Two years ago, I left for a sabbatical at Harvard Business School. During my time at HBS, I spent many Friday afternoons at the famous Harvard economic history seminar. You can click here to read a recent article about the prospects for economic history at Harvard (hat tip - Ryan Kee). Economic and business history is also thriving at HBS - click here to learn more. Business history has significant place in the curriculum at HBS, with MBA students taking courses in business history and the history of capitalism. It is my firm belief that students in business schools need to have a better grounding in history if they are to understand capitalism.
According to Robert Shiller , speaking at Davos, Bitcoin is a perfect example of a bubble - story here . Shiller sees Bitcoin as a backwards step in the evolution of money. George Selgin , a free banker, takes an opposing view - click here . Although he doesn't believe that Bitcoin is money, he sees its development as a fascinating turn in the evolution of money. In particular, he lauds the fact that Bitcoin production is constrained and cannot be infinite. There is a short video below where Bitcoin explain how it works.