Grow the Economy, Career Choice, Talking to Children

Dr. John Short, Professor of Public Policy at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. The state of our economy is one of the greatest concerns facing the nation. With massive public concern and the topic over taking the current presidential diabetes, many are looking for answers to solve our economic woes. According Dr. Short those answer may lie within our cities. Dr. Short’s recent article, “Want the economy to grow? It’s time to look at cities and efficiency,” discuss the need for growth and expansion in our cities. Dr. Short explains more about the future of the nation's economy.

If you’ve ever lived in an apartment, or checked into a hotel, you’ve probably experienced some noise that you didn’t like: like loud stomping upstairs, music blasting through walls, or even a baby crying nonstop. Whether the perpetrator is oblivious to the noise they’re making, or just doesn’t care, there’s one thing that we know for sure: you can’t block out all noise. That’s just life. But what do we do when other people’s noises start affecting our quality of life—maybe we start losing sleep, or we can’t concentrate on our work? And worse yet, what if the noises can’t be contained because they don’t come from something that can be reasoned with? Madeleine Dresden, our Life Lessons segment producer, discusses what it’s like to have to deal with nice neighbors who have, as she calls them, Velociraptor children.

Dr. Jonathan Schulz is a research fellow in experimental economics at Yale studying cross-cultural differences in human behavior. As a child you may have known exactly what you wanted to be when you grew up. Options ranged from firefighter to doctor to artist. Then you hit college and real life settles in. You eventually choose a career, but how confident were you in your career choice? With statistics indicating that only 27% of college graduates get a job related to their major, it’s easy to be uncertain. Our guest today is Dr. Schulz recently conducted a study looking at over-confidence in career choice.

Julie Nelson (the "Child Whisperer") has a master's degree in Marriage, Family, and Human Development. She teaches classes such as Applied Parenting and Marriage and Relationship Skills at Utah Valley University. Dr. Matt and Julie talk about  developing communications skills by listening to children.