#137 Life as Conversation - Russ Roberts on his relationship with his father, starting the EconTalk podcast in 2006, Adam Smith, why people want to be "lovely", aiming high, why it's hard to have fun, misunderstandings of the academic world, and moving to Israel in his 60's

[00:59] Paul: Welcome to The Pathless Path. I'm Paul Millerd, and in this podcast, we examine the invisible scripts that run our lives and dare to imagine new stories for work and life. Today I am talking with Russ Roberts. I'm really excited for this conversation. Russ is the host of probably one of two podcasts in addition to the Bill Simmons podcast that I've listened to the longest. His podcast was one of the very few at the beginning and was an absolute delight.

I used to call my cousin after the episodes to just kind of recap what we had learned. And there was, if you can believe it, there was almost a shortage of deep nerdy content on the internet at one time. He's also a professor of economics and recently took a job at Shalem College in Jerusalem to the president. I think the thread that I think of most when I think of Russ is just somebody that is curious about what it means to live a good life and excited to explore that in today's conversation. Welcome to the podcast and conversation, Russ.

[02:08] Russ Roberts: Thank you, Paul, and thanks for the kind words. Appreciate it.

[02:11] Paul: The question we always start with, with all the guests, and I'm really curious if your answer is, what are the stories and scripts you grew up with that told you, okay, this is what I'm supposed to do as an adult?

[02:25] Russ Roberts: Well, that's a tough one. Um, my dad was of course a big influence on me. My mom, in that area, uh, of work— my mom was a stay-at-home mom when I was growing up. She eventually became a nurse, which was quite an amazing thing. Uh, but for my dad My dad went off to work, came home around 5:30. We had dinner together every night, and then he would sit and read on the couch most of the time.

It's my main memory. Sure, that's not accurate, but that was my memory. We did play some ping pong together and we listened to music and all kinds of other things. But my— I would say my main memory of my dad growing up was him reading a book. So if you asked me what were my expectations for my adult life, I would say when I was really young, it was that someday I too would be able to read the books in his bookcase, which really excited me. And every once in a while, I'd pick one of them up.

In fact, I remember one of them quite well. It was something about the Chisholm Trail. Never interested in me. But I figured some— there'd be a day where I'd pick that book up and find it riveting, like the books he found riveting. But no, not the Chisholm Trail. But So reading was a big part of my expectations as an adult.

And for work, you know, I don't think we had many expectations. I wasn't— they didn't put many dreams into me about what I was going to do with my life once I got out of the house. And it was a while before I thought I wanted to be a professor, which was where I ended up, at least for the first part of my career. And then I became this offbeat, weird professor who did podcasts and rap videos and animated poems and wrote novels. So Um, you know, the only other thing I would say is that I wanted to be a novelist when I was growing up, and I, I had no idea whether that was realistic or not. My parents never encouraged or discouraged it.

Um, so that's all I got. You can, you can push me if you want.

[04:25] Paul: Yeah, I'd, I'd love to hear. I mean, I know your dad has been a big influence on you, and I've read the eulogy you've written. It's a beautiful ode to him. I sense he also— his life sort of gained importance to you over time. You wrote, "He was an extraordinary man who acted like an ordinary one." Do you remember the first moment you realized, "Oh, wow, this man is special in ways I didn't really appreciate"?

[04:54] Russ Roberts: It's interesting. Growing up, I always respected him. I thought he was this smartest man in the world. I later found out that might not be true. But what did fascinate me as I grew older was some of the more offbeat things that he would tell me that I thought were implausible that turned out to be true. And that just increased my respect for him.

He was a self-made person intellectually. He went to college. He had a master's degree in psychology that he never really used. He had his own independent intellectual life, mostly around history. He was very interested in European history, and he formed all kinds of opinions about history in the world and diplomacy that had an impact on me. But there were many of them I thought were crazy or wrong or silly.

And, you know, it's a kind of a cliché that it usually goes the other direction. You know, you think your parents are idiots when you're growing up, then you find out that they were actually, you know, smart. For me, it was— it was— I always thought he was smart. I realized later he was more than smart. He was wise. He saw things that, that weren't often seen by others.

[06:09] Paul: It seemed like the thing that stood out in your reflections of him was that he was interested in the world. Has that been something that's been consistent in your journey as well?

[06:21] Russ Roberts: Yeah, I don't think about that much, but I, I think that was probably a huge impact on me. When we would go traveling, we'd go on vacation, he would always say to me, keep your eyes open. And he'd often say, look up, don't just look on the ground and right ahead of you, but look at the— when we were in a city, he'd tell me to, you know, look at the architecture and look at other things than just what was— were— that was— that were in front of you. But, um, He had a very strong curiosity, and because he was not an academic, he did not have access directly to academics to ask questions. He would often write them. He wrote authors that he admired about their work.

And he would sometimes write— he was very into gardening. He would write some botanist, academic botanist, or agricultural person for, you know, advice about his fig tree or whatever he was working on. In the garden, but he had a huge curiosity to figure things out. And he would often— and again, I don't think I've appreciated how, before your question, how much this affected me— would often say, you know, "Why is that?" And he'd point out something either in the world or in a book or, you know, where we're walking around. And about half the time I'd say, "Who cares?" But he did. What?

[07:44] Paul: You're his son too.

[07:45] Russ Roberts: Yeah, exactly.

[07:46] Paul: It turns out response—

[07:47] Russ Roberts: I have a lot of that curiosity, and I, I don't think about it enough.

[07:51] Paul: I'm—

[07:52] Russ Roberts: I don't know how much of it's genetic versus, um, you know, acquired through growing up in his household, but I certainly, um, got some of my curiosity from him. There's, there's no doubt about it. And maybe the habits of mind that he embedded in me early on with those kinds of questions and observations.

[08:13] Paul: What did he think when you started becoming interested in economics?

[08:19] Russ Roberts: Well, he was skeptical about economics, but this is one of those examples where he got wiser as I got older. You know, when I was in graduate school, of course, I thought I knew the truth and he didn't, just FYI, in my mind. And I would tell him things, and I, you know, I would give him what to me were obvious truths, and he would explain patiently to me that he was unconvinced by that, or that was just an interesting theory. And, um, again, here's an example of something that I probably have not really appreciated until your question. A huge theme of our interactions when I was in college and graduate school, and even later, had to do with the limits of knowledge. You know, I tell him they finally figured out X, and he'd say, yeah, I don't think they figured out X, and I don't think they ever will.

