Calendrier du 09 avril 2020
TOM (Théorie, Organisation et Marchés) Lunch Seminar
Du 09/04/2020 de 16:00 à 17:00
online
CASELLA Alessandra (Columbia)
Mediating Conflict in the Lab
écrit avec Evan Friedman and Manuel Perez
According to the theory of mechanism design, the presence of a mediator can strictly improve the chances for peace between two contestants. What is striking is that the result follows even when the mediator is less informed than the two parties and has no enforcement power. We test the theory in a lab experiment where two subjects negotiate how to share a resource. In case of conflict, the subjects' privately known strength determines their payoff. The subjects send cheap talk messages about their strength to one another or to the mediator, before making their demands or receiving the mediator's recommendations. We find that, in line with the theory, messages are significantly more sincere when sent to the mediator. However, contrary to the theory, peaceful resolution is not more frequent, even when the mediator is a computer implementing the optimal mediation program. While the theoretical result refers to the best (i.e. most peaceful) equilibrium under mediation, multiple equilibria exist, and the best equilibrium is particularly vulnerable to small deviations from full truthfulness.
Macroeconomics Seminar
Du 09/04/2020 de 15:45 à 17:00
PSE - ZOOM https://zoom.us/j/270544774?pwd=ekZXTTlieDhvS3FWQ1FFOFoweHo3Zz09
ALTOMONTE Carlo (Bocconi)
Markups, Intangible Capital , and Heterogeneous Financial Frictions
écrit avec D. Favoino (Tinbergen Institute), M. Morlacco (USC) and T. Sonno (U. Bologna & LSE_CEP)
We study the importance of financial frictions for markups heterogeneity. Heterogeneous credit constraints distort the decision of firms to invest in a cost-reducing technology (akin, but not limited to, intangible capital). The resulting dispersion in marginal costs interact with variable demand elasticity to generate endogenous dispersion in markups. Financial variables operate both at the extensive margin, by acting as a barrier to entry into investment, and at the intensive margin, by distorting the level of investment of individual firms. We test the model predictions in the context of a quasi-natural experiment in France, using balance-sheet data from 2002 to 2013 for a representative sample of French manufacturing firms. Our results shed light on the sources of markup heterogeneity and misallocation.
brown bag Travail et Économie Publique
Du 09/04/2020 de 11:00 à 12:00
Using ZOOM
BEHAGHEL Luc (PSE)
Directing job search: a large scale experiment
écrit avec Sofia Dromundo, Marc Gurgand, Yagan Hazard and Thomas Zuber
We analyze the employment effects of directing job-seekers' applications towards establishments likely to recruit, building upon an existing Internet platform developed by the French public employment service. Our two-sided randomization design, with about 1.2 million job-seekers and 100,000 establishments, allows to precisely estimate supplyand demand-side effects. We find a 2% increase in job finding rates among women, while establishments advertised on the website increase their hirings on indefinite duration contracts by 4%.