Nobel Prize-winner and co-author of Nudge Richard Thaler and rising star economist Alex Imas
explore behavioral economics in this fully updated edition of the seminal work The Winner's
Curse Why do people cooperate with one another when they have no incentive to do so? Why do
we hold onto possessions of little value? And why is the winner of an auction so often
disappointed? Over thirty years ago Richard Thaler introduced readers to behavioral economics
in his seminal Anomalies column written with collaborators including Daniel Kahneman and Amos
Tversky. These provocative articles challenged the fundamental idea at the heart of economics
that people are selfish rational optimizers and provided the foundation for what became
behavioral economics. That was then. Now three decades later Thaler has teamed up with
economist Alex Imas to write a new book. Every chapter starts with an original Anomaly
retaining the spirit of its timestamp. Then shifting to the present they provide current
updates to each asking how the original findings have held up and how the field has evolved
since then. It turns out these findings still show up almost everywhere. Anomalies pop up in
people's decisions to save for retirement and how they carry outstanding credit card debt. Even
experts fail to optimize. The key concept of loss aversion explains missed putts by golf pros
and the selection of which stocks to sell by portfolio managers. In this era of meme stocks and
Dogecoin it is hard to defend the view that financial markets are highly efficient. The good
news however is that the anomalies have got much funnier. With both readability and rigor
The Winner's Curse illuminates these ideas for anyone - from those with a cursory understanding
of economics to fellow economists. Each chapter provides a key insight into human behavior so
readers learn how to better understand the choices made by their friends colleagues and
customers and might just become better at making decisions themselves.
