Took us three years, but this 7-chapter Handbook provides comprehensive treatment of reference dep (Ted O'D & Charlie S), beh finance (Nick B), household finance (gang of 4), corp finance (Ulrike M), beh public (Doug B & Dmitry T), beh IO (Botond K & Paul H), Struct beh (myself)
Very excited to announce the Handbook of Behavioral Economics: Foundations and Application, Volume 1 published today! Vol Eds: B. Douglas Bernheim, Stanford University,; Stefano DellaVigna, Berkeley University; David Laibson, Harvard University.
@sdellavi
Tell others you love their paper, when you do. Tell them you love how hard they are working on sthg, when that's what they are at. Tell them you struggle too, and that we connect through our common struggles as well. We never know when someone really needs to hear a kind word.
I have a joke, but I'm just too sad.
Connect with your friends, students, and colleagues in these troubling times. Take the opportunity to tell them what they mean to you. The future is bright because of what they all have to offer to the world. Make sure they know it.
On peer review, editors and journals, triggered by the JPE episode on Twitter. I wanted to give a take on what I and other editors try to do to give a fair share to papers. Peer review will always have flaws but, like democracy, is the best of the systems we have. (my view) 1/6
Esther is not just an amazing researcher. She also set incredible standards as founding editor at AEJ Applied, helping make AEJs the most important change in econ publishing in 25 yrs (since the Larry Katz era at QJE). Now she is attentive leader for us AER coeditors. So grateful
Congratulations to AER editor Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee of
@MIT
and Michael Kremer of
@Harvard
on winning the
@NobelPrize
in Economic Sciences! Read more here:
What message do we give as economists if missing a Nobel prize is cause for depression? This loss saddens me in more ways than one. The hope is that we live in peace with our work, and are in touch with our family and friends. RIP
“Colleagues said Professor Weitzman had grown increasingly despondent after being passed over for the Nobel Prize in economics last year and had left a note questioning whether he any longer had the mental acuity to contribute to his field.”
New NBER wp: Many diff-in-diff papers use state level laws, but what do we know about those? Two key facts. From 1950s to 90s, best predictor of law adoption is adoption by geographic neighbors. Last 20 yrs, best predictor is adoption by politically aligned states
#polarization
I think this is exactly right about the culture of interrupting speakers too much in economics. It is not good and hurts especially women. Put me among those that never liked this aspect of our culture. In our seminar we have always tried hard not to do that.
So glad uniform pricing project which we started 10 (!) years ago is out. Retail chains price near uniformly across their stores with implications for inequality (increases it), response to shocks (dampens it), mergers, trade. An example in growing "behavioral firms" lit
1/5After 4 yrs as coeditor at the AER (2 to go), time to look at some facts. Thread. I handled about 180 new submissions per year, but 230 in 2020 given the Covid-related submission boom. About 7% R&R rate, w 14 R&Rs in 2017, 13 in 2018, 14 in 2019 and 13 in 2020 (more to come)
Congrats to Haas Profs. Annette Vissing-Jørgensen & Stefano DellaVigna, among the six
@UCBerkeley
faculty elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences for 2021!
@sdellavi
@americanacad
Thanks
@raogautam
. All: Feel free to browse and download my PhD lectures on behavioral economics, send me an email if they are useful or you have comments / corrections
Torturing your data until it speaks: Bad idea. Writing half a dozen or more articles per year: Terrible idea. Write one or two, take the time to ensure findings are robust, polish your writing, and live with the 5+ ideas that never came to fruition
My older son who is dyslexic read this just like it was written normally since to him all letters overlap and garble in any case. This is an amazing task to try.
I condemn sexual assaults and am deeply saddened by what i hear. I have never witnessed a case first hand but heard about the appalling Dan Houser behavior. I respect the seniors who reported his behavior to his univ. (even if not enough). I never invited DH for a seminar since
It has been a tough year in many ways, the pandemic, election stress, schools closed, the CA fires. So it is something to be able to enjoy these amazing Berkeley sunsets while being healthy. I will just opt not to check what my boys are doing while I relax!
Dear referees, in these hard times, editors understand if some reports need more time. Many of us have kids home or face difficulty working. But the solution is not to go back to dark days of 10 months for decisions. Reminders help keep time. Thanks truly, on behalf of authors.
