Title: Causal Inference with Corrupted Data: Measurement Error, Missing Values, Discretization, and Differential Privacy (with Anish Agarwal)

TITLE: Identifying Managerial Skill (joint with: Ben Weidmann (Harvard), Joe Vecci (Gothenburg), Farah Said (Lahore), David Deming (Harvard))

ABSTRACT: We know that managers matter but we do not know how to prospectively identify good managers. We demonstrate the potential of using repeated random assignment to identify the causal contribution managers make to teams, and the measurable skills associated with this. We randomly assign managers to multiple teams, and predict team performance based on the team’s endowment of productive skill. Some managers consistently cause their teams to exceed predicted performance. Managerial skills are roughly as important to team outcomes as worker productivity. Good managers score higher on measures of allocative skill, and there are no differences in managerial skill across gender, age and ethnicity. We experimentally evaluate different methods of manager selection. People who select into managerial roles are typically not better managers than those appointed by lottery. However, selecting managers based on allocative skill dramatically improves team performance.

Title: Diversity and Discrimination in the Classroom, joint with Dan Anderberg, Christina Felfe, Helmut Rainer and Thomas Siedler.

Abstract: What makes diversity unifying in some settings but divisive in others? We examine how the mixing of ethnic groups in German schools affects intergroup cooperation and trust. We leverage the quasi-random assignment of students to classrooms within schools to obtain variation in the type of diversity that prevails in a peer group. We combine this with a large-scale, incentivized lab-in-field-experiment based on the investment game, allowing us to assess the in-group bias of native German students in their interactions with fellow natives (in-group) versus immigrants (out-group). We find in-group bias peaks in culturally polarized classrooms, where the native and immigrant groups are both large, but have different religious or language backgrounds. In contrast, in classrooms characterized by non-cultural polarization, fractionalization, or a native supermajority, there are significantly lower levels of own-group favoritism. We find empirical evidence that culturally polarized classrooms foster negative stereotypes about immigrants' trustworthiness and amplify taste-based discrimination, both of which are costly and lead to lower payouts. In contrast, accurate statistical discrimination is ruled out by design in our experiment. Consistent with a simple model, discrimination in culturally polarized classrooms is associated with lower levels of intergroup friendship and larger identity gaps. Taken together, these findings suggest that extra efforts are needed to counteract low levels of inclusivity and trust in culturally polarized environments.

Title: Marriage and the Intergenerational Mobility of Women: Evidence from Marriage Certificates 1850-1920 

Abstract: Due to data limitations, long-run changes in women’s economic mobility are not well understood. Using a set of marriage certificates from Massachusetts over the period of 1850-1920, we link women and men to their childhood and adult census records to obtain a measure of occupational standing across two generations. Intergenerational mobility was higher for women than for men in the earliest 1850-70 cohort. Men’s mobility increases by the 1880-1900 cohort, whereas women’s does not, leading to a convergence. During a period with low married women’s labor force participation, the choice of a partner was crucial for women’s economic status. We find evidence of strong and increasing assortative matching prior to 1880, followed by declines to the 1900-20 cohort. Absent the increase in marital sorting, married women would have experienced the same increases in intergenerational mobility as did men in the sample. Finally, both men and women in the youngest cohort experience an increase in mobility and decreases in marital sorting, consistent with the widespread expansion of educational attainment during the “High School Movement."

Title: Monetary policy, information, and country risk shocks in the euro area.

Title: Top Flight - How responsive are top earners to tax rates?

Title:  Regulation by Reputation? Intermediaries, Labor Abuses, and International Migration (with Niharika Singh, University of Notre Dame)

Title : Immersive learning: 4-week block teaching.

Speaker: Rebecca Wilde (WMG)

Abstract:

Immersive learning has recently gained attention within the higher education sector. Current publications reflect heavily around the benefits gained from block teaching. A significant caveat within the existing body of literature is around how 4-week block teaching and immersive learning is operationalised in terms of curriculum design; and how this is cascaded to a course and module level. The focus of the session will be upon WMG’s experience of moving from a one-week block to a four-week block teaching model.

Title to be advised.

Title: Voter polarization and extremism

Title: Optimally informative monetary policy

Title: BETWEEN TWO WORLDS: EDUCATION-OCCUPATION MISMATCH FOR SECOND-GENERATION IMMIGRANTS IN THE UK

Authors

Subhasish Dey, University of Warwick

Mahima Kapoor, University of Warwick

Anirban Mukherjee, University of Calcutta

Abstract:

This study assesses the quality of occupations that second-generation immigrants are employed in relative to natives in the UK. Based on the concept of education-occupation mismatch, we investigate whether the utilization of workers’ skills is commensurate with those required under the job. Using the multinomial logistic regression model to fit data from the Understanding Society: UK Household Longitudinal Study, we show that second-generation immigrants have a higher probability of being over-educated than natives and evaluate the mechanisms driving the results. We further explore the presence of double penalty along the overlap of legal and social identities. The findings direct attention towards the unique context of second-generation immigrants and inform policy efforts.

