Inside the Speed-Reading Mind of Marginal Revolutionary Tyler Cowen

Bloomberg has a very interesting profile out on the hyper-prolific economist, blogger, and author Tyler Cowen. It's filled with plenty of quirky personal details; here's more of a trophy-room section for those of you who aren't aware of Cowen's reh-zoo-may:

In January, Dutton published Cowen's e-book, "The Great Stagnation." It has shown up twice on the New York Times' e-book bestseller list. Dutton, a Penguin imprint, will release a hardcover edition on June 9, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its May 30 issue. […]

Tyler Cowen has read what's listed in Harold Bloom's "The Western Canon," though not, he concedes, every single last one of the Icelandic sagas. He rereads what you probably haven't heard of, like Anton Chekhov's "Sakhalin Island." […]

He has a PhD in economics from Harvard University and holds the Holbert C. Harris Chair of Economics at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, where he's taught since 1989. He runs the university's Mercatus Center, a libertarian think tank, and has published 15 books and over 60 academic articles. In May the American Institute for Economic Research asked academic economists to name their favorite economists under 60. Cowen ranked 16th, only five thinkers behind Ben S. Bernanke, the current chairman of the Federal Reserve.

Cowen is still best known for the blog he shares with Alex Tabarrok, "Marginal Revolution." The same survey listed Cowen and Tabarrok's blog as the second-most popular on economics. Greg Mankiw's eponymous blog at Harvard just edged it out; both picked up far more votes than Paul Krugman's New York Times blog "Conscience of a Liberal," which ranked third, or "Freakonomics," at fifth. That's among economists.

According to Compete.com, "Marginal Revolution" gets more unique visitors than any other blog in the AIER survey's list, except for Krugman's and "Freakonomics," both hosted by the New York Times.

Whole entertaining profile here.

Read Cowen's short 'n' sweet Reason archive here. We took two bites at the apple of The Great Stagnation–by Ronald Bailey and Brink Lindsey. You can see what Cowen had to say about The Declaration of Independents: How Libertarian Politics Can Fix What's Wrong with America, over at our brand spanking new Declaration2011 website. We also interviewed the Marginal Revolutionary in 2003, 2007, and again in 2009 (see below). Plenty more where that came from here.