Highly Linkable

Thank God they don't make 'em like they used to.

Watch this and be sure to watch the last "magic" point about a 52-card deck which starts at the 14:06 mark.

Tucker Max offers great advice on why he stopped (and you should stop or not start) angel investing.

This is not a top ten ranking for a university to aspire to.

Steve Landsburg brings his always valuable counter-conventional perspective to Serial: Season One. It is as hard for me to argue with his logic as it is to accept his conclusion. I believe he is right, but I also believe he has introduced an implied simplifying assumption(s) that ignores principles of justice and that may reduce or even reverse his conclusion. I think these principles could impact the model in both a practical sense (given the iterative and complex/diverse nature of the world of crime and punishment, including these principles might get us to better outcomes) and an ethical sense (it seems problematic to have low thresholds for high severity crimes). I might also quibble with his standard of proof and his philosophical position that a juror should be trying to reach a state of belief rather than my philosophical position that a juror should be trying to validate that the prosecution "undoubtedly" proved its case.

Let's look in on how the nation's first experiment with a $15 minimum wage is going--"Look Away . . . I'm Hideous!" Wonder how the guy who wants to take this model nationwide would react? And keep in mind Seattle's cost of living index is about +20% above the national average. How would this minimum wage sell in Peoria, Illinois, to name just one low-cost-of-living place?

Finally and while we're mentioning The Bern, don't miss Reason's take on Charles Koch's friendly letter to Bernie.

Two Partial Lists of Investments

The following partial lists of investments have at least one key, distinct difference between them. Can you identify it?

List 1:

• Stocks (equity ownership - residual claims on assets)
• Bonds (credit lending - contractual claims on assets)
• Real Estate (equity ownership of real, surface property such as your personal home, a home or apartment you rent out, a business building, a REIT, etc.)
• Mineral Estate/Rights (equity ownership of real, under-the-surface property - the right to mine resources)

List 2:

• Currencies (US Dollars, Euros, Yen, etc.)
• Commodities (energy and agricultural such as oil and frozen concentrated orange juice)
• Precious Metals (gold, silver, etc.)
• Industrial Metals (copper, nickel, aluminium, etc.)

I will follow up with the answer in a few days.

Highly Linkable

Let's begin with a few on immigration (I've been saving these; hence, the late dates on some):

Alex Tabarrok made the case for completely open borders in The Atlantic.

Bryan Caplan continues to fight the good fight. Here are some points he didn't have an opportunity to make at a workshop but did get to share with us, fortunately. And don't miss his speech at the Open Borders Meetup. 

Found this advice on idling cars in the cold helpful and attractively counterintuitive.

Let me take a moment to sing the praises of Comedy Central's "Drunk History". If you haven't watched it yet, start now before finishing this sentence . . . too late. I can think of three ways it is awesome:

1. It is a better way to learn history than traditional approaches because you remember and enjoy it; therefore, you stick with it longer. In that sense learning is a lot like exercise--the best method is the one you will stick with and the one that will stick with you. 
2. It tells stories that our traditional, state-driven history instruction won't tell. 
3. While it is uproariously hilarious to listen to the various drunk narrators describing history, it is also a pretty insightful take on history in a meta sense. Namely, history is vague and uncertain. We should be careful not to be too confident that we've got it figured out precisely.

Tyler Cowen's interview with Chris Asness is extremely rewarding. A few of the money quotes:

"There’s no investment process so good that there’s not a fee high enough that can’t make it bad."

"High frequency trading [which he doesn't engage in] has made the world more just and fair, particularly for small investors."

"This is not Lake Wobegon. We can’t all beat the index. It’s actually a precise mathematical identity."

On superheros: "Even the most insane billionaire cannot afford a hundredth of what frigging Tony Stark or Bruce Wayne have. It’s infuriating. ... I’ve done well. I’m not the most insane out there. But if I wanted to go build a Batcave at my house, it would take approximately 600 times my wealth, and everyone would know about it."

Speaking of rewarding, George Will always delivers as he does here on Michael Bloomberg's potential entry into the presidential election.

And lastly, Scott Sumner on economists who lack an imagination. (I agree in all four cases, and there is no contradiction between that and my other strongly held views.)