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Samuel Bowles

Samuel Bowles is a researcher at the Santa Fe Institute and author of The New Economics of Inequality and Redistribution and the forthcoming Machiavellli’s Mistake: Why Good Laws Are No Substitute for Good Citizens.

Articles

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Everyday Economists

The postwar generation understood why a prosperous working class is crucial to the economy. Can economics be accessible again to ordinary Americans?
Samuel Bowles, Joshua Cohen
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Is Equality Passé?

The welfare state is in trouble not because selfishness is rampant (it is not), but because many egalitarian programs no longer evoke deeply held notions of fairness.
Samuel Bowles, Herbert Gintis

Forums

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Is Equality in Our Nature?

Pessimism about a selfish electorate is fundamentally misdirected.
Herbert Gintis, Samuel Bowles

Forum Responses

Response: How Markets Crowd In Morals

How Markets Crowd In Morals Michael Sandel is right that “sometimes offering payment for a certain behavior gets you less of it, not more.” Though you are not likely to see this...
Samuel Bowles

Response: Is Equality in Our Nature? — Final Response

Some analysts trace the problems of the welfare state to waning public altruism and ascendant self-interest. We disagree with this diagnosis. Rather, two other basic motives–strong reciprocity and basic needs generosity–underlie the public’s assessment...
Herbert Gintis, Samuel Bowles

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