Calendrier du 14 février 2018
Development Economics Seminar
Du 14/02/2018 de 16:30 à 18:00
salle R2-01, campus Jourdan, 48 boulevard Jourdan 75014 Paris
MANI Anandi (University of Oxord, Blavatnik School of Government)
COGNITIVE DROUGHTS‡
écrit avec Guilherme Lichand (University of Zurich, Dept. of Economics)
This paper tests whether uncertainty about future rainfall affects farmers’ decision-making
through cognitive load. Behavioral theories predict that rainfall risk could impose a psychological tax on
farmers, leading to material consequences at all times and across all states of nature, even within
decisions unrelated to consumption smoothing, and even when negative rainfall shocks do not materialize
down the line. Using a novel technology to run lab experiments in the field, we combine survey
experiments with recent rainfall shocks to test the effects of rainfall risk on farmers’ cognition, and find
that it decreases farmers’ attention, memory and impulse control, and increases their susceptibility to a
variety of behavioral biases. Effects are quantitatively important, equivalent to losing 25% of one’s
harvest at the end of the rainy season. Evidence that farmer’s cognitive performance is relatively less
impaired in tasks involving scarce resources suggests that the effects operate through the mental
bandwidth mechanism.
Economic History Seminar
Du 14/02/2018 de 12:30 à 14:00
Salle R2-01, Campus Jourdan, 48 boulevard Jourdan, 75014 Paris
RUEDA Valeria (Oxford)
Political unification and geographic economic disparities in Italy 1861-71
écrit avec Brian A’Hearn