And I thought, being again an academic with a lot of faith in the academic process, institutions, peer review, etc., I'd say, no, no, Dad, they figured this out, really, come on. And we'd have a really serious, intense argument. We'd also argue about whether vodka had any flavor. He said it didn't. And therefore this— I agreed with him, it didn't. But the therefore was, therefore you should never pay a premium for a good, good bottle of vodka because they, quote, all tasted the same.

And he would challenge me to say I wouldn't be able to tell them apart. And we had a lot of conversations like that. But those weren't so important and interesting because I still think I'm right about that one. The more important one would be where he'd say, you know, I don't think that economic theory is like science. And I go like, yes, it is. Milton Friedman said.

And, you know, when I got older, I got a lot more skeptical and I got a lot more like my dad, which is interesting.

[10:04] Paul: Yeah, I— it's interesting seeing my own journey too.

[10:07] Russ Roberts: I—

[10:08] Paul: when your podcast first came out, I think I got really excited. I was working in strategy consulting, like intoxicated with analytical proof of things, and I would find nuggets in yours and then people would say things like, no, actually here, Russ Roberts thinks this, or here's this proof of things. I think one of the things I remember that changed my mind dramatically reading of yours is your take on inequality, right? You can't just compare inequality from today to 40, 50 years ago because marriage rates have changed dramatically, the makeup of people has changed dramatically, and at the higher end, there's more people well off. But it turns out, uh, no one really cares about that.

[10:58] Russ Roberts: No, they don't. No, no. One of the, uh— and of course I could be wrong, but, you know, one of the things that I believe deeply when I was in graduate school and for a good chunk of my professional life after graduate school was that the truth will out. That, you know, insights that are, that are true will triumph over insights that are— that might not be false, but they fail to take account of certain things. And I don't believe that anymore. I wish I liked that view.

I wish I could still hold it, but I can't.

[11:35] Paul: Were you— you have this. So I'll be honest, I've read a few of your books. I've not read The Invisible Heart. But is that sort of part of your slow realization that there's more than economics? And there's this constant through line of like you were always mentioning heart and wisdom in a lot of your writing over the years. Does it seem obvious that that was kind of the direction you were going in terms of how you thought about life?

[12:03] Russ Roberts: But— Well, it's funny you say that because that book is actually It's in some ways, it's not like my other books. It's more of a manifesto. My other books are educational. I'm trying to teach something. I teach a lot of things in that book, but the underlying theme is that it's a defense of free markets from, in a written in the form of a novel. And the hard part is that I believed and still believe that many economic phenomena like markets and the prosperity that I think often comes in the wake of using market forces is more than just money.

It's more than just the material. It also involves the material world. It also involves, you know, our dreams and our aspirations, our sense of meaning. So I still feel that way. I don't— but what I do— what I think the most important thing to summarize it briefly that has changed in my view on that is that The economic toolkit is fundamentally based on the question, what's in it for me? What am I going to get out of this transaction?

And it focuses on what a rational person would do with a limited amount of money and lots of things they want. What, what should I buy and how much? And that's a pretty reliable way of looking at the world for many of our commercial transactions. We do want to spend our money wisely, more or less. We make mistakes, but we want— we try to learn from them. The flaw that I think there is in modern economics is that taking that idea, what's in it for me, which is a great starting place, and deciding it applies to everything, uh, that all of economic and non-economic activity, the heart and the soul and sources of meaning and purpose, all can be seen through this framework of what's in it for me.

And my view is, is that that fundamentally ignores our sense of duty, responsibility, our values sometimes. And there's ways to fix that using economics. You say, well, I'll just put those into what's in it for me includes a feeling of meaning. But I think that's often missed and not easily done. And so I think the economist inevitably in real life tends to focus on what is observable. What is measurable.

And that means we're going to leave out some of the things that we might think are important, like duty and responsibility. And particularly when you think about marriage, of course, many people in a bad marriage leave. That's the "what's in it for me" thing. But a lot of people stay. And you could argue that that's more interesting than the people who leave. They feel they have a responsibility either to their spouse or their children or a promise they made.

And so I've increasingly become interested in that part of human behavior that I view as basically outside the most narrow conception, at least, of economics.

[15:00] Paul: Yeah, I mean, this conversation, economically, it doesn't make sense for you to really give me time.

[15:07] Russ Roberts: Yeah, why am I doing this? Yeah, it's crazy.

[15:11] Paul: But you sense that there's something more, or maybe you saw something, or maybe I just kept emailing you and—

[15:19] Russ Roberts: Well, I follow you on Twitter. I follow you on Twitter. And, you know, maybe I'm thinking— this is the way the economist would explain this— like, why am I giving you an hour of my time? Well, maybe some people listen and buy my book, or maybe some people listen and start listening to econ talk, or maybe he'll retweet some of my tweets and, and that'll be good for me. But the— I think the thoughtful person realized that all those things are not irrelevant. But I would much prefer to live a life where, wow, I have a chance to talk to an interesting person for an hour who's very far away physically.

And how cool is that? And I've read a little bit about your, your work, and we have some similarities about how we view the world and how we view planning and purposeful behavior. And maybe I'll learn something. Oh, but that'll get me more money. And I just— can't it just be it's, it's fun and I enjoy it? And that's okay too.

That's in economics. I want to make it clear. I don't think economics is all about the stock market and making money, but the idea of, say, helping someone who's younger than I am and is trying to make his way in the world bravely without normal employment— Paul, I salute you, and I'm happy to be helpful to you.

[16:37] Paul: I appreciate that so much. And it sort of brings me— so I was rereading this book. How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life. I feel like it should be called How Russ Roberts Can Change Your Life. Very sneaky. But yeah, I love how you talk about— first of all, The Theory of Moral Sentiments is such an interesting book.

It's something I've gone to on your urging. And one, you say Adam Smith probably could not have predicted most of the modern economy, which I think is really interesting. And two, you say that we totally misinterpret his idea of self-interest. And in his time, self-interest also meant taking care of your community and seeing those people around you thrive. So what fascinated you about that? And how do you think Adam Smith might think about today's world?

