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We report on two novel choice experiments with real goods where subjects in one treatment are forced to choose, as is the norm in economic experiments, while in the other they are not but can instead incur a small cost to defer choice. Using a variety of measures, we find that the active choices (i.e., those that exclude the deferral outside option) of subjects in the nonforced‐choice treatment are generally more consistent. We also find that the combined deferral and active‐choice behavior of subjects in that treatment is explained better by a model of dominant choice with incomplete preferences than it is by rational choice. Our results suggest that nonforced‐choice experiments and models can be helpful in separating people's rational, hesitant/not‐yet‐rational and genuinely irrational behavior, and can potentially offer important new insights in revealed preference analysis. Gerasimou (the corresponding author) and Costa-Gomes gratefully acknowledge financial support from the British Academy (2012–13 SRG). Cueva acknowledges support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (Grant PID2019-108193GB-I00) and the Generalitat Valenciana (Grant SEJI/2019/005).

Despite the distinctive character of the Austrian approach to «microfoundations for macroeconomics», the literature on free banking contains a number of arguments which make use of game-theoretic concepts and models such as the well-known Prisoner’s Dilemma model. While there can be no general a priori presumption against the possible usefulness of game-theoretic concepts for Austrian theorizing, in the context of the debate on free banking such concepts and models have been used with varying degrees of perspicacity. One example which is elaborated in the paper is concerned with the interaction configuration between independent banks in a fractional-reserve free banking system, which has sometimes been modeled as a One-Shot Prisoner’s Dilemma game. This conceptualization does not provide a sufficient argument for the in-concert overexpansion thesis, nor for the thesis that fractional-reserve free banking will tend to lead to the establishment of a central bank. The author drops the implicit assumption that there exists a one-to-one correspondence between the outcome matrix and the utility matrix. When it is acknowledged that banks in a fractional-reserve free banking system need not necessarily adopt a «myopic», self-regarding perspective but may recognize the long-run harmony of interests between the banking sector and society at large, a different conceptualization and a different matrix representation emerge. Key words: Economic Mechanism Design; Business Cycle Theory; Prisoner’s Dilemma; Free Banking. JEL codes: D01, E31, E32, E42, E52, E58, E66, G18, K39. Resumen: A pesar del carácter distintivo del enfoque austríaco de las «microfundaciones para la macroeconomía», la literatura sobre la banca libre contiene algunos argumentos que recurren a los conceptos y modelos de la teoría de juegos tales como el conocido modelo Dilema del Prisionero. A pesar de que no puede existir una presunción a priori sobre la posible utilidad de conceptos de la teoría de juegos para las teorías austríacas, en el contexto del debate sobre la banca libre tales conceptos y modelos han sido manejados con distintos grados de perspicacia. Un ejemplo elaborado en el documento comenta la configuración de interacción entre los bancos independientes en un sistema de banca libre con reserva fraccionaria, que a veces ha sido modelado como un juego de Dilema del Prisionero One-Shot. Esta conceptualización no ofrece suficientes argumentos para la tesis de la sobreexpansión in-concert, ni para la tesis de que un sistema de banca libre con reserva fraccionaria tendería a la creación de un banco central. El autor abandona la asunción implícita de que existe una correspondencia de uno a uno entre la matriz de resultado y la matriz de utilidad. Al reconocerse que los bancos en un sistema de banca libre con reserva fraccionaria no deben adoptar necesariamente una perspectiva «miope» y egoísta, pero pueden reconocer la armonía de intereses a largo plazo entre el sector bancario y la sociedad en general, surgen una conceptualización y representación de la matriz distintas. Palabras clave: Diseño de mecanismo económico; Teoría del ciclo económico; Dilema del Prisionero; Banca libre. Códigos JEL: D01, E31, E32, E42, E52, E58, E66, G18, K39.

We present a semiparametric method to estimate group-level dispersion, which is particularly effective in the presence of censored data. We apply this procedure to obtain measures of occupation-specific wage dispersion using top-coded administrative wage data from the German IAB Employment Sample. We then relate these robust measures of earnings risk to the risk attitudes of individuals working in these occupations. We find that willingness to take risk is positively correlated with the wage dispersion of an individual’s occupation.

We investigate what statistical properties drive risk-taking in a large set of observational panel data on online poker games (n=4,450,585). Each observation refers to a choice between a safe 'insurance' option and a binary lottery of winning or losing the game. Our setting offers a real-world choice situation with substantial incentives where probability distributions are simple, transparent, and known to the individuals. We find that individuals reveal a strong and robust preference for skewness. The effect of skewness is most pronounced among experienced and losing players but remains highly significant for winning players, in contrast to the variance effect.

