Best of #econtwitter - Week of July 4, 2021 [2/2]

Welcome readers old and new to this week’s edition of Best of Econtwitter. Thanks to those sharing suggestions, over email or on Twitter @just_economics.

This is part two of two, this week — part one is here.

Paper summary threads

Nuno Palma @nunopgpalma

I explore the discovery of rich deposits of precious metals in America in the early modern period as a natural experiment for random variation in changes in money supply in Europe. The open access version of the paper is in this post:

nofuturepast.wordpress.comThe real effects of monetary expansions: evidence from a large-scale historical experimentThe main paper from my PhD dissertation is now forthcoming at the Review of Economic Studies. I explore the discovery of rich deposits of precious metals in America in the early modern period as a …

Nuno Palma @nunopgpalma

A 10% increase in production of precious metals led to a hump-shaped response of real GDP, with a cumulative increase up to 0.9% six to nine years later. The evidence suggests that this is because prices responded to monetary injections with considerable lags.

Seth Zimmerman @SethDZimmerman

New NBER WP out today! "Smart Matching Platforms and Heterogeneous Beliefs in Centralized School Choice," with Felipe Arteaga, @adamkapor, @ChrisANeilson. nber.org/papers/w28946 1/N

nber.orgSmart Matching Platforms and Heterogeneous Beliefs in Centralized School ChoiceFounded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, and business professionals.

Anup Malani @anup_malani

See @arpitrage’s summary of our new @nberpubs working paper on the economic impacts of COVID in India. His description focuses on how households adapt. We have a number of other findings on inequality and people’s perceptions about COVID, which we’ll try to tweet about as well.

Arpit Gupta @arpitrage

New Substack post, which covers: - A @ManhattanInst brief on Value Capture (https://t.co/ppivawnhHZ) - New paper on the pandemic's impact on India. Thread on paper 👇 https://t.co/gMZ3E4f6z1 https://t.co/NYRJzHCljK https://t.co/QBIUDwBN4J

^newsletter avoids most Covid content, but some general results on risk sharing here

Ted Loch-Temzelides @TedLoch

1/4 Biologists often interpret resource exchanges among organisms as symbiotic mutualisms. My latest in @PNASNews shows these can be modeled as Walrasian equilibria.

pnas.orgWalrasian equilibrium behavior in natureMutualisms are commonly observed ecological interactions, often involving the exchange of resources across species. Such exchanges can be thought of as biological markets. Biologists modeling these markets often employ an informal mix of economics and game-theoretic concepts. A fundamental question …

Dr. Chloe N. East (she/her/hers) @ChloeEast2

Health inequalities persist across generations. What can public policy do about it? @smilleralert Marianne Page @LaurawherryR & I show expanding Medicaid to disadvantaged pregnant women improved the health of their kids *AND* their grandkids link: nber.org/papers/w23810 1/N

nber.orgMulti-generational Impacts of Childhood Access to the Safety Net: Early Life Exposure to Medicaid and the Next Generation’s HealthFounded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, and business professionals.

Raffaella Sadun @raffasadun

What type of skills are requested in C-suite positions? We explore this question in a new paper linked below. Quick answer: social skills—e.g. being able to truly understand and empathize, persuade others—are increasingly in high demand.

NBER @nberpubs

Novel data show an increasing relevance of social skills in top managerial occupations and a greater emphasis on social skills in larger and more information-intensive organizations, from Stephen Hansen, Tejas Ramdas, @raffasadun, and Joe Fuller https://t.co/POq5FnnSqY https://t.co/LkprDZMwnd

^see also: survey on CEO compensation design

Kunal Mangal @mrgunalan

New Working Paper! "How much is a government job in India worth?" cse.azimpremjiuniversity.edu.in/publications/h… How much are government employees in India compensated? A simple question, but turns out we have no idea! This paper is my attempt at getting an order-of-magnitude estimate. 1/n