[17:38] Russ Roberts: Well, I'm not sure he cared so much. I'm not sure it's right that he cared about a community thriving. What he cared about, which is related, so maybe this is where you got that from. He understood that we care a lot about the people around us rather than people who are far away from us.

[17:54] Paul: Right.

[17:55] Russ Roberts: And a lot of people say, well, that's immoral. Smith would say it's human. He might say, yeah, you might be right. Maybe it'd be better to care as much about somebody far away than somebody near you. But Most people don't, and you could argue they should. But if we're trying to understand why people do what they do, we might want to start with the fact that in general, people are more caring about the people near them they encounter, they see every day or often, or from their community or who are like them.

And Smith was interested really in why anybody did anything nice. Like, why would we do anything that sacrifices our own well-being for other people? Why wouldn't I always put myself first? Why wouldn't I, following what we talked about earlier, why wouldn't I always ask, what's in it for me, and go for that? And he argues that that's really not the way most people behave. They don't go for what's in it for me every time.

They might in some situations, but in many they won't, because if they do, they'll be isolated. They won't have any friends. They won't be respected. They won't be admired. And Smith was very fascinated in this book The Theory of Moral Sentiments, with the idea that what motivates us is not our pocketbook and is not our narrowest of self-interests, but rather the respect we earn from the people around us. And again, that's self-interested in a sense, right?

Certainly, I like to be respected. But he was saying that you would sacrifice, say, money, profitable opportunity to maintain the respect of the people around you. And that distinction of thinking of self-interest that way is, I think, quite useful. But the main point is that Smith was very aware of the fact that we care deeply about how we are seen in the world. And I think that insight hasn't changed since 1759 when he first wrote it down, and I think He understood profoundly how our sense of meaning and purpose comes from how other people see us, not just how we see ourselves. They all matter.

Smith understood that, but, but understood the importance of our, our, how people view us. And I, you know, I don't know how he'd see the world today. I don't, I'm not sure it's a meaningful question. I don't think there are many things he would you know, obviously observed that would be so radically different. I'm not sure he'd know where to start. But he certainly understood the power of what I would call, what I sometimes call emergent order.

The fact that there are many good things that happen in the world that are not controlled from the top down, but that emerge from the bottom up. And that hasn't changed either since 1759. It's just gotten maybe more dramatic in certain areas, both positive and negative. He'd see the positive ones. He'd also see the negative ones. And I don't think you'd find that surprising at all.

[20:51] Paul: Yeah, you called the impartial— impartial observer, right?

[20:56] Russ Roberts: He calls it— he calls it the impartial spectator. That's, that's a separate thing. Yeah, that's the idea that when we're trying to decide what the right thing to do is, we act as if there's somebody like over our shoulder, uh, keeping an eye on us, and we're worried about how we would be judged. And I think that's, um, again hadn't changed since 1759.

[21:17] Paul: Yeah. Your favorite phrase, one of your favorite phrases to quote from this is, man desires to be loved and to be lovely. Um, that's a shortened version of it, but I really loved the, I always think about the second part of this when I think about my previous path. I was often praised, um, for being on this path, being impressive, earning a good amount of money, but it never felt good. Um, because I don't think I was respected in the way I wanted to be respected. And I think on this new path, it was really a process of me of coming to terms with realizing I wanted to be appreciated and actually daring to admit that to myself was a big release, I think.

Um, and it was in alignment with how I want to be perceived in the world. So maybe talk a bit about this phrase of wanting to be lovely. It didn't mean sort of how we use it in today's world, but in Smith's time, it was sort of like wanting to be respected or appreciated.

[22:25] Russ Roberts: Correct. So Smith says that we naturally desire to be loved and lovely. Loved doesn't mean just loved physically, emotionally, romantically. He meant respected, admired, praised, and so on. And the lovely part is to earn those things honestly. So you are praised and honored and respected because you are honorable, you are praiseworthy, you are respectable.

And what I love about the phrase, you know, I like to say, I like to say aim high, right? Aim high. I don't say that because, well, that way, if you aim high, you'll at least get part of the way. You know, if you have some ambition, you should at least get, you know, part of the way. If you don't aim high, you'll never get anywhere. That's not the reason I like it.

I like it because it says aspire, aspire, try to be more than what you are. Try to be better tomorrow than you are today. By the way, a strong view of my dad's. He was very big on improvement. And worrying less about where you were, but rather the direction you were going. And I think the idea of being lovely, of being something that is— of being a person who is admirable, respected, someone who matters, someone who plays a positive role in people's lives, that's a good goal.

You know, for some people, religion helps them get there. Other people, it might be their self-respect. Smith certainly thought that. Smith didn't think people did it because they thought they were supposed to. He thought they did it because they would thereby earn the respect of people around them. And I think they both matter.

I think many times we care about what people think about us, but we also sometimes have some kind of higher value, whether it's religious or ethical, something we've accepted upon ourselves as a form of our identity. And I think that's really great. Um, I, I often ask guests on EconTalk why they think it's hard for people to just go out and have fun all the time. I don't think I've ever gotten a good answer. Um, my answer, which I often don't give, so it's, uh, like breaking news, Paul, for your podcast— my answer is there's something inside us that wants more than just fun. More than just pleasure.

If we were just animals of a certain kind, animals are really simple. You know, they stay alive, they find food, they find shelter, they procreate, procreate. We're animals, according to one view of the world, and we have all the same drives. And yet, when we merely fulfill those physical desires, I think often we are not so happy. And that's fascinating to me. And to answer that question, why, you have to think— I mean, I think a thoughtful person should think about it and figure out for themselves whether it's important to them.

There are many people who are happy who just look for physical pleasure. I don't— I'm not saying it's not possible, but for many people, that's not enough. Now, you could argue it's because they've been burdened by culture. And, you know, much of our culture wars, I think, are over this question. But I think it's fascinating to me that we aspire, that we stretch and reach and aim high. You know, the poet Browning said, "Oh, that a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?" And, you know, that was a religious formula.

I said, I'm not sure he only meant it religiously by heaven. I think he meant things that give us great joy. That's interesting, right? Why is it that a stretch goal that is met is so satisfying? I mean, why not just be happy all the time? Just have fun.

