Chris Neill 🐧
@chrisneill.bsky.social
Associate Professor, Economics (education, labour, public econ, policy) at Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, 🇨🇦.
Originally from 🇦🇺, I tend to prefer rivers that I can swim away in, rather than skate away on.
Originally from 🇦🇺, I tend to prefer rivers that I can swim away in, rather than skate away on.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Once again, I feel like I need to run some basic etiquette lessons for existing in public in a city/on the subway. The person going OUT the door goes first.
Then the person going in.
Hold doors for old people, people with strollers, kids.
Try to look up from phone when doing so.
Thank you.
Then the person going in.
Hold doors for old people, people with strollers, kids.
Try to look up from phone when doing so.
Thank you.
October 5, 2026 at 3:00 PM
Once again, I feel like I need to run some basic etiquette lessons for existing in public in a city/on the subway. The person going OUT the door goes first.
Then the person going in.
Hold doors for old people, people with strollers, kids.
Try to look up from phone when doing so.
Thank you.
Then the person going in.
Hold doors for old people, people with strollers, kids.
Try to look up from phone when doing so.
Thank you.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
CONFERENCE ANNOUNCEMENT! The 2027 Meeting of the Race and Stratification in the Economy Working Group at @nber.org will be held on April 2, 2027! The deadline for submissions is December 10,2026. Please Share!! More details are here: www.asc.ohio-state.edu/logan.155/pd...
www.asc.ohio-state.edu
October 5, 2026 at 1:47 PM
CONFERENCE ANNOUNCEMENT! The 2027 Meeting of the Race and Stratification in the Economy Working Group at @nber.org will be held on April 2, 2027! The deadline for submissions is December 10,2026. Please Share!! More details are here: www.asc.ohio-state.edu/logan.155/pd...
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
"If you were to completely cancel and refund all of the money spent on bike lanes, even in the last 10 years in the city of Calgary, you wouldn't even barely be able to afford just one single interchange that's built in the suburbs," -Mayor Farkas @jeromyyyc.bsky.social
#yycbike #Calgary
#yycbike #Calgary
Councillor wants Calgary to pause new bike lanes ahead of upcoming provincial legislation | CBC News
With the province expected to take more authority over municipal bike lanes in the months ahead, one Calgary councillor wants the city to pause any new bike lane projects in the meantime.
www.cbc.ca
October 5, 2026 at 12:45 PM
"If you were to completely cancel and refund all of the money spent on bike lanes, even in the last 10 years in the city of Calgary, you wouldn't even barely be able to afford just one single interchange that's built in the suburbs," -Mayor Farkas @jeromyyyc.bsky.social
#yycbike #Calgary
#yycbike #Calgary
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Fine motor skills are important at any age. Over the weekend, I crocheted this alpha motor neuron innervating a muscle.☺️
October 5, 2026 at 8:34 AM
Fine motor skills are important at any age. Over the weekend, I crocheted this alpha motor neuron innervating a muscle.☺️
Sure theories can show this under particular conditions like perfect information on the part of the benevolent dictator, the same way markets are efficient under particular conditions like no monopolies. Anyone who thinks about it realizes that the conditions don't generally hold but.
“Democracy has been hailed as, like, the holy grail for the last couple hundred years, but democracies are inefficient,” said the crypto billionaire. “If you get a benevolent dictator, it’s actually extremely efficient."
Hmm, where have I heard this before?
www.nytimes.com/2026/10/01/b...
Hmm, where have I heard this before?
www.nytimes.com/2026/10/01/b...
Inside a Billionaire’s Paradise With Crypto’s Most Powerful Ex-Convict (Gift Article)
Changpeng Zhao, jailed in the United States for a financial crime and pardoned by President Trump, is now living a gilded life in the United Arab Emirates.
www.nytimes.com
October 6, 2026 at 1:09 AM
Sure theories can show this under particular conditions like perfect information on the part of the benevolent dictator, the same way markets are efficient under particular conditions like no monopolies. Anyone who thinks about it realizes that the conditions don't generally hold but.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Tongfen v0.3.9 is now on CRAN. This fixes the problem introduced by StatCan blocking programmatic data download starting last week, we now host the correspondence files independently. This restores package functionality at the cost of complicating data provenance.
Make Data Based on Different Geographies Comparable
Several functions to allow comparisons of data across different geographies, in particular for Canadian census data from different censuses.
mountainmath.github.io
October 5, 2026 at 3:58 PM
Tongfen v0.3.9 is now on CRAN. This fixes the problem introduced by StatCan blocking programmatic data download starting last week, we now host the correspondence files independently. This restores package functionality at the cost of complicating data provenance.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
A tribute to Chuck Blackorby, @ubcvse.bsky.social Professor Emeritus who recently passed away.
Thanks to Walter Bossert and John Weymark for writing.
economics.ubc.ca/profile/char...
Thanks to Walter Bossert and John Weymark for writing.
economics.ubc.ca/profile/char...
