Olivier Ledoit, Michael Wolf, Spectrum estimation: a unified framework for covariance matrix estimation and PCA in large dimensions, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 105, 2013. (Working Paper)
Covariance matrix estimation and principal component analysis (PCA) are two cornerstones of multivariate analysis. Classic textbook solutions perform poorly when the dimension of the data is of a magnitude similar to the sample size, or even larger. In such settings, there is a common remedy for both statistical problems: nonlinear shrinkage of the eigenvalues of the sample covariance matrix. The optimal nonlinear shrinkage formula depends on unknown population quantities and is thus not available. It is, however, possible to consistently estimate an oracle nonlinear shrinkage, which is motivated on asymptotic grounds. A key tool to this end is consistent estimation of the set of eigenvalues of the population covariance matrix (also known as the spectrum), an interesting and challenging problem in its own right. Extensive Monte Carlo simulations demonstrate that our methods have desirable finite-sample properties and outperform previous proposals. |
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Matthias Doepke, Fabrizio Zilibotti, Parenting with style: altruism and paternalism in intergenerational preference transmission, In: Department of Economics Working Paper Series, No. 104, 2012. (Working Paper)
We construct a theory of intergenerational preference transmission that rationalizes the choice between alternative parenting styles (related to Baumrind 1967). Parents maximize an objective function that combines Beckerian and paternalistic altruism towards children. They can affect their children’s choices via two channels: either by influencing their preferences or by imposing direct restrictions on their choice sets. Different parenting styles (authoritarian, authoritative, and permissive) emerge as equilibrium outcomes, and are affected both by parental preferences and by the socioeconomic environment. We consider two applications: patience and risk aversion. We argue that parenting styles may be important for explaining why different groups or societies develop different attitudes towards human capital formation, entrepreneurship, and innovation. |
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Andreas Hefti, Local contraction-stability and uniqueness, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 112, 2013. (Working Paper)
In this paper we analyze R&D collaboration networks in industries where firms are competitors in the product market. Firms’ benefits from collaborations arise by sharing knowledge about a cost-reducing technology. By forming collaborations, however, firms also change their own competitive position in the market as well as the overall market structure. We analyze incentives of firms to form R&D collaborations with other firms and the implications of these alliance decisions for the overall network structure. We provide a general characterization of both equilibrium networks and endogenous production choices, and compare it to the efficient network architecture. We also allow for firms to differ in their technological characteristics, investigate how this affects their propensity to collaborate and study the resulting network architecture. |
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Stefan Jönsson, Armin Schmutzler, All-pay auctions: Implementation and optimality, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 108, 2013. (Working Paper)
This paper analyzes how all-pay auctions with endogenous prizes can be used to provide effort incentives. We show that wide classes of effort distributions can be implemented as equilibrium outcomes of such games. We also ask how all-pay auctions have to be structured so as to induce high expected highest efforts without generating excessive wasteful efforts of losers. All-pay auctions with endogenous prizes can do better than all-pay auctions with fixed prizes in this respect, in particular, when the prize function is approximately linear. We use the results to compare patents and prizes as innovation incentives, and to explore promotion incentives in organizations. |
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Joseph P Romano, Michael Wolf, Testing for monotonicity in expected asset returns, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 17, 2013. (Working Paper)
Many postulated relations in finance imply that expected asset returns strictly increase in an underlying characteristic. To examine the validity of such a claim, one needs to take the entire range of the characteristic into account, as is done in the recent proposal of Patton and Timmermann (2010). But their test is only a test for the direction of monotonicity, since it requires the relation to be monotonic from the outset: either weakly decreasing under the null or strictly increasing under the alternative. When the relation is non-monotonic or weakly increasing, the test can break down and falsely ‘establish’ a strictly increasing relation with high probability. We offer some alternative tests that do not share this problem. The behavior of the various tests is illustrated via Monte Carlo studies. We also present empirical applications to real data. |
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Michael D König, Dynamic R&D networks, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 109, 2013. (Working Paper)