An analysis of the Survey of Consumer Finance shows that wealthy investors have a higher return on their stocks than their poorer counterparts. Three key empirical facts emerge: (i) wealthy investors employ more productive search efforts, (ii) financial risk bearing and search efforts are complementary, and (iii) wealthy investors have a higher risk adjusted return. These facts present a challenge to the “standard” asset pricing theory, which assumes that the return on stocks is uncorrelated with wealth and omits any relationship between search activity and portfolio returns. This study presents a search theoretic model of portfolio choice to understand the relationship between wealth, return, and search behavior.

We provide a simple necessary and sufficient condition for when a multiproduct demand system can be generated from a discrete choice model with unit demands.

We develop a new method to estimate the parameters of threshold distributions for market participation based upon an agent-specific attribute and its decision outcome. This method requires few behavioral assumptions, is not data demanding, and can adapt to various parametric distributions. Monte Carlo simulations show that the algorithm successfully recovers three different parametric distributions and is resilient to assumption violations. An application to export decisions by French firms shows that threshold distributions are generally right-skewed. We then reveal the asymmetric effects of past policies over different quantiles of the threshold distributions.

Incentivized experiments in which individuals receive monetary rewards according to the outcomes of their decisions are regarded as the gold standard for preference elicitation in experimental economics. These task-related real payments are considered necessary to reveal subjects' "true preferences". Using a systematic, large-sample approach with three subject pools of private investors, professional investors, and students, we test the effect of task-related monetary incentives on risk preferences elicited in four standard experimental tasks. We find no systematic differences in behavior between subjects in the incentivized and non-incentivized regimes. We discuss implications for academic research and for applications in the field.

We study whether and how time preferences change over the life cycle, exploiting representative long-term panel data. In order to disentangle age effects from cohort and period factors, we estimate individual fixed-effects models, substituting period effects with period specific determinants of time preferences. We find that discount rates linearly decrease over the life cycle. This pattern holds when adjusting for the curvature of the utility function. We show the quantitative importance of this finding by demonstrating that a canonical life-cycle model with decreasing discounting significantly improves its fit to consumption and asset data relative to the model with constant discounting. October 2020

In this study, we investigate how and why people discriminate among different groups, including their in-group and multiple out-groups. In a laboratory experiment, we use dictator games for five groups to compare actual transfers to in-group and out-group agents with the respective beliefs held by dictators and recipients in these groups. We observe both in-group favoritism and discrimination across multiple out-groups. Individuals expect others to be in-group biased, as well as to be treated differently by different out-groups. We find that dictators’ in-group favoritism is positively related to the degree of in-group favoritism they expect other dictators to exhibit. Moreover, we find that a dictator tends to be relatively more generous toward a specific out-group when he or she expects that dictators belonging to that out-group are generous toward members of his or her in-group. Thus, our study provides evidence for indirect reciprocation expectation.

We model individual identification choice as a strategic group formation problem. When choosing a social group to identify with, individuals appreciate high social status and a group stereotype to which they have a small social distance. A group׳s social status and stereotype are shaped by the (exogenous) individual attributes of its members and hence endogenous to individuals׳ choices. Unless disutility from social distance is strong enough, this creates a strategic tension as individuals with attributes that contribute little to group status would like to join high-status groups, thereby diluting the latters׳ status and changing stereotypes. Such social free-riding motivates the use of soft exclusion technologies in high-status groups, which provides a unifying rationale for phenomena such as hazing rituals, charitable activities or status symbols that is not taste-based or follows a standard signaling mechanism.

Levent Ulku acknowledges financial sup port from the Asociacion Mexicana de Cultura. The Hicksian definition of complementarity and substitutability may not apply in contexts in which agents are not utility maximisers or where price or income variations, whether implicit or explicit, are not available. We look for tools to identify complementarity and substitutability satisfying the following criteria: they are behavioural (based only on observable choice data); model‐free (valid whether the agent is rational or not); and they do not rely on price or income variation. We uncover a conflict between properties that it is arguably reasonable for a complementarity notion to possess. We discuss three different possible resolutions of the conflict. Postprint

This paper extends the notion of the rational agent in economics by acknowledging the role of the unconscious in the agent's decision-making process. It argues that the unconscious can be modelled by a rational agent with his own objective function and set of information. The combination of both the conscious and unconscious agents is called the "dual agent". This dual agent presents rationally biased behaviors that may not disappear through aggregation, and could be potentially measured. It also provides a theoretical approach to the emotionally-driven actions. On the social sciences side, the paper pleads for a wider use of substantive rationality in the understanding of human behavior.

