# Questions tagged [soft-question]

A Non-specific question regarding economic practice and analytical development.

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### Recursive Macroeconomics - Practice Questions

I am looking for practice questions on recursive macroeconomics that focus on the following: Defining Competitive equilibriums (Arrow Debreu, Sequential Market, Recursive Competitive) for different ...
0answers
17 views

### How *do* NGOs, think tanks, and governments weigh income/consumption tradeoffs/transfers at different income levels?

In considering policies and transfers, how do we (economists, NGOs, governments & think tanks) weigh income (consumption) tradeoffs between the poor & the very poor? E.g., 'is giving 100 USD/...
1answer
25 views

### When should we use "internal consistency" test?

From a paper of Gao (2021), I saw a paparagraph We deviate from this traditional specification in three ways: we examine only money held by corporations, we include real GDP growth in the regression ...
2answers
114 views

### Curiousity the validity of an example of normative, positive and consumer surplus?

Following up a pretty long but very informative discussion with 1muflon1, I want to expand and merge with consumer surplus to have a big picture. In research of Dasgupta, 2019 about that after ...
1answer
118 views

### Is there any overlap between Rawlsian approach and uncertainty avoidance?

From the definition of the Rawlsian approach The Rawlsian approach to social welfare, built on the foundation of the “veil of ignorance” (Rawls, 1999, p. 118) where "veil of ignorance" is ...
1answer
98 views

### Is there any example to see the differences among Rawlsian ethics, Utilitarianism or (classical) liberalism ethics in policy economics?

From a decent answer and comment here of 1muflon1, I am motivated to know more about Rawlsian ethics, Utilitarianism, or (classical) liberalism ethics in policy economics. However, so far, I still not ...
2answers
231 views

### Why "positive theory" is important in discussions of how antitrust law achieve "normative goal"?

In this description regarding positive theory and normative theory, from what I understand, positive theory is based on fact and cannot be approved or disapproved (e.g., explain how the economy ...
2answers
33 views

### What is the proper way to read and/or express "price elasticity of demand"?

The natural language phrase such as square root of x for a function $Sqrt(x)$ precedes the input with the word of. When we talk of a bivariate function, such as $x/y$ aka $Ratio(x,y)$, we say simply ...
3answers
933 views

### What is the consensus (if any) on Peters "The ergodicity problem in economics" (2019)?

Peters (2019) made a splash criticizing the theory of expected utility on the grounds that it implicitly assumes ergodicity where this is unwarranted. He stated this applies widely in economics, to ...
1answer
113 views

### Why did the Cambridge Capital Controversy have no impact on economic modelling?

Every now and again I find myself looking into the Cambridge Capital Controversy in terms of debate around general equilibrium modelling often walking out more confused than I have before doing such a ...
1answer
25 views

### Curiousity about the significance symbol in Stata?

Today when I read the esttab command of Stata, I saw the star options description: ...
1answer
85 views

### Replication of empirical results in Economics

I was reading about the replicability crisis in Psychology and Medicine. Many psychology experiments, for instance, were being conducted on undergraduate students, with too low sample sizes, which ...
2answers
172 views

### What are the advantages using Otree to progam economic experiments?

I need to decide between learning Ztree and Otree. The added cost of complicating the server setup severely should have some benefit. Apart from Ztree being ugly, are there any other advantages of ...
1answer
79 views

### Soft question: How do you create/draw/plot economic graphs digitally?

Obviously I'm talking about a theoretical graph not one where you can just plot the data. The only two options I can think of are just using shapes in word/powerpoint or using TikZ in Latex which is ...
2answers
42 views

### If I had a new economical theory, how could I share it with academical environments? I call it “algorythmic economy”

If I had a new economical theory, how could I share it with academical environments? I call it algorythmic economy. I have made this same question on Quora. https://www.quora.com/unanswered/If-I-had-a-...
1answer
65 views