In this paper we analyze R&D collaboration networks in industries where firms are competitors in the product market. Firms’ benefits from collaborations arise by sharing knowledge about a cost-reducing technology. By forming collaborations, however, firms also change their own competitive position in the market as well as the overall market structure. We analyze incentives of firms to form R&D collaborations with other firms and the implications of these alliance decisions for the overall network structure. We provide a general characterization of both equilibrium networks and endogenous production choices, and compare it to the efficient network architecture. We also allow for firms to differ in their technological characteristics, investigate how this affects their propensity to collaborate and study the resulting network architecture. |
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Rafael Laliv, Simon Luechinger, Armin Schmutzler, Does supporting passenger railways reduce road traffic externalities?, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 110, 2013. (Working Paper)
Many governments subsidize regional rail service as an alternative to road traffic. This paper assesses whether increases in service frequency reduce road traffic externalities. We exploit differences in service frequency growth by procurement mode following a railway reform in Germany to address endogeneity of service growth. Increases in service frequency reduce the number of severe road traffic accidents, carbon monoxide, nitrogen monoxide, nitrogen dioxide pollution and infant mortality. Placebo regressions with sulfur dioxide and ozone yield no effect. Service frequency growth between 1994 and 2004 improves environmental quality by an amount that is worth approximately 28-40 % of total subsidies. An analysis of household behavior shows that the effects of railway services on outcome variables are driven by substitution from road to rail. |
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Ho Fai Chan, Bruno Frey, Jana Gallus, Benno Torgler, Does the John Bates Clark Medal boost subsequent productivity and citation success?, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 111, 2013. (Working Paper)
Despite the social importance of awards, they have been largely disregarded by academic research in economics. This paper investigates whether a specific, yet important, award in economics, the John Bates Clark Medal, raises recipients’ subsequent research activity and status compared to a synthetic control group of nonrecipient scholars with similar previous research performance. We find evidence of positive incentive and status effects that raise both productivity and citation levels. |
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Michelle S. Sovinsky, Steven Stern, Dynamic modelling of long-term care decisions, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 113, 2013. (Working Paper)
This paper describes and analyzes research on the dynamics of long-term care and suggests directions for the literature to make progress. We discuss sources and causes of dynamics including inertia/state dependence (confounded by unobserved heterogeneity); match-specific effects; and costs of changing caregivers. We comment on causes of dynamics including learning/human capital accumulation; burnout; and game-playing. We suggest how to deal with endogenous geography; dynamics in discrete and continuous choices; and equilibrium issues (multiple equilibria, dynamic equilibria). Next, we evaluate the advantages of different potential data sources (NLTCS, PSID, AHEAD/HRS, SHARE, ELSA) and identify first order data problems including noisy measures of wealth and family structure. We suggest some methods to handle econometric problems such as endogeneity (work, geography) and measurement error. Finally, we discuss potential policy implications of dynamics including the effect of dynamics on parameter estimates and direct policy implications of inertia (implications for family welfare, parent welfare, child welfare, and cost of government programs). |
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Robertas Zubrickas, The provision point mechanism with reward money, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 114, 2013. (Working Paper)
We modify the provision point mechanism by introducing reward money, which is distributed among the contributors in proportion to their contributions only when the provision point is not reached. In equilibrium, the provision point is always reached as competition for reward money and preference for the public good induce sufficient contributions. In environments without aggregate uncertainty, the mechanism not only ensures allocative efficiency but also distributional. At a specific level of reward money, there is a unique equilibrium, where all consumers contribute the same proportion of their private valuations. The advantages of the mechanism are also demonstrated for collective action problems. |
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Claudia Bernasconi, Similarity of income distributions and the extensive and intensive margin of bilateral trade flows, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 115, 2013. (Working Paper)
This paper investigates empirically how similarity of demand structures - approximated by similarity of income distributions - affects trade patterns along both the extensive and intensive margin. The idea that similarity of demand structures intensifies trade goes back to the well-known Linder hypothesis. Based on a sample of 102 countries, I find that bilateral trade volumes are increasing in the overlap of two countries income distributions. This effect is driven by both the extensive and intensive margin. I establish two novel measures of income similarity - the average income level of the overlap area and the range of incomes for which two distributions overlap - and document that both are important determinants of bilateral trade margins. My analysis shows that the positive relationship between similarity of income distributions and bilateral trade margins is present at the aggregate and disaggregate level of trade flows. |
