“The checking account is like the trash can of personal finance.” Today’s podcast guest, the famed behavioral economist Dr. Dan Ariely, is not a fan of checking accounts. Or supermarket end caps. Or anything that distracts us from our financial goals. In this episode, he explains why. Dan Ariely is one of the world’s most renowned behavioral economists. He’s the James B. Duke Professor of psychology and behavioral economics at Duke University. His TED Talks have been viewed more than 15 million times. In 2018, he was named one of the 50 most influential living psychologists in the world. He’s the New York Times bestselling author of many books, including Predictably Irrational, a book that challenges our assumptions about our ability to make rational decisions. He also wrote Dollars and Sense, a book about our cognitive biases, and The Honest Truth About Dishonesty, a book about how we lie to everyone, including ourselves.