Our Most-Read Stories of 2025
This year, our faculty and alumni provided expertise on pressing issues including political polarization, sports gambling, tariffs, public education, the business of the arts, and the seismic impact of AI.
Small Changes, Big Results: Research-Backed Tips for Living a Good Life in 2025
January 06, 2025
We asked Yale SOM faculty for their best tips on living happily, healthily, and productively in the new year.
The Key Information Hiding Behind ‘Consensus’ Target Stock Prices
January 21, 2025
Ordinary investors generally can only see an average of analysts’ target prices for a given stock. In a new study, Yale SOM’s Thomas Steffen and Frank Zhang find that when the degree of variation within that “consensus” figure is large, it’s a bad sign for future returns.
AI Photo Analysis Illuminates How Personality Traits Predict Career Trajectories
January 30, 2025
Recent advancements in AI have made it possible to infer personality traits from a single photograph of a person’s face. A new study co-authored by Yale SOM’s Kelly Shue applies these techniques to a large set of photos of MBA graduates to assess the effects of personality on labor market outcomes.
Why Do Museums Matter?
February 06, 2025
Daniel Weiss ’85, former president and CEO of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, discusses the distinctive joys and challenges of leading mission-driven organizations.
Do Oscar Wins Pay Off?
February 25, 2025
We asked Prof. Abraham Ravid, who studies the economics of the film business, to break down the financial stakes of Hollywood’s biggest night.
The Funding Crisis Facing Nonprofits
March 06, 2025
We talked to Andrea Levere ’83 and Alexandra Sing ’20, CEO and COO of Capitalize Good, about the state of the social sector and the increased urgency of their work working with funders and nonprofits to move toward a model of stable, long-term capital.
Free Pre-K Gives Parents’ Income a Long-Lasting Boost
March 10, 2025
Prof. Seth Zimmerman and his co-authors found that parents with kids in New Haven’s lottery-based pre-K program earn thousands of dollars more per year than their peers, likely because they are able to work longer hours and make more progress in their careers.
When Is It OK to Use Connections to Land a Job?
April 09, 2025
New research co-authored by Yale SOM’s Laura Adler explores how people reconcile conflicting beliefs about the roles of social capital and merit in the job search. Their results show that widely held attitudes about when it’s acceptable to make use of connections can help perpetuate inequality.
Can AI Replace Human Debt Collectors?
May 20, 2025
New research co-authored by Yale SOM Professor James Choi finds that people are less likely to follow through on a commitment to repay a debt if it’s made to an AI agent. The finding hints at one area where humans may always retain an advantage over bots.
Will Self-Driving Cars Lower Ride-Hailing Prices?
June 16, 2025
Lower cost is one anticipated advantage of incorporating autonomous vehicles (AVs) into ride-hailing services. But a study co-authored by Prof. Zhen Lian suggests that lower prices will only materialize under certain market conditions, such as using a single app for both AVs and human drivers.
Beauty, Power, Art, and Finance
July 16, 2025
Art, money, and power twist together in complex ways, in a dynamic that may be older than humans. In his research, Yale SOM’s William Goetzmann traces the social meaning of art and money and the ways they set pecking orders, create art superstars, and blow up into senseless bubbles.
In the Wake of the Pandemic, Flexible Work Arrangements Made Workers Less Likely to Start Their Own Businesses
August 12, 2025
Flexibility has long been a selling point for entrepreneurship. But COVID-19 helped make flexible arrangements more of a norm. A new study co-authored by Yale SOM’s John Barrios shows how this shift in workplace norms changed who starts businesses.
For Women, Female Peer Groups Are Crucial for Career Advancement
August 20, 2025
When women have more female peers in their MBA programs, they are more likely to reach senior management roles, according to a new study co-authored by Yale SOM’s Menaka Hampole.
A Model for Understanding
August 27, 2025
While the rest of the world races to pour huge amounts of data into AI systems, operations research expert Edward Kaplan is focused on what he calls “little data”: finding the right mathematical model to illuminate a business or public policy problem when you have limited information.
Why Is Enrollment Plunging in the Public Schools?
September 02, 2025
Public school enrollment has dropped sharply since COVID-19, with some students moving to private or charter schools and others leaving the system entirely, according to a new report co-authored by Prof. Faidra Monachou.
The Corporation Is Centuries Older than We Thought
September 15, 2025
The genesis of the joint-stock company is usually traced to the founding of the English East India Company and the Dutch East India Company around 1600. New research co-authored by Prof. William Goetzmann says this origin story may be off by centuries.
How Nations Use Economic Power to Shape the World Order
October 01, 2025
Yale SOM’s Christopher Clayton is helping to pioneer the field of geoeconomics, which explains how countries wield economic weapons to reshape global power dynamics—and what happens when they go too far.
What Is a Nonprofit for?
October 2, 2025
Is a nonprofit simply an organization that doesn’t make a profit? Economist Judith Chevalier, who teaches Yale SOM’s Strategic Management of Nonprofits course, explains when the nonprofit model works better than a for-profit approach, how nonprofits compete, and how nonprofit organizations are reinvigorating old industries.
Do the New Obesity Drugs Pay for Themselves?
October 07, 2025
Could expensive drugs like Ozempic save healthcare systems money by reducing the risk of obesity-associated diseases? A new study co-authored by Yale SOM’s Jason Abaluck suggests that other health expenses may actually increase over the first couple years of treatment.
This Is How the AI Bubble Bursts
October 08, 2025
Yale SOM leadership expert Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and co-author Stephen Henriques write that the tangle of AI deals among tech giants could be signs of dangerous overinvestment in the developing technology. They outline three ways the bubble could pop.
The Top Ten AI Competitors
October 23, 2025
The mammoth investments pouring into artificial intelligence companies are remaking the high-tech industry. Former SOM Dean Ted Snyder and investor Logan Bender ’19 assess which leading companies are likely to keep their advantage and which could be crushed by the rolling wave of innovation.
How Gambling Is Transforming the Experience of Sports
November 06, 2025
We asked Professor Nathan Novemsky, who has examined the psychology of gambling in multiple studies, how the ubiquity of betting is changing the way we watch sports.
An Interactive Tool Helps School Districts Redesign Their Bus Schedules—and Get Kids a Little More Sleep
November 25, 2025
Yale SOM operations scholar Zhen Lian and her co-authors created an interactive tool that helped San Francisco reach consensus on school schedules, move start times later, and save millions of dollars in transportation costs.
A Different Kind of Wedge Issue: What Golf Reveals About Working Across Ideological Lines
December 03, 2025
How do political differences affect workplace performance? A study of professional golfers, co-authored by Yale SOM’s Balázs Kovács, suggests that working alongside someone of the opposite political orientation may dampen the ability to execute tasks successfully.