Best of #econtwitter - Week of June 7, 2020

Welcome to this week’s edition of the Best of Econtwitter. Recommendations always welcome over email or on Twitter @just_economics.

New papers

Barbara Biasi @BarbaraBiasi

🚨New working paper alert “Flexible Wages, Salaries, and The Gender Gap,“ with Heather Sarsons. A thread; comments welcome! 1/9 tinyurl.com/ybj4wtr6

Michael Ewens @startupecon

The paper in one figure: compensation increases with firm size proxies only after a startup completes its first product.

NBER @nberpubs

Compensation for founder-CEOs of VC-backed startups increases significantly after the firm achieves product-market fit, marking the startup's transition from 'differentiation' to 'standardization', from @startupecon, Ramana Nanda, and Christopher Stanton https://t.co/o4vblh6dqT https://t.co/ZE85HPC6nO

Arshia Hashemi @ArshiaHashemi

🚨 NEW PAPER 🚨 "Social Insurance in General Equilibrium". Comments very welcome! THREAD Link: static1.squarespace.com/static/5e96d45…

David Broockman @dbroockman

My work w/ @esoltas on discrimination in elections is out in the Journal of Public Economics @JPubEcon authors.elsevier.com/a/1bCZtAlw9itfn It's in an econ journal, but the paper is about an idea I think poli sci should think about more: acting on racism can undermine one's own goals. (1/n)

Ralph Lütticke @RalphLuet

Now out as @cepr_org working paper: The Liquidity Channel of Fiscal Policy (with @christianbaye13 and @bornecon). Gated:cepr.org/active/publica… Ungated: dropbox.com/s/yyzhz2zv487i… Thread.

dropbox.comBBL_Fiscal_Liquidity_June_2020.pdfShared with Dropbox

Public goods

John Cawley @cawley_john

I'm happy to serve on the new AEA Ad Hoc Committee on the Job Market, with Matt Gentzkow, Brooke Helppie-McFall, Peter Rousseau & Wendy Stock. We'll be collecting & disseminating info on the job market for rookie Econ PhDs. #EconTwitter #EconJobMarket 1/5

aeaweb.orgAmerican Economic AssociationCommittee Members:

Institutional reform proposals

Paul Novosad @paulnovosad

What if, effective immediately, we declare the next 10 journals to be just as good as top5s. AEJs, REStat, JEEA, you decide. This would have a whole lot of benefits. 1/N

Ivan Werning @IvanWerning

I feel we need to talk about the QJE and JPE being department owned operations, Harvard* and JPE, with editors that stay on for decades (perhaps as a result of the small pool they draw on, or otherwise). Is this the best for the profession? (* don’t be confused, not MIT)

Florin Bilbiie @FlorinBilbiie

STOP TOP5: a proposal to cure top5ism An idea I've been toying with for long. Motivated to post here by recent posts. Sloppy, meant to launch a debate. Most people agree that the obsession with top5, I call it top5ism (top5itis, tyranny, whatever you want to call it) is toxic1/n

Matthias Doepke @mdoepke

Concentration of power is a problem in economics, and the top-5 journals are the prime example. A realistic path for improvement is to massively increase the number of papers published in these journals. Top-5 publications are artificially scarce. Let's change that. 1/6

Ivan Werning @IvanWerning

I feel we need to talk about the QJE and JPE being department owned operations, Harvard* and JPE, with editors that stay on for decades (perhaps as a result of the small pool they draw on, or otherwise). Is this the best for the profession? (* don’t be confused, not MIT)

Christian Zimmermann @CZimm_economist

I once floated a proposal that would put the journal hierarchy upside down. Any manuscript submission would have to start at the lowest level, say at the "Journal of the Labor Income Share." Once it passes that hurdle (which should be PLOS-like easy), then it can apply to 1/n

Kurt MIT-shock-man @SorryToBeKurt

At face value, it sounds like a very simple proposal. Let me offer some thoughts being on the other side, as an. editor at a top-5 1/

Matthias Doepke @mdoepke

Concentration of power is a problem in economics, and the top-5 journals are the prime example. A realistic path for improvement is to massively increase the number of papers published in these journals. Top-5 publications are artificially scarce. Let's change that. 1/6 https://t.co/fhNuqSFUEh

Miscellaneous

Jason Abaluck @Jabaluck

It's time for normative economics Saturday wherein we discuss whether economic analysis reaches insane conclusions about racism. (Indirectly inspired by: )

Simon Mongey @Simon_Mongey

@haralduhlig @FedericoGanz You're putting preventing small amounts of looting ahead of everything else. That's a choice. I'm choosing to put the ability of people to choose where and when to protest first. It's a question of values.

Ben Golub @ben_golub

Popular opinion: formalizing normative reasoning about big political questions is tricky. But only a little thought is enough to see that the toolbox that most economists reflexively reach for (Pareto efficiency, planner weights, etc.) isn't so useful for these questions. 1/3

Jason Abaluck @Jabaluck

Suppose society is 75% white people who like being racist and are rich(er), so they are willing to pay $50,000 to preserve the racist status quo. It's 10% black people who are each willing to pay $50,000 to end the racist status quo. Does pareto efficiency say: let's be racist?