We seek an evolutionary explanation for why in some situations humans maintain either optimistic or pessimistic attitudes towards uncertainty and are ignorant to relevant aspects of their environment. Players in strategic games face Knightian uncertainty about opponents' actions and maximize individually their Choquet expected utility with respect to neo-additive capacities (Chateauneuf, Eichberger, and Grant, 2007) allowing for both an optimistic or pessimistic attitude towards uncertainty as well as ignorance to strategic dependencies. An optimist (resp. pessimist) overweighs good (resp. bad) outcomes. A complete ignorant never reacts to opponents' changes of actions. We focus on sub- and supermodular aggregative games and provide monotone comparative statics w.r.t. optimism/pessimism. With qualifications we show that in finite populations optimistic (resp. pessimistic) complete ignorance is evolutionary stable and yields a strategic advantage in submodular (resp. supermodular) games with aggregate externalities. Moreover, this evolutionary stable preference leads to Walrasian behavior in these classes of games.

A theory of incomplete preferences under uncertainty is proposed, according to which a decision maker’s preferences are indeterminate if and only if her confidence in the relevant beliefs does not match up to the stakes involved in the decision. The author uses the model of confidence in beliefs introduced in Hill (2013), and axiomatise a class of models, differing from each other in the appropriate notion of stakes. Comparative statics analysis can distinguish the decision maker’s confidence from her attitude to choosing in the absence of confidence. The model naturally suggests two possible strategies for completing preferences, and hence for choosing in the presence of incompleteness. One strategy respects confidence – it relies only on beliefs in which the decision maker has sufficient confidence given the stakes – whereas the other goes on hunches – it relies on all beliefs, no matter how little confidence the decision maker has in them. Axiomatic characterizations are given for each of the strategies. Finally, the author considers the consequences of the model in markets, where indeterminacy of preference translates into refusal to trade. The incorporation of confidence adds an extra friction, beyond the standard implications of non-expected utility models for Pareto optima.

We characterize lexicographic preferences on product sets of finitely many coordinates. The main new axiom is a robustness property. It roughly requires this: Suppose x is preferred to y ; many of its coordinates indicate that the former is better and only a few indicate the opposite. Then the decision maker is allowed a change of mind turning one coordinate in favor of x to an indifference: even if one less argument supports the preference, the fact that we started with many arguments in favor of x suggests that such a small change is not enough to give rise to the opposite preference.

Laboratory experiments have established the existence of cognitive biases, but their explanatory power in real-world economic settings has been difficult to quantify. We evaluate the extent to which a cognitive bias, confirmatory bias, affects the opinions of experts in a real-world environment. In the Associated Press Top 25 College Football Poll, expert pollsters are tasked with assessing team quality, and their beliefs are treated week to week with game results that serve as signals about an individual team’s quality. We exploit the variation provided by actual game results relative to market expectations to develop a novel regression-discontinuity approach to identify confirmatory bias. We construct a data set that matches more than 20 years of individual game characteristics to poll results and betting market information and show that teams that slightly exceed and barely miss market expectations are exchangeable. The likelihood of winning the game, the average number of points scored by teams and their opponents, and even the average week of the season are no different between teams that slightly exceed and barely miss market expectations. Pollsters, however, significantly upgrade their beliefs about a team’s quality when a team slightly exceeds market expectations. The effects are sizable—one fifth of the standard deviation in poll points in a given week can be attributed to confirmatory bias, which is equivalent to nearly half of the voters in the poll ranking a team one slot higher when they slightly exceed market expectations. This type of updating suggests that even when informed agents make repeated decisions, they may act in a manner consistent with confirmatory bias.

Under Medicare Part D, senior citizens choose prescription drug insurance offered by numerous private insurers. We examine nonpoor enrollees' actions in 2006 and 2007 using panel data. Our sample reduced overspending by $298 on average, with gains by 81 percent of them. The greatest improvements were by those who overspent most in 2006 and by those who switched plans. Decisions to switch depended on individuals' overspending in 2006 and on individual-specific effects of changes in their current plans. The oldest consumers and those initiating medications for Alzheimer's disease improved by more than average, suggesting that real-world institutions help overcome cognitive limitations. (JEL D14, G22, H51, I13, I18)

Financial support from ESRC grant RES-000-22-3474 is gratefully acknowledged There are many situations in which alternatives ranked by quality wish to be chosen and compete for the imperfect attention of a chooser by selecting their own salience. The chooser may be "tricked" into choosing more salient but inferior alternatives. We investigate when competitive forces ensure instead that (strictly) higher salience is diagnostic of (strictly) higher quality, and the most frequently chosen alternative is the best one. We prove that the structure of externalities in the technology of salience is key. Broadly speaking, positive externalities in salience favour correlation between quality and salience. Postprint

Fungibility of money is a central assumption in the theory of consumer choice: any unit of money is substitutable for another. This implies that the composition of income or wealth is irrelevant for consumption. We find that even in a simple, incentivized setup many subjects do not treat money as fungible. When a label is attached to a part of their budget, subjects change consumption according to the label. We first provide suggestive evidence from the field and then use a laboratory experiment to show this result in a tightly controlled environment. In the lab, subjects with lower cognitive abilities are more likely to violate fungibility. The findings lend support to behavioral models of narrow bracketing and mental accounting. One implication of our results is that in-kind benefits distort consumption more strongly than usually assumed. (JEL: C91, C93, D01, H31, I38)

