Abstract A principal (such as a centrist political party) can partially influence the allocation of power between two competing parties. The principal is closer to one party, the “Friend”, than to the other, the “Enemy”. The principal’s optimal contract initially seeks to exclude the Enemy. However, once the Enemy gains power, the principal embraces him in exchange for policy moderation. Moderation also disciplines the Friend, inducing him to move closer to the principal’s preferred policy. Principals close to the Friend fully embrace the Enemy; more centrist principals divide their support. Commitment benefits the principal only if she is close to the Friend and parties value power little.
Abstract We study opinion dynamics in a social network consisting of two groups. Agents update their opinions by conforming to members of their own group while rejecting the views of the opposing group (affective polarization), and by listening to a media outlet that may provide biased information. We characterize the long-run opinions and identify when affective polarization and media bias lead to ideological polarization, persistent disagreement, or failures of learning. We also derive when information interventions or censorship improve the accuracy of average opinions and reduce disagreement, and when they backfire: better information helps only under specific media bias configurations and when directed to the agents we identify as most effective at propagating it through the network.
Abstract This paper studies the unemployment of physical capital—defined as idle units searching to be traded—and its macroeconomic implications. I provide evidence documenting that capital unemployment is large, volatile, and increases during economic downturns. I construct a capital-accumulation model that explains these patterns, with trading frictions in capital markets, which give rise to equilibrium capital unemployment, and financial shocks, which lead to large fluctuations in trading probabilities and capital unemployment. Using the model, I show that trading frictions and capital unemployment matter for aggregate dynamics. First, unemployed capital affects aggregate investment dynamics: Downturns characterized by large increases in unemployed capital are followed by investment slumps, because the economy tends to recover by absorbing existing unemployed capital rather than by producing new capital goods. Second, capital unemployment constitutes a propagation mechanism from financial shocks to economic activity, which shows up at the aggregate level as measured total factor productivity.
Abstract Consider a setting where N players, partitioned into K observable types, form a directed network. Agents’ preferences over the form of the network consist of an arbitrary network benefit function (e.g., agents may have preferences over their network centrality) and a private, or dyadic, component which is additively separable in own links. This latter component allows for unobserved heterogeneity in the costs of sending and receiving links across agents (respectively out- and in- degree heterogeneity) as well as homophily/heterophily across the K types of agents. In contrast, the network benefit function allows agents’ preferences over links to vary with the presence or absence of links elsewhere in the network (and hence with the link formation behavior of their peers). In the null model, which excludes the network benefit function, links form independently across dyads in the manner described by Charbonneau (2017) among others. Under the alternative, there is interdependence across linking decisions (i.e., strategic interaction). We show how to test the null with power optimized in specific directions. These alternative directions include many common models of strategic network formation (e.g., “connections” models, “structural hole” models etc.). Our random utility specification induces an exponential family structure under the null which we exploit to construct a similar test which exactly controls size (despite the the null being a composite one with many nuisance parameters). We further show how to construct locally best tests for specific alternatives without making any assumptions about equilibrium selection. To make our tests feasible, we introduce a new MCMC algorithm for simulating the null distributions of our test statistics.
Abstract We study monopolistic certification in markets where sellers possess partial private information about product quality. A certifier can provide information through two channels: screening sellers’ private information (soft information) and acquiring new quality data (hard information). We prove that any certification menu achieving less than maximal screening is Pareto dominated by one with full screening. Among Pareto-efficient menus, the certifier’s profit-maximizing menu provides maximal soft information while restricting hard information provision. The two channels diverge because screening creates value the certifier can fully capture, whereas hard information amplifies costly information rents. Using power value functions, we derive comparative statics showing that information restrictions target low-quality sellers when information value is moderate, but high-quality sellers receive perfect quality revelation when information value is high.
Abstract We document that the source of funds for paying health insurance premiums has a dramatic impact on plan choices. We focus on the MediSave programme in Singapore, a medical savings account that is used to pay out-of-pocket medical spending. Residents can also pay their health insurance premiums with cash or MediSave funds, but are subject to limits that vary by age and over time. By exploiting variations in those limits, we consistently find that when individuals are able to pay their health insurance premiums with MediSave funds, they are less price sensitive and more willing to enrol in more generous plans. We develop and estimate a mental accounting model which explains these patterns. We embed and reject alternative explanations such as hassle costs and liquidity constraints. We then extend this model and show that mental accounting can explain much, but not all, of the misweighting of premiums relative to out-of-pocket expenses in health insurance choice. We also find that allowing MediSave payment for both premiums and out-of-pocket expenses (e.g. putting them in the same mental account) enhances individual welfare and reduces adverse selection.