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Zheng Song, Kjetil Storesletten, Yikai Wang, Fabrizio Zilibotti, Sharing high growth across generations: Pensions and demographic transition in China, In: UBS Center Working Paper Series, No. 1, 2012. (Working Paper)
Intergenerational inequality and old-age poverty are salient issues in contemporary China. China’s aging population threatens the fiscal sustainability of its pension system, a key vehicle for intergenerational redistribution. We analyze the positive and normative effects of alternative pension reforms, using a dynamic general equi- librium model that incorporates population dynamics and productivity growth. Although a reform is necessary, delaying its implementation implies large welfare gains for the (poorer) current generations, imposing only small costs on (richer) future generations. In contrast, a fully funded reform harms current generations, with small gains to future generations. High wage growth is key for these results. |
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Filippo Brutti, Philip Saure, Transmission of sovereign risk in the Euro crisis, In: Studienzentrum Gerzensee, No. 12.01, 2012. (Working Paper)
We assess the role of financial linkages in the transmission of sovereign risk in the Euro Crisis. Building on the narrative approach by Romer and Romer (1989), we use
financial news to identify structural shocks in a vector autoregressive model of daily sovereign CDS premia for eleven European countries. To estimate how these shocks
transmit across borders, we use data on cross-country bank exposures to sovereign debt. Our results indicate that exposure to Greek sovereign debt and the debt of
Greek banks constitute important transmission channels. All else being equal, the transmission rate to the country with the greatest exposure to Greece (1.22 percent of GDP) has been roughly 46 percent higher than the rate to the country with the least exposure (0.08 percent of GDP). |
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Andreas Kettemann, Signe Krogstrup, Portfolio balance effects of the SNB’s bond purchase program, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 116, 2013. (Working Paper)
This paper carries out an empirical investigation of the impact on bond spreads of the announcement, purchases and exit from the SNB’s bond purchase program in 2009-2010. We find evidence in favor of a narrowing yield spread of covered bonds as a result of the program. The effect materialized in the days following the announcement of the SNB’s intention to buy bonds issued by private sector borrowers, as markets learned that the SNB was buying covered bonds. The specification of the bond spreads used allows us to identify this effect as a discounted portfolio balance effect of the expected purchases, as distinct from policy signalling. In contrast, we find no evidence of a further effect of the actual purchases and subsequent sales on bond spreads. |
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Lukas Inderbitzin, Stefan Staubli, Josef Zweimüller, Extended unemployment benefits and early retirement: program complementarity and program substitution, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 119, 2013. (Working Paper)
This paper explores how extended unemployment insurance (UI) benefits targeted to older workers affect early retirement and social welfare. The trade-off of optimal UI between consumption smoothing and moral hazard requires accounting for the entire early retirement system, which often includes extended UI and relaxed access to disability insurance (DI). We argue that extended UI generates program complementarity (increased take-up of UI followed by DI and/or regular retirement benefits) and program substitution (increased take-up of UI instead of DI). Exploiting Austria's regional extended benefit program, which extended regular UI benefits to up to 4 years, we find: (i) program complementarity is quantitatively important for workers aged 50+; and (ii) program substitution is quantitatively relevant for workers aged 55+. We derive a simple rule for optimal UI that accounts for program complementarity and program substitution. Using the sufficient statistics approach, we conclude that UI for older workers was too generous and the regional extended benefit program was a suboptimal policy. |
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Bettina Susanne Klose, Daniel J Kovenock, The all-pay auction with complete information and identity-dependent externalities, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 118, 2013. (Working Paper)
We derive a necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of equilibria with only two active players in the all-pay auction with complete information and identity-dependent externalities. This condition shows that the generic equilibrium of the standard all-pay auction is robust to the introduction of "small" identity-dependent externalities. In general, however, the presence of identity-dependent externalities invalidates well-established qualitative results concerning the set of equilibria of the first-price all-pay auction with complete information. With identity-dependent externalities equilibria are generally not payoff equivalent, and identical players may earn different payoffs in equilibrium. These observations show that Siegel’s (2009) results characterizing the set of equilibrium payoffs in all-pay contests, including the all-pay auction as a special case, do not extend to environments with identity-dependent externalities. We further compare the all-pay auction with identity-dependent externalities to the first-price winner-pay auction with identity-dependent externalities. We demonstrate that the equilibrium payoffs of the all-pay auction and winner-pay auction cannot be ranked unambiguously in the presence of identity-dependent externalities by providing examples of environments where equilibrium payoffs in the all-pay auction dominate those in the winner-pay auction and vice versa. |
