We study the existence of homophily (i.e. the tendency for people to make friends with people who are similar to themselves) with respect to trustworthiness. We ask whether two friends show similarly trustworthy behavior towards strangers, and whether this is anticipated by outsiders. We develop...

In a recently published article, Bruni and Stanca (2008) suggest that television viewing has a negative impact on life satisfaction. In this note we argue that the empirical approach they use (an approach that omits the main effect of TV viewing in life satisfaction) is problematic. We estimate...

How does a choice experiment (CE) model derived under standard preference axioms perform for respondents with incomplete preferences? Using simulated data, we show how such miss-specification results in unnecessary noise and bias in welfare estimates, and can be avoided.

In their article “One Swallow Doesn’t Make a Summer: New Evidence on Anchoring Effects,” Zacharias Maniadis, Fabio Tufano, and John List (2014) present a framework for statistical inference. Presenting evidence from a simulation, the authors suggest that a decision about whether to call an...

Researchers frequently studied the casual relationships of other-regarding preferences by applying experimental methods in bilateral settings (e.g., dictator game and ultimatum game). We use a framed experiment on taxes to study preferences for redistribution in a multi-person setting. We find...

Have you ever heard the joke that if you ask three economists for an economic policy advice, you will get at least four different answers? This study takes the joke seriously by investigating whether an agent's wish for a scientific hypothesis to be true affects the agent's belief that the...

Is it possible to elicit reliable assessment from an assessor having a conflict of interest (e.g. a professor that writes a recommendation letter for a formal PhD student)? We propose an experimental test and show that compared to a not-incentivized assessment, a promise to give a truthful...

Is it possible to elicit reliable assessment from an assessor with conflict of interest (e.g. a professor that writes a recommendation letter for a formal PhD student)? We propose an experimental test and show that compared to a not-incentivized assessment, a promise to give a truthful...

The Porter hypothesis suggests that environmental regulations, such as restricting firms to reduce pollution, stimulates innovations and create a win-win situation for the environment and for firms. It has received a great deal of attention from academics as well as bureaucrats who disagree...