Tuesday's Assorted Links

Elasticity, chicken wings, lipstick, pizza contracts, and transfer payments

Hi y’all! Here are some of my favorite stories from the past week:

1. As inflation rates remain high, CEOs are talking more about price elasticities [The New York Times]

2. Chicken wing prices are now lower than pre-pandemic levels, but that may change with the NFL season ahead of us [Axios]

3. Can lipstick sales predict recessions? [Insider]

4. A Canadian pizza chain is offering futures contracts to help customers combat inflation [Toronto Guardian]

5. When families receive $1,300 in a baby's first year of life, that baby grows up to earn at least 1-2% higher income as a young adult. The transfer pays for itself in federal income tax revenue alone. [NBER Working Paper]

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Yesterday I wrote about potential causes for the expected drop in college enrollment, and what that might mean for economic growth and spillover effects. Check it out:

Why All the Empty Seats?

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Week 33 is over and I’m up to 32 books for the year. Last week I finished a true crime book called Rogues: True Stories of Grifters, Killers, Rebels and Crooks. It was a collection of the author’s articles that were published in The New Yorker over the past few years. It held just the right amount of intrigue that I found myself checking for updates or more information after reading each chapter.

I recently started Paul Oyer’s new book, An Economist Goes to the Game. It mostly looks at a lot of famous sports stories and uses basic economic concepts to explain the outcome. For example, why do so many cyclists take performance-enhancing drugs and why is South Korea so good at producing female golfers? I’m about 1/3rd of the way through and have enjoyed it.