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2020

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Articles 31 - 60 of 111

Full-Text Articles in Econometrics

Menu-Dependent Food Choices And Food Waste, Hongxing Liu, Joaquín Gómez-Miñambres, Danyi Qi Sep 2020

Menu-Dependent Food Choices And Food Waste, Hongxing Liu, Joaquín Gómez-Miñambres, Danyi Qi

ESI Working Papers

We use a combination of randomized field experiments and online surveys to test how the menu design affects food choices and food waste. In our field experiment, participants face one of two menus: a narrow menu that only displays a small portion of food, or a broad menu that also contains bigger portions. While all options are equally available in both menus, they differ in how easy and fast the different choices can be made. Our results show that, compared to the broad menu, participants in the narrow menu ordered smaller portions of food. Importantly, food intake was similar across …


A Notion Of Prominence For Games With Natural-Language Labels, Alessandro Sontuoso, Sudeep Bhatia Aug 2020

A Notion Of Prominence For Games With Natural-Language Labels, Alessandro Sontuoso, Sudeep Bhatia

ESI Working Papers

We study games with natural-language labels (i.e., strategic problems where options are denoted by words), for which we propose and test a measurable characterization of prominence. We assume that – ceteris paribus – players find particularly prominent those strategies that are denoted by words more frequently used in their everyday language. To operationalize this assumption, we suggest that the prominence of a strategy-label is correlated with its frequency of occurrence in large text corpora, such as the Google Books corpus (“n-gram” frequency). In testing for the strategic use of word frequency, we consider experimental games with different incentive structures (such …


Trust And Trustworthiness In Procurement Contracts With Retainage, Matthew J. Walker, Elena Katok, Jason Shachat Aug 2020

Trust And Trustworthiness In Procurement Contracts With Retainage, Matthew J. Walker, Elena Katok, Jason Shachat

ESI Working Papers

In complex procurement projects, it is difficult to write enforceable contracts that condition price upon quality. Supplier non-performance becomes an acute risk, particularly when there is intense competition for the contract. An established incentive mechanism used to mitigate the problem of supplier non-performance is retainage, in which the buyer sets aside a portion of the purchase price. After project completion, the buyer determines the amount of retainage that is released to the seller, considering any defects that arise. While generally a feasible contract form to implement, the practical difficulties in assessing completion introduce a moral hazard for the buyer. We …


The Impact Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On Economic Behaviours And Preferences: Experimental Evidence From Wuhan, Jason Shachat, Matthew J. Walker, Lijia Wei Aug 2020

The Impact Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On Economic Behaviours And Preferences: Experimental Evidence From Wuhan, Jason Shachat, Matthew J. Walker, Lijia Wei

ESI Working Papers

We examine how the emergence of Covid-19 in Wuhan, and the ramifications of associated events, influence pro-sociality, trust and attitudes towards risk and ambiguity. We assess these influences using an experiment consisting of financially incentivized economic tasks. We establish causality via the comparison of a baseline sample collected pre-epidemic with five sampling waves starting from the imposition of a stringent lock- down in Wuhan and completed six weeks later. We find significant long-term increases - measured as the difference between the baseline and final wave average responses - in altruism, cooperation, trust and risk tolerance. Participants who remained in Wuhan …


Does Free Information Provision Crowd Out Costly Information Acquisition? It’S A Matter Of Timing, Diego Aycinena, Alexander Elbittar, Andrei Gomberg, Lucas Rentschler Aug 2020

Does Free Information Provision Crowd Out Costly Information Acquisition? It’S A Matter Of Timing, Diego Aycinena, Alexander Elbittar, Andrei Gomberg, Lucas Rentschler

ESI Working Papers

We consider the issue of how timing of provision of additional information affects information-acquisition incentives. In environments with costly attention, a sufficiently confident agent may choose to act based on the prior, without incurring those costs. However, a promise of additional information in the future may be used to encourage additional attentional effort. This may be viewed as a novel empirical implication of rational inattention. In a lab experiment designed to test this theoretical prediction, we show that promise of future “free” information induces subjects to acquire information which they would not be acquiring without such a promise.


