they are not too restrictive. Many of the good deals sell out at the beginning of the month, so be on the lookout.

Kindle
This is kind of a toss-up. I love the idea of an e-reader. My library is already overflowing and I have a hard time finding things when I want to. Plus, the e-versions often sell at a nice discount compared to the print copies. And there is no issue of shipping. I am still waiting a bit to see how the e-reader market fleshes out, but otherwise I could buy the Kindle right away.

Zune HD
This is also somewhat of a toss-up. Microsoft has come a long way from the original ugly brown Zune models. I got a chance to play around with this thing. And the ZuneHD is fantastic. The screen is amazing. The touch screen is very responsive. And pictures look great. I liked this a lot better than any iPod I have played with, particularly because of the HD output. The Zune is available in both 16GB and 32GB.

What are your gift ideas?
I’ve listed all the items that have come to my mind. Now I want you to chime in. What would you give an economist? Feel free to promote your own project/site in the comments.

http://xkcd.com/673/

но я сейчас разговариваю с третьим человеком из Verizon, и прихожу к выводу, что no-hire ограничением в нем является наличие IQ в районе 60 и выше.

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I get a kick out of the edgy comedy on The Colbert Report. It’s amazing how Stephen Colbert makes a mockery of opposing ideas through caricature and showmanship.

Last week Colbert was playfully discussing nuclear arms. He was interviewing Joseph Cirincione, a representative of a nuclear disarmament lobby, the Ploughshares Fund. Colbert played devil’s advocate and supported the idea of mutually assured destruction.

The clip is embedded on this site, or you can see it at Colbertnation.com.

The clip gets interesting at about the 2:25 mark, and continue reading for my comments on the clip:

Trouble viewing clip? Try visiting Better know a lobby – Plougshares Fund at Colbertnation.com

Relevant clip section

[around 2:25, my transcription]

Colbert: How many times can we destroy the world over right now?

Cirincione: We have 23,000 nuclear weapons. It takes about 100 weapons to blow up the world, so several thousand times.

Colbert: Okay, let’s get it down to only being able to do it world once. Anything after that, you’re just being greedy.

Cirincione: I will take that deal.

Colbert: Good, at least we agree on one thing. To destroy the world once.

Cirincione: We don’t even need that. Why, obviously. Why would you want to have an arsenal that could destroy the planet?

Colbert: In case someone else wants to do it first. Maybe someone else we don’t know has developed a bomb to destroy the world. And we say don’t do that or else we will do it. See?

Cirincione: That is the logic of the Cold War. And it was an insane logic.

Colbert: It’s not insane logic. Let’s say you want to kill me. You have a gun. I have a gun. Now, I can point my gun at you. That’s mutually assured destruction.

Cirincione: That is correct.

Colbert: Now you point a gun at me, I point my gun at my own head. I take away your motivation to kill me.

Cirincione: The current course we are on is analogous to that.

Colbert: I don’t know what analogous means. But you’re saying I’m right?

A few of my comments

There are several interesting points raised in the comedic discussion. How is it possible that we have 23,000 nuclear weapons? What could be the logic of the escalation?

Some have suggested the logic can be understood by the analogous dollar auction game. In this game, to recap, a dollar is auctioned off to a group of people. The game proceeds by steadily increasing bids, first a few cents, and so on. The dollar is awarded to the highest bidder for the prevailing bid. The twist is that the second-place bidder must also pay, but gets nothing in return. This small rule change turns a simple, sensible game into an absolutely insane one. What happens is that at each step the losing bidder finds it rational to bid higher, and so the auction continues mercilessly to higher amounts. Professors commonly do this experiment in class to raise $5 to $10. The game only ends when someone has the decency to stop the pissing contest.

And perhaps so it is with nuclear escalation. At each step, there is a “sensible” reaction to enemy escalation which results in further escalation. Incidentally, this was discussed in William Poundstone’s book “The Prisoner’s Dilemma,” an excerpt can be read here.

Colbert also discusses the strategy of mutually assured destruction. I have discussed this concept thoroughly before, likening the situation to a gossip war. What I will say here is that peace can be shown to be an equilibrium outcome. The other outcome is world annihilation. But there is a reason peace is preferred over war, and this is often referenced in analyzing the actions of Kennedy in the Cuban missile crisis. I’ll end by on the note that if you would like to read about the game theory in detail, check out my post on mutually assured destruction.