Calendrier du 23 mai 2019
Macroeconomics Seminar
Du 23/05/2019 de 15:45 à 17:00
PSE - 48 boulevard Jourdan, 75014 Paris, salle R2-21
SCHAAL Edouard (CREI)
Herding Cycles
écrit avec Mathieu Taschereau-Dumouchel
We embed a theory of rational herding into a business-cycle framework. In the model, technological innovations arrive randomly over time. New innovations are not immediately productive, and there is uncertainty about how productive the technology will be. Investors receive private signals about the future productivity and decide whether to invest in the technology or not. Macroeconomic variables and prices partially aggregate private information but do not reveal the true fundamentals as the agents ignore the degree of correlation in their information sets. Herd-driven boom-bust cycles may arise in this environment when the technology is unproductive but investors' initial signals are optimistic and highly correlated. When the technology appears, investors mistakenly attribute the observed high investment rates to high fundamentals, leading to a pattern of increasing optimism and investment until the economy reaches a peak, followed by a quick collapse, as agents ultimately learn their mistake. As such, the theory can shed light on bubble-like episodes in which excessive optimism about uncertain technology fueled overinvestment, and were followed by sudden recessions. We calibrate the model to the U.S. economy and show that the theory can rationalize various patterns observed during technology-driven cycles like the IT-led boom and bust of 1995-2001. Finally, we show that leaning-against-the-wind policies can be welfare improving as they can increase the amount of private information that becomes public.
Travail et économie publique externe
Du 23/05/2019 de 12:30 à 13:45
STANGE Kevin (University of Michigan)
Migration from Sub-National Administrative Data: Problems and Solutions with an Application to Higher Education
écrit avec Co-author: Andrew Foote
Recent research in many fields of social science makes extensive use of subnational administrative data, such as from states, counties, or school districts. Recent work on the labor market consequences of post-secondary education, in particular, have used administrative data from institutions matched with in-state earnings data. However, none of these papers have the ability to follow workers outside of the state, which could bias measured effects on earnings. While most of these papers acknowledge the issue, they are unable to quantify the effect that non-random attrition has on their results. In addition to these academic papers, a number of states have produced and publicized average earnings of graduates to inform students, again using in-state earnings data. Using new data merging college records with both in-state and national earnings from the LEHD, this paper documents how earnings estimates are biased in practice. We also document how this differs by field of study and college selectivity, as well as the extent to which attrition is differential across the earnings distribution. We find that out-of-state migration is particularly problematic for high-earners, flagship graduates, and computer science majors and grows with time since graduation. In our empirical example, we find that the effect of graduating from a flagship university (relative to less selective public 4-year) is 26% higher than one would estimate using in-state earnings exclusively. Various approaches to testing for and bounding this bias are considered.
TOM (Théorie, Organisation et Marchés) Lunch Seminar
Du 23/05/2019 de 12:30 à 13:30
salle R2-20, campus Jourdan - 48 bd Jourdan, 75014 Paris
BIZET Romain (Mines ParisTech)
Keep calm and carry on: A theory of governmental crisis communication
écrit avec Pierre Fleckinger (Mines ParisTech and PSE)
This paper develops a model of strategic communication which questions how informed
governments can credibly and effectively disclose warning information to exposed populations in the wake of major disasters. Credible public communication strategies take the
form of severity scales whose optimal design hinges on the divergence between individual
and social preferences, typically embodied by the existence of external effects of individual
responses. Private and committed modes of communication are also investigated and shown
to increase expected welfare. The paper also considers combinations of crisis communication
with disaster management strategies. In particular, when ex post transfers are available -
e.g. through public relief funds or emergency response plans - it is optimal for the government to subsidize pro-social actions and to provide partial public insurance when responses
entail negative externalities. These transfers facilitate communication and improve response.
Several policy aspects and applications of the model are discussed.
Texte intégral
Behavior seminar
Du 23/05/2019 de 11:00 à 12:00
salle R2-21, campus Jourdan - 75014 Paris
DESSI Roberta (Toulouse School of Economics )
Public goods and future audiences: acting as role models?
écrit avec Giuseppe Attanasi, Frédéric Moisan, Donald Robertson
We study how participants' behavior in an experimental public good game is affected when they know that information about their choices and outcomes, together with different sets of information about their identity, will be transmitted the following year to a set of new, unknown participants - with no payoff linkages between the two sets of players. We explore two questions: first, does knowing that they will be acting as role models for future players influence individuals' choices? Second, how does behavior vary with the degree of future visibility of participants' identity? We find no evidence of a significant role model effect, but a surprising effect of visibility: when subjects know their photo will be transmitted to future, unknown and unrelated participants, they contribute significantly less. We consider different possible explanations, and argue that the most convincing is a sucker aversion explanation according to which subjects in the photo treatment become more sensitive to being perceived as exploited by their peers.
Behavior Working Group
Du 23/05/2019 de 10:00 à 10:45
Jourdan, R2-20
LOBECK Max ( University of Konstanz)
Principals' Distributive Preferences and the Incentivization of Agents