People trade favors when doing so increases efficiency. Will they when it reduces efficiency, such as in political logrolling? We introduce the “Stakeholder Public Bad” game, in which common fund contributions increase one person's earnings (the “Stakeholder”) while reducing others’ earnings and overall efficiency. The Stakeholder position rotates through all group members or just alternates among two people (making it easier to form a coalition). High Stakeholder rewards provide a lever for reciprocity: if someone contributes when another is Stakeholder, he may be rewarded with a gift when he becomes Stakeholder. Reciprocity is only possible when agents know others’ roles and actions, so information provision may be pro- or anti-social. In a laboratory experiment, we combine a rotating or alternating asymmetry in payoffs with varying levels of information provision to examine pro- and anti-social reciprocity. We find that subjects in the Stakeholder role willingly sacrifice social welfare. We also see both anti-social and pro-social favor trading, particularly when coalition-forming is easier. Favor trading does not change the mean level of public bad provision. People who trade favors tend to be less risk averse.

Besides the numerous effects that the financial crisis of 2007 has produced over the entire global economy, its onset has reopened fundamental discussions on the methodology of the economic science. One of the main controversies in the literature revolves around the nature of the neoclassical homo oeconomicus used in the mainstream analysis, with emphasis on the concept of rationality. Although the causes of the crisis are numerous, we propose to investigate in this paper only some aspects related to the psychological factors that contributed to the outbreak of this situation. The analysis is developed especially around the concept of economic rationality, arguing that the human being has a bounded rationality rather than a perfect one. Moreover, the relationship that exists between bounded rationality and the economic freedom of the individual is brought to the fore.

This study aimed to: (1) analyze the characteristics of households affecting energy consumption of simple household electricity, (2) analyze the probability of each of the factors affecting the energy consumption of small household electricity. The study was conducted in city of Medan in the period of January 2014 to September 2014 with samples of 143 small households as the customers of PLN (State Electricity Company) Medan, which use the low voltage of electricity named TR-1/450VA. Data were analyzed by using the logistic regression model. The estimation results indicated that: (1) the higher the willingness to pay (WTP) of households, the higher the tendency to consume electrical energy >100 KWh per month by 4.694 times than of the households with willingness to pay < Rp 100 thousand per month, (2) the closer the households residence to the city center, the higher the tendency to consume electrical energy > 100 KWh per month by 2.288 times than of the households residence in the suburbs, (3) increasingly unfavourable response to electrical quality, the higher the chance to consume electrical energy > 100 KWh per month.

There is little evidence in support of the main economic rationale for regulating athletic doping: that doping reduces fan interest. The introduction of random testing for performance-enhancing drugs (PED) by Major League Baseball (MLB) offers unique data to investigate the issue. The announcement of a PED violation: (a) initially reduces home-game attendance by 8 percent, (b) has no impact on home-game attendance after 12 days, and (c) has a small negative impact on the game attendance for other MLB teams. A lower bound for the cost of a PED violation to a team is $451K. This is the first systematic evidence that doping decreases consumer demand for sporting events.

There are many goals an instructor may wish to accomplish in a course on economic principles. For us one goal should be the education of a generation of sensible and active members of civil society. This is an ambitious goal: it requires that students internalize the economic way of thinking and learn to exercise active citizenry. After experimenting with a variety of methods, we have concluded that requiring students to write an op-ed is the most conducive to the development of the economic way of thinking. Here we share what we have learned in the process, hoping that the pedagogical capability of writing an op-ed will encourage others to adopt the assignment into their classrooms.

Previous experimental research suggests that individuals apply rules of thumb to a simplified mental model of the “real” decision problem. We claim that this simplification is obtained either by neglecting the other players’ incentives and beliefs or by taking them into consideration only for a subset of game outcomes. We analyze subjects’ eye movements while playing a series of two-person, 3×3 one-shot games in normal form. Games within each class differ by a set of descriptive features (i.e., features that can be changed without altering the game equilibrium properties). Data show that subjects on average perform partial or non-strategic analysis of the payoff matrix, often ignoring the opponent´s payoffs and rarely performing the necessary steps to detect dominance. Our analysis of eye-movements supports the hypothesis that subjects use simple decision rules such as “choose the strategy with the highest average payoff” or “choose the strategy leading to an attractive and symmetric outcome” without (optimally) incorporating knowledge on the opponent’s behavior. Lookup patterns resulted being feature and game invariant, heterogeneous across subjects, but stable within subjects. Using a cluster analysis, we find correlations between eye-movements and choices; however, applying the Cognitive Hierarchy model to our data, we show that only some of the subjects present both information search patterns and choices compatible with a specific cognitive level. We also find a series of correlations between strategic behavior and individual characteristics like risk attitude, short-term memory capacity, and mathematical and logical abilities.