Susan Athey in her Presidential address then describes her surprise in 2008 learning about the hundreds of A/B tests run in tech companies. She then described how AB testing is only the first step in the innovation process
Sending decision letter and reports to all reviewers is the *least* we can do as editors to thank reviewers for taking the time. In my 4 years at JEEA and 1.5 so far at the AER I do not think I ever skipped this step
@drcolleenmurphy
Thread. We build on our work on gender diffs in selection of Econometric Society Fellows. People asked us: is econ special? Eg, compare to a social sci w/ more females, psych, and to a science w/ underepresentstion of females like econ, math. How to compare apple to apple? (1/6)
Currently, women are 3 to 15 times more likely to be selected as members of the AAAS and NAS than men with similar publication and citation records, from David Card,
@sdellavi
, Patricia Funk, and Nagore Iriberri
Check out Distinguished AEA Lecture by Emmanuel Saez who is now making the case that evidence from behavioral economics explains why we need a substantial public sector such as social security, public insurance, etc. Happening right now but you can find recorded ex post
I am with
@leah_boustan
that we can get points across in a seminar without attacking the presenter. David Laibson for example always sets an example of clarity with kindness. I have a way to go, but want to get there
Fact 3 on Top Journals: Given facts 1 and 2, acceptance rates in top journals keep declining, are at 2.5% for QJE, 3% for RES, 4% at JPE, 5-6% at AER and EMA
Avner Shlain, on the JM, has striking evidence on how much higher a $5.00 price feels to consumers compared to a $4.99 price: about 15 cents more, which is a lot. Under his estimates grocery chains are losing money by not setting all prices at 99c. Check out the paper!
I agree with spirit of this comment: we are all too quick ex post, myself included, to find a result unsurprising. Publishing precise results makes sense no matter the point estimate. This is a major reason for our initiative to collect forecasts EX ANTE
@evavivalt
@Devin_G_Pope
Editors, reviewers:
Just because a study is not surprising *to you* does not mean that the study does not provide a novel contribution, when there is no other study out there documenting the "unsurprising" result.
We are researchers, not clowns trying to amuse you.
Such a liberating comment from
@LHSummers
. I hated trigonometry and geometry in school, and barely made it. Only to later fall in love with statistics and of course social science in college. How much easier to relate to for a person interested in behavior, not shapes
“It is absurd that high school students are taught trigonometry but not statistics, and physical science but not social science.”
Totally agree with
@LHSummers
CC:
@HowIDecide
I have been outed! Walking & reading in Berkeley Hills. How can you put down Obama's memoire once you started it?! A benefit of ADHD for me is having good multi-tasking (reading and checking for obstacles) so still alive after 10 years of this... for now!
@raogautam
@veenadubal
Surprised and delighted to be in this list in great company for the forecasting work with
@Devin_G_Pope
. Lots of important questions on which research findings are forecastable and which not. More to come!
@evavivalt
@tedmiguel
@CFCamerer
@rglenner
Read below about persecution of Andreu Mas-Colell. We all know stories of public-minded, straight-speaking economists silenced in other countries, but Spain? Calling on well-known economists to denounce this.
@JustinWolfers
@R_Thaler
@paulmromer
Working papers ungated at author websites. In Vol 2, out next year, time preferences (Keith E & David L), limited attention (Xavier G), individual biases (Dan B), interactive biases (Erik E), beh health (
@amitabhchandra2
,
@BenHandel
, Josh S), beh devo (
@raogautam
& Michael K)...
Very excited to announce the Handbook of Behavioral Economics: Foundations and Application, Volume 1 published today! Vol Eds: B. Douglas Bernheim, Stanford University,; Stefano DellaVigna, Berkeley University; David Laibson, Harvard University.
@sdellavi
@AEAjournals
Congrats to
@sdellavi
& co-authors for their paper on media advertising under Berlusconi's political tenure, showing a new lobbying channel
Very excited to announce the Handbook of Behavioral Economics: Foundations and Application, Volume 2 published today! Vol Eds: B. Douglas Bernheim, Stanford University; Stefano DellaVigna, Berkeley University; David Laibson, Harvard University.
