# All Questions

7,512 questions
20k views

### What is structural estimation compared to reduced form estimation?

I've heard a lot of definitions given for structural estimation. But it's never seemed entirely clear to me. Some times I've heard that what one person might call "reduced form" estimation should ...
4k views

### Where can I find data on income and social mobility over time? How far back is data available?

I'm interested in income and social mobility. I understand that Piketty's research deals with the the distribution of income over a long time period. I have also seen some of Chetty and Saez's ...
95 views

### Differences between LATE and Heckman Selection

I have heard that a paper by Heckman and Vytlacil demonstrate comparisons between nonparametric Heckman selection (NP Heckit) and the LATE (local average treatment effect) framework. Could someone ...
217 views

### Contest: earliest written instance of economic thought

Following part 5 of @Lateral fractal answer to "Handy Hints for Committing to the Beta" on the meta "Have fun! No fun = No play. No play = No beta. I'm sure I'm not the only one to feel that a ...
301 views

### Is technical analysis somehow a valid method for investment? [closed]

I personally think technical analysis (TA) is not useful at all but I still see lot of courses about technical analysis, and even people using it. They have the advantage of being easy to learn and ...
58 views

### Is there some kind of consensus on the determinant factors of education achievement?

There is quite a bit of literature on the economics of education. One of the most debated aspects of it arises when estimating the achievement of the student (usually in the form of standardized test ...
2k views

### From an economics perspective, what are the ramifications of a currency with fixed money supply?

I'm thinking specifically of bitcoins. What are the pros and cons of having a fixed number of coins, as opposed to more "normal" currencies? Would the currency have no inflation?
38 views

### Was there any use of scoring rules in economics or finance before Hanson published about LMSR?

Scoring rules arose in the field of meteorology, with the seminal paper published in 1950, but I can't find any references to their using in economics or finance until Hanson published in 2002. Half a ...
230 views

### Time costs and the St. Petersburg paradox

In the St. Petersburg paradox, we end up with the problem that a rational agent should be willing to play the game for any wager, if we look at expected income or utility of expected income. The ...
479 views

### When does the Divine Equilibrium refinement coincide with that of Perfect Sequential Equilibrium?

In signaling games, it seems that the Cho Kreps refinement (intuitive criterion) is the go to refinement for eliminating bad sequential equilibria. Divine equilibrium and perfect sequential ...
591 views

### What is the advantage and disadvantage of fiscal illusion policy in terms for the financial market?

What is the advantage and disadvantage of fiscal illusion policy for the financial market? Fiscal illusion suggests that when government revenues are not completely transparent or are not fully ...
3k views

### What was economics like as a field before Adam Smith, the father of *modern* economics?

Adam Smith is called the "father of modern economics" and his book The Weath of Nations, a fundamental work in the field of economics, is considered the first modern book on economics. In addition, ...
80 views

### How come the CBO reported the Federal Deficit for FY2014 was \$483 Billion when debt went up by \$1.1 trillion?

The Monthly Budget Review: Summary for Fiscal Year 2014 states that the deficit was \$483 billion. Treasury Direct shows Total Public Debt Outstanding increasing over the same period from \$16.7 ...
520 views

### Can the Machina Paradox be solved by expanding the choice set?

In another question, the Machina paradox is mentioned as a possible counterexample to the expected utility model: Adding to the list of paradoxes, consider Machina's paradox. It is described in Mas-...
274 views

### What are the recent advancements in building a unified theory of bounded rationality?

It seems that bounded rationality models focus on explaining a particular psychological bias, in a very specific way. In particular, its seems that the state of the art consensus is that one size does ...
1k views

### What are Giffen Goods?

What exactly are Giffen goods and are they of purely theoretical interest or has there been empirical evidence of their existence?
80 views

### Pricing a negative externality under high uncertainty and severe non-linearity

Take a negative externality such as excess greenhouse gas emissions. We know some awkward things about the economic cost of this externality: There is fairly large uncertainty about the timing of ...
179 views

### A market correction for an industry which has had long-run negative externalities

Take a market where there have been long-run negative externalities. That is to say, the negative externalities have been in place long enough to have played a part in the investment decisions for all ...
923 views

### What are the arguments against the rational expectations hypothesis?

I believe the rational expectations hypothesis says that agents in a model bear expectations that are the same as mathematical expectations. Under what circumstances does this hypothesis become ...
221 views

### Self-selection bias during the course of experiments

Suppose you are running a randomized experiment to assess the effect of $X$, say some training program for unemployed people, on $Y$, say the chance of finding a job in the coming year. Suppose also ...
97 views

### What makes a factor valid in a factor pricing model of assets?

This question is related to another question here. The question linked to asks for examples of factors commonly used in ICAPM models (intertemporal capital asset pricing model). What I want to know ...
1k views

### Book recommendations on empirical methods in economic research and econometrics?

This question is more so geared toward anyone with research experience within economics, though of course, anyone is welcome to respond. I'm an undergraduate math major with a minor in economics. I'...
38 views

### Have any chemical reactions been used to simulate CTMC for economic simulations

Assumption and Question Given that many economic models can be viewed as Continuous Time Markov Chains, and that many chemical reactions are also described as such, have any experiments been ...
462 views

