On Monday, I asked: What is almost always the top-selling item in any grocery store? The answer: bananas. Way to go, comment-poster tomsteuber! What’s really wild is that tomsteuber is also correct that bananas are the top-selling item at Wal-Mart (as measured by dollar sales). And Wal-Mart, as you may or may not realize, is [...]

One thing people tend to care about a lot when oil gets really expensive is what happens at the gas pump. Gas prices broadly follow the cost of crude, but there’s a lot more that goes into how much a fill-up sets you back. I called up Oil Price Information Service (OPIS), a group that [...]

Big news today in commodities: crude oil closed above $100 a barrel for the first time ever. In the days that follow, you’re going to be hearing a lot about what OPEC will do when it meets on March 5, and maybe some more about Venezuela’s president threatening to cut off exports to the U.S. [...]

It’s hard to swing a dead cat without hitting a behavioral economist these days. In case you’re one of those people who only reads this blog for the trivia, and you don’t normally follow economics, I’ll explain. Neo-classical economics (i.e., what you learned as a college freshman) assumes that individuals are rational and act in [...]

Technically I’m off for Presidents’ Day, which is why today’s post will be short and sans multimedia. You know, it’s a real mystery to me who gets off work for Presidents’ Day and who doesn’t. Maybe Lisa Cullen can sort that out. Anyway, I’m hereby declaring this Trivia Night. Here’s your question (maybe it’ll be [...]

There’s a new poll about the public’s views on the U.S. economy out from the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press. They ask a lot of questions about economic problems facing the nation and who’s at fault — it’s interesting, read it — but one of the more surprising results comes from [...]

Justin is having a hard time being away from his blog, but you, dear readers, are the beneficiaries. He just radioed this in: BREAKING NEWS! I just saw Stan O’Neal looking at the sale window at Frank Stella [Clothiers] on 58th before going into the New York Athletic Club next door!!!!! That Stan O’Neal? Yes, [...]

I was doing an interview for our annual What’s Next issue this morning when Fed Chair Ben Bernanke went to the Hill to talk about the economy. I’m just now catching up with what he had to say. Lots of good thinking on how crappiness in the credit markets and write-downs at big banks have [...]

Thanks, Justin! And what a warm welcome from That Anonymous Dude. I feel at home already. Though I do feel the need to point out that I know more about taxation in northern Europe than you have been led to believe. I once wrote an entire sentence on the topic. So, today I’d like to [...]