economic policy. See policy
economics profession: behind other disciplines in attention to narratives, 12–13, 13f; events as natural experiments in, 72–73; potential of collaborative research for, 17, 302n1
economic stimulus: Keynes and Samuelson on effects of, 27–28; in Republican policy of 1920s, 189; stimulate the economy as phrase in late twentieth century, 50–51
economic strength, perception of, 272
education, narrative-centered learning in, 77–78
efficiency experts, 184
Eichengreen, Barry, 133, 172
Einstein, Albert, 192, 199
Eisenhower, Dwight, 261
electric dollars, 193
electronic brain, 195
Elliott, Catherine S., 281
elliptic curve digital signature algorithm, 5, 9
emotions: affect heuristic and, 67, 233; Bitcoin epidemic and, 5–6; in construction of narratives, 65; of financial panics, 115; flashbulb memory and, 80–81, 307n13; of gold standard debate, 160, 172; Harding’s references to normalcy and, 244; historians’ explanatory use of, 14; in housing boom of 1997–2006, 217; perceptions of people’s reactions to story and, 64; profiteer narratives and, 247, 249; in quantitative study of narratives, 287; in response to narratives, xi, 35, 54; revealed in stories, 79; risk assessment and, 67; studied in economics without being partisan, 279; underconsumption narrative during Depression and, 188. See also anger about inflation; anger at businesspeople; anger at oil crisis of 1970s; fear
The Engineers and the Price System (Veblen), 193
entrepreneurship: cryptocurrencies and, 4, 92; labor-saving machinery narrative and, 209; Reagan policies and, 52
The Epic of America (Adams), 151
epidemic curve, 18–24, 19f, 22f, 289–93, 291f
epidemics of diseases: AIDS, 24; co-epidemics with narratives, 23; recurrence and mutation of, 108; repeats of variants of, 271; size of, 292–93. See also Ebola epidemics; influenza; Kermack-McKendrick SIR model
epidemics of economic narratives: on automation, 199–200; on bimetallism, 22–23, 22f; on Bitcoin, 22–23, 22f; co-epidemics of diseases with narratives, 23; co-epidemics of narratives, 294–95, 322n9; on cost-push inflation, 258, 259f; on electronic brain, 195; forecasting and, xi, 295, 322n9; of “going viral” and “trending now,” x; on housing market, 227; on leading indicators, 125; medical model and, 21–23, 22f, 292; not heard by everyone in the population, 292; on profiteer, 241–42, 243f; random events affecting, 75; repeats of, with unpredictable timing, 271; self-fulfilling prophecies and, 74; sizes and time frames of, 88–89, 292–93; on technological unemployment, 183–85, 294, 295; with varying contagion rates and recovery rates, 295; volatility and, 5; on wage-price spiral, 258, 259f. See also compartmental models of epidemics; Kermack-McKendrick SIR model; viral narratives
epidemics of narratives: random events affecting, 40, 99–100; recognized since ancient times, 58–60. See also epidemics of economic narratives; viral narratives
epidemiology, insights from, xviii, 14, 17, 23–24, 277, 289
Escalas, Jennifer Edson, 77
“Every day in every way I get better and better,” 121
The Evolution of Beauty (Prum), 65
excess profits, 242
excess profits tax, of US during World War I, 249, 265
exogenous shocks to economy, 73, 75–76
expectations, and representativeness heuristic, 66–67
extraordinary popular delusions, 59, 119
Facebook, meme quickly going viral on, 88
fact-checking websites, 85, 96
fair wage-effort hypothesis, 250
fair wage narratives, 249–50
fake news, 84–85, 273
fake wrestling matches, 84–85
Falk, Emily B., 54
false narratives, 95–97
family circle, literature read aloud in, 274
Famous First Bubbles (Garber), 5
famous people: patterns of mentions in books, 24. See also celebrities
Farmer, Roger E. A., 74
farmers: impact of gold standard on, 157–58, 161, 163; labor-saving machinery and, 176–77, 183, 185, 187, 209
farmland: earlier real estate talk centered on, 212; as speculative investment, 213, 214
Farnam, Henry W., 72–73