@sdellavi
#BehavioralEconomics
Do you want to learn how to estimate a structural
#BehavioralEconomics
model? Or maybe you know how to do that with Matlab/R and want to switch to
#Julia
or
#Python
? We've got you covered! In these notebooks, we replicate 4 recent and influential papers:
RT this. Doing econ PhD applications for students is insane and as consequence most people I know have assistants do it for them. Places like UCLA ask ridiculous information that an assistant would not know and would drive faculty crazy. Glad
@berkeleyecon
is one of simplest.
Could someone PLEASE make a Common Application for econ grad school? Or at least a JOE-like site?
I only have 3 students applying, and the volume of email is just insane.
Papers and Proceedings are OUT of the AER, now they are called the AEA papers and Proceedings, to make clear they are not AERs. Makes sense since P&Ps are not refereed
@Devin_G_Pope
We have a 2018 update to "Nine Facts about Top Journals in Economics" (JEL) with David Card, since a few people had asked about page length, submissions, and acceptance rates. Fact 1: Submissions keep increasing fast, at all journals now also including JPE. AER has the most subs
Data posting back then from the
@AEAjournals
. AER first issue in 1911 has article on Seasonal Variation in NY Money Market: data is posted as a fold in. Way to go! Thanks Sofia and Miguel Villas-Boas for this
I was so lucky to have
@elianalaferrara
as one of my first econ teachers at
@Unibocconi
. Always clear, humorous, dedicated, purposeful and caring. I have been blessed to become her coauthor and friend. My esteem for her has only grown, ceiling effects be damned! So well deserved.
W/ this team, a few years back we studied the role of gender in referees
and editor decisions. With this latest, which came out of a call by the ES society, we study gender diffs in honors in economics. For honors we observe pubs and cites, so easier to study counterfactuals
Women are under-represented in economics. Are they also under-recognized for their contributions? We study gender gaps in recognition for top honors, e.g., Econometric Society fellows, controlling for pubs and cites, going back 70+ years. Read on
If you ever get cynical about economics, please watch Al Roth lecture talk about the work on kidney exchange which saves so many lives. It is brilliant and heart warming. In the talk he in fact downplays his contributions
Check out our proposal on
@sciencemagazine
. Ask experts (& non-experts) to predict research results. Clarifies how much updating/surprise with a study, can reduce incidence of null results, and helps in experimental design. Ongoing work w/
@Devin_G_Pope
@evavivalt
@deankarlan
While the value of forecasts of research results is a newly emerging topic in
#economics
, similar forecasts could also provide great benefits to research broadly and across disciplines, argues this
#SciMagPolicyForum
. Read more: ($)
#SocialScience
Translation: "Tackling the energy crisis with solidarity, shaping a new reality." The German Council of Economic Experts has submitted its new annual report to the Chancellor. That's council member Prof. Ulrike Malmendier on the right.
@umalmend
@Bundeskanzler
@SVR_Wirtschaft
This excellent paper by Anya S and Chuck L is a great example of the importance of eliciting forecasts. Per se, a null result on fund-raising can be... duh. But if all fund-raisers think it's a great tool? The finding turns beliefs around dramatically
@evavivalt
@Econ_4_Everyone
I learned so much from many in the profession, but Pat Kline is in a special league. Pat sees to the core of a problem right away and will build an econometric ladder for you to take out the endogeneity (or otherwise) fire. Go Pat!
@berkeleyecon
@emiguel
@supKaur
@dannyyagan
Very proud of advisee
@jonastun
. We know boys choose competition more than girls, but what about parents? After all, parents play key role in school choices. Before you read on, make a guess: do you think the gender difference will be similar, larger or smaller among parents?
Fave JMP so far:
@jonastun
on preferences for competition.
Parental choice leads to smaller gender gap in preferences for competition than allowing children to choose for themselves. Why? Paternalistic parents act against what child wants.
Academic twitter--will there be a job market at all this year for assistant profs at top 25 U.S. research uni's? Are there *any* that have not announced hiring freezes? It makes a difference for student planning if the U.S. market will be "just dismal," or entirely dead
Check out the great work of advisee Maxim Massenkoff on the JM. JMP is piece of "sociology and economics" in that it validates the sociological narrative of family "turning points" to lower crime. Larger impacts than any incentive-based intervention I know.
