Based on the popularity of pitch sessions run by organizations such as Startup America Partnership, the Case Foundation Pitch-It Competition will allow a select group of Aspen Scholars to compete in a public forum for grant dollars. In front of a judging panel including Jean Case, Steve Case, Jerry Murdock, and others, the scholars will have five minutes each to convince these judges that they deserve funding. Join us for a chance to hear stories about big bets, experimentation, and failing...

If you could change your (or others’) behavior, say, around weight loss, savings plans, the high school dropout dilemma, or worker productivity, how might you do it? Can you? The field of behavioral economics examines psychology as it evaluates economic decision-making. We’re not always as rational as we think we are. Three of the country’s top experts in the field of behavioral economics will get you thinking. Sendhil Mullainathan Eldar Shafir David Laibson

The Dow reaches an all-time high, yet the economy is still considered fragile. Consumer confidence is rising, yet unemployment remains unacceptable. How do markets relate to economic realities in the short run and in the long run? What effects do the Fed and government policies have on the markets? What are our economic prospects now and over time? Speakers: David M. Rubenstein, Robert Rubin, David Leonhardt

Cyber espionage and cyber attacks, specifically, could represent an enormous, perhaps catastrophic event for the global financial system. What can we do to secure our financial institutions? Speakers: Tim Pawlenty, Kevin J. Delaney, Mike McConnell

The United States and China may be divided by political culture and belief, but they are bound together by mutual self-interest. As acclaimed Harvard Law professor Noah Feldman examines the past and current global economic dynamics between East and West, he makes a compelling case for competitive cooperation as the only way forward that can preserve the peace and make winners out of both sides.

Fiscal cliffs, debt ceilings, sequestration—it’s easy to dismiss our budget crises as a passing fad, but there is a very real problem here, and it’s that we, the voters, can’t make the tough choices. In this timely book, David Leonhardt, the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times economic columnist and Washington bureau chief, offers a radically sensible plan for closing our deficit, shifting spending to investing, and getting us back to growth. Speakers: Ruth Marcus, David Leonhardt

Jacob J. Lew is the current United States Secretary of the Treasury, serving since 2013. He served as the 25th White House Chief of Staff from 2012 to 2013.

If you were choosing today, would you choose fruit or chocolate for next week? Why is it so hard to stick with our plans to eat well, save more, pay off our debts, take our medication, and exercise? Why do we join health clubs that we rarely visit? Why is there a persistent gap between our good intentions and our actions? How can we design social institutions that empower our good intentions, enabling us to resist the lure of instant gratification? These are the questions that Harvard...

Showcasing the power of innovative public-private partnerships, Walter Isaacson will moderate a panel discussion with Goldman Sachs Chairman and CEO Lloyd Blankfein, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, Huffington Post President and Editor-in-Chief Arianna Huffington, and Margaret Spellings, former US secretary of education. The panel will explore the importance of small businesses to municipal economies as well as the importance of establishing and scaling local economic development...

The Case Foundation’s Be Fearless campaign inspires a more fearless approach to creating lasting change. We'll discuss risk-taking, bold solutions, and failing forward. The foundation's founders Steve and Jean Case will frame the challenges we face as a society when it comes to being fearless in thinking big about social change. Speakers: Jean Case, Steve Case, Andrea Mitchell

How can we become more innovative about solving the problems of poverty? What kind of leadership is needed to do so? Jacqueline Novogratz and Chris Anderson are speakers.

Vivek Wadhwa, a leading scholar and public voice on entrepreneurship and public policy, makes clear that the issue is not simply the threat of reverse brain drain but a newly identified and historically unprecedented halt in high-growth, immigrant-founded start-ups. The United States hasn’t yet responded to the intensifying competition that countries such as China and India offer and has left some of the most educated and talented entrepreneurial immigrants with no choice but to take their...

