Bankruptcy acts as insurance if the decision to default is negatively correlated with income shocks. However, whether bankruptcy actually provides insurance is dependent on the punishment for default. Such rules can instead cause the consumer to become credit constrained. If debts are not fully...

We empirically measure the effects increasing competition on equilibrium bidding in procurement auctions. In common value auctions, the winner's curse counsels more conservative bidding as the number of competitors increases. First, we estimate the structural parameters of an equilibrium bidding...

In recent years a lot of work has been done on the dynamics of personal distribution of wealth and income in a macro economy (e.g. Das (1993), Benabou (1996)). Similarities in the relative wages and personal distribution across countries have also been noted. While the issue of trade and...

A method is proposed for the consistent nonparametric estimation of conditional probability and probability density functions along with associated gradients when both the conditioned and conditioning variables are categorical, continuous, or a mixture of both types. The method builds on the...

Many economic and econometric applications require the integration of functions lacking a closed form antiderivative, which is therefore a task that can only be solved by numerical methods. We propose a new family of probability densities that can be used as substitutes and have the property of...