What a sweet graph!
It shows the propensity to commit a crime by women leading up to and after having a baby (~50% drop from pre to post). It’s a job market paper by Massenkoff and Rose at Berkeley. Hat tip:
@MargRev
Behavioral econ meets Cognitive and Neuroscience- how? Decision time conveys info about preference and beliefs. Where? Session below, 8am tomorrow. Check it out!
If you're at
#ASSA2024
, please come to our session on Sunday morning (8am) on inferring preferences from decision times. We have papers on editorial decisions at journals, bargaining on eBay, and happiness surveys. It should be fun!
@sdellavi
Today I have 5,000 followers, that is, about 20 percent more than yesterday when it was 4,999. Amazing how that works. Thanks
@Devin_G_Pope
@NicoLacetera
@JustinSydnor
for explaining left digit bias to me
Sad that this is the response of epidemiologists to a very careful and savvy reader of scientific data,
@ProfEmilyOster
. In my work with EthanK about media bias and Fox News, we were lucky that political scientists were open minded about what an economist could do on their turf.
AAP compares me to anti-vaxxers for writing on breastfeeding. Hmm...
“That’s the really scary part of having a person like Oster, who is not an epidemiologist, distilling this information to the lay public,” Feldman-Winter told me. “It’s basically as bad as the anti-vaxxers.”
After several fascinating experiments (most of which nudges, it turns out), it is clear that there are many ways to design experiments more efficiently
In this short paper for AEA P&P we provide evidence re: getting forecasts of experimental results. Does it matter to use slider or text entry? Is there an anchoring effect? And what is the average s.d. treatment effect expected for 3 development RCTs?
@Devin_G_Pope
@evavivalt
1/N Econ has, to say the least, a poor record on diversity w/ respect to female and URM faculty. But have things at least improved? If so, how much & how? Thread on new paper w/ David Card, Patricia Funk, Nagore Iriberri. We study honors in econ: Ect. Society, AAAS, Sloan, NAS
Al Roth: "Thanks for economics being intellectually open, including to someone like me who did not have an economics degree. Let's keep it open!" Amazing talk
Good way from
@tbarrios2
to honor a giant who passed much too soon. This paper by
@Alan_Krueger
and Alex Mas is a perennial favorite, I teach it every year in my behavioral (not labor) class. It uses detailed tire failure data to shine a light on what (de)motivates workers
This paper is important: compares publication bias across fields in same setting, MTurk studies. No pub bias for economists, huge for marketing and other social sciences (as per spike at t=1.96). No excuse for p hacking on MTurk where easy and cheap to recruit subjects for power
The graph for marketing is absolutely depressing. We have a tool to detect excessive use of degrees of freedom (p-curve), and another one to eliminate them altogether (pre-registration): When will we start using them?
Our take on gender in econ journals 1/3: First the positive (i) 4 leading journals chose transparency (ii) M & F refs give same recs to M & F papers so no male animus (iii) no diff delays by gender (iv) editors put equal weight on recs of M & F refs (v) F papers less desk rej'ed
5. Periodic checks. Every year or so i check the papers w/ R&Rs. Are there enough papers of authors i did not know? Enough juniors? Enough not in top places? Diversity by gender and other dimensions? Different areas? (Eg, not all behavioral in my case)
Time prefs chapter has great coverage of present bias and other models of various time pref puzzles. Attention paper covers scarcity model but also optimal inattention and some evidence. Dan Benjamin paper has unique summary of old literature on individual biases, and newer work
Confession: 55 to 60 hours of work per week is about what I do. If I did not have 3 kids it would probably be around 70. Excuse: I LOVE my work and I get to interact with so many exceptional students and colleagues. But hobbies, other than cooking, are gone
I tell my graduate students and post-docs that if they’re working 60 hours per week, they’re working less than the full professors, and less than their peers.
Interesting read. In my econ 101a i teach self control problems and altruism, and we do a risk aversion mini experiment. These topics are some of the favorites of the students, together with game theory. Slutzsky gets no love!