Who cares? Why would you give yourself the heartache and headache of some aspiration, some goal that you can't, you might not achieve? Just go out and eat, drink, and be merry. But I don't think that's easy for most human beings. Or at least some human beings. I think I'm one of them.

Maybe, maybe it's rare. I don't know.

[26:41] Paul: I love that answer. And it resonates so deeply with my path. I think I was so confused on my previous path because I didn't desire towards what I thought was greatness, which was what everyone else was aiming at, these sort of like become a partner of a consulting firm, but then creating some space in my life, I just, I realized, oh, I do have this urge. It sort of opened up and released into writing and. Writing my book was the greatest creative project of my life. Like, the intrinsic rewards from it in and of itself were so— I can't even describe it.

I sense you probably know what that feels like, putting a gift or a book into the world. Is that the same drive that led you to send an email to Don Cox in 2006 and launch this podcast?

[27:39] Russ Roberts: I don't think so, but, but there is a piece that is like that. I'll try to articulate it. Don Cox was my first guest on EconTalk, I think is what you're referring to. And yeah, you know, I didn't, I didn't have a plan. Uh, you'll like this. I, I didn't think, uh, wow, if I do this for so many years, I'll become famous and I'll, I'll get paid to do it and I'll get a talk show on NPR, whatever it was.

I mean, no one—

[28:03] Paul: I just thought in 2006 about No one thought that in 2006 about podcasts.

[28:08] Russ Roberts: It's true. I just thought, wow, a few thousand people might listen to what I have to say. This is so much fun. It's exciting. Incredible. You know, I'd been a guest on a podcast and I asked them how many downloads they got and they said 2 or 3,000.

I just couldn't believe it. I thought, wow, this is so amazing. If I could go into an auditorium with 3,000 people in it every week with 2 chairs in the front and I could sit and talk to somebody And of course, I didn't realize by far the best thing about it wasn't that the number of people in the room would get bigger and bigger. By far the best thing was I got to talk to that person in the chair. And I didn't even imagine how transformative it would be to interview smart people week after week after week. But the part I can relate to that I think you'll like is that, you know, I went to the University of Chicago for graduate school economics, which is a very respected program.

I had teachers who either won Nobel Prizes or would win them. And that was the game that I was in. I was going to be just like them. I was going to publish a lot of academic research. I would become a full professor. I would get a Nobel Prize.

And I didn't even know what came after that. But that was the path that I was expected to follow. By going to graduate school at a place like Chicago. And, you know, it took me a long, long time, mostly through personal failure, to realize that that was not the only way to be successful or happy. Even as an economist, I could have left the field, but I stayed in the field, did these funkier, offbeat, quirky things. And when I started doing some of those, I remember a great sense of shame.

Mostly shame that I had let down my professors. I had let down my own goals. I failed. And giving up. I was giving up instead of saying, "Well, I just have to work harder." I was giving up. And so when I took a job in business school at Washington University running an experiential center that didn't exist yet, I was going to be the first founder, first director of it.

It was called the Management Center, and I got to form, shape it, which was exhilaratingly fun, but I had no idea whether I was going to enjoy it or be good at it. And I called my advisor from graduate school, Gary Becker, and said, do you think this is a good move for me? And of course, I just wanted his blessing. I didn't want him— if he said no, I don't know what I would have said. I didn't really have— I didn't like— my academic career wasn't going particularly well at the time. But basically, I wanted him to give me his blessing and say, yeah, you'll get back into the academic life because you'll, through these projects that you'll be working on in this center, you'll get access to data.

Maybe you'll be able to. And I don't know whether he was being nice to me and realizing I needed to hear something like that, even if it wasn't true. But he, that's what he said. And so it sort of gave me permission to betray him. And to do something that was not normal scholarly research. And that was really hard for me for a long time.

You know, and as I got stranger as an economist and did more things that were not normal, you know, I just— I got more and more comfortable with it, that I saw that there were other things that were good about it. Of course, part of it was just telling myself that because I didn't want to admit I'd failed. I wasn't a first-rate academic economist. I wrote some papers. They did okay, but I didn't have the knack that somebody would have to have to be at the top of the profession. And that was very hard for me to admit.

I needed to find some other form of success, and I found different ones and different kinds. But it was interesting, again, relative to what you were talking about in terms of people's expectations for you, I wanted the approval of those people whose respect I wanted and who had certain expectations for me as a graduate student.

[32:21] Paul: Yeah, that is such a hard thing. So many— I sort of talked to tons of people about different paths, and it's definitely something I went through. It was so hard to process that after leaving my path. I felt like a loser.

[32:36] Russ Roberts: Yeah.

[32:37] Paul: And like, I felt like I was letting down everyone in my life, but I had this hunch in me that I had to head in this new direction. And the thing that really helped me in those moments was finding other sort of what I call weirdos like me. What were some of the things beyond your advisor helping you? And did you find the others? Did you— when did you stumble upon people like Tyler Cowen and others? Like that that were sort of doing things a little different?

[33:09] Russ Roberts: Well, that wasn't important, actually. I mean, I like Tyler. He became my colleague at George Mason, and I got that job. Don Boudreaux was the chair at the time, and he liked the offbeat stuff I did that promoted economic education. Most of the profession had no interest in it. You know, the world's changed so much since then that we're talking around 2000.

Around 2000, you know, if you did something for the general public as an economist, you were kind of looked down on. Now people podcast, they write books for the general public, they, um, they do all kinds of things that, that then would have been seen as unseemly, uh, or shortly before that as seen as unseemly. And now there's, there's more tolerance. But I think I'm going to answer your question a different way. Where, when you take a leap and you get off the normal path that you're expected to go on and you, you're in uncharted territory, you often need somebody or some group of people to give you the support you need to make that step.

And, you know, a lot of it in my case was my wife, who, you know, if I'd lost her respect, if it had been important to her that I was an academic, you know, you know, normal academic economist instead of a weird one, that would have been just— I don't think I could have done it. So certainly her support and ongoing respect for me and support were crucial to do those kind of things. I think a lot of it, and I'm sure this is true for you too, you could comment on it. A lot of it is you find there are other rewards that that turn out to be pretty nice, you know. And I mean, again, not financial, but in terms of ego. And, um, you know, I'd never done anything entrepreneurial in my life until then, and I was essentially creating the center from scratch.

