The Lure of Incredible Certitude -- by Charles F. Manski
Forthright characterization of scientific uncertainty is important in principle and serves important practical purposes. Nevertheless, economists and other researchers commonly report findings with...
View ArticleWeight gains from trade in foods: Evidence from Mexico -- by Osea Giuntella,...
In this paper, we investigate the effects of trade in foods on obesity in Mexico. To do so, we match data on Mexican food imports from the U.S. with anthropometric and food expenditure data. Our...
View ArticleTransportation and Health in a Developing Country: The United States,...
I study the impact of transportation on health in the rural US, 1820-1847. Measuring health by average stature and using within-county panel analysis and a straight-line instrument, I find that greater...
View ArticleLong-Term Care Hospitals: A Case Study in Waste -- by Liran Einav, Amy...
There is substantial waste in U.S. healthcare, but little consensus on how to identify or combat it. We identify one specific source of waste: long-term care hospitals (LTCHs). These post-acute care...
View ArticleTake Two! SAT Retaking and College Enrollment Gaps -- by Joshua Goodman, Oded...
Data on millions of SAT-takers show only half retake the exam, with even lower retake rates among low income and underrepresented minority students. Scoring below multiples of 100 increases retaking,...
View ArticleShift-Share Designs: Theory and Inference -- by Rodrigo Adao, Michal Kolesar,...
We study inference in shift-share regression designs, such as when a regional outcome is regressed on a weighted average of observed sectoral shocks, using regional sector shares as weights. We conduct...
View ArticleImpure Impact Giving: Theory and Evidence -- by Daniel M. Hungerman, Mark...
We present a new model of charitable giving where individuals regard out-of-pocket donations and the matches they induce as different. We show that match-price elasticities combine conventional price...
View ArticleThe Spread of Deposit Insurance and the Global Rise in Bank Asset Risk since...
We construct a new measure of the changing generosity of deposit insurance for many countries, empirically model the international influences on the adoption and generosity of deposit insurance, and...
View ArticleMarket Expanding or Market Stealing? Platform Competition in Bike-Sharing --...
The recent rise of dockless bike-sharing is dominated by two platforms: one started first in 82 Chinese cities, 59 of which were subsequently entered by the second platform. Using these variations, we...
View ArticleMisallocation in the Market for Inputs: Enforcement and the Organization of...
The strength of contract enforcement determines how firms source inputs and organize production. Using microdata on Indian manufacturing plants, we show that production and sourcing decisions appear...
View ArticleUniversal Basic Incomes vs. Targeted Transfers: Anti-Poverty Programs in...
Developing country governments are increasingly implementing cash assistance programs to combat poverty and inequality. This paper examines the potential tradeoffs between targeting these transfers...
View ArticleInvesting Outside the Box: Evidence from Alternative Vehicles in Private...
This paper undertakes a comprehensive analysis of alternative investment vehicles in private equity, using unexplored custodial data about 112 limited partners over four decades. We differentiate...
View ArticleWho Benefited from Women's Suffrage? -- by Esra Kose, Elira Kuka, Na'ama Shenhav
While a growing literature has shown that women prefer investments in child welfare and increased redistribution, little is known about the long-term effect of empowering women. Exploiting plausibly...
View ArticleOver-reaction in Macroeconomic Expectations -- by Pedro Bordalo, Nicola...
We study the rationality of individual and consensus professional forecasts of macroeconomic and financial variables using the methodology of Coibion and Gorodnichenko (2015), which examines...
View ArticleAttitudes Toward Debt and Debt Behavior -- by Johan Almenberg, Annamaria...
We combine survey data on debt attitudes with registry data on household balance sheets to shed light on the determinants of household debt. We introduce a simple and novel survey measure of attitude...
View ArticleInsolvency After the 2005 Bankruptcy Reform -- by Stefania Albanesi, Jaromir...
The 2005 Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act (BAPCPA) is the most important reform of personal bankruptcy in the United States in recent years. This legislation overhauled...
View ArticleEconographics -- by Jonathan Chapman, Mark Dean, Pietro Ortoleva, Erik...
We study the pattern of correlations across a large number of behavioral regularities, with the goal of creating an empirical basis for more comprehensive theories of decision-making. We elicit 21...
View ArticleAuthoritarian Elites -- by Adlai Newson, Francesco Trebbi
We explore the role of ruling elites in autocratic regimes and provide an assessment of tools useful to clarify the structure of opaque political environments. We first showcase the importance of...
View ArticleCommodity Trade Matters -- by Thibault Fally, James Sayre
Primary commodities are used as inputs into all production processes, yet they account for approximately 16 percent of world trade. Despite their share in trade, we show that the aggregate gains from...
View ArticleMachine Learning for Regularized Survey Forecast Combination:...
Despite the clear success of forecast combination in many economic environments, several important issues remain incompletely resolved. The issues relate to selection of the set of forecasts to...
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