Thaler's Mug
— THE BEHAVIOURAL CONCEPT
The endowment effect.
It's the idea that "people often demand much more to give up an object than they would be willing to pay to acquire it" - so in the original Thaler experiment, people who were endowed with a mug felt it was worth more solely because it was theirs. Crazy right?
So, has any Thalers in your life convinced you to buy a ridiculously expensive mug lately?
— THE inspiration
Thaler's research on the endowment effect using mugs. So naturally, the comic had to be drawn on a mug!!
Cool concept + Creative Object = Crazy Comic
The OG paper, if you haven't read it, everything will make sense after you do:
Kahneman, D., Knetsch, J. L., & Thaler, R. H. (1991). Anomalies: The endowment effect, loss aversion, and status quo bias. Journal of Economic perspectives, 5(1), 193-206.