Abstract We study structural change in production networks for intermediate inputs (input–output network) and new capital (investment network). For each network, we document that the share of output produced by services (relative to goods) is rising over time. While the relative prices of services that produce intermediates and consumption are rising, we find that the relative price of services that produce investment is falling over time. We then develop a multi-sector growth model to study these trends and their implications for economic growth. To match the relative price trends, inputs to intermediates production are complements and inputs to investment production are substitutes. Hence, structural change endogenously reallocates resources to the slowest growing intermediates producers and the fastest growing investment producers. Growth accounting exercises reveal that investment-specific technical change accounts for an increasing share of U.S. aggregate growth, with 20% of aggregate growth since 2000 due to investment structural change. Growth projections from our model show that structural change within investment networks alone can offset stagnating or declining growth in other sectors due to Baumol’s cost disease.
Abstract We examine the welfare-based opportunity cost of foreign exchange (FX) intervention when both covered interest rate parity (CIP) and uncovered interest rate parity (UIP) deviations are present. We consider a small open economy that receives international capital flows through constrained international financial intermediaries. Deviations from CIP come from limited arbitrage or through a convenience yield, while UIP deviations are also affected by global risk. We show that the sign of CIP and UIP deviations may differ for safe haven countries. We find that FX reserves may provide a net benefit, rather than a cost, when international intermediaries value the safe-haven properties of a currency more than domestic households. We show that this has been the case for the Swiss franc and the Japanese Yen. We examine the optimal policy of a constrained central bank planner in this context.
Abstract The seminal paper by Baron and Ferejohn (1989, “Bargaining in Legislatures”, American Political Science Review, 83, 1181–1206) leaves significant gaps in our understanding of open rule bargaining. We aim to fill these gaps by providing a fresh analysis of open rule bargaining. Our approach relies on an appealing class of stationary equilibria. In this class, we show that delays tend to be longer and allocations tend to be less egalitarian than originally predicted by Baron and Ferejohn. Our results shed new light on the efficiency and fairness implications of using an open vs. closed rule in legislatures and of bargaining processes in general.
For many technologies and behaviours, an agent's benefit from adopting depends on his contacts adopting, and the benefit to his contacts of adopting depends on their contacts adopting. This paper examines how the architecture of these connections shapes the success or failure of the diffusion of innovations. We start with a standard model of diffusion with the key addition that some agents can coordinate their decisions. This captures the idea that people often talk and make decisions together with friends or family to adopt technologies. We show that insularity of connections, that is, the extent to which agents tend to concentrate their connections to a narrow set of other agents, determines contagion. However, whether insularity helps or hinders depends on the technology being diffused. For technologies that are valuable even without many contacts adopting, we find insular connections hinder adoption, but for technologies that are valuable only when many contacts adopt, insular connections facilitate adoption.
Business dynamism-the process of firm entry, growth and exit-lies at the heart of modern endogenous growth models. While productivity differences have traditionally been seen as the main driving forces of business dynamism, a growing body of evidence suggests that customer acquisition is at least as important. In light of this evidence, we propose a novel endogenous growth model in which innovating firms must first acquire customers to sell their products. Estimating our model with aggregate and firm-level data, we find that expansions of firms' customer bases (market sizes) boost their incentives to innovate and shift resources towards high-growth businesses ("gazelles"). Combined, these effects explain over 40% of aggregate growth and substantially change predictions about the efficacy of growth policies. Finally, we document support for key model predictions using firm-level micro-data.
We investigate optimal monetary and macroprudential policies in an open economy with aggregate demand externalities and an occasionally binding zero lower bound constraint. Our analysis highlights that the optimal policy balances output stabilization and capital flow management. When macroprudential policy is available, monetary policy stabilizes the output gap. By contrast, when macroprudential policy is not available, monetary policy is used prudentially. However, contrary to a widespread view, raising the interest rate is not necessarily the optimal prudential policy. Finally, we show that international spillovers operate through the world real rate, but macroprudential policies provide insulation from the adverse effects of foreign policies.
We study the labour market effects of permanent 30%-64% reductions on unemployment insurance benefits available in seven states. Leveraging linked firm-establishment data, we find that establishments based on reform states experience employment increases that are 0.8%-1.3% larger than those of the same firm's establishments in other states. Using a similar multi-state firm design, starting salaries are 1.2%-5.5% lower in reform states and posted salaries for the same job fall by 3.2%-3.5%. The negative co-movement of employment and wages after the reform suggests a labour supply shock and mitigates against confounding changes in labour demand driving the results. Our findings are consistent with workers lowering their reservation wages as outside options fall, and employers take advantage of this by offering lower wages and increasing employment.