The Effects Of Admission To Jail On Crime Rate In Mclean County, Illinois, Derek Conley Aug 2020

The Effects Of Admission To Jail On Crime Rate In Mclean County, Illinois, Derek Conley

Stevenson Center for Community and Economic Development—Student Research

The relationship between crime and incarceration is growing in interest in the United States. The United States incarceration rate is often double or triple the rate of other Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. The hardline approach the United States has taken on crime has many citizens and academics questioning its effectiveness on achieving safer communities. Traditional theory suggests incarcerating individuals for deviant behavior reduces the crime rate through the mechanisms of incapacitation, deterrence, rehabilitation, and retribution. However, some scholars believe concentration of incarceration in neighborhoods disrupts the social fabric of the neighborhood and produces the opposite of …


A Covid-19 Teaching Example: Pooled Testing With Microsoft Excel, Humberto Barreto Aug 2020

A Covid-19 Teaching Example: Pooled Testing With Microsoft Excel, Humberto Barreto

Economics and Management Faculty publications

This paper uses pooled testing as a teaching example for undergraduate statistics, econometrics, or quantitative methods courses. It offers step-by-step instructions to create an Excel spreadsheet that uses Monte Carlo simulation to find the optimal group size for a given infection rate. A completed version of the spreadsheet, along with readings, questions, and analytical solution is available at tiny.cc/pooledtesting.


Activation Of Trpa1 Nociceptor Promotes Systemic Adult Mammalian Skin Regeneration, Jenny J. Wei, Hali S. Kim, Casey A. Spencer, Donna Brennan-Crispi, Ying Zheng, Nicolette M. Johnson, Misha Rosenbach, Christopher Miller, Denis H. Y. Leung, George Cotsarelis, Thomas H. Leung Aug 2020

Activation Of Trpa1 Nociceptor Promotes Systemic Adult Mammalian Skin Regeneration, Jenny J. Wei, Hali S. Kim, Casey A. Spencer, Donna Brennan-Crispi, Ying Zheng, Nicolette M. Johnson, Misha Rosenbach, Christopher Miller, Denis H. Y. Leung, George Cotsarelis, Thomas H. Leung

Research Collection School Of Economics

Adult mammalian wounds, with rare exception, heal with fibrotic scars that severely disrupt tissue architecture and function. Regenerative medicine seeks methods to avoid scar formation and restore the original tissue structures. We show in three adult mouse models that pharmacologic activation of the nociceptor TRPA1 on cutaneous sensory neurons reduces scar formation and can also promote tissue regeneration. Local activation of TRPA1 induces tissue regeneration on distant untreated areas of injury, demonstrating a systemic effect. Activated TRPA1 stimulates local production of interleukin-23 (IL-23) by dermal dendritic cells, leading to activation of circulating dermal IL-17–producing γδ T cells. Genetic ablation of …


Rhode Island Current Conditions Index -- August 2020, Leonard Lardaro Aug 2020

Rhode Island Current Conditions Index -- August 2020, Leonard Lardaro

The Rhode Island Current Conditions Index

No abstract provided.


The Impact Of Taxes And Wasteful Government Spending On Giving, Roman Sheremeta, Neslihan Uler Jul 2020

The Impact Of Taxes And Wasteful Government Spending On Giving, Roman Sheremeta, Neslihan Uler

ESI Working Papers

We examine how taxes impact charitable giving and how this relationship is affected by the degree of wasteful government spending. In our model, individuals make donations to charities knowing that the government collects a flat-rate tax on income (net of charitable donations) and redistributes part of the tax revenue. The rest of the tax revenue is wasted. The model predicts that a higher tax rate increases charitable donations. Surprisingly, the model shows that a higher degree of waste decreases donations (when the elasticity of marginal utility with respect to consumption is high enough). We test the model’s predictions using a …


The Economics Of Babysitting A Robot, Aleksandr Alekseev Jul 2020

The Economics Of Babysitting A Robot, Aleksandr Alekseev

ESI Working Papers

I study the welfare effect of automation on workers in a setting where technology is complementary but imperfect. Using a modified task-based framework, I argue that imperfect complementary automation can impose non-pecuniary costs on workers via a behavioral channel. The theoretical model suggests that a critical factor determining the welfare effect of imperfect complementary automation is the automatability of the production process. I confirm the model's predictions in an experiment that elicits subjects' revealed preference for automation. Increasing automatability leads to a significant increase in the demand for automation. I explore additional drivers of the demand for automation using machine …


Eco 230 / Mgt 230 Introduction To Economic And Managerial Statistics, George Vachadze Jul 2020

Eco 230 / Mgt 230 Introduction To Economic And Managerial Statistics, George Vachadze

Open Educational Resources

Development and application of modern statistical methods, including such elements of descriptive statistics and statistical inference as correlation and regression analysis, probability theory, sampling procedures, normal distribution and binomial distribution, estimation, and testing of hypotheses.


