In this paper, we adapt the audit studies methodology to analyze gender and racial differences in hiring for a particular segment of the market of three selected occupations in Metropolitan Lima: salespersons, secretaries and (accounting and administrative) assistants. The adapted pseudo-audit...

This paper tests stylized facts and theories from behavioral economics and laboratory experiments using a randomized field experiment of our design. A major South African consumer credit lender issued 60,000 scripted direct mail solicitations where several marketing “treatments†were...

This paper estimates the prevalence of asymmetric information in a consumer credit market using a field experiment of our design. A major South African lender issued 60,000 direct mail offers where the interest rate was randomized along two different dimensions — an initial “offer...

This paper proposes a test for the existence of placebo effects, as described by the so-called expectancy theory. This theory, which is the dominant medical theory of how placebo effects operate, posits that health outcomes rise in individuals' beliefs about the probability that they are getting...

The paper explores the implications of means of payment substitutability and capital mobility on the properties of the money demand, using the Thomas (1985) stochastic dynamic optimising model, where the specific role of money is explicitly accounted for. Extending the model to a case in which...

This paper explores the quantitative impact of the Baby Boom on stock and bond returns. It constructs a neoclassical growth model with overlapping generations, in which agents make a portfolio decision over risky capital and safe bonds in zero net supply. The model has exogenous technology and...

This paper presents a model developed to explain the life-cycle patterns in both homeownership and portfolio allocation, and the relationship between them, using a model of rational agents. Two key innovations are incorporated into this model. First, housing is explicitly modeled as both a...

In this article we construct a model in which agents exhibit preference for ownership with respect to a durable (house). Ownership is modeled as a continuous function of debt service normalized by the price of the house. We study the utility optimization problem of an investor not endowed with...

This paper investigates the uncertainty in variance and covariance of asset returns. It is commonly believed that these second moments can be estimated very accurately. However, time varying volatility and nonnormality of asset returns can lead to imprecise variance estimates. Using CRSP value...

I develop a Markov model of samrt money chasing past winning funds while taking into account associated costs. The model also allows market capital entry and exit. The steady-state capital allocations re derived using constant transition probabilities. The results sugget that down side risk is...