We build a quantitative spatial model in which some workers can substitute on-site effort with work done from home. Ability and propensity to telecommute vary by education and industry. We quantify our framework to match the distribution of jobs and residents across 4,502 U.S. locations. Then, we simulate permanent increases in the attractiveness and productivity of telework that lead to greater adoption of hybrid and fully remote work. To validate our model, we show that our results are positively correlated with local changes in residents, jobs, and housing costs since 2019. The rise of telework results in a rich non-monotonic pattern of reallocations of residents and jobs within and across cities. Workers who can telecommute experience welfare gains, and those who cannot suffer losses. Broader access to jobs reduces wage inequality across residential locations, and heralds a partial reversal in the spatial concentration of talent and spending power known as the "Great Divergence".
We implement Pigovian transport pricing in a field experiment in urban agglomerations of Switzerland over the course of 8 weeks. Our pricing considers the external costs from climate damages, health outcomes from pollution, accidents and physical activity, and congestion. It varies across time, space, and mode of transport and is deducted from a budget provided to GPS-tracked participants. The treatment significantly reduces the external costs of transport during the course of the experiment. The main underlying mechanism is a shift away from driving towards other modes, such as public transport, walking, and cycling. Providing information about the external costs of transport alone is insufficient to change the transport behaviour for the sample majority. A time-invariant tax on CO2 and health-related externalities would capture most of the welfare gains associated with the first-best policy.
We evaluate the efficiency of dynamic linked environmental regulation. Linked regulation allows inspectors who uncover violations at one plant to increase future enforcement at other plants that share a common owner. When compliance costs are correlated, regulators can then target scarce enforcement resources towards bad actors without inspecting everyone. We develop an empirical framework of dynamic moral hazard under linked regulation that allows for large portfolios of plants and for choices to be interdependent within the portfolio of plants and across time. Using the framework we evaluate a linked regulation scheme in Texas and find that linked regulation performs substantially better than both unlinked regulation and untargeted regulation. We test two alternative theoretical mechanisms that underpin the benefit—a “firm-wide moral hazard mechanism” and a “correlated targeting mechanism”—and find that a large share of the value of linked regulation is due to the former.
While the USD dominates cross-border transactions today, a few other currencies are also used internationally. This paper shows that central bank policies that reduce the volatility of borrowing costs for foreign firms in domestic currency can trigger a jumpstart of the currency’s international status, because firms’ choices of the currency of their working capital complement their sales invoicing. Empirically, the creation of swap lines by the People’s Bank of China between 2009 and 2018 supports this theoretical claim. Signing a swap line with a country is associated with an increase in the probability that the country would use the RMB at all by 12%, and a four-fold increase in the value of the country’s RMB payments.
I propose a model of skill-replacing routine-biased technological change (SR-RBTC). In this model, technology substitutes for the use of skill in routine tasks, in contrast to standard RBTC models, which assume that technology replaces the workers themselves. The SR-RBTC model explains three key trends that are inconsistent with standard RBTC models: (1) why specifically middle wages declined even though workers in routine occupations are dispersed across the entire bottom half of the wage distribution, (2) why middle wages stopped declining while technological change continued, and (3) why there is no substantial decline in the average wage of workers in routine occupations. I derive two new testable predictions from the model: a decrease in the return to skill and a decrease in skill level in routine occupations. I use an interactive fixed-effects model to confirm both predictions. Since SR-RBTC violates the ignorability assumption required by standard decomposition methods, I introduce a "skewness decomposition" to show that SR-RBTC is the main driver of bottom-half inequality trends.
Discrete choice data allow researchers to recover differences in utilities, but these differences may not suffice to identify policy-relevant counterfactuals of interest. In fact, in the case of dynamic discrete choice models, only a narrow set of counterfactuals are point-identified. In this paper, we explore how much one can learn about counterfactual outcomes of interest within this framework. We focus on the partial identification of counterfactuals, while allowing for (mild) model restrictions that can gradually shrink the identified set. We derive bounds for low-dimensional objects (such as average welfare) as arguments of optimization programmes, along with a uniformly valid inference procedure. Furthermore, we develop new and tractable computational tools and algorithms suitable for dealing with high-dimensional problems like this. Finally, we illustrate in Monte Carlos, as well as an empirical exercise of firms' export decisions, the informativeness of the identified sets, and we assess the impact of (common) model restrictions on results.