How Can Econometrics Help Fight The Covid'19 Pandemic?, Kevin Alvarez, Vladik Kreinovich Jul 2020

How Can Econometrics Help Fight The Covid'19 Pandemic?, Kevin Alvarez, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

The current pandemic is difficult to model -- and thus, difficult to control. In contrast to the previous epidemics whose dynamics was smooth and well described by the existing models, the statistics of the current pandemic is highly oscillating. In this paper, we show that these oscillations can be explained if we take into account the disease's long incubation period -- as a result of which our control measures are determined by outdated data, showing number of infected people two weeks ago. To better control the pandemic, we propose to use the experience of economics, where also the effect of …


Rhode Island Current Conditions Index -- July 2020, Leonard Lardaro Jul 2020

Rhode Island Current Conditions Index -- July 2020, Leonard Lardaro

The Rhode Island Current Conditions Index

No abstract provided.


Redundancy Insurance Is Not Unemployment Insurance, Zhengxiao Wu Jul 2020

Redundancy Insurance Is Not Unemployment Insurance, Zhengxiao Wu

Research Collection School Of Economics

In a commentary, SMU Senior Lecturer of Statistics Wu Zhengxiao discussed the difference between redundancy insurance and unemployment insurance. He shared Japan's example, where the cost for unemployment insurance is higher than redundancy insurance, and added that being an unprecedented policy, more care should be taken when implementing it.


Quantile Treatment Effects And Bootstrap Inference Under Covariate-Adaptive Randomization, Yichong Zhang, Xin Zheng Jul 2020

Quantile Treatment Effects And Bootstrap Inference Under Covariate-Adaptive Randomization, Yichong Zhang, Xin Zheng

Research Collection School Of Economics

In this paper, we study the estimation and inference of the quantile treatment effect under covariate‐adaptive randomization. We propose two estimation methods: (1) the simple quantile regression and (2) the inverse propensity score weighted quantile regression. For the two estimators, we derive their asymptotic distributions uniformly over a compact set of quantile indexes, and show that, when the treatment assignment rule does not achieve strong balance, the inverse propensity score weighted estimator has a smaller asymptotic variance than the simple quantile regression estimator. For the inference of method (1), we show that the Wald test using a weighted bootstrap standard …


Public Leaderboard Feedback In Sampling Competition: An Experimental Investigation, Stanton Hudja, Brian Roberson, Yaroslav Rosokha Jul 2020

Public Leaderboard Feedback In Sampling Competition: An Experimental Investigation, Stanton Hudja, Brian Roberson, Yaroslav Rosokha

ESI Working Papers

We investigate the role of performance feedback, in the form of a public leaderboard, in a sequential-sampling contest with costly observations. The player whose sequential random sample contains the observation with the highest value wins the contest and obtains a prize with a fixed value. We find that there exist parameter configurations such that in the subgame perfect equilibrium of contests with a fixed ending date (i.e., finite horizon), providing public performance feedback results in fewer expected observations and a lower expected value of the winning observation. We conduct a controlled laboratory experiment to test the theoretical predictions, and find …


In-Fill Asymptotic Theory For Structural Break Point In Autoregressions, Liang Jiang, Xiaohu Wang, Jun Yu Jul 2020

In-Fill Asymptotic Theory For Structural Break Point In Autoregressions, Liang Jiang, Xiaohu Wang, Jun Yu

Research Collection School Of Economics

This article obtains the exact distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator of structural break point in the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process when a continuous record is available. The exact distribution is asymmetric, tri-modal, dependent on the initial condition. These three properties are also found in the finite sample distribution of the least squares (LS) estimator of structural break point in autoregressive (AR) models. Motivated by these observations, the article then develops an in-fill asymptotic theory for the LS estimator of structural break point in the AR(1) coefficient. The in-fill asymptotic distribution is also asymmetric, tri-modal, dependent on the initial condition, and delivers …