Charles Blackorby - Vancouver School of Economics
economics.ubc.ca
October 5, 2026 at 6:07 PM
A tribute to Chuck Blackorby, @ubcvse.bsky.social Professor Emeritus who recently passed away.
Thanks to Walter Bossert and John Weymark for writing.
economics.ubc.ca/profile/char...
Thanks to Walter Bossert and John Weymark for writing.
economics.ubc.ca/profile/char...
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
The red-belly black who lives on and around our place is very big and very — no other way to put it — courteous. Respects our space, tolerates us, clears out for the kids, I suspect, most days. The snake was obviously close by while the boys played and waited until we'd left.
October 5, 2026 at 8:02 AM
The red-belly black who lives on and around our place is very big and very — no other way to put it — courteous. Respects our space, tolerates us, clears out for the kids, I suspect, most days. The snake was obviously close by while the boys played and waited until we'd left.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
What’s the word for a book that you’ve been meaning to read for years, finally do so, and then you’re blown away?
October 4, 2026 at 9:33 PM
What’s the word for a book that you’ve been meaning to read for years, finally do so, and then you’re blown away?
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Behavioral economics gives us a new way to understand why homicides surged during the pandemic, then plummeted, from Jens Ludwig www.nber.org/papers/w35827
October 4, 2026 at 3:02 PM
Behavioral economics gives us a new way to understand why homicides surged during the pandemic, then plummeted, from Jens Ludwig www.nber.org/papers/w35827
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
What happens when you put a daycare and a long-term care home under one roof? A little bit of magic for old and young alike, they learned at Perley Health, by Sabrina Bedford
ottawacitizen.com/news/childre... via @ottawacitizen.com @alexmunter.bsky.social
ottawacitizen.com/news/childre... via @ottawacitizen.com @alexmunter.bsky.social
What happens when you put a daycare and a long-term care home under one roof
Retired major Doug Bird, a resident of Perley Health, didn't get many visitors. Now he has 39 little ones waving hello every day.
ottawacitizen.com
October 4, 2026 at 11:56 PM
What happens when you put a daycare and a long-term care home under one roof? A little bit of magic for old and young alike, they learned at Perley Health, by Sabrina Bedford
ottawacitizen.com/news/childre... via @ottawacitizen.com @alexmunter.bsky.social
ottawacitizen.com/news/childre... via @ottawacitizen.com @alexmunter.bsky.social
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Fantastic read here:
Anthropic’s policy of matching employees charitable donations with donations of stock is...pretty dilutive!
www.theinformation.com/articles/ant...
Anthropic’s policy of matching employees charitable donations with donations of stock is...pretty dilutive!
www.theinformation.com/articles/ant...
October 4, 2026 at 9:30 PM
Fantastic read here:
Anthropic’s policy of matching employees charitable donations with donations of stock is...pretty dilutive!
www.theinformation.com/articles/ant...
Anthropic’s policy of matching employees charitable donations with donations of stock is...pretty dilutive!
www.theinformation.com/articles/ant...
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Better cross-country data and measurement have raised the contribution of inputs—mostly human capital—in accounting for international differences in GDP per worker, from @LagakosDavid and @todd_schoellman www.nber.org/papers/w35826
October 4, 2026 at 2:01 PM
Better cross-country data and measurement have raised the contribution of inputs—mostly human capital—in accounting for international differences in GDP per worker, from @LagakosDavid and @todd_schoellman www.nber.org/papers/w35826
A long ago study from Oz showed property taxes are efficient revenue raisers wrt domestic welfare, because they fall partly on foreigners.
But seems this change, hitting a potentially dd-elastic group with deliberate efforts to make it maximally salient might not deliver the forecast revenue.
But seems this change, hitting a potentially dd-elastic group with deliberate efforts to make it maximally salient might not deliver the forecast revenue.
It is as if they *want* Canadians to boycott them. www.cbc.ca/news/world/f...
Florida weighs ditching property taxes and sticking Canadians with the bill | CBC News
Florida voters are weighing whether to scrap residential property taxes and the state's governor has a solution to that potentially huge revenue loss: tax Canadians more.
www.cbc.ca
October 4, 2026 at 2:24 PM
A long ago study from Oz showed property taxes are efficient revenue raisers wrt domestic welfare, because they fall partly on foreigners.
But seems this change, hitting a potentially dd-elastic group with deliberate efforts to make it maximally salient might not deliver the forecast revenue.
But seems this change, hitting a potentially dd-elastic group with deliberate efforts to make it maximally salient might not deliver the forecast revenue.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Yes! Some already do this, e.g. City of Vancouver Open Data portal now serves parquet files.
StatCan unfortunately does not, but the cansim, canivt, and canpumf R packages all use parquet or DuckDB under the hood now to increase performance for users after download.
StatCan unfortunately does not, but the cansim, canivt, and canpumf R packages all use parquet or DuckDB under the hood now to increase performance for users after download.
