"As you can see," said Robert Reich, taking the stage with no lectern in the Thorne Auditorium at Northwestern University School of Law, "the economy has worn me down. A year and a half ago, I was 6-foot-2."

And so, with his first words, the diminutive former U.S. secretary of labor answered the question of how an economics lecture would fit within an event themed to amusement: quite nicely, thank you.