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作者:Kartal, Melis; Tyran, Jean-Robert
作者单位:Vienna University of Economics & Business; University of Vienna; University of Copenhagen
摘要:This paper studies , theoretically and experimentally , the effects of overconfidence and fake news on information aggregation and the quality of democratic choice in a common-interest setting. We theo-retically show that overconfidence exacerbates the adverse effects of widespread misinformation (i.e. , fake news). We then analyze richer models that allow for partisanship , targeted misinformation intended to sway public opinion , and news signals correlated across voters (due to media owners...
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作者:Denti, Tommaso
作者单位:Cornell University
摘要:e provide testable conditions under which the cost of acquir-ing information is given by the expected reduction of a measure of uncertainty (e.g., entropy). The assumption, under the name of pos-terior separability, is nearly universal in the literature of rational inattention; yet, a testable characterization has been lacking. In applications to experimental data, we indicate situations in which posterior separability is & mdash;and is not & mdash;a compelling assumption for the cost of infor...
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作者:Berkouwer, Susanna B.; Dean, Joshua T.
作者单位:University of Pennsylvania; University of Chicago
摘要:We study an energy efficient charcoal cookstove in an experiment with 1,000 households in Nairobi. We estimate a 39 percent reduction in charcoal spending, which matches engineering estimates, generating a 295 percent annual return. Despite fuel savings of $237 over the stove's two-year lifespan-and $295 in emissions reductions-households are only willing to pay $12. Drawing attention to energy savings does not increase demand. However, a loan more than doubles willingness to pay: credit const...
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作者:Angelucci, Charles; Meraglia, Simone; Voigtlaender, Nico
作者单位:Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); University of Exeter; Center for Economic & Policy Research (CEPR); University of California System; University of California Los Angeles; National Bureau of Economic Research
摘要:We study the emergence of urban self-governance in the late medie-val period. We focus on England after the Norman Conquest of 1066, building a novel comprehensive dataset of 554 medieval towns. During the Commercial Revolution (twelfth to thirteenth centuries), many merchant towns obtained Farm Grants: the right of self -gov-erned tax collection and law enforcement. Self-governance, in turn, was a stepping stone for parliamentary representation: Farm Grant towns were much more likely to be su...
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作者:Bernhardt, Dan; Krasa, Stefan; Shadmehr, Mehdi
作者单位:University of Illinois System; University of Illinois Chicago; University of Illinois Chicago Hospital; University of Warwick; University of North Carolina; University of North Carolina Chapel Hill; University of North Carolina School of Medicine
摘要:We investigate the susceptibility of democracies to demagogues, studying tensions between representatives who guard voters' long-run interests and demagogues who cater to voters' short-run desires. Parties propose consumption and investment. Voters base choices on current-period consumption and valence shocks. Younger/poorer economies and economically disadvantaged voters are attracted to the demagogue's disinvestment policies, forcing farsighted represen-tatives to mimic them. This electoral ...
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作者:Huffman, David; Raymond, Collin; Shvets, Julia
作者单位:Pennsylvania Commonwealth System of Higher Education (PCSHE); University of Pittsburgh; Cornell University; University of Cambridge
摘要:A long-standing puzzle is how overconfidence can persist in settings characterized by repeated feedback. This paper studies managers who participate repeatedly in a high-powered tournament incen-tive system, learning relative performance each time. Using reduced form and structural methods we find that (i) managers make over-confident predictions about future performance; (ii) managers have overly positive memories of past performance; (iii) the two phenom-ena are linked at an individual level...
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作者:Montero, Eduardo; Yang, Dean
作者单位:University of Chicago; University of Michigan System; University of Michigan
摘要:Does variation in how religious festivals are celebrated have eco-nomic consequences? We study the economic impacts of the timing of Catholic patron saint day festivals in Mexico. For causal iden-tification, we exploit cross-locality variation in festival dates and in the timing of agricultural seasons. We estimate the impact of agriculturally coinciding festivals (those coinciding with peak planting or harvest months) on long-run economic development of localities. Agriculturally coinciding ...
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作者:Andersen, Steffen; Badarinza, Cristian; Liu, Lu; Marx, Julie; Ramadorai, Tarun
作者单位:Copenhagen Business School; National University of Singapore; University of Pennsylvania; Imperial College London; Center for Economic & Policy Research (CEPR)
摘要:We quantify reference dependence and loss aversion in the housing market using rich Danish administrative data. Our structural model includes loss aversion, reference dependence, financial constraints, and a sale decision, and matches key nonparametric moments, including a hockey stick in listing prices with nominal gains, and bunching at zero realized nominal gains. Households derive substan-tial utility from gains over the original house purchase price; losses affect households roughly 2.5 t...
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作者:Lee, David s.; Mccrary, Justin; Moreira, Marcelo j.; Porter, Jack
作者单位:Princeton University; National Bureau of Economic Research; Columbia University; Getulio Vargas Foundation; University of Wisconsin System; University of Wisconsin Madison
摘要:In the single-IV model, researchers commonly rely on t-ratio-based inference, even though the literature has quantified its potentially severe large-sample distortions. Building on Stock and Yogo (2005), we introduce the tF critical value function, leading to a stan-dard error adjustment that is a smooth function of the first-stage F-statistic. For one-quarter of specifications in 61 AER papers, cor-rected standard errors are at least 49 and 136 percent larger than conventional 2SLS standard e...