Blows my mind that in 2026 Parquet is not yet the absolute default for data sharing
A few years back there was a lovely talk at @rohanalexander.bsky.social 's Toronto Data Workshop by some students who articulated one of my soapboxes far better than I ever have: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Evcn...
A few years back there was a lovely talk at @rohanalexander.bsky.social 's Toronto Data Workshop by some students who articulated one of my soapboxes far better than I ever have: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Evcn...
Exploring Alternatives to REST for Accessing Public Data Sets
YouTube video by Rohan Alexander
www.youtube.com
October 3, 2026 at 11:44 PM
Yes! Some already do this, e.g. City of Vancouver Open Data portal now serves parquet files.
StatCan unfortunately does not, but the cansim, canivt, and canpumf R packages all use parquet or DuckDB under the hood now to increase performance for users after download.
StatCan unfortunately does not, but the cansim, canivt, and canpumf R packages all use parquet or DuckDB under the hood now to increase performance for users after download.
Voting is quicker in Canada, but way more fun in Australia.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democra.... #USpol #USA In Australia we can eat and drink whilst in line on election day. In fact because our elections are compulsory and held on a Saturday, School halls are used as polling Stations. Schools fundraise by selling food and drink. We celebrate our Democracy.
Democracy sausage - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
October 3, 2026 at 7:00 PM
Voting is quicker in Canada, but way more fun in Australia.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Good Saturday morning to everyone except StatCan, who decided to break reproducible workflows by disabling programmatic data download for some of their data and put it behind a Cloudflare "human" check. Leaving me to decide whether to remove cancensus package functionality or re-host the data.
StatCan disabled programmatic download on some census data · Issue #228 · mountainMath/cancensus
StatCan has disabled programmatic download on the attributes file and geographic data and possibly other files. These are now behind a CloudFlare verification that requires manual interactive downl...
github.com
October 3, 2026 at 5:39 PM
Good Saturday morning to everyone except StatCan, who decided to break reproducible workflows by disabling programmatic data download for some of their data and put it behind a Cloudflare "human" check. Leaving me to decide whether to remove cancensus package functionality or re-host the data.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
In 1974, Cornell lecturer Lin Farley began recognizing a pattern in the experiences women shared in her Women and Work course: women were being pushed out of jobs by men’s sexual behavior. Farley coined the term, “sexual harassment.”
October 3, 2026 at 12:00 PM
In 1974, Cornell lecturer Lin Farley began recognizing a pattern in the experiences women shared in her Women and Work course: women were being pushed out of jobs by men’s sexual behavior. Farley coined the term, “sexual harassment.”
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
Wisteria tree at Ashikaga Flower Park, Japan. Photography by KotHat on photohito
October 3, 2026 at 3:07 PM
Wisteria tree at Ashikaga Flower Park, Japan. Photography by KotHat on photohito
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
October 3, 2026 at 6:39 AM
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
This is a good article and I would love to see the play. It reminds me yet again how today’s economics is so apparently utilitarian, yet so uninterested in the actual wellsprings of utility.
It is not a sensible discipline from which to draw your philosopher kings.
www.ft.com/content/c13f...
It is not a sensible discipline from which to draw your philosopher kings.
www.ft.com/content/c13f...
John Maynard Keynes and the search for the good life
Playwright James Graham on an economist who asked the right questions in bad times — and why he matters so much today
www.ft.com
October 3, 2026 at 8:11 AM
This is a good article and I would love to see the play. It reminds me yet again how today’s economics is so apparently utilitarian, yet so uninterested in the actual wellsprings of utility.
It is not a sensible discipline from which to draw your philosopher kings.
www.ft.com/content/c13f...
It is not a sensible discipline from which to draw your philosopher kings.
www.ft.com/content/c13f...
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
We don’t need to panic about AI. We need to hold its creators accountable when things go wrong.
We don’t need to panic about AI. We need to hold its creators accountable when things go wrong
If a chatbot prompt like ‘find Australian medicine statistics’ results in a website breach, the responsibility does not lie with a piece of code
johnquigginblog.substack.com
October 3, 2026 at 7:38 AM
We don’t need to panic about AI. We need to hold its creators accountable when things go wrong.
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
The South Asian population has become a huge target in Canada by far-right extremists hell bent on “remmigration”. www.isdglobal.org/digital-disp...
October 2, 2026 at 5:28 PM
The South Asian population has become a huge target in Canada by far-right extremists hell bent on “remmigration”. www.isdglobal.org/digital-disp...
Reposted by Chris Neill 🐧
This is great, but also quite unfortunate that the data comes with a very restrictive licence. Just the other day I was looking into what it would take to add this data to campumf, but only the 1881 data come with an Open Data license. Maybe another effort to transcribe these can resolve that.
October 2, 2026 at 8:03 PM
This is great, but also quite unfortunate that the data comes with a very restrictive licence. Just the other day I was looking into what it would take to add this data to campumf, but only the 1881 data come with an Open Data license. Maybe another effort to transcribe these can resolve that.