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Is the pencil underrated? Tim Harford examines the role pencils have played in developing our world, and finds out why some writers have called them a "miracle of the free market". Do they have a point?

Available now

10 minutes

Last on

Mon 24 Jun 2019 03:50GMT

Image credit

Graphite pencils (Credit: Benoit Tessier/Reuters)

Sources

Henry Petroski - The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance, Faber and Faber London 1989

Milton Friedman, Free to Choose, PBS 1980

Eric Voice "History of the Manufacture of Pencils" 1950 Transactions of the Newcomen Society

Broadcasts

  • Sat 22 Jun 2019 04:50GMT
  • Sat 22 Jun 2019 13:50GMT
  • Sun 23 Jun 2019 14:50GMT
  • Sun 23 Jun 2019 21:50GMT
  • Sun 23 Jun 2019 22:50GMT
  • Mon 24 Jun 2019 03:50GMT

Podcast