An important advance in the study of reference-dependent preferences is the discipline provided by coherent accounts of reference point formation. Kőszegi and Rabin (2006) provide such discipline by positing a reference point grounded in rational expectations. We examine the predictions of...

Individuals frequently face intertemporal decisions. For the purposes of economic analysis, the preference parameters assumed to govern these decisions are generally considered to be stable economic primitives. However, evidence on the stability of time preferences is notably lacking. In a large...

Some individuals borrow extensively on their credit cards. This paper tests whether present-biased time preferences correlate with credit card borrowing. In a field study, we elicit individual time preferences with incentivized choice experiments, and match resulting time preference measures to...

Some individuals borrow extensively on their credit cards. This paper tests whether present-biased time preferences correlate with credit card borrowing. In a field study, we elicit individual time preferences with incentivized choice experiments, and match resulting time preference measures to...

Approximately half of credit card holders in the United States regularly carry unpaid credit card debt. These so-called “revolvers” exhibit payment behavior that differs from the behavior of those who repay their entire credit card balance every month. So far there has been no empirical...

Experimental tests of dynamically inconsistent time preferences have largely relied on choices over time-dated monetary rewards. Several recent studies have failed to find the standard patterns of time inconsistency. However, such monetary studies contain often discussed confounds. In this...

This project examines the role of heterogeneity in gain-loss attitudes for identi- fying models of expectations-based reference dependence (Kőszegi and Rabin, 2006, 2007) (KR). Different gain-loss attitudes lead to different signs for KR comparative statics. Failure to account for the known...