fear: of automation, 196; brain structures involved in, 56–58; changing economic behavior years after relevant narrative, 109; extended to unrelated events, 67; false narratives and, 95; in financial crises, 55–58; during Great Depression, 109, 127–28, 141; of human irrelevance, 208; identified as cause of Great Depression, 132; of machines replacing jobs, 175; “of fear itself,” 128; Roosevelt’s exhortations about, 128, 129; suicides after crash of 1929 and, 233; technocracy movement leading to, 194. See also panic
Federal Reserve: cause of Great Depression and, 132–33; Consumer Expenditure Survey of, 282; control of inflation and, 262; creation of, 111, 117; J. P. Morgan and, 111, 117–18; warning about speculation in 1929, 126
Federal Reserve Act of 1913, 117
feedback loops: 1930s-style models of, 287; between postponing consumption and job loss, 144–45; of prices in speculative bubbles, 216–17
Feelings in History (MacMullen), 14
Ferguson, Hill, 219
Festinger, Leon, 218
fiat money, 156
fiction, xii, 16. See also novels
films: less luxurious during the Depression, 142; predicting the success of, 41–42
finance, lagging in attention to narratives, 13f
financial advisers, automated, 275
financial crises, 55–56, 86. See also bank runs; world financial crisis of 2007–9
financial panic narrative, 114, 115, 116f; crowd psychology and, 119–20, 120f; frequency of appearance of five major occurrences, 118f; J. P. Morgan and, 117–18; nineteenth-century worldviews and, 116–17; rekindled in 2007 in United Kingdom, 119. See also panic
“fire in a crowded theater” narrative, 127, 129
fiscal policy, motivations of, 281
Fisher, Irving, 75–76, 128, 247, 266
Fisher, R. A., 65
Fisherian runaway, 65
flashbulb memory, 80–83, 307n13; of stock market crash of 1929, 233; of stock market crash of 1987, 233
flipping, 223–24
Florida land boom of 1920s, 214, 215, 220–21
flu epidemics. See influenza
fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging): of brain activation by analogy and metaphor, 17; of sharing content in form of stories, 54
focused interviews, as research tools, 281
focus groups, 282–84
folklore studies, 15, 16
forecasting. See economic forecasting
forgetting, in epidemic model, x, 25, 296. See also memory
forgetting rates: differences in, 89; effect of slight changes in, 40; lowered by identified personality, 100; lowered by symbols or rituals, 62; lowered by visual detail, 45, 46. See also recovery rates
The Forgotten Depression (Grant), 242, 251
formula stories, 16
Forster, E. M., 181
founding-father story, 15
The Fountainhead (Rand), 50
framing, 66
free markets: forgotten nineteenth-century advocate of, 110; George’s Progress and Poverty on, 111; inflation and, 263; twentieth-century narratives about, xii, 50–51
Free Men and Free Markets (Theobald), 210
Free Silver movement. See Silverites
Friedman, Irving S., 262, 263
Friedman, Milton, 73, 132–33, 307n3
“From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs,” 102
frugality narratives: American Dream narrative in contradiction to, 155; in Great Depression, 136–37, 142–43, 252; in Japan after 1990, 150
Galbraith, John Kenneth, 233
Gallup, George, 118–19
Gallup Data Collection, 284
gambling culture, and booming stock market, 29
Garber, Peter, 5
Garrett, Geoffrey, 299
GDP data, limited value of, 74–75
GDP growth in US: not successfully forecast, xiv, 301n5. See also economic growth
The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money (Keynes), 27
geographic pattern of spread, of economic narratives, 296, 299
George, Henry, 111, 178–79, 188, 209, 310n1
Germany: hyperinflation after World War I, 247, 266; reparations from World War I and, xvii–xviii
Glass, Carter, 191
Gödel, Escher, Bach (Hofstadter), 47
Goetzmann, William, 67
“going viral”: appearing in newspapers around 2009, x; mathematical model of epidemic and, 293. See also viral narratives
gold: fears and rumors about, at start of World War I, 94; mystique about, 157; public perception of value in, 5; seen as safest investment, xii; spiritual significance of, 165; still held by central banks, 156–57
gold bugs, 163–64
Goldman, William, 41