Radhika Jain @radhi_jain

Thanks @khoslasaksham! Our WP shows large gender disparities in utilization of hospital care despite massive govt subsidies (within PMJAY-like insurance prog). Increasing gender-neutral subsidies/access to social services may not close gender gaps bc males benefit as much/more

Saksham Khosla @khoslasaksham

Research by @DupasPascaline + @radhi_jain on gender bias in health insurance uptake in India shows: - in Rajasthan, there were over 225,000 missing female hospital visits over a 3-year period - policies directly targeting gender disparities are essential https://t.co/EsaBE72lTz https://t.co/jcX5beMUpu

Arpit Gupta @arpitrage

Is looking like a really interesting presentation by @thesamasher

Bahujan Economists @BahujanEcon

We are holding a discussion on Caste and Economic Inequality with @devdatalab @thesamasher tomorrow! The session will focus on a series of empirical research studying inequality in access to economic opportunity across caste and religion. Zoom Link: https://t.co/3Dr8zofRn6 https://t.co/yci5OaBWUu

Robert Dur @DurRobert

What teachers really want? A principal who supports them with disruptive students. This is valued equal to a 17% salary increase. It also nearly eliminates aversion to teaching in disadvantaged settings. Important paper: edworkingpapers.com/sites/default/… by Andrew C. Johnston @datacrat

John Kramer @jvkramer1

Large share of people in Europe spend all of their income and have very little savings. In our paper, we investigate whether the size of this fraction matters for how monetary policy affects the real economy in different countries. 2/5

Nathan Miller @NateHMiller

This might be a good time for a thread on my research with @GloriaSheu and Matt Weinberg about price leadership in the beer industry, now forthcoming at AER.

AEA Journals @AEAjournals

Forthcoming in the AER: "Oligopolistic Price Leadership and Mergers: The United States Beer Industry" by Nathan H. Miller, Gloria Sheu, and Matthew C. Weinberg. https://t.co/lT7oIfLWvc

Seth Benzell @SBenzell

@LuedtkeAllison @BryanAStuart Thanks for the kind words. You can read my tweet thread about the paper here:

Seth Benzell @SBenzell

Happy to announce "Network of Thrones" w/ Kevin Cooke (also on the market) has been accepted at AEJ:Applied @AEAjournals! We show royal family ties prevented interstate wars. 👑💑👑➡️☮️ Like #Habsburgs or #GameofThrones? Read on! 1/n https://t.co/dhJ0U9fBRo

Interesting discussions

Stefano DellaVigna @sdellavi

List of psych phenomena that do not replicate. Includes a lot of classics... In some case (e.g., Milgram) phenomenon stands, just not the original experiments. My work with @elinos shows up in nudges, where we do replicate effectiveness, just 5x smaller effect than pub papers

James Heathers @jamesheathers

A list of all major psych research results in which we have lost confidence. Damn. https://t.co/blkMk4s0sK

^Thaler pushback in the replies

Claudia Troccoli @ClaudiaTroccol1

Econ needs better mechanisms to encourage replication and correction of errors in published papers. My recent experience with Economic Journal (EJ) provides a blatant example of this problem. (1/n) @EJ_RES #EconTwitter

Ben Moll @ben_moll

OK I'll bite :-) Off the top of my head, here are 6 reasons (in somewhat random order) why a heterogeneous agent model allows you do more than "just starting from the MPC>>0 and then going forward from there": (I'm sure there are many others -- what else?)

JW Mason @JWMason1

Here is my contribution to this panel: https://t.co/FECJrMDzAv https://t.co/n5CSFqqKkY

^Ivan Werning also comments

scott cunningham @causalinf

Who is your favorite economist from let’s call it an “earlier era”? I’ll let you decide what an earlier era is. I was thinking just now, and I’d never said this before until now, I’m going to say Paul Samuelson. Transformative architectural like work over a career for one 1/n