A discussion with Speakers: Bruce J. Katz and Walter Isaacson

Work today is about more than income: it's a platform for purpose, fulfillment, and even happiness. Yet as work continues to evolve with our society, many are increasingly left out. Join us for a conversation on the future of work and shape a new vision that is both satisfying and inclusive for all of us. Jocelyn Wyatt, Austan Goolsbee, Patrice Martin, and Elaine L. Chao are featured here.

Marcus Samuelsson, born in Ethiopia and raised in Sweden, moved to Harlem after 9/11, searching for a sense of community that he hadn’t experienced in the New York of haute cuisine — which he had helped reshape when cooking at the midtown restaurant Aquavit. Not only did he find a richer, more cosmopolitan, and more vibrant community than he had imagined, now he's reshaping a new Harlem renaissance at his restaurant and night club Red Rooster—importing new visitors to Harlem from all over the...

Market instability, economic turmoil, inadequate risk controls, bank failures, and scandals have tested public confidence in our global financial ecosystem. Can better governance and risk management at institutions, stronger leadership and boards, intelligent regulation by government agencies, and a better understanding of the complexities of interconnected economies and markets restore our trust? A prestigious panel of experts with experience in the financial arena, government, and media...

In both the private sector and in government, Julius Genachowski has been recognized as a bold and accomplished leader in technology, media, and telecommunications. As chairman of the Federal Communications Commission from 2009 to May 2013, he focused the FCC on broadband, successfully driving major initiatives to extend high-speed Internet access, free up spectrum, preserve Internet freedom, and promote competition. His tenure saw a strengthening of America's tech-related global...

Perry Chen, co-founder of Kickstarter, and Walter Isaacson in "Kickstarter and the Economics of Creativity" at the 2013 Aspen Ideas Festival. Speakers: Perry Chen, Walter Isaacson

Business investment, corporate profits, and stock market valuations are at all-time highs, while productivity and employment growth are in the doldrums. GDP and entrepreneurship are somewhere in the middle, not catastrophic, but not impressive. So is optimism or pessimism warranted at present? And is growth itself changing? Panelists from divergent backgrounds will explore these questions. Vivek Wadhwa Andrew McAfee Gillian Tett

Get a taste of radio's irreverent and insightful coverage of money, business, and economic news that influences your life. What is the cost of the consumer economy in the culture of “more is better”? More and more essentials of life are for sale: good health, good education, safe neighborhoods. And that means a competition in which people spend more to stay in the same relative place. Can we afford our consumer economy? Join "Marketplace" host Kai Ryssdal; "Marketplace" reporters Krissy...

With worker productivity gains on par with economic growth, the prospects for dramatic, or even optimistic, growth in employment are slim. The ranks of the unemployed, while slowly inching downward, are still uncomfortably high. But there are other issues at stake when it comes to American jobs that raise critical questions. Where will jobs come from? Are we prepared for the jobs that are coming down the pike? What is the role of government? And importantly, do they pay as well as they...

One of the country’s foremost demographers, Nicholas Eberstadt studies the astonishing growth of entitlement spending and details the enormous economic and cultural costs of this epidemic. Leading political theorists, William Galston questions Eberstadt’s conclusions about the corrosive effect of entitlements on character and offers his own analysis of the impact of American entitlement growth. Presented by Booz Allen Hamilton William A. Galston Chrystia Freeland Douglas Holtz-Eakin

There has always been some gap between rich and poor in this country, but in the last few decades, what it means to be rich has changed dramatically. Alarmingly, the greatest income gap is not between the 1 percent and the 99 percent, but within the wealthiest 1 percent of our nation—as the merely wealthy are left behind by the rapidly expanding fortunes of the new global super-rich. Chrystia Freeland, an acclaimed business journalist who has spent nearly two decades reporting on the new...

We are quickly approaching a time when the number of people 65 and over will outnumber children 15 and under for the first time in our history. In this wide-ranging interview, AARP CEO Barry Rand will discuss the opportunities and challenges this presents for society and individuals, especially today's middle-class workers, in terms of finances, health, and communities, as well as what individuals can do to live their best life and thrive in this new Age of possibilities. Speakers: A. Barry...