gold standard: adoption in US, 166; defined, 156; eighteenth-century origins of, 166; end of, 156, 172–73; impact on farmers, 157–58, 161, 163; length of Great Depression and, 132; meaning “the best,” 158. See also bimetallism
Gold Standard Act of 1900, 157, 312n10
gold standard narrative: morality and rectitude represented in, 172; somewhat active today, 156; symbolism in congressional debate and, 165–66; two separate epidemics of, 158–59, 159f, 166; Wizard of Oz and, 171–72, 313n29
Google Ngrams, x, xiii; imperfect for narrative research, 280–81
Google’s “OK Google,” 207
Grais, R. F., 294
grand narrative, 92
Grant, James, 242, 251
Grant, Ulysses S., 157
The Grapes of Wrath (Steinbeck), 131
The Great Crash, 1929 (Galbraith), 233
Great Depression of 1930s, 111–12; angry narratives in, 239; bimetallism epidemic during, 23; blamed on loss of confidence, 130; blamed on “reckless talk” by opinion leaders, 127; confidence narratives in, 114, 122; consumption demand reduced after, 307n3; crowd psychology and suggestibility in understanding of, 120; deportation of Mexican Americans during, 190; depression of 1920–21 and, 243, 251–53; difficulty of cutting wages during, 251–52; Dust Bowl and, 130–31; fair wage narrative during, 250; family morale during, 138–39; fear during, 109, 127–28, 141; flu epidemic of 1918 mirroring trajectory of, 108; frequency of appearance of the term, 133, 134f; frugality and compassion in, 135, 136–37, 140–43, 252; gold standard narrative during, 158–59; labor-saving machinery and, 174; lists of causes created at the time, 129–30; modern theories about causes of, 132–33; modesty narrative during, 135, 136–37, 139, 142–45, 147–48, 150; narratives after 2007–9 crisis and, 95; narratives focused on scarcity during, 129; narratives illuminating causes of, ix–x; not called “Great Depression” at the time, 133–34; not forecast by economists, xiv; ordinary people’s talking about, 90–91; photos providing memory of, 131; prolonged by avoidance of consumption, 139, 142, 144–46; as record-holder of economic downturns, 112; revulsion against excesses of 1920s during, 235–36; robot tax discussed during, 209; seen as stampede or panic, 128; technocracy movement and, 193–94; technological unemployment narrative and, 183, 184; today’s downturns seen through narratives of, 134–35, 264; underconsumption narrative during, 188–90; women’s writing about concerns during, 137–40, 145–46
The Great Illusion (Angell), 95
Great Recession of 1973–75, 112
Great Recession of 1980–82, 112
Great Recession of 2007–9, 112; bank failures as key narratives in, 132; fear about intelligent machines and, 273; fueled by real estate narratives, 212; predicted by few economists, xiv; rapid drop in confidence during, 272
Great Society, 50
Greenspan, Alan, 227
Gresham’s Law, and bimetallism, 169, 313n27
hacker ethic, 7
The Hacker Ethic and the Spirit of the Information Age (Himanen), 7
Hackett, Catherine, 140, 253–54
Halley, Edmund, 124
“Happy Birthday to You” (song), 97–100
Harari, Yuval Noah, 208
Harding, Warren, 244–45
“hard times,” 134
Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression (Terkel), 234
Harris, Sidney J., 263
Harvey, William Hope, 161, 162, 312n10
Hazlitt, Henry, 247
“Heads I win, tails you lose,” 110
health interventions, narrative presentation of, 78
Heathcote, Jonathan, 214
Heffetz, Ori, 144
Hepburn, Katharine, 201
Hero of Alexandria, 175
Hicks, John, 24, 26
Hill, Napoleon, 121–22
Himanen, Pekka, 7
historical databases, 279; of letters and diaries, 285
historical scholarship: compared with historical novel, 79; economics learning from, 78; use of narrative by, 14, 37
Hitler, Adolf, 122, 142, 195
HIV (human immune deficiency virus), 24; coinfective with tuberculosis, 294–95
Hoar, George Frisbie, 178
Hoffa, Jimmy, 260
Hofstadter, Douglas R., 47
Hofstadter, Richard, 36
Hollande, François, 151
Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Jr., 127
Holtby, Winifred, 140