Um, I was also moving in a world I had no experience in, which is the business world. So for the first time in my life, I put a suit on every day. I'd never done that before. Haven't done it much since, but for a while there, for a few years, I was putting a suit on every day, calling on local businesses and asking what problems they had that our students might be able to help them with. As I was basically creating the first program I started, there was a consulting program where students under the supervision of a faculty member would work on a real-world problem. So I thought that was really cool for the students.

I liked the people I interacted with, mostly in the business world. And I was stretching. I was doing a bunch of things I had not imagined I'd be capable of. When I took that job, the first thing I did— it's pretty embarrassing— the first thing I did is I went over to the bookstore and I went over to the management and business section of the bookstore and started looking for books I should read to try to tool up. The second thing I did is I called my brother, who's a very skilled person in the world of business, and said, you know, how am I going to get organized? How am I going to be productive?

How am I going to make sure I keep my commitments. I need a system. The third thing I did was really shocking. I took a course in time management, uh, that was part of Stephen Covey's empire. And I went there kind of holding my nose, thinking maybe I'll get something out of this, you know. I could need some tools about, you know, taking care of my to-do list and organizing and planning.

And I found it to be an exhilarating, shockingly entertaining and productive experience. Not literally in the sense that it made me more productive, but in the sense that it opened my eyes to a world. It was basically, you know, the first self-help thing I'd ever seen. And it was like, wow, there's some cool stuff here. I've been, I've been wrong. So a lot of the, I think the power when you take that leap and go off the path you're expected to be following is you find two things.

You learn that some of the things about the path are really quite pleasant you didn't anticipate. But the second is like, hey, you're going through the jungle, you're cutting your own path. It's scary. And when it turns out okay, you feel really good about yourself. It's, you know, there's a set of, again, emotional and psychological rewards there that are very different from what you've experienced before. And it's fun to do things that are hard and not fail.

And of course you do fail sometimes, you make mistakes. Um, that's interesting too.

[37:40] Paul: Yeah, that definitely resonates. I think just the ownership of choosing things and then also risking failure is sort of thrilling in an interesting way that when people are projecting on my path, they say, oh, aren't you worried about running out of money? Aren't you worried about healthcare? It's like, yeah, I am.

[38:01] Russ Roberts: Yeah.

[38:01] Paul: And, um, but that's not a good enough reason to avoid the possibility of, I think often what keeps people on these kind of paths or, uh, for you on these paths is a sense of wonder, sort of the joy of finding things out, the, the joy of even finding out you're not good at things.

[38:19] Russ Roberts: Yeah.

[38:19] Paul: Can have value in and of itself. Um, what role has want— Yeah, go ahead.

[38:26] Russ Roberts: I would say one more thing. We'll come to wonder in a sec if you want, but I was going to make an observation that, um, you know, fear is a big part of this. We're— we haven't really talked about directly, uh, and, and the need for comfort. So, you know, I, I— in that book you haven't read, The Invisible Heart, I tell the story— I think it's in that book, I'm pretty sure it's in that book— of— based on a true story that my front porch of the house I bought in St. Louis did not have a railing, and it was just— the porch was pretty high off the ground, maybe 6 feet off the ground, 5 feet. And the city of St.

Louis, when I moved in, required us to put a railing up by law. And I said, I don't want a railing. And, and we tried. We had pictures of the house. It was built in like 1906, I think. We have pictures from early on in the house's existence where there's no railing, and people care about historical accuracy.

And, and, um, and they told me that I needed to have a railing because if there were kids playing on the porch, they could fall off. And I said, but don't you think it's a good idea? It's hilarious. Great moment. And in, uh, municipal, um, hearings. I said, don't you think it'd be a good idea for, for a child to learn that, that there's a thing called the edge that they shouldn't get too close to?

And sometimes they fall off and they might break an arm, yeah, but they'd get a life lesson. They're not going to die. It's very hard to die from a, from a 5, 6-foot fall. I said, this is an important part of life, is to understand risk and to, and to face it. So, you know, I wrote that book and a friend of mine read it and said, like, like, what are you doing romanticizing risk? You're a professor, you don't live that way.

So I, I do think that we have this urge to be safe and comfortable and not to go off the path. It's too scary. And when you find out that you don't get hurt when you leave It's fairly fun. It's pretty cool.

[40:40] Paul: Yeah. And I think you've been an inspiration. I think seeing you go through this shift, uh, you moved to a different country when you could have just sort of coasted into retirement. You could continue doing the podcast, hang out in the US. I'm sure, um, you probably didn't take the job for the money. Uh, What, what was attractive about, uh, embarking on a new path in your 60s?

[41:10] Russ Roberts: Yes, I was, uh, 66 when I moved to Israel and became president of Shalem College. Um, you know, half the people I asked about whether I should do this said, uh, you're gonna hate it, administration is a nightmare. Um, they didn't actually worry about what it would be like to move to a foreign country because if anything were Jewish, had been to Israel, and like me, had visited and enjoyed it. It's a nice country. Didn't realize that living in Israel as an immigrant is much harder than visiting as a tourist. And so that's one thing.

The other group said, and this is the group I ended up, of course, listening to, was that, you know, at this point in your career, it's unusual you get a chance to do something. It's, it might be important. And for me, it was more of a calling. It was If you've listened to EconTalk, you know I'm still, I'm less interested in economics than I was 10 years ago. I'm more interested in philosophy, the flourishing. I'm more interested in education.

And here I had a chance to be in a really unusual educational institution. We have small classes. The people read the books intently under the supervision of an incredible, the guidance of great teachers. I mean, this is an amazing, amazing place. And I thought it would be a privilege to be part of it. And I just couldn't imagine saying no, unless my wife said no, and she didn't.

She was in favor of it. Somebody said to me, he said, "Just take the job. It'll be like a syringe of epinephrine into your heart." And that was a little strong. I don't think that's quite, it's not quite that exhilarating 'cause it's, There are a lot of challenges to moving and moving to a foreign country and taking on a job that's very different from the job you've done before. But most of it's pretty exhilarating. It's in the ballpark of that.

But it's a blessing, and I'm very grateful for it, to be able to tackle something this interesting this late in life. It's amazing.

[43:19] Paul: Has it reinspired you, uh, about education and thinking about the future?