A tanulmányban ármerevséget vezetünk be egy ágensalapú piaci modellbe a Calvo-féle megoldáshoz hasonló módon. Amellett érvelünk, hogy az árak merevségének DSGE modellekben leírt következményei (átváltás az ár és a termelés ingadozása között, illetve az átlagos értékek változatlansága az ármerevség függvényében) csak a modellek sajátos feltevéseiből következnek. Megmutatjuk, hogy egy ágensalapú modellben más hatások mutathatók ki: pozitív kapcsolat van az ár és a termelés ingadozása között az ármerevség függvényében, ami egy fordított U alakú összefüggés szerint hat a változók ingadozására. A rugalmasabb árak nagyobb átlagos kibocsátáshoz is vezetnek. A vállalatok ármerevségbeli heterogenitásának nincs hatása a változókra. Ha a vállalatok nagyobb súllyal veszik figyelembe a versenytársak árait az árdöntés során, akkor rugalmas árak mellett csökken, ragadós árak mellett nő az ár és a termelés ingadozása. A vállalatok közötti ismertségi hálózat sűrűségének növekedése rugalmas árak esetén csökkenti a változók ingadozását, ragadós árak mellett nem hat rájuk. Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) kód: B59, D01, D21, D49, E12, L11., The paper introduces price rigidity into an agent-based market model in a way similar to Calvo pricing. It is argued that the usual consequences of rigidity of prices observable in DSGE models (trade-off between the volatility of the price and the output, and the constancy of average values as a function of price rigidity), are merely implied by the specific assumptions of the models. It is shown that the effects are different in an agent-based model. Here there is a positive relation between price volatility and output as a function of price rigidity, which affects the volatility of the variables in a reversed U-shaped relation. Higher price flexibility leads to higher average output as well. The heterogeneity of firms in price rigidity does not affect the variables. If firms place greater weight on the prices of their competitors in price decision-making, then with flexible prices the volatility of the price and the output decrease, while with sticky prices they increase. An increase in the density of the network of acquaintances among firms decreases the volatility of the variables with flexible prices, but it does not affect them with sticky prices.

Constructing compensation schemes for effort in multi-dimensional tasks is complex, particularly when some dimensions are not easily observable. When incentive schemes contractually reward workers for easily observed measures, such as quantity produced, the standard model predicts that unrewarded dimensions, such as quality, will be neglected. Yet, there remains mixed empirical evidence in favor of this standard principal-agent model prediction. This paper reconciles the literature by using both theory and empirical evidence. The theory outlines conditions under which principals can use a piece rate scheme to induce higher quantity and quality levels than analogous fixed wage schemes. Making use of a series of complementary laboratory and field experiments we show that this effect occurs because the agent is uncertain about the principal's monitoring ability and the principal's choice of a piece rate signals to the agent that she is efficient at monitoring.

A tanulmány a neoklasszikus közgazdaságtan alaptézisét, a szűkösségnek a termelésben játszott meghatározó szerepét teszi kritika tárgyává. Ehhez felvázolja a szűkösség és a felesleg mibenlétét, egymással való kapcsolatukat és a társadalom fejlődésében játszott szerepüket. Bemutatja, hogy a kisajátítással a szűkösség új formája jön létre, amelyet a feleslegre irányuló termelés táplál. A feleslegtermelés általános módjára vonatkozóan bevezeti a kezdeti előny és a kumulatív előnyszerzés, valamint az osztályfelesleg fogalmát. Rávilágít, hogy a kapitalizmusban a feleslegtermelés módja megváltozott, mert az előnybirtokosok szubjektív igényei helyett a piac specifikus törvényeinek rendelődik alá. Ennek következtében ma már elegendő osztályfelesleg termelődik ahhoz, hogy a szűkösség egyáltalában felszámolható legyen. Ennek szükségességét mutatja, hogy a feleslegtermelés a vele együtt járó szűkösségtermeléssel minduntalan megakad, és ilyenkor különösen kiélezi a gazdasági-társadalmi problémákat. Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) kód: B13, D01, D24, D31, J01, J30, K11, O1, P10., The study aims to criticize the basic thesis of mainstream economics that scarcity plays a determining role in production. To do so it outlines the essence of and relation between scarcity and surplus, and the role they play in the development of society. The author argues that scarcity is the result of appropriation of the means of production and of production that aims at surplus. With the general mode of the production of surplus, the study introduces the notion of initial advantage, cumulative advantage and class surplus. It highlights how the production of surplus has been changed under capitalism, where it has become subordinated to the specific rules of the market instead of the subjective needs of those who hold the benefits. Consequently the class surplus produced nowadays is enough to put an end to scarcity in general. The need to eliminate general scarcity is underlined by the fact that the production of surplus and the collateral production of scarcity halt from time to time and exacerbate existing socio-economic problems in times of crises.