Forecasting Singapore Gdp Using The Spf Data, Tian Xie, Jun Yu Jul 2020

Forecasting Singapore Gdp Using The Spf Data, Tian Xie, Jun Yu

Research Collection School Of Economics

In this article, we use econometric methods, machine learning methods, and a hybrid method to forecast the GDP growth rate in Singapore based on the Survey of Professional Forecasters (SPF). We compare the performance of these methods with the sample median used by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). It is shown that the relationship between the actual GDP growth rates and the forecasts from individual professionals is highly nonlinear and non-additive, making it hard for all linear methods and the sample median to perform well. It is found that the hybrid method performs the best, reducing the mean squared …


Two Suggestions To Wp Mp Jamus Lim, Zhengxiao Wu Jul 2020

Two Suggestions To Wp Mp Jamus Lim, Zhengxiao Wu

Research Collection School Of Economics

In a commentary, SMU Senior Lecturer of Statistics Wu Zhengxiao discussed the arguments presented by Workers’ Party’s candidate Associate Professor Jamus Lim during the live broadcast of a political debate, and put forth two suggestions for Assoc Prof Lim.


Realized Semicovariances, Tim Bollerslev, Jia Li, Andrew J. Patton, Rogier Quaedvlieg Jul 2020

Realized Semicovariances, Tim Bollerslev, Jia Li, Andrew J. Patton, Rogier Quaedvlieg

Research Collection School Of Economics

We propose a decomposition of the realized covariance matrix into components based on the signs of the underlying high-frequency returns, and we derive the asymptotic properties of the resulting realized semicovariance measures as the sampling interval goes to zero. The first-order asymptotic results highlight how the same-sign and mixed-sign components load differently on economic information related to stochastic correlation and jumps. The second-order asymptotic results reveal the structure underlying the same-sign semicovariances, as manifested in the form of co-drifting and dynamic “leverage” effects. In line with this anatomy, we use data on a large cross-section of individual stocks to empirically …


Trust, Reciprocity, And Social History: New Pathways Of Learning When Max U (Own Reward) Fails Decisively, Vernon L. Smith Jul 2020

Trust, Reciprocity, And Social History: New Pathways Of Learning When Max U (Own Reward) Fails Decisively, Vernon L. Smith

ESI Working Papers

"This evaluation begins with the BDM protocol—itself a methodological contribution—and the experimental findings. The question of the replicability and robustness of these unexpected results is addressed next in a summary of two subsequent experimental papers. We follow with a discussion of two attempts to explain qua understand the BDM findings; both, however, have methological deficiencies—Reciprocity and Social Preference explanations. Finally, we offer a brief on Adam Smith’s (1759; 1853; hereafter in the text, Sentiments) model of human sociability, based on strictly self-interested actors, that culminates in propositions that (1) account for trust game choices, and (2) predict action in new …


Forecasting Skills In Experimental Markets: Illusion Or Reality?, Brice Corgnet, Cary Deck, Mark Desantis, David Porter Jul 2020

Forecasting Skills In Experimental Markets: Illusion Or Reality?, Brice Corgnet, Cary Deck, Mark Desantis, David Porter

ESI Working Papers

Using experimental asset markets, we study the situation of a financial analyst who is trying to infer the fundamental value of an asset by observing the market’s history. We find that such capacity requires both standard cognitive skills (IQ) as well as social and emotional skills. However, forecasters with high emotional skills tend to perform worse when market mispricing is high as they tend to give too much emphasis to the noisy signals from market data. By contrast, forecasters with high social skills perform especially well in markets with high levels of mispricing in which their skills could help them …


Strategic Problems With Risky Prospects, Alessandro Sontuoso, Cristina Bicchieri, Alexander Funcke, Einav Hart Jun 2020

Strategic Problems With Risky Prospects, Alessandro Sontuoso, Cristina Bicchieri, Alexander Funcke, Einav Hart

ESI Working Papers

We study “hypothetical reasoning” in games where the impact of risky prospects (chance moves with commonly-known conditional probabilities) is compounded by strategic uncertainty. We embed such games in an environment that permits us to verify if risk-taking behavior is affected by information that reduces the extent of strategic uncertainty. We then test some implications of expected utility theory, while making minimal assumptions about individuals’ (risk or ambiguity) attitudes. Results indicate an effect of the information on behavior: this effect is triggered in some cases by a belief-revision about others’ actions, and in other cases by a reversal in risk …


