General patterns of bias in risk beliefs are well established in the literature, but much less is known about how these biases vary across the population. Using a sample of almost 500 people, the regression analysis in this paper yields results consistent with the well established pattern that...

This article examines the rationality of seatbelt usage using an original data set of 465 adult respondents. People with high stated values of statistical life, who do not smoke, and who have risk beliefs that are highly elastic with respect to actual risks are more likely to use seatbelts, as...

We analyze smoking risk beliefs and smoking behavior using individual data from 1997 for the United States and 1998 for Massachusetts. Smokers and adults more generally overestimate the lung cancer risks of smoking and the mortality risks and life expectancy loss. Higher risk beliefs decrease...

Long-term deals are one tool that both players and franchises use to manage risk. That tool has been much discussed and empirically tested with respect to player shirking, and has more briefly, and only theoretically, discussed with respect to reducing variance in future payrolls. Our work looks...

We apply quintile regression methodology to player pay and performance data from the 1985-86 to 2005-06 seasons of the National Basketball Association (NBA). In addition to confirming a finding from Hakes and Turner (2007) of systematic bias in pooled OLS regressions of career paths for salary...

Using panels of player pay and performance from Major League Baseball (MLB), we examine trends in player productivity and salaries as players age. Pooling players of all ability levels leads to a systematic bias in regression coefficients. After addressing this problem by dividing players into...

We apply quintile regression methodology to player pay and performance data from the 1985-86 to 2005-06 seasons of the National Basketball Association (NBA). In addition to confirming a finding from Hakes and Turner (2007) of systematic bias in pooled OLS regressions of career paths for salary...

Michael Lewis's book, Moneyball, is the story of an innovative manager who exploits an inefficiency in baseball's labor market over a prolonged period of time. We evaluate this claim by applying standard econometric procedures to data on player productivity and compensation from 1999 to 2004....

Prior research has produced conflicting evidence of racial profiling during traffic stops. We instead analyze rates of case dismissal against felony arrestees by race. Superficial bias based on ldquo;unobservablesrdquo; should be reduced because of the evidentiary requirements and nonnegligible...