This scientific approach has focused my attention more on clarifying some aspects of the economic implications on the educational services market. The issue dealt provides a brief overview of the conceptual delimitations, of the main components and of the categories of recipients on the education market, and of this market’s mechanisms which have as effect human interactions in social cooperation, as well as being a consequence of relationships manifestation on the free market and in this investigated area.

A large economics literature seeks to understand the reasons why individuals make charitable contributions. Fundamental features of most models of charitable giving are the inclusion of externalities induced by other agents and the Lancasterian characteristics approach to specifying utility functions. This paper develops a general, revealed-preference methodology for testing a variety of preference structures that allow for both externalities and characteristics. The tests are simple linear programs that are transparent, computationally efficient, and straightforward to implement. We show how the technique applies to standard models of privately provided public goods and novel models that account for other-regarding preferences based on relative consumption and donations among individuals. We also conduct an original experiment that enables testing and comparing many models on a single data set. Our experiment design allows us to focus on intrinsic motivations which are often hard to disentangle from other extrinsic or image effects in field data. The results provide the first revealed-preference evidence on the importance of social comparisons when individuals make charitable contributions. Models that include preferences for either relative consumption or donations yield significantly greater explanatory power than the standard model of impure altruism.

Using the techniques of revealed preference analysis, we study a two-stage model of choice behavior. In the first stage, the decision maker maximizes a menu-dependent binary relation encoding preferences that are imperfectly perceived. In the second, a menu-independent binary relation is maximized over the subset of alternatives that survive the first stage. This structure can support various interpretations, including those of salience effects, positive action, and surface characteristics. We characterize the model behaviorally both in ordinal form and in terms of the corresponding numerical representations.

We provide conditions under which contingent claim and asset demands are consistent with state independent Expected Utility maximization. The paper focuses on the case of a single commodity and demands are allowed to be functions of probabilities and not just prices and income. We extend prior analyses by deriving three distinct tests for demands to be rationalized by Expected Utility: (i) a contingent claim analogue to the certainty strong axiom of revealed preference, (ii) a characterization of the functional form for demand, and (iii) necessary and sufficient conditions based on the Slutsky matrix. (JEL D01, D11, D81) The neoclassical certainty model of consumer behavior postulates that a consum er’s demand can be described as having been derived from utility maximization sub ject to a budget constraint. One is then naturally led to ask what this model implies about observed demand behavior. This question has been addressed using two quite distinct approaches. The first, originating in the work of Slutsky (1915) and Antonelli (1886), derives necessary and sufficient conditions for utility maximization assum ing knowledge of the consumer’s demand functions. The second approach known as “revealed preference,” following the classic work of Samuelson (1938), provides necessary and sufficient restrictions on a finite set of demand-price pairs such that the demand behavior of a consumer is consistent with utility maximization. In this paper, we extend both approaches to a classic portfolio choice problem, where consumers possess state independent Expected Utility preferences and there is a single commodity in each state. We focus only on the complete market case, where the financial asset setting is equivalent to the contingent claim setting and hence it is only necessary to discuss demand tests for the latter. We depart from the standard contingent claim theory by assuming that state of nature probabilities are not fixed and we model demand as a function of probabilities as well as prices and income. For the revealed preference approach, with the restriction of a single commodity in each state, we derive a much simpler test for Expected Utility maximization than those that currently exist in the literature. For example the formulation of Green and

Coordination on focal points in one shot games can often be explained by team reasoning, a departure from individualistic choice theory. However, a less exotic explanation of coordination is also available based on best-responding to uniform randomisation. We test the team reasoning explanation experimentally against this alternative, using coordination games with variable losses in the off-diagonal cells. Subjects’ responses are observed when the behaviour of their partner is determined in accordance with each theory, and under game conditions where behaviour is unconstrained. The results are more consistent with the team reasoning explanation. Increasing the difficulty of the coordination tasks produces some behaviour suggestive of response to randomisation, but this effect is not pronounced.

Outward direct investment (ODI) from the People's Republic of China (PRC) is surging. A common perception is that it was driven by the country's resource-seeking and technology-seeking motives. Using a new, unique, and comprehensive dataset that covers close to 10,000 Chinese ODI deals from 1998 to 2009, we find that in contrast to the common perception, over half of the ODI deals are in service sectors, with many of them appearing to be export-related. In addition to documenting the pattern and trend of the PRC's ODI, we empirically examine both the determinants and effects of ODI at the firm level. We find that ex ante larger, more productive, and more export-intensive firms are more likely to start investing abroad. Using matching estimation techniques, we find that ODI is associated with better firm performance, including higher total factor productivity, employment, and export intensity, and greater product innovation. To assess the relative contributions of technology transfer, export promotion, and resource seeking to the positive effects of ODI, we use ODI data merged with customs transaction-level trade data. We find that firms’ ODI participation is associated with significantly better trade performance, measured by export and import volumes, export and import unit values, and number of export destinations. Contrary to perceived technology-seeking and resource-seeking motives, we find no evidence that ODI firms import more capital or intermediate inputs compared to non-ODI firms. © 2013 Asian Development Bank and Asian Development Bank Institute.