Estimating Selection Models Without Instrument With Stata, Xavier D’Haultfœuille, Arnaud Maurel, Xiaoyun Qiu, Yichong Zhang Jun 2020

Estimating Selection Models Without Instrument With Stata, Xavier D’Haultfœuille, Arnaud Maurel, Xiaoyun Qiu, Yichong Zhang

Research Collection School Of Economics

This article presents the eqregsel command for implementing the estimationand bootstrap inference of sample selection models via extremal quantile regression. The command estimates a semiparametric sample selection model withoutinstrument or large support regressor, and outputs the point estimates of the ho-mogenous linear coefficients, their bootstrap standard errors, as well as the p-valuefor a specification test.


Identifying Latent Grouped Patterns In Cointegrated Panels, Wenxin Huang, Sainan Jin, Liangjun Su Jun 2020

Identifying Latent Grouped Patterns In Cointegrated Panels, Wenxin Huang, Sainan Jin, Liangjun Su

Research Collection School Of Economics

We consider a panel cointegration model with latent group structures that allows for heterogeneous long-run relationships across groups. We extend Su, Shi, and Phillips (2016, Econometrica 84(6), 2215-2264) classifier-Lasso (C-Lasso) method to the nonstationary panels and allow for the presence of endogeneity in both the stationary and nonstationary regressors in the model. In addition, we allow the dimension of the stationary regressors to diverge with the sample size. We show that we can identify the individuals' group membership and estimate the group-specific long-run cointegrated relationships simultaneously. We demonstrate the desirable property of uniform classification consistency and the oracle properties of …


Identifying Latent Grouped Patterns In Conintegrated Panels, Wenxin Huang, Sainan Jin, Liangjun Su Jun 2020

Identifying Latent Grouped Patterns In Conintegrated Panels, Wenxin Huang, Sainan Jin, Liangjun Su

Research Collection School Of Economics

We consider a panel cointegration model with latent group structures that allows for heterogeneous long-run relationships across groups. We extend Su, Shi, and Phillips (2016, Econometrica 84(6), 2215-2264) classifier-Lasso (C-Lasso) method to the nonstationary panels and allow for the presence of endogeneity in both the stationary and nonstationary regressors in the model. In addition, we allow the dimension of the stationary regressors to diverge with the sample size. We show that we can identify the individuals' group membership and estimate the group-specific long-run cointegrated relationships simultaneously. We demonstrate the desirable property of uniform classification consistency and the oracle properties of …


Rhode Island Current Conditions Index -- June 2020, Leonard Lardaro Jun 2020

Rhode Island Current Conditions Index -- June 2020, Leonard Lardaro

The Rhode Island Current Conditions Index

No abstract provided.


Religion In Economic History: A Survey, Sascha O. Becker, Jared Rubin, Ludger Woessmann Jun 2020

Religion In Economic History: A Survey, Sascha O. Becker, Jared Rubin, Ludger Woessmann

ESI Working Papers

This chapter surveys the recent social science literature on religion in economic history, covering both socioeconomic causes and consequences of religion. Following the rapidly growing literature, it focuses on the three main monotheisms—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—and on the period up to WWII. Works on Judaism address Jewish occupational specialization, human capital, emancipation, and the causes and consequences of Jewish persecution. One set of papers on Christianity studies the role of the Catholic Church in European economic history since the medieval period. Taking advantage of newly digitized data and advanced econometric techniques, the voluminous literature on the Protestant Reformation studies its …


Deviance Information Criterion For Latent Variable Models And Misspecified Models, Yong Li, Jun Yu, Tao Zeng Jun 2020

Deviance Information Criterion For Latent Variable Models And Misspecified Models, Yong Li, Jun Yu, Tao Zeng

Research Collection School Of Economics

Deviance information criterion (DIC) has been widely used for Bayesian model comparison, especially after Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is used to estimate candidate models. This paper first studies the problem of using DIC to compare latent variable models when DIC is calculated from the conditional likelihood. In particular, it is shown that the conditional likelihood approach undermines theoretical underpinnings of DIC. A new version of DIC, namely DICL, is proposed to compare latent variable models. The large sample properties of DICL are studied. A frequentist justification of DICL is provided. Like AIC, DICL provides an asymptotically unbiased estimator to …