Rational Minds Part 1: A Nation Of Gamblers – Ed Glaeser

Ed Glaeser is the Fred and Eleanor Glimp Professor of Economics at Harvard University.

Show notes

Selected links

• Follow Ed: Website
• ‘A Nation Of Gamblers: Real Estate Speculation And American History’, 2013 Ely Lecture by Ed Glaeser
• One Hundred Years Of Land Values In Chicago, by Homer Hoyt
• The Land Boomers, by Michael Cannon
• ’25 years of housing trends’ report by Aussie Home Loans

Topics discussed

• A potted history of real estate speculation in the United States. 8:51
• How would Ed describe the Great Convulsion of the 2000s to an alien observer? 13:40
• Why is real estate well-suited to being a speculative asset? 16:04
• If speculators aren’t crazy, what are they? 17:00
• Was the Great Convulsion primarily driven by credit availability? 20:44
• What would a good Bayesian have thought in response to the 2000s housing market in the US? 22:23
• Radical uncertainty and its implications for rationality in the context of housing markets. 24:06
• Are extrapolative beliefs rational? 26:22
• Are housing bubbles irrational? 29:51