[43:25] Russ Roberts: Big time. Um, I was just talking to a faculty member last night and she was telling me, uh, I was at a dinner for a job candidate and she sitting next to a faculty member who said that she'd had her last class a few days before and, or the night before, And the students stayed after to talk about what the class meant to them. And I said, well, what time did you leave? Oh, 9:00, 9:30. I said, when did you get there? 4:30.

It's like, that kind of dedication. And I have many of our faculty are that devoted. It moves me beyond. I can't tell you how moved I am by it. And then we have faculty here. It'd be amazing if it happened once.

It happens more than once that the students go to a faculty member they love and say, could you teach us a class on X? And the faculty member says, sure. And they don't get paid for it. Students don't get credit. It's just an extra thing to a really incredibly intense workload that they already have. And it happens.

I mean, it just blows me away. So to be around that, that interest, that level of curiosity, on our students' part, and they're amazing. And to be— to have faculty members who, who live to try to satisfy that curiosity, it's just— it's the best. It's just the best. I'm going to teach a course, not for credit, not for pay, to students who won't get credit, uh, on a book, you know, next semester, and I can't wait. I don't have time to do it, but I can't wait.

I'll do it. I think we're going to do Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, which is a book that had a huge impression on me, uh, in the way I thought about uncertainty. And I think a very valuable, um, set of lessons for any thinking person, and that we don't teach anywhere else. You know, you could take a course on statistics will not cover anything that's in that book. And, you know, my students are all Israeli. They all speak Hebrew as their native language.

Their English skills vary. Some are great, some are good. And to try to read that book— they're gonna try to read it in English. It's translated to Hebrew, but they'll try to read it in English alongside me. I think it would be a great experience because, uh, it's a very flamboyantly written book. They'll learn a lot of unusual ways of expressing oneself in English.

[45:56] Paul: So wanted to ask you, uh, so I'm gonna ask this two ways and you can pick either both or the more interesting way, uh, but what do academics not get about the internet and/or what do internet people not appreciate about academia?

[46:13] Russ Roberts: Um, I think most people don't understand academic life because, you know, the metaphor I always use is the kitchen. You know, if someone reads a study that's been published, peer-reviewed in a journal, and maybe a fancy journal, uh, most people in the real world assume it's true. And, uh, I know it's not, that it's often not true and sometimes literally wrong. Um, so I've become a skeptic, as listeners to my podcast know, about the value of some— often a lot of empirical work is not reliable. Especially in the social sciences, but also elsewhere. So that's one thing that nobody gets about academic life.

They think that people in academic life are searchers for truth, that they are not interested in money or self-esteem or ego or fame or power. They just sit around and think deep thoughts all day, and then they eventually share them with the rest of the world. This is not my experience in this world. And so I don't think there's anything different about tech people in their misunderstanding of academic life. In the other direction, I think, you know, the most— and again, it's a similar mistake I think that everybody makes, so you wouldn't think academics would make it. It comes up, I think, about it fairly often.

What people write and what they say is not always what they believe. And this is hard for people to kind of accept. They could, you know, they think, most of us think that we ourselves, of course, only write and say things that we think. That turns out not to be true. But we certainly have that often, that self-image of ourselves. But the idea that someone on the internet is saying something absurd to get attention and clicks or views or friends is not our default.

Our default is, oh yeah, well, they— I guess they're crazy, or they believe this, that, or the other. And often I look at it and I think, I think they just thought that would be helpful to their presence, their media presence. And, um, you know, I think this is true The most obvious case is politicians. Politicians obviously don't believe what they say. Sometimes they might, but that's not the starting point. The starting point is, what shall I say?

Sometimes it's not, it's, by the way, it doesn't mean it's always horrible. They might say, this is what the world needs right now from me is to hear this. And so I'll say it in a way that encourages people to feel good about fill in the blank or whatever it is. But most people's default is, that they actually believe those things. And I think that's not true. And I think especially the media these days, tragically, but it's understandable.

They're right. Journalists will write things now that are extremely outlandish to get attention. And I see that. I look at it kind of like with bemusement. But most people think like, oh my gosh, what are they? Why are they, you know, It's like, well, because it works.

What are you talking about? They're not— it's very much like the academics. They're not the truth-seekers we imagine them to be. We shouldn't think of them that way. They're— it's complicated. I don't think they're totally unprincipled.

I just— like, I don't think academics are corrupt when I say that they want attention or to be published or to get on the front page of a newspaper with their latest study. That's not corrupt. That's human. Uh, but it does lead sometimes to corruption, and I think that's true in journalism also. The incentives are not aligned with truth-seeking, and, um, once you realize that, you look at the world a different way.

[50:04] Paul: Despite this, uh, there are large amounts of people listening to podcasts like yours that do desire to go deeper. Has it surprised you how much interest you've had on your podcast and seeing others that do want to go deep, uh, and finding a way through the internet.

[50:23] Russ Roberts: Yeah, the, you know, when I started EconTalk, I, I think in my mind it was going to be 45 minutes to an hour. I think some of the earlier episodes are short-ish, but eventually, pretty early on, I realized an hour is a good length. And, and it reminded me of, it's a round number, 1 hour. Like, most shows are an hour or 20 or 30 minutes. They're round. They're not like 73 minutes or 26 minutes.

So I thought this makes sense. Turns out silly. Nobody cares. What they really care about, whether it's a multiple of your commute or not. So is it— you can hear the whole thing going home and, you know, going to work, coming home, or walking the dog 3 times. You know, that's what people care about.

But at the beginning, you know, I told people I was gonna do this podcast, I was going to interview people. Here are the things I heard. Well, you're going to run out of guests because there aren't that many economists to interview. And I found out you can interview somebody more than once. They have more than one thing to say. And I realized I could interview people who weren't economists.

It would still be interesting. They'd be related to economics. Now I realize I don't have to do that either. I can do just anybody who's interesting to me. So I don't do much economics anymore. There now and then.

And then I realized, I saw that people who were doing 2 and 3, 4-hour podcasts and people would ask me to be on their program. And I'd say, how long? They say, well, we usually go about 3 hours. I'm thinking, I don't have 3 hours to say about anything. And I will get incredibly bored if I have to listen to myself talk for 3 hours. So, let's— can we shoot for a shorter time?

