I am the H. J. Louis Professor of Management and Professor of Economics at Cornell University’s Johnson Graduate School of Management and the Co-director of the Paduano Faculty Research Seminar in Business Ethics and NYU’s Stern School of Business. My “Economic View” column appears regularly in The New York Times.
Ethical Systems Interview (January 2016)
Follow me on TwitterMy Approach to Ethical Systems:
Although traditional rational choice theory predicts that people will always defect in one-shot prisoner’s dilemmas, exceptions to this prediction are well documented. A longstanding challenge in evolutionary biology has been to explain how individuals who cooperate in one-shot dilemmas could survive in highly competitive environments.
My work in this area has focused on the strategic role of moral emotions in helping meet this challenge.
My Ethical Systems Research Page: Cheating & Honesty
My Major Relevant Publications:
Books
- Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy (2016) (public library) This book shows that a more accurate understanding of how chance plays a much larger role in important life situations could lead to better, richer and fairer economies and societies.
- What Price The Moral High Ground? (2004) (public library). This book challenges the idea that one can do well only if one forgoes doing good.
Press
- Review of “On Inequality” in The American Interest (October 2015)
- “Why have weddings and houses gotten so ridiculously expensive? Blame Inequality” on Vox.com (January 2015)
- Since 2005, I’ve been writing an economics column for the New York Times, appearing every fifth Sunday.
Academic Articles
- “On the Evolution of Moral Sentiments,” chapter in Foundations of Evolutionary Psychology (2007).
- “The Status of Moral Emotions in Consequentialist Moral Reasoning,” chapter in Moral Markets: The Critical Role of Values in the Economy (2007).
- “Feeling our Way to the Common Good: Utilitarianism and the Moral Sentiments,” article in The Monist (2010).