### Examples of Factors in the ICAPM

The intertemporal capital asset pricing model (ICAPM) is different from the CAPM in that in the ICAPM, utility is conditioned on some set of state variables. The ICAPM results in a multifactor pricing ...
150 views

### Is there a theory of financial regulation?

I wonder whether there exists (even a young) theory of financial regulation in the sense of "how to regulate a financial institution/system in an optimal manner"? I mean, there is experience about ...
95 views

### Lifecycle Consumption Models and Dispersion in Consumption

Lifecycle models base on the assumption that households want to maximize their consumption and at the same time insure themselves against income shocks. However, there is a lot of (c.p.) consumption ...
660 views

### Simulating a Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman

Say I have solved an HJB of the form: $\rho V(k) = \max_c g(c) + V'(k)(z - c)$ I have calibrated $\rho$ to monthly parameters. I would like to simulate the development of $k$. I start with $k(0)$. ...
481 views

### Experiments contradicting the expected utility model

This is a question I asked on the cognitive science beta, but which never got any answer. I do not know what the policy should be for question migration/reposting (maybe worth discussing in the meta?),...
112 views

### Objections to total surplus as tool for welfare measurement

I think people would agree that the most common tool for welfare measurements in economics is the notion of total surplus. Throughout it's history, total surplus has been criticized several times ...
326 views

### Unemployment and the Frisch-Elasticity

There is the long debate on the Frisch-Elasticity being the driver of unemployment over the business cycle. One argument against the voluntary-unemployment mechanism of RBC models is that if we ...
3k views

### How do Marxist economists solve the Diamond-Water Paradox?

For class surveying different economic systems, I read a book on Marxism and its core beliefs. As I read, I came to learn that the Marxist view of economics depends heavily on the Labor Theory of ...
148 views

### Currency Values, Developing Economies and Balance of Trade

For a developing economy like India, where balance of trade is negative, is it good to have a weak dollar or a strong dollar? Dollar value increases (Rupee, the local currency, weakens), imports (...
63k views

### Partial vs. general equilibrium

Microeconomic models are usually classified as partial and general equilibrium models. As a layman, I understand that partial equilibrium focuses attention on a few economic variables to find the ...
80 views

### Are there studies that empirically validate results in contract theory? [closed]

I have started learning contract theory of late, and I find some of the assumptions and findings of the theory are too technical. Are there empirical studies that have validated concepts in contract ...
150 views

### Modified core for cooperative games

In the core of cooperative games, the total cost of forming a coalition is shared by all members in a coalition (efficiency). However for my problem I only require that all members are individually ...
331 views

### What are some theoretical explanations for deviations from the efficient market hypothesis?

According (the semi-strong form of) the efficient market hypothesis, the price of an asset should reflect all publicly available information about the 'fundamental value' of that asset. The reasoning ...
576 views

### Are there theories that invalidate the “tragedy of the commons”?

Wikipedia states: The tragedy of the commons is an economics theory by Garrett Hardin, according to which individuals, acting independently and rationally according to each one's self-interest, ...
1k views

### Are there real world examples of a shoe event horizon?

This is a famous quote from Douglas Adam's The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: Many years ago this was a thriving, happy planet – people, cities, shops, a normal world. Except that on the ...
108 views

### Help a writer worldbuild a failing economy [closed]

I'm writing fanfiction for the superhero serial novel Worm. The main setting in Worm is Brockton Bay, a failing city of about 300,000 people. The economy has been in decline since the decline of ...
79 views

### What is the relationship between real growth and stock market [closed]

I am interested in understanding when the stock market can influence real growth and the opposite, when real growth can influence the stock market. In other words, in which way causation is more ...
117 views

### How much impact does memory have on risk pricing?

Have studies been done that demonstrate the limits of human memory on reputation in the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma? i.e. at what point (on average) does a player start to "forget" the actions of a ...
77 views

### Simulations Using Binomial Coefficients

In closed loop toy models with a fixed money supply, what are the downsides of calculating probable outcomes with a binomial coefficient? For example, given a toy economy where trades yield a profit ...
2k views

### How is price elasticity determined in practice?

Price elasticity of demand and Price elasticity of supply are two of the most important concepts of microeconomics, but they're generally explained from a hypothetical standpoint, and little effort is ...
7k views

### Is complex analysis used in economics?

It's frequently useful in physics and engineering applications; are there any applications in theoretical economics? (If not, were there any attempts at incorporating CA that just never caught on?) ...
1k views

### Unemployment and the Minimum Wage---what are the main counter-arguments to Card and Krueger?

Card and Krueger's paper (AER 1994, "Minimum Wages and Employment: A Case Study of the Fast-Food Industry in New Jersey and Pennsylvania") uses a difference-in-difference identification strategy to ...
2k views

### What benefits do governments receive from not eliminating debt?

Most major economies have substantial government debt; for example among the OECD countries the lowest debt rate is Estonia with around 6% of GDP. Now we may be in a global recession at the moment, ...
3k views

### How does a reduction in consumer spending in favour of consumer saving, affect economic activity?

Let's say our government runs an advertising campaign, encouraging its citizens to reduce spending money on consumer items, and instead save more money. Let's say the campaign is successful, and ...
78 views

### How are economic principles applied to non-financial models, such as a democratic election?

Economic agents make decisions in particular models. These models do not need to be related to financial contexts, and economics can be used to describe how agents will act in any other field in which ...