Both formal and informal institutions are usually perceived as constraints that structure and limit human behavior. This is understandable when we use them as an addition to neoclassical economics and as an attempt to overcome its deficiencies. Yet institutions also enable behavior which would otherwise probably be inexistent. This paper aims to highlight the enabling feature of institutions and briefly recognizes selected consequences of it. We argue (1) that because institutional arrangements cause specific distribution results thus the process of institutional change is virtually infinite and does not have to lead to socially optimal effects and (2) that informal institutions (social norms) have today important explanatory and creative power for the existing social order and economic development. We conclude by suggesting that more interdisciplinary approach to economics may contribute to our better understanding of socioeconomic reality and indicate promising threads of current research.

We examine a type of lottery used to distribute some publicly held resource access rights. The lottery provides participants with the opportunity to choose among a set of simple gambles over multi-attribute goods. Participant choices result in an endogenous distribution of success rates over gambles that reflects tradeoffs between the relative desirability of the available goods and the probability of winning. When lottery winnings are multi-attribute goods, lottery outcomes provide sufficient information to estimate hedonic prices, marginal utility, and marginal rates of substitution among attributes. We develop a model for characterizing preferences from this information set. We apply our model to Idaho׳s Four Rivers Whitewater Recreation Lottery, which allows applicants to apply for one permit among a large set of alternative river/day combinations that provide varying river and weather characteristics. This lottery structure shows promise as a foundation for economic experiments for preference revelation.

Some policy problems pit one group׳s interests against another׳s. One group may determine provision of a project (such as a dam) that benefits group members but hurts others. We introduce a model of such projects. In-group members may contribute to a common fund that benefits them as a public good. Benefits from the project may vary within the group. Provision has negative downstream externalities: contributions hurt agents outside the in-group (“Outsiders”), rendering them anti-social. Many models of social preferences predict that such externalities should reduce provision, although conditional cooperation or a preference for in-group members may counteract this. We test this model with a lab experiment using Outsiders with whom the in-group members have more and less contact. With homogeneous in-group benefits, the presence of negative downstream externalities reduces contributions by half when they have closer contact with Outsiders but not at all when they have had no contact. We introduce a rotating high-return position that allows subjects to trade favors. In this setting, contributions of non-privileged members diminish slightly when faced with the negative externality given closer contact with Outsiders, and not at all with less contact. Reciprocal giving occurs whether or not Outsiders are present.

We examine whether the three-point rule—the increase in rewards for a win from two to three points that the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) adopted in 1995—makes Bundesliga games become more exciting. Using regression discontinuity design as the empirical strategy, we do not find evidence that the three-point rule makes games more decisive, increases the number of goals, or decreases goal differences. We only find some evidence that the three-point rule increases the second-half goals of losing first-half teams. Overall, our results suggest that, in the case of Bundesliga games, the three-point rule does not work as FIFA intended.

This study addresses two significant limitations in the literature on cross-country expenditure comparisons: (a) treatment of all countries, large and small, as single entities with no spatial differences inside the countries, and (b) use of Divisia price indices, rather than Rank 3 preference-based “exact price” indices, in the expenditure comparisons. This paper compares alternative preference consistent methods for estimating spatial price differences in a large heterogeneous country, namely India, that are benchmarked against the spatial prices generated by the Laspyeres and Tornqvist price indices. Unlike the use of conventional price indices, the use of demand-systems-based methods allows the incorporation of price-induced substitution effects between items. The paper illustrates the usefulness of the methodology by using the “exact” spatial price indices, in conjunction with the inequality-sensitive welfare measure due to Sen, to rank the Indian states and examine changes in ranking during one of the most significant periods in independent India. The results have methodological and empirical implications that extend far beyond India.

The appeal of the microfoundations project in economics is strongly supported by the considerable force of the discipline's "hard core" (in Lakatos' sense). This is especially the case, if the microfoundations metaphor is seen as a way of giving precedence to microeconomics in unifying economic theory rather than as requiring that all macroeconomic propositions are reduced to or derived from microeconomic ones. Given the micro-theoretical nature of the "hard core", the microfoundations project and professional respect for the "hard core" have become closely intertwined and the orientating and disciplining role of the latter is of crucial importance in driving the former. Thus, questioning the microfoundations project is tantamount to confronting the "hard core". Maximization of utility and maximization of profit, which are the two most fundamental tenets of the "hard core", both suffer from serious weaknesses. Maximization of utility is not only contradicted by a lot of experimental and other empirical evidence but it is also neither necessary nor sufficient for establishing the "law" of demand. Profit maximization is falsified both on theoretical and empirical grounds, in the case of large corporations under managerial control, and is inconsistent or implausible in the case of small owner-run firms. Consequently, privileging micro over macro theory does not ensure sound foundations and the microfoundations project makes little sense. It follows that the search for consistency between microeconomics and macroeconomics should best be pursued in terms of the bridge metaphor.