But definitely, I underestimated the interest in the longer form. I started to say earlier, when I told people it was gonna be an hour, they said, "Oh, well, nobody will listen more than 10 minutes." 'Cause radio's 10 minutes. I mean, that's a long radio clip in the news or a feature story. And that'd be like NPR. I mean, no— most shows on the radio are 2.5 minutes, 3 minutes. A little news story, a little clip.

And so I took a chance. And of course, we found out very quickly that people were very thirsty for longer-form forms of entertainment. I would never have imagined in the early— let me say it differently. In the early days of EconTalk, I foolishly thought my audience was people who were interested in economics. That's not true. My market was actually people who wanted to listen to podcasts.

And it almost didn't matter what it was about. They wanted diversion. They wanted education. They wanted intellectual stimulation. And, you know, I thought, oh, I want people who like subscribe to The Economist or The Wall Street Journal. Not true.

I wanted people who were commuters, who had a dog they had to walk, who had a lot of dishes to do, who worked out at the gym an hour a day or 2 hours a day. Those were my— that's my audience. And, you know, one of the challenges for my program— first of all, it's called EconTalk, and I added the tagline "Conversations for the Curious" because it's not just about econ anymore, and only occasionally.

[53:20] Paul: Um, yeah, and I've never subscribed to The Economist, uh, but I probably listened to several hundred episodes. Um, and shout out to my cousin Brian, who, uh, I think introduced me to the podcast, and we've had probably hundreds of conversations about your conversations. And I love the, the idea of conversations. Uh, it's such a beautiful metaphor for life too. It's something you talked about a lot in Wild Problems and something that's inspired me. I think David White's idea of the conversational nature of reality is sort of like exploring the frontier of life, relationships, and reality has been powerful for me.

You say, "The conversation, like a work of art, takes on a life of its own. You give up some control and in return, the heart opens." How are conversations a metaphor for a lot of things in life for you?

[54:23] Russ Roberts: Well, I like to believe, I don't know if it's true, I don't know how you'd know if it's true, but I like to think that our brain was hardwired to learn via conversation more more than it is through, say, reading. Reading is amazing. I love reading. Obviously, I read a lot, and I've learned a lot from books, but there's a different kind of thing that's taking place when you ask questions and hear answers and challenge the answer and come back and go back and forth. It's interesting to me— I think I've talked about on the program— we don't teach our children to how to be good conversationalists. You know, at best, we might teach them don't interrupt, which is good.

It's a good rule. But it's not enough. And listening is about a lot more than not talking. And that's a very powerful thing. And it's really hard to remember and it's hard to build as a habit. As much as I think about it and work on it, I don't think I'm very good at it.

And I think so. One thing is that it's the way we learn. But I think the second thing is the way— it's the way we, of course, move through the world. With other people. And the reason that's so important is that it's kind of all there is. That's the sense in which I think David Whyte is right.

It is life. And you can go— keeping our metaphor of exploration— you go through the jungle with a machete and, and hack your way through and on your own. It's really different when you do it with somebody else. It's really different when you share life experiences with friends, family, loved ones. It's kind of the whole thing. It's— there's not much else that's better.

And I would just add, it also includes silence. It's really important to remember that a conversation is not just two people talking, and it's not just one person talking, one person listening. It's often two people looking at each other and not saying anything. That is also part of conversation. It's not just how many words you can get into the into the ether that someone else will hear. Um, pauses are important.

Um, are important. Um, looking off in the distance is important. But it is— it's kind of the whole thing. And, uh, again, I find it fascinating that we don't think about how to get better at it. I'm sure there are books written on it. I have not read them.

I probably should. A big fan of David Whyte, by the way. Um, He's amazing. I love his book, The Heart Aroused. It's a fantastic book about poetry and life. So, yeah, conversation is crucial.

And I mean, just here we have a great example. Earlier we talked about my father. You asked me a couple of questions. You didn't tell me things about my father. You didn't know my father. You didn't even secondhand that you'd read something about my father.

But you asked me a question and you listened to the answer, and it prompted me to think of some things maybe I never thought about before. How remarkable is that? That through the act of conversation, I learned something about myself and my relationship with my dad that I wouldn't otherwise have. It's incredible.

[57:31] Paul: Do you have a path role model right now at this stage of your life?

[57:37] Russ Roberts: Not literally. I mean, I can't— if you mean a person, no. Um, there are a lot of people I admire and respect, uh, who, who, um, I probably unconsciously, uh, emulate. I think, um, how old are you?

[57:56] Paul: 37.

[57:57] Russ Roberts: Okay, so I'm 68. Uh, there's a point in your life— for me, I don't know if it's general, I suspect it is for the the reading I've done, where you realize you're mortal. I think you probably realize you're mortal, but you don't internalize it. And there's an age where you think about it. And I think, uh, if I had to— I mean, this is really— it sounds dark. I don't think it's dark at all, actually, but it sounds a little dark.

You know, I think thinking about how one should die, and not just how one should live, and how one should think about one's impending death. There are a lot of people I read about who inspire me to think, well, I hope I could be like that when I get even older and closer to death. And I think the, you know, I like the line, no one on their deathbed wishes they'd spent more time at the office. But I think death is a very useful and powerful way to remind you how to live. And, um, we talked earlier about aiming high. I think it's nice to imagine that when you come toward the end of your life, you can look back on it with pride.

I think that matters. Uh, so I, I've— I don't know whether it's coincidence or just luck, or whether I just notice it more when I read about people toward the end of their life. They inspire me, uh, to think about how I might want to live both literally the rest of my life, what I'm going to do and try to, try to experience and achieve, but also how I should think about it. And I think it's a good thing, but I don't think you can do it when you're 37. You know, there are people who try. I'm not sure you can teach someone to do it.

I don't know if anyone's listening going, yeah, I'm going to do that. I think it's just something that it's the natural experience if you're blessed to live a longish life, you inevitably get better at thinking about it.

[59:54] Paul: Yeah. I've definitely been inspired by a lot of end-of-life books, but it's a continued practice. So one thing I wanted to ask you, and we can head towards the closing because I know you're trying to get to dinner on time.

[01:00:09] Russ Roberts: I got 9 minutes. And I mean that. We can use all 9.

