From the Beatles to Macklemore: Economics in Music in the Pop Culture Era

Abstract

Economists have explored the relationship between economics and music since Tinari and Khandke (2000) made use of popular songs, dating back to the 1930s, to help teach economics. This paper takes the work of Tinari and Khandke and combines it with the more recent efforts of Mateer and Rice (2007) and Hall, Lawson and Mateer (2008) to create a database of the best economic songs for each year from 1964 through 2015. The database provides a historical timeline that helps instructors connect economic events from the past with the music of that time period. For each song selected, we provide the core economic concept(s) that it conveys and a sample of the relevant lyrics.