Economists have widely embraced the behavioral-economics revolution, but their textbooks have not. The “standard model” continues to dominate Econ 101 and introduce new generations to a neoclassical fantasyland. By
@elliswonk
Plenty of sober academics are concerned about growing industrial concentration but none are as outspoken and effective as
@ProfFionasm
in supporting vigorous antitrust enforcement and challenging the status quo. Great profile here
Check out the outstanding work of our JM student
@AnneKaring
. She has a very clever model-based design that uses color-coded bracelets to signal completion of vaccination in Sierra Leone.
Great paper that shows with simple but powerful design that we cannot offer elicitation mechanisms that assume rationality, when we know subjects are behavioral. This may unlock research area of studying elicitation incentives for humans, not for econs, to paraphrase
@R_Thaler
Very excited to have our paper accepted at the AER. Grateful for the reviewers’ comments, and for the constructive and very thoughtful insights provided by our editor
@sdellavi
! Thank you.
@davidndanz
@AlistairEcon
List of psych phenomena that do not replicate. Includes a lot of classics... In some case (e.g., Milgram) phenomenon stands, just not the original experiments. My work with
@elinos
shows up in nudges, where we do replicate effectiveness, just 5x smaller effect than pub papers
Excellent thread on writing a job market paper. Proud that it's coming from
@TDeryugina
, one of my very first undergraduate advisees, now a star in the environmental field.
Some miscellaneous writing advice, especially for those writing up their JMP right now.
1. Completing a solid draft will take a lot longer than you think. Plan accordingly (i.e., spend as much of your research time writing as possible).
Very pleased to see this in print some 10 years since we started planning this! Are you curious about how unemployed workers search while unemployed? Do they ramp up search near expiration? Does it come down afterwards?
#referencedependence
Congratulations to
@elianalaferrara
who is a terrific economist with a deep sense of mission and public-mindedness. On a more personal level, she was a major inspiration for me to study economics... thank you for showing the way!
Emi brings great creativity, energy and thoughtfulness to our department, to the AER where it is a pleasure to be coeditors, and to the discipline at large. So glad to have her and Jon around!
Laibson's Ely lecture all centered around self control, and the paradox of limited demand for commitment. This is an issue he has wondered about at least since my grad school time
Do you have a view on the impact of interventions by the Nudge Units? Take this survey to predict the impact from 241 nudge interventions. Results coming soon with
@ElizabethLinos
!
.
@B_I_Tweets
&
@OESatGSA
tested the impact of 241 nudges involving over 24 million participants (wow!).
@ElizabethLinos
&
@sdellavi
compiled them & want *you* to give your best guess of what the average effect size was.
I just did it & can't wait to know the results!
#nudge
⬇️
Farhan Zaidi: behavioral economist by training, baseball star manager by vocation. Econ nerds like me: Read about his prob. weighting paper, one of the best to date. Everyone else: enjoy reading about a superb human being.
@emiguel
David Hirshleifer is the rare economist who is an expert in finance, economic theory, and behavioral econ with major contributions in all 3 areas. Herding or limited attention anyone? Great choice
@4misceldah
In
#BehavioralEconomics
, "structural estimates take calibrations one step further," "can provide useful input already at the design stage of the experiment," and "help with welfare and policy evaluations, an area of fast growth within behavioral economics."
@sdellavi
I agree too. Top public schools like
@UCBerkeley
, UCLA, UMich, have been pushed to expand as demand went up. Why shouldn't Ivies expand to? It would benefit all
Strong agree. Successful institutions grow when they can train/serve more (sports, firms, religion). Selective colleges do too, but usually $ for centers, new schools. Why not more undergrads? Marginal costs are housing, food, larger intro classes— easily paid for.
We have a similar finding in paper with
@Devin_G_Pope
published in 2018 JPE. Laypeople guess on average near perfectly which of 15 behavioral treatments are most effective. Accuracy similar to one of experts. Would be good to cite related work across disciplines!
@BrianNosek
27 high-profile social science findings were evaluated by 233 people without a PhD. These laypeople predicted replication success above-chance (58%)
When laypeople were informed about the strength of evidence from the original studies, this boosted prediction accuracy (67%)