Title: Moving to Opportunity, Together

Title: On the Inconsistency of Cluster-Robust Inference and How Subsampling Can Fix It

Abstract: Conventional methods of cluster-robust inference are inconsistent in the presence of unignorably large clusters. We formalize this claim by establishing a necessary and sufficient condition for the consistency of the conventional methods. We find that this condition for the consistency is rejected for a majority of empirical research papers. In this light, we propose a novel score subsampling method that achieves uniform size control over a broad class of data generating processes, covering that fails the conventional method. Simulation studies support these claims. With real data used by an empirical paper, we showcase that the conventional methods conclude significance while our proposed method concludes insignificance.

Title: Social Influence in Online Reviews: Evidence from the Steam Store

Abstract: How good are reviews as signals of product quality for consumers? Using a data-set derived from the popular Steam gaming platform I investigate the ‘priming’ of quality judgements as based on pre-existing consumer assessments. A policy reform on Steam in 2019 changed the average level of exposure to previous consumer quality ratings, with this randomly occurring within a game and reviewer’s life cycle. I find that removing the exposure of a reviewer to a product’s average rating leads to a 35% drop in the dependency of their review on such a rating. This is not driven by selection effects, and is robust to a wide range of alternate specifications and measures. The effect is heavily asymmetric: negativity compounds to inflate the gap between poorly-rated and well rated games. This is driven by users who are less experienced both within and across games. Finally, using estimates of owner data, I run a simple structural model of game choice based on rating. A 1% increase to product rating is equivalent to a 2.5 dollar sale price reduction, suggesting this effect has large implications for buyers and sellers.

Title: Statistical Discrimination and the Distribution of Wages

Here is the MS Teams link for this CRETA seminar 

https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3a44e76bae944e45478914cb98497b7098%40thread.tacv2/1715100204271?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%2209bacfbd-47ef-4465-9265-3546f2eaf6bc%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%22aac8c148-e99c-4793-9a9e-9a8b8d83de0e%22%7d

Title: Two-dimensional information choice in committees

Title: National Road Upgrading and Structural Transformation: Evidence from Ugandan Households (with Ian Herzog and Siyuan Liu)
Abstract: Structural transformation, typically characterized by labor transitioning from agriculture to a diverse industrial economy, has been slow in Sub-Saharan Africa. Even though the region is urbanizing, a significant portion of the urban population continues to depend on agriculture. We argue that this is because smaller cities are isolated from national markets and trade. We test this claim using granular individual panel data and Uganda's doubling of paved roads, which improved remote areas' market access. We find that market access causes workers to quit family farms and take specialized paid work. Effects concentrate in peripheral areas, households with a comparative advantage in off-farm work and reflect off-farm opportunities rather than reduced demand for farm output. In addition, market access causes remote households to simplify farming techniques and scale back farming. Findings are consistent with reliable transport allowing trade with urban areas, creating opportunities to specialize according to individual comparative advantage.

Title: Derivative pricing with strategic competition for liquidity.

Title to be advised.

Title : Parents’ Earnings and the Returns to Universal Pre-Kindergarten.

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Title: The Value of Ratings: Evidence from their Introduction in Securities Markets.

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Title: Organizing a Kingdom (with Charles Angelucci and Simone Meraglia)

Abstract: We develop a framework that examines the organizational challenges faced by central rulers when delegating administrative authority over rural areas and towns to local elites. We highlight two key mechanisms that describe how shifts in the economy can lead to institutional change: First, as towns’ economic potential grows (e.g., due to the Commercial Revolution), their inefficient administration by outsiders (i.e., landed elites) leads to higher losses for the ruler. Thus, the ruler grants self-governance to towns, allowing urban elites to better adapt to local shocks (trade opportunities). Second, in order for self-governing towns to coordinate their choices with the ruler’s interests, they need to receive reliable information about shocks to the kingdom (e.g., war threats). To ensure effective communication, the ruler informs towns directly in central assemblies. Overall, this process increases the weight given to urban elites’ preferences in decisions made by all stakeholders. Our framework can explain the emergence of municipal autonomy and towns’ representation in parliaments throughout Western Europe in the early modern period. We also discuss how the model applies to other historical dynamics, and to alternative organizational settings.