### What are some good Phd or research programs for Economic History / Economic Thought History?

Please correct me if I am wrong, but my impression is that most "mainstream" economics programs are now focusing less and less on economic thought history. So, in order to do research on ...
0answers
59 views

### Since Changes-in-Changes model is good, why do people hardly use it

I am a new master student who has just read Athey and Imbens (2006) "Identification and inference in nonlinear difference‐in‐differences models." They introduced the Changes-in-Changes (CIC) ...
3answers
1k views

### Citing non-economics studies in an economics research paper

I am currently working on a paper in economics that has some dimensions that discuss women's social value. As is the case in developing countries a lot of economic studies do not exist whereas there ...
1answer
76 views

### Can I rename a utility function based on its properties?

A big name researcher gives a name to a specific utility function 30 years ago. Now I am writing a paper and feel that a new name might be more suited because of the properties associated with the ...
0answers
191 views

### In Economics, how likely is a R&R paper be finally accepted in a top field journal or top 5 journal? [closed]

Based on reliable data (if there is any), how likely is a R&R be finally accepted approximately? Here is some numbers I found: According to an anonymous comment, the post RR acceptance rate for ...
1answer
89 views

### Why is Ricardian Equivalence Important?

Ricardian equivalence is a result regarding the ineffectiveness of government due to consumption smoothing behavior of consumers. A primary reason why it fails is due to population turnover (i.e ...
1answer
2k views

### Why hasn't JPE formally retracted Emily Oster's article "Hepatitis B and the Case of the Missing Women" (2005)?

Amartya Sen (1992) argued that there were more than 100M "missing women" worldwide. In "Hepatitis B and the Case of the Missing Women" (2005), Emily Oster argued that hepatitis B ...
1answer
48 views

### Which database language and database management system should an economics student learn? (Provided that one has to be learned) [closed]

I will have to pick essentially any DBS, learn how to use it and use it during a period of 2-3 month. I do not possess any noteworthy background knowledge, so I will be starting from scratch ...
2answers
198 views

### Proof Based Math Education in Economics

One of the things I've experienced as a graduate student is really the lack of math being a main factor in holding me back from approaching more advanced materials in microeconomics and macroeconomics....
1answer
326 views

### Is it necessary to ask permission before including someone in the acknowledgements of a economic research paper?

Do I need permission to thank someone, even if I said “all mistakes are our own”? Do I have to make sure that the person being thanked must read the paper, or, it is fine if he just discussed about ...
1answer
39 views

### Gamification and incentives

Is there any (theoretical?) work on "gamification" in game theory? I do not have a proper definition of gamification, but StackExchange would be an example. Contributers like us provide a ...
1answer
133 views

### Are simultaneous equation models out of fashion? Why?

According to Angrist & Pischke "Undergraduate econometrics instruction: Through our classes, darkly" (2017) Tables 2 and 3, econometrics textbooks deemphasized simultaneous equation ...
2answers
535 views

### How can I model my problems with math?

I want to ask a question about mathematical economics. When I read an article about economics, I see lots of mathematical equations. I can solve them without any help. But I can't create my own ...
1answer
27 views

### How do 'econometric' explanations differ from 'economic' ones?

I am interpreting some coefficients of a regression model and have been asked to, first, give an 'economic' explanation and then an 'econometric' explanation as to why coefficients differ as more ...
2answers
122 views

### What are the correct utility functions?

It is common to talk about utility functions. For example in a universe with only two goods, we might assume each person (or group of people) carries a function $u(x,y)$ in their heads. When offered ...
1answer
53 views

### Is there a "name" for price leadership oligopoly?

Oligopoly equilibrium in the static setup consists of cournout equilibrium and bertrand equilibrium (Nash Equilibria)while in sequential games we have stackelberg equilibrium and price leadership ...
4answers
436 views

### What is an economic crisis?

I'm not sure if this is a silly question or overly semantic but I think the term "Crisis" is misunderstood (or at least misunderstood by myself). There are a number of ways the term is used, namely: ...
1answer
674 views