Many Day-of-the week anomaly papers have suggested investor behaviour as the explanation of highly differentiated returns on Mondays; yet, rarely found a paper has empirically investigated it. Therefore, this paper proposes Moon-Induced mood as the determinant of that irrational behaviour. This proposition is based on our preliminary findings that the full moon phase occurred more often on Mondays compared to other days; an indication of a causal relationship. By taking Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Philippines as samples during the period of 1999-2010, this paper found: (1) There is evidence of a Monday effect across all the ASEAN stock markets, (2) The moon phase and its interaction with Mondays has significantly influenced the Monday effect, and (3) A full moon on Monday has significant negative influenced on Monday returns. In conclusion, the stimulation by moon phase forms affection bias, and the resulting outcome is the irrational stock market behavior. Classification-JEL: G02, D01 Keywords: Moon Effect, Day-Of-Week-Anomaly, Irrational Behavior, ASEAN., International Journal of Economic Behavior, Vol 4, No 1 (2014): International Journal of Economic Behavior

For long, economics and sociology have been exploring rationality and decision-making with analytical tools of their own. This paper aims at comparing Keynes’s theories with Bourdieu’s in this regard. It hinges around three headings, namely: 1) a spontaneous, embodied view on action; 2) the analogical nature of expectations; 3) the organicism or the micro/macro connection issue. Animal spirits and habitus appear to be very much in tune with each other. Beyond the differences in the research topics, it seems that both theories are consistent and should benefit from cross-fertilization. In particular, the very concept of animal spirits could benefit from the habitus on six points: endogenizing of preferences, extension of the notion of capital not the least to other dimensions such as culture and symbol), practical sense, structural effects, power relationships and a refined articulation of the microeconomic foundations of macroeconomics to the macroeconomic foundations of microeconomics.

The purpose of this article is to analyze the relationship between the discipline of Behavioural Economics and the Neoclassical School. On the basis of the available literature, the paper aims to investigate if the two branches are totally opposite, or if the behavioural theories only extend and complement the mainstream economics.

The paper aims to draw conceptual definitions in an overview on the issue of knowledge management in NGOs. Motivation for knowledge management, environment, and main features of knowledge management in NGOs are exposed and annotated. NGOs are interested to be more efficient and effective in their effort to offer social value to their beneficiaries. Therefore, they are interested to adopt the knowledge management vision and practices The paper's assertions are based on the theoretical concepts of knowledge management and on the 20 years of author's experience in the civil sector in Romania.

L’intérêt des Français pour l’économie progresse par rapport à l’année dernière, avec une préoccupation marquée pour la situation de l’État et des finances publiques, sujet d’inquiétude pour 80 % d’entre eux. S’ils ont une perception collective pessimiste de la situation économique, ils sont plutôt optimistes sur leur situation individuelle.

We study a Bayesian game of two-sided incomplete information in which an agent, who owns a project of unknown quality, considers proposing it to an evaluator, who has the choice of whether or not to accept it. There exist two distinct tiers of evaluation that differ in the benefits they deliver to the agent upon acceptance of a project. The agent has to select the tier to which the project is submitted for review. Making a proposal incurs a cost on the agent in the form of a submission cost. We examine the effect of changes in the payoff parameters at the two tiers of evaluation on the efficiency of the equilibrium outcome. We show that changes in these parameters that are aimed at increasing the level of self-screening exerted by the agent do not necessarily have beneficial effects either on the quality of projects submitted for review or on the quality of projects that are implemented. From a methodological viewpoint, our paper proposes a novel method of performing comparative statics in games whose equilibria are defined by a system of equations with no closed-form solution.

Favor trading is common. We do something nice for someone and they do something nice in return. Several motives might underlie such behavior, including altruism, strategic motives, and direct or indirect positive reciprocity. It is not yet well-understood how these fit together to affect behavior, how they interact in various institutional structures, and how they play out over time. We use a laboratory experiment to study the elements and dynamics of favor trading in a particular setting: the private provision of a public good. In our experiment, giving subjects the ability to practice targeted reciprocity by making a simple, low-cost change in information provision increases contributions to the public good by 14 %. Subjects reward group members who have previously been generous to them and withhold rewards from ungenerous group members. Strategic concerns cannot explain all of this behavior, and it must be at least partly due to direct reciprocity. When someone cannot directly benefit from favor trading, he gives much less to the public good. People thus excluded from the “circle of reciprocity” provide a clean and strict test of indirect reciprocity. Contrary to previous studies in the literature, we do not observe indirect reciprocity.