WTF?!

An Economic Tour of the Weird

Stanford Economics and Finance 2017 264pp, illus, notes, ind, $27.95, IDBN 9781503600911

This book is what happens when a professor of economics and law with a love of the curious examines what looks like irrational behaviour. (Spoiler alert: it isn’t.) Take, for instance, the apparently misogynistic public auctions of pre-owned wives in 19th century England. The women had a veto, and the evidence suggests they traded up financially. One welcomed the transaction as “the happiest moment of her life”, and her husband escaped the legal requirement to provide bed and board. A snappy discussion on indirect Coasean bargaining ensues, expanded in the Notes for Nerds appendix. The sales ended only when they stopped being useful – basically, when married women gained property and child custody rights. Like the other examples, this is an ingenious, incentive-driven solution to a contemporary problem. And so on to Gypsy superstition, cursing monks, judicial combat and the rest… Excellent.