### What is a what is meant by a "workhorse" macroeconomic model

A number of times ive seen the Neoclassical Growth Model and Overlapping Generation Model setups referred to as a "workhorse of modern macroeconomics". What does this mean exactly?
1answer
44 views

### What does this sentence (from Galbraith) mean?

In Galbraith's Economics in perspective. A critical history (a spanish edition, bear that in mind), by chapter 2 the author says: The conservatives, in a non-socialist economy, proclaim the right ...
0answers
45 views

### What are the exact sources of CARES Act economic transfers? [duplicate]

The bill Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act provides "2 trillion". (There is also H.R.6201 - Families First Coronavirus Response Act providing aid.) From which sources will the ...
0answers
45 views

### Federal Reserve Leveraging of COVID-19 Fund

Reading an article in The New York Times about the COVID-19 stimulus bill, I stumbled on this detail the Fed can take a limited amount of funds and deploy them widely: The central bank only needs ...
4answers
1k views

### Why does the Solow Model matter for undergraduate students?

I've been looking at the economics undergraduate curriculum and have been thinking and wondering as to what specific skillset we want to equip undergraduate students with in the working world. One ...
4answers
223 views

### Why is so much of macroeconomic theory dedicated to economic growth?

I'm an economics PhD student and throughout my macroeconomics education I've found the topic of economic growth always being discussed at great length. From an Naive perspective id expect that one of ...
1answer
36 views

### Publishing in conferences and then journals

In economics, it is very common for researchers to submit papers to conferences before submitting their papers to journals. Are there any cases in which submitting a paper to a conference makes ...
0answers
51 views

### Are there really only two main macroeconomic models?

I was told that there are really two broad categories of economic models in macroeconomics. These Being: 1)Neoclassical Growth Models 2)Overlapping Generations Models All other models that exist are ...
0answers
37 views

### Software used for solving demands of different functions

I'm currently doing some research on demand systems and have been experimenting with different underlying utility functions which will generate different systems of demands. However I've been doing ...
2answers
152 views

### What do game theorists think of behavioural economics?

Though behavioural economics has been popularized over the past decade in both industry and pop culture, it seems that not much has changed with regard to the standard economic definition of ...
0answers
31 views

### Regarding Macroeconomic Models

I've recently started my PhD and upon looking at my textbook (the sargent one) I found that it differed greatly from my Masters textbook (Romer) and in turn my undergraduate macro text (williamson). ...
2answers
227 views

### what are some unique features of heterodox economics?

I've been reading up a bit on heterodox economics as well as watched some of the lectures online and quite frankly, I'm having a hard time figuring out whats are the unique features of this school of ...
0answers
35 views

### Would apprenticeships improve the economy long term?

Evening my name is Nick and I am a high school student from Fairfield California and I’m 17, my super hyper theatrical question is about a substitute to college in order to create more efficiency in ...
1answer
287 views

### Why is it called Bayesian Persuasion?

I'm sure most of you are familiar with the paper titled "Bayesian Persuasion" by Kamenica and Gentzkow (2011), (you can find it here). I was wondering what are your thoughts as to why it is called "...
2answers
73 views

### Economics PhD graduate? [closed]

What are the options for Economics PhD students after graduation? I am aware most students end up going into academia as either professors or researchers. What are the options in the corporate world ...
2answers
55 views

### What is the Thomson Reuters tool that is used in universities? [closed]

I'm not an economics major but when I go to the library of the economics department I see that computers have access to something that is related to Thomson Reuters. given that I'm interested in ...
0answers
96 views

### Open Foundational Problems in Mathematical Economics

What are some open problems in mathematical economics which are treated as if they have been solved in economics papers? As an example, one of my teachers has previously pointed out to me that there ...
1answer
327 views

### Technical Analysts and Econometricians: A Question on Methods

I've been reading the book Technical Analysis Explained by Martin J. Pring as a result of a conversation with one of my friends who said he did technical analysis but didn't apply the types of models ...