People I (Mostly) Admire

He’s a Harvard physician and economist who just started a third job: host of the new podcast Freakonomics, M.D. He’s also Steve’s former student. The two discuss why medicine should embrace econ-style research, the ethics of human-challenge trials, and Bapu’s role in one of Steve’s, ahem, less-than-successful experiments. This episode originally aired on August 21st, 2021.

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Is the oxymoron really “the secret sauce to everything”? That’s the case Ingels makes in this debut episode of our new video show Better in Person, filmed in Stephen Dubner’s living room.


If you'd like to see the video version of Better in Person, you can watch it on YouTube or Apple Podcasts.



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He argues that personal finance is so simple all you need to know can fit on an index card. How will he deal with Steve’s suggestion that Harold’s nine rules for managing money are overly complicated? Harold and Steve also talk about gun violence — a topic Harold researches as a public-policy professor at the University of Chicago — and they propose some radical ideas for reducing it. This episode originally aired on August 13th, 2021.

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She’s the C.E.O. of Zoox, an autonomous vehicle company. Steve asks Aicha about the big promises the A.V. industry hasn’t yet delivered — and the radical bet Zoox is making on a driverless future. Plus, Steve wants to know how she’s maintained her spark. This episode originally aired on August 6th, 2021.

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Steve continues his conversation with his good friend, MacArthur “Genius Grant” recipient, and fellow University of Chicago economist. Sendhil breaks down the hypothesis of his book Scarcity, explains why machines aren’t competition for human intelligence, and tells Steve why it’s important to appreciate other people’s good ideas before developing your own. This episode originally aired on July 30th, 2026.

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