In an economy with imperfect labor contracts, differences in the distribution of talent can be an independent source of comparative advantage. I study a world economy with two activities, one in which an individual's contribution to production can be measured accurately and another in which...

Research in behavioral economics has uncovered the widespread phenomenon of people making decisions against their own good intentions. In these situations, the government might want to intervene, indeed individuals might want the government to intervene, to induce behavior that is closer to what...

This paper is concerned with a policy oriented macroeconomic experiment involving an international economy with a relatively small home country and a large foreign country. It compares the economic performance of two alternative tax systems as a means to finance unemployment benefits: a...

Explaining individual behavior in politics should rely on the same motivational assumptions as explaining behavior in the market: That’s what Political Economy, understood as the application of economics to the study of political processes, is all about. In its standard variant, those who...

According to the endowment effect there is some discomfort associated with giving up a good, that is to say, we are willing to give up something only if the price is greater than the price we are willing to pay for it. This implies that the indifference curves should designate a reference point...

We study the effects of two widely observed behavioral policy interventions⸻the simplification of complex decisions and the implementation of high-quality defaults. Based on a laboratory experiment featuring a dual-task paradigm, we demonstrate that these policies do not only improve decisions...

This paper seeks to extend the domain of identity economics by exploring motivational foundations of in-group cooperation and out-group competition. On this basis, we explore the reflexive interaction between individual economic decisions and social identities in response to technological change...

Implicit contracts can mitigate moral hazard in labor, credit and product markets. The enforcement mechanism underlying an implicit contract is the threat of exclusion: the agent fears that he will lose future income if the principal breaks off the relationship. This threat may be very weak in...

In a model where consumers have quasi-hyperbolic preferences, we compare immediate subsidies paid for health-conscious consumption and future subsidies rewarding good health outcome. We characterize the subsidy rates which implement the unbiased choice. These rates differ because of two...

This paper shows that reciprocity has powerful implications for many economic domains. It is an important determinant in the enforcement of contracts and social norms and enhances the possibilities of collective action greatly. Reciprocity may render the provision of explicit incentive...