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Lasse Steiner, Bruno Frey, Simone Hotz, European capitals of culture and life satisfaction, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 117, 2013. (Working Paper)
This paper analyzes whether hosting the most prestigious European cultural event, the European Capital of Culture, has an impact on regional economic development or the life satisfaction of the local population. Concerning the economic impact, we show that European Capitals are hosted in regions with above average GDP per capita, but do not causally affect the economic development in a significant way. Even a positive impact on GDP per capita would not imply a positive impact on individual utility or social welfare of the regional population. Surprisingly, using difference-in-difference estimations, a negative effect on the well-being of the regional population is found during the event. Since no effect is found before the event, reverse causality and positive anticipation can be ruled out. The negative effect during the event might result from dissatisfaction with the high levels of public expenditure, transport disruptions, general overcrowding or an increase in housing prices. |
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Björn Bartling, Ernst Fehr, Holger Herz, The intrinsic value of decision rights, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 120, 2014. (Working Paper)
Philosophers, psychologists, and economists have long argued that certain decision rights carry not only instrumental value but may also be valuable for their own sake. The ideas of autonomy, freedom, and liberty derive their intuitive appeal - at least partly - from an assumed positive intrinsic value of decision rights. Providing clean evidence for the existence of this intrinsic value and measuring its size, however, is intricate. Here, we develop a method capable of achieving these goals. The data reveal that the large majority of our subjects intrinsically value decision rights beyond their instrumental benefit. The intrinsic valuation of decision rights has potentially important consequences for corporate governance, human resource management, and optimal job design: it may explain why managers value power, why employees appreciate jobs with task discretion, why individuals sort into self-employment, and why the reallocation of decision rights is often very difficult and cumbersome. Our method and results may also prove useful in developing an empirical revealed preference foundation for concepts such as "freedom of choice" and "individual autonomy". |
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Timo Boppart, Josef Falkinger, Volker Grossmann, Protestantism and education: Reading (the bible) and other skills, In: IZA Discussion Paper, No. 5402, 2010. (Working Paper)
During industrialization, Protestants were more literate than Catholics. This paper investigates whether this fact may be led back to the intrinsic motivation of Protestants to read the bible and to what extent other education motives might have been involved as well. We employ a historical data set from Switzerland which allows us to differentiate between different cognitive skills: reading, numeracy, essay writing and Swiss history. We develop an estimation strategy to examine whether the impact of religious denomination was particularly large with respect to reading capabilities. We find support for this hypothesis. However, we also find evidence which is consistent with the view that Protestants’ education otives went beyond acquiring reading skills. |
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Timo Boppart, Franziska J Weiss, Non-homothetic preferences and industry directed technical change, In: Working paper series / Department of Economics, No. 123, 2013. (Working Paper)
Sectoral data features (i) changing relative expenditures of different sectors, (ii) non-constancy in relative prices and (iii) long-run trends in relative TFP growth rates across sectors. We provide a tractable theory of industry directed technical change, which is able to reconcile these findings. In doing so, this paper emphasizes the importance of directed technical change, nonhomotheticity of preferences and structural change as a long-run phenomenon. Using the input-output tables of the U.S., our theory helps us to reconstruct how structural change in terms of final consumption affects the market size of industry value-added. Arguing that the structural change across broad categories of final consumption is exogenous from the perspective of an individual firm, this gives us an instrument for the industrial market size (at the valueadded level). We then empirically test for the market size effect of induced innovation. Our findings suggest that a 1 percent increase in an industry’s market size (relative to GDP) leads to an increase in the TFP growth rate of about 0.3 percentage points over five years. |
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