China's actions in limiting the export of rare earths have drawn the world's attention. The United States, Japan and the European Union have been frustrated with China's measures, even threatening to bring the case to the WTO. These rare earth trade disputes are but the tip of the iceberg. Forms...

International finance law keeps the tradition of “soft law” standards even after the 2008 financial crisis. This status quo derives from concerns over sovereignty and regulatory uncertainty. Although soft law has merits in pragmatic rule making and flexible rule implementation, soft law is...

To stimulate product reviews, many large e-commerce platforms have launched reviewer incentive programs in which free products are provided to reviewers in exchange for them generating reviews on the received free products (incentivized reviews). Prior studies explored the effects of incentives...

This paper studies the impact of short-term introductory incentives on new users' retention and contribution in online communities. We draw on a policy change in a large online health community to compare new physicians who are affected by the policy versus those who are not. Based on the...

We explore whether there is a gender wage gap in the gig economy and examine to what degree gender differences in job application strategy could account for the gap. With a large-scale dataset from a leading online labor market, we show that females only earn around 81.4% of the hourly wage of...

App-based monitoring is widely used in online labor markets to reduce information asymmetry between firms (employers) and contractors. Such monitoring apps provide employers with detailed information on contractors' work progress and effort level. A unique characteristic of app-based monitoring...

We study the nature of home bias in online employment, wherein the employers prefer workers from their own home countries. Using a unique large-scale dataset from a major online labor platform, we identify employers' home bias in their online employment decisions. Moreover, we find that...

Two-sided platforms are typically plagued with asymmetric information, limiting market efficiency. Situated in the context of the increasingly popular online platforms for labor contracting (herein referred to as “online labor markets”), this paper investigates whether the implementation of...

Two-sided online platforms are typically plagued with hidden information (adverse selection) and hidden actions (moral hazard), limiting market efficiency. Situated in the context of the increasingly popular online platforms for labor contracting (herein referred to as “online labor...

Based on repeated expressions and the peer influence literatures, we tested the impact of elite politicians' online social networking behaviors on their partisanship behavior. We constructed a panel data for 414 Members of The 113th U.S. House of Representatives across a period of 9 months. To...