We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 August 2023
Behavioural economics is almost certainly the most fun and influential field in economics today, setting out to explore human behaviour in all its scope and strangeness. Be it the cooperative behaviour amongst the Indonesian whale-hunters of Lamalera village or the reluctance of university students to avoid painful electrocution when presented with costless alternatives, behavioural economists seek to understand the forces that govern the decisions we make. In this field lie the keys to making this world a better and more compassionate place.
The 2008 financial crash
On 15 September 2008, the fourth largest investment bank in the United States filed for the largest bankruptcy in history. For many commentators, this marked the point at which the most severe financial crash the world had experienced since 1929 became unavoidable. In the years immediately following the collapse of Lehman Brothers, some 30 million people worldwide lost their jobs due to the crash, many being consigned to long-term joblessness; poverty and inequality rates in developed countries rose to levels unprecedented in recent history, with poverty rates rising above 15 per cent in both the United States and Europe; and rates of mental illness, suicide and abuse all increased markedly. The countries hardest hit lost a decade of economic growth, but the true human costs of the crash – the devastation experienced by countless individuals and families – will never be fully understood (Okter-Robe & Podpiera 2013).
The terrible economic events of 2008–13 have led to something of a revolution within the economics discipline, for many validating the dissatisfaction amongst economics students that had been growing throughout the preceding decade. Back in June 2000, a group of university students in Paris circulated a petition calling for an increase in the realism of their economics curriculum, which they believed was too narrow, abstract and detached from the real world. The following year, 27 PhD candidates at the University of Cambridge launched their own similar petition and other students gathered at Kansas City issued a letter calling on economics departments around the world to reform their courses. In March 2003, students at Harvard University joined the fray.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.