[01:00:16] Paul: I'm about to be a father for the first time in a month. My wife and I are having a daughter. What do you think your children would say you did well as a father?

[01:00:31] Russ Roberts: I can't answer that. You'd have to ask them. I guess there's sort of two categories, right? There's what do I think my children would say and what they would actually say. It's kind of like, are they remotely close? I have no idea.

I do think, putting aside what one's children think as they grow older, and I think, I'm sure it changes with age. You know, there are many stages of life as the child of a parent where your views change of, you know, who your parents are. But I do think there are certain Coming back to earlier point, there are certain things that as you get older, you want to make sure you were diligent about as a parent, if you're lucky enough, blessed enough to be a parent. Paying attention is one of them. Children can be frustrating and difficult at various ages, especially when they're younger, and staying focused on them and appreciating that unbelievable growing up thing is so precious, and it's easy to miss it. You don't pay enough attention.

One of my favorite 90 seconds is, uh, a little video that Gretchen Rubin made called The Days Are Long and the Years Are Short. Because when you start to have a kid, people say, oh boy, it goes by so quickly. It doesn't. Any one day seems eternal when you're taking care of a, of a helpless infant, and who doesn't want to sleep and is screaming. And if, uh, if you're lucky to have two, it gets twice as hard. And then three, you're playing shorthanded, uh, because you don't— there's only two of you if you're lucky.

And so, uh, paying attention is really hard. Uh, so that's one thing I, I'd say. Um, you know, I spent— you— I know you started asking about Wonder earlier, and I interrupted to, to add a, uh, some follow-up comment. But I think instilling in our children a sense of wonder is just, um, it's one of the most fun things about being a parent. I don't know if it sticks or makes a difference, but certainly that was part of my goal as a parent, was to make my students appreciate— my students, like my children— to make my children appreciate wonder, um, and awe and the transcendent, um, and, um, It's a beautiful thing. And they're, they're really tricky, Paul.

They, they, they go their own way. You can't help it. It's the way they're born. And it starts young. You know, they want to do their own thing, and you have different opinions sometimes. That could be challenging, but, um, enjoy it.

It's, um, it's wonderful. I hope.

[01:03:25] Paul: Yeah. David White says anything worth committing to will, uh, inevitably break your heart.

[01:03:32] Russ Roberts: And, uh, yeah, got that right. That's a hard, um, truth to accept. But I, I would recommend, by the way, um, check out Brian Doyle, One Long River of Song. I think that's what it's called. Um, a lot of that's about his experience as a parent.

[01:03:50] Paul: I thought you're going to recommend Brian Kaplan on parenting.

[01:03:53] Russ Roberts: No, no, I never— I wouldn't— I don't know. Not what I had in mind, Brian. I don't agree with Brian. Brian thinks that it doesn't matter how you raise your kids, they're going to turn out the same way no matter what. I don't agree, but he's got a lot of data.

[01:04:10] Paul: I will definitely, uh, check that out. You, you've done over 800 episodes of your podcast. Any dream guests still that you'd love to have on?

[01:04:19] Russ Roberts: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. I'm, I'm at around 880 right now. Uh, if you mean living, an important distinction. There are plenty of dead people I miss, uh, I did get to interview, uh, who were alive in my lifetime and I missed. But in terms of people I could interview now, I want, I want to interview Mark Knopfler, who I believe is the— he's like my favorite songwriter from Dire Straits days, and his solo career is even better than Dire Straits.

He's a brilliant poet and a brilliant guitarist and I'd love to interview him. I'd love to interview Tom Stoppard, who wrote my favorite play, Arcadia. Having said that, I've been blessed to interview Amor Towles and Mark Halperin, my two favorite living novelists. Um, so, and I've interviewed a lot of my favorite economists, uh, so I, I got no complaints. But if I could, the two that I'd like to get now are, uh, Mark Knopfler and, and Tom Stoppard, if they're listening. If either of you are listening, Mark, Tom, please get in touch, mail@econtalk.org, and we'll find a time.

[01:05:30] Paul: Maybe the power of the internet. Who is your favorite living economist?

[01:05:37] Russ Roberts: I'd have to— I can't answer that. I'd have to insult some friends of mine, many of whom would be in my top 5. But I don't want to pick one. It's, it's, uh, when I was younger, it would have been, it would have been someone like Milton Friedman or, um, Ronald Coase. I got to interview both of them. Um, and, uh, I don't know if there's anyone out there now that, that I'd long to interview or who I haven't gotten to.

Um, but many of them are my— have been my guests more than once on EconTalk. Learned a lot from them. Uh, so beautiful.

[01:06:14] Paul: Uh, what are you excited about, uh, in this current chapter, and what comes next for you?

[01:06:19] Russ Roberts: Well, I have a lot of things in my job that I'd like to achieve, uh, in terms of the quality of the— of what we do here and, and what programming we might add to what we do here at Shalem College in Jerusalem. Um, but I also have some books I want to write. I think still. I want to write a book on— I'm writing a book on prayer. Or at least I think I am. I've been doing it for a long time.

So there comes a point where you have to sometimes admit that you're not writing a book on prayer, you've written an essay on prayer. And that's it. There's nothing left. But I have a couple of other ideas, or books I'd like to write. And, you know, it's funny, when I interview somebody well, and if you feel this way, but when I interview somebody well, on my podcast and I learn something from them and I bring out from their book or their ideas something that I thought was said in a particularly powerful way, I just find that— I mean, I just— it makes my heart sing. I— so as long as I get thrills from that, which I still do, I think I'm going to do econ talk for a while and There's something fun about getting to 1,000 episodes.

I don't know, but I have a feeling I might just do it till I can't hear anymore. It's something of an addiction as much as it is a responsibility.

[01:07:44] Paul: I definitely feel the same. And this has— that's a good place to close. And this has been a thrilling experience for me. I want to close with a quote and you can say where people to find you, but listen to EconTalk. Um, to follow Russ, even if all you care about is having a good time during all too short time on this earth, you will struggle to anticipate what it is that will bring delight, pleasure, contentment. And most of us care about more than just having a good time.

We would like to find purpose and meaning from wild problems. Thank you for the conversation today, Russ.

[01:08:20] Russ Roberts: Thank you, Paul. It's great talking. Really enjoyed it.