COFFEE & BISCUITS

When I was in Berkeley, I had some friends who had taken Intermediate Microeconomics with David Card, and they had often talked about how this professor kindled their passion for economics. Curious about how this professor could inspire people around me so, I went to his talk on how to do research in economics.

At the end of his talk, I went up to him to ask a question that has been bothering me. My current research approach. This is timely because I have been struggling with my thesis proposal these weeks. My adviser has been tough on my proposal, and said, “You need to go through that struggling period.” And struggled I did.

Anyway, so I asked David Card, given a circumstance like mine (I will not bore you with details here), how would he go on. He asked the following question: “Is the observation unit an agent who maximizes?” (You see, a maestro will ask questions of such specificity). He gave the answer.

I exited the room, sort of moping.

But it was very nice to have heard him speak today. He, the guy who inspired such passion for economics for Jessica and Anderson!