Contacts: 
Pat Suhrcke, Director
(617) 495-2727  
email: Public Events@cambridgeforum.org                            
Press Release
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NUDGE: IMPROVING DECISIONS ABOUT HEALTH, WEALTH, AND HAPPINESS

7:30 p.m., Wednesday, NOVEMBER 12, 2008
Cambridge Forum
3 Church Street
Cambridge, MA

Free and Open to the Public

Why do consumers insist on having the most up-to-date features when buying a new technical product, such as a cell phone, yet, once owned, keep the default settings? Why do people who get paid bi-weekly–not monthly–save more? Forty years of social science research now better informs about how real humans actually make economic choices in real life–not rational, lots of mistakes, and the desire to keep the status quo.

Should the government, recognizing these human limitations, adopt a “Libertarian Paternalism” in public policy on a range of social issues: such as, obesity, health, retirement savings and fuel economy policy? Or, is this over-reaching of individual freedom by forcing us to be “good”?

Cass Sunstein will address these questions when he presents his book, Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness on November 12 at Cambridge Forum. Cass R. Sunstein, is newly appointed Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at the Harvard Law School and the first director of its new Program on Risk Regulation. Formerly, he was tenured professor at the University of Chicago Law School.

Richard Thaler, co-author, is Ralph and Dorothy Keller Distinguished Service Professor of Behavioral Science and Economics and Director of the Center for Decision Research, Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago.

Book signing courtesy of Harvard Book Store follow the program. 
Cambridge Forums are free and open to the public. Book signing will follow 
program. Open discussion follows speaker presentation. Events are recorded 
for public radio broadcast. CDs and tapes are available.  Call 617-495-2727.  
Forums can also be viewed online: Go to www.cambridgeforum.org and click on the 
WGBH Forum Network.

Cambridge Forum 
3 Church Street 
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone/fax:  617-495-2727
email: director@cambridgeforum.org
website:  http://www.cambridgeforum.org 

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