homeownership: advantages over renting, 223, 317n18; advertising promotions for, 219–20; American Dream narrative and, 154–55; condominium conversion boom and, 223–24; seen as investment by many buyers, 226–27
home price indexes, 97, 215–16, 222
home price narratives, 215–17; declining by 2012, 227; fueling a speculative boom, 217–18, 222, 223–24
home prices: available on the Internet, 218; construction costs and, 215, 317n6; falling dramatically with financial crisis of 2007–9, 223; only going up, xii; price of land and, 215; ProQuest references to, 213–14, 216; rising again from 2012 to 2018, 223, 225; social comparison and, 218, 220; supply of housing and, 222; supply of land and, 221–22; surge leading up to financial crisis of 2007–9, 222–23. See also housing booms
Homer, 174, 314n1
honesty: economic narratives about, 101; phishing equilibrium and, 61
Hoover, Herbert, 90, 91, 138, 188–89, 191, 253
Hooverville, 131
hormonal response to narratives, 54–55
House Lust (McGinn), 217–18
housing booms: from 2012 to 2018 and continuing, 223; conspicuous consumption and, 225; feedback loop of prices in, 216–17; fueled by home price narratives, 217–18, 222, 223–24; as investment in land rather than structure, 221, 223; peak in 2005 predicted by few economists, xiv; record-setting boom of 1997–2006, 217; world financial crisis of 2007–9 and, 154, 155, 217, 222–23, 226, 227. See also home prices; real estate boom in 2000s
“housing bubble”: Internet searches for, 226, 226f; looking beyond headlines and statistics, 238; stories found by ProQuest in 2005, 227. See also housing booms
housing market: narratives about, before 2007–9 financial crisis, 227; speculative bubbles in, 216–17; surveys of US homebuyers in, 285–86; today’s status of, 226–27
Howard, Milford, Wriarson, 166
Hull, Clark, 195
human interest of economic narratives: added by celebrities, xii, 100–102, 153; impact on events and, 77; many dimensions of, 79–80
human interest of stories, 32
human tragedy narratives in Great Depression, 137, 141
Hume, David, 58, 71
hyperinflation in Germany after World War I, 247, 266
hypnosis narrative, 122
ICOs (initial coin offerings), 76
identity economics, xxi
“I Have a Dream” speech (King), 153–54
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sp; Iliad (Homer), 174, 314n1
immunity to disease, 20, 289
Index of Consumer Sentiment, 119
Industrial Revolution: labor-saving machinery narrative and, 9; narratives about confidence and, 114; real estate narratives and, 212; as term introduced in nineteenth century, 175
inequality: artificial intelligence narrative and, 273; Bitcoin and fear of, 8–9; burgeoning public attention to, 210–11; decline in modesty narrative and, 150; George’s Progress and Poverty on, 111, 178–79; labor-saving machinery and, 178–79, 180; opposition to gold standard and, 166; origins of the boycott and, 240
infectives in an epidemic, 23, 289; declining contagion rate and, 296
inflation: anger about, 239, 245, 247, 263–64, 265–66; central bank role in control of, 261, 262; cost-push inflation, 258–59, 259f, 260; demand-pull inflation, 258; economic growth and, 319n10; economists’ views of, in 1997 study, 263, 264; highest in US from 1973 to 1981, 262; hyperinflation in Germany after World War I, 247, 266; as negative terminology, 172–73; public views of, in 1997 study, 263–64; runaway US inflation of 1970s, 256; sources of evil blamed for, 263, 266; stock market response to decline in, 29; unusually tame now, 266; wage-price spiral narrative and, 258–62; during wars, 265–66; after World War I, 243–49, 250; after World War II, 255–56
Inflation: A World-Wide Disaster (Friedman), 262
inflation targeting, 261, 262
influencer marketing, 274–75
influenza: new forms and new epidemics of, 271; pandemic of 1918, 108, 198, 252; SEIR model of epidemics of, 294
information cascades, 300
information technology: changing contagion rates and recovery rates, 273–75; communication of stories through, xviii; history of inventions in, 273; for research in narrative economics, 279. See also Internet; search engines
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