One of the big take-aways from a lot of economic theory is that people should engage in consumption smoothing.

Prenatal testing is a complicated decision for many women, forcing us to confront concerns about a disabled child and risks of miscarriage.

The key to good decision making is evaluating the available information - the data - and combining it with your own estimates of pluses and minuses. As an economist, I do this every day.

For many women - myself included - pregnancy brings on tremendous anxiety and confusion, along with the joy.

Good household decision-making often relies on thinking about your household like a firm.

All's fair in love and purchasing.

I think we've moved to thinking of parenting and pregnancy as something in which you should lose yourself.

There is some risk to increase birth defects if you do a lot of outdoor gardening when you are pregnant. That can increase rates of toxoplasmosis.

In short, humans are programmed to get bored.

Talking to women about birth can be polarizing.

As people do a task, they improve at it.

I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality.

Politicians pay more attention to interest groups than to the public interest.

I was always taught my do's and don'ts: For do's I did, and for don'ts, I said I won't.

Out of my great sorrows, I make little songs.

I love Coldplay. I love Steely Dan - Steely Dan's probably one of my top three bands of all time.

Art is not boosterism, it's not propaganda, and it's not spin, but that's not something that art does, and nor has it historically ever done it.

Counting the ways the Book of Mormon brings peace to the soul is like counting the sand on the seashore.

This possibility bothered me as I thought it was not advisable to remain in one academic environment, and the long dark winters in Edinburgh could be rather dismal.

“You don't have to be in shape to bowl. It's the only sport where there's a way to signal for a cocktail waitress.”

I don't want there to always be this stigma of the "female" artist. "Oh, what does it feel like to be a female doing something?" That hurts me.