When policymakers and private agents use models, the economists who design the model have an incentive to alter it in order to influence outcomes in a fashion consistent with their own preferences. I discuss some consequences of the existence of such ideological bias. In particular, I analyze...

At the 2016 Academy of Management Conference, a group of distinguished compensation researchers held a panel discussion on the future of compensation research. Their remarks were compiled into an article published in this issue. Soon after the panel, Charles Fay commissioned a similar discussion...

This paper examines whether the introduction of corporate governance (CG) reforms in general and that of transparency and disclosure (T&D) rules in particular can necessarily boost firm performance. Existing literature suggests that CG reforms can boost performance because it can resolve the...

We revisit the link between poverty, the middle class and institutional outcomes using a newly developed cross-country panel dataset containing detailed information on the distribution of income and expenditures. When the size of the middle class increases (measured as the proportion of people...

In this paper, we study how wage mobility in the low-wage sector has changed in western Germany between 1984 and 2004. Using German individual register data, we document a clear upward trend in the persistence of low-wage employment for both men and women. Next to compositional shifts of the...

The aim of this paper is twofold. On the one hand, the economic insights about the employment impact of technological change are disentangled starting from the classical economists to nowadays theoretical and empirical analyses. On the other hand, an empirical test is provided; in particular,...

Life evaluations and emotional states are distinct subjective well-being (SWB) components. We explore the relationship between opportunities and SWB dimensions, distinguishing between actual capabilities and means (education, employment, and income) and perceived opportunities (autonomy and...

We examine the role of financial aid in shaping the formation of human capital in economics. Specifically, we study the impact of a large merit-based scholarship for graduate studies in affecting individuals' occupational choices, career trajectories, and labor market outcomes of a generation of...

This paper uses as source material twenty-three autobiographical essays by Nobel economists presented since 1984 at Trinity University (San Antonio, Texas) and published in Lives of the Laureates (MIT Press). A goal of the lecture series is to enhance understanding of the link between biography...

The economics of religion is a relatively new field of research in economics. This survey serves two purposes – it is backward-looking in that it traces the historical and sociological origins of this field, and it is forward-looking in that it examines the insights and research themes that...