Episode 10: Behavioral Economist Dan Ariely + FIFA’s Strange Business Decisions

Title: Dan Ariely, Duke University professor of psychology and behavorial economics and NYT best selling author.

Dan Ariely's career started in a hospital bed. 

In his senior year in high school, while a trainee in the Israeli military, a magnesium flare exploded next to him. The resulting burns covered 70 percent of his body and left him in horrendous pain, trapped in bandages and isolated in a hospital for three years. During that time, he developed a sense of detachment. He watched the world around him and wondered why things were happening to him; why nurses and doctors were making certain decision and wondering if there was a better way. That sense of being an outsider continued as he healed and launched his path as a behavioral economist, studying why humans made the decisions they did. Ariely talks to Evan and returning guest-host Dan about how the experience shaped him, how it's influenced how he leads his life, and how he runs his business (he sold his management app, Timeful, to Google earlier this year). Along the way, he offers some surprising findings about what makes us save (and what doesn't) and more.

Dan and Evan start the show talking about FIFA and the amazing corruption that soccer's governing body apparently reveled in. Dan asks: Could out-going president Sepp Blatter and his lieutenants still have accomplished their main goal — creating terrific soccer (just kidding! Creating tremendous wealth) — without running afoul of the U.S. government? Evan struggles to see the genius in Dan's business parallels. 

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