The Great Divergence

[Research Highlight]

July 12, 2018

This video explains how technology diffusion contributes to the growing productivity gap between rich and poor countries.

Breaking down barriers

[Research Highlight]

July 16, 2018

What are the spillover effects from free trade agreements?

Multiple Activities in Networks

By Ying-Ju Chen, Yves Zenou, and Junjie Zhou

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, August 2018

We consider a network model where individuals exert efforts in two types of activities that are interdependent. These activities can be either substitutes or complements. We provide a full characterization of the Nash equilibrium of this game for any netw...

Two-Sided Investment and Matching with Multidimensional Cost Types and Attributes

By Deniz Dizdar

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, August 2018

Heterogeneous buyers and sellers must make investments before entering a continuum assignment market. I show that efficient ex post contracting equilibria (Cole, Mailath and Postlewaite 2001b) exist in a general assignment game framework. I then shed ligh...

Electoral Accountability and Interdistrict Competition

By Galina Zudenkova

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, August 2018

This paper analyzes a multidistrict game of electoral accountability in which constituencies compete over scarce resources by setting expectations for targeted spending. I build a political agency model in which a vote-maximizing politician is subject to ...

When to Confront: The Role of Patience

By Alvaro Sandroni and Can Urgun

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, August 2018

This paper examines the effects of patience on ordinary conflicts such as divorce, price wars and commercial litigation. Players optimally decide when, if ever, to start a destructive confrontation. In the unique equilibrium, there is a tight connection b...

Why Voting? A Welfare Analysis

By Moritz Drexl and Andreas Kleiner

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, August 2018

This article studies costly signaling. The signaling effort is chosen in multiple periods and observed with noise. The signaler benefits from the belief of the market, not directly from the effort or the signal. Optimal signaling behavior in time-varying ...

Wall Street Journal features AER: Insights

[News]

July 23, 2018

Newspaper writes about growing demand for shorter economics papers.

Protecting American jobs?

[Page]

Immigration barriers intended to boost domestic wages and employment may offer little help to US workers.

Consumer Valuation of Fuel Costs and Tax Policy: Evidence from the European Car Market

By Laura Grigolon, Mathias Reynaert, and Frank Verboven

American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, August 2018

To what extent do car buyers undervalue future fuel costs, and what does this imply for tax policy? To address both questions, we show it is crucial to account for consumer mileage heterogeneity. We use product-level data for a panel of European countries...

Can Online Off-the-Shelf Lessons Improve Student Outcomes? Evidence from a Field Experiment

By Kirabo Jackson and Alexey Makarin

American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, August 2018

Many websites now warehouse instructional materials designed to be taught by teachers in a traditional classroom. What are the potential benefits of the new resources? We analyze an experiment in which we randomly give middle school math teachers access t...

AEA Member Announcements: AEA 2018 Annual Election of Officers (July 27, 2018)

[News]

July 26, 2018

View member announcement from July 27, 2018

Rejecting the party line

[Page]

How does the roll-call order relate to whether a Senator breaks ranks on a vote?

Taking professors' privilege

[Research Highlight]

July 20, 2018

How does denying researchers full rights to their work affect startup activity at universities?

Matching with Moral Hazard: Assigning Attorneys to Poor Defendants

By Behrang Kamali Shahdadi

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, August 2018

We model the problem of assigning counsel to poor defendants as a matching problem. A novel aspect of this matching problem is the moral hazard component on the part of counsel. Within the model, we show that holding the total expenditure for counsel fixe...

The best defense money can buy

[Research Highlight]

August 03, 2018

How should poor defendants be matched with a government-provided attorney?

A powerful incentive to save

[Page]

Can a temporary banking promotion have lasting effects on financial behavior?

The Effect of Children's Gender on Living Arrangements and Child Support

By Kristin Mammen

American Economic Review, May 2008

The Economist highlights JEP article about social connectedness

[News]

August 09, 2018

Researchers use Facebook data to create "Social Connectedness Index."

Refusing to act on climate change

[Page]

The outlook for meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement doesn't look good in an era of minimal policy intervention.