Best of #econtwitter - Week of October 3, 2021 [1/2]
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 one of two, this week. Part two is here.
Paper summary threads
Most long-run estimates of U.S. intergenerational mobility only include white men. What does mobility over the 20th century look like when we include non-whites *and* women?
A thread on my new paper with @ikuziemko and @snaidunl
Retrospective power analyses demonstrate that most studies were underpowered to detect all but large effect sizes. We conclude that many published findings using the RD design are exaggerated if not altogether spurious. [4/4]
We show that the literature demonstrates some pathological behavior consistent with selective reporting of findings. The figure below demonstrates that findings cluster just at or just above the t-statistic threshold of 1.96 (i.e. a p-value of less than or equal to 0.05). [2/4]
🚨New working paper alert🚨
@davidmolitor and I present an overview of “The Causal Effects of Place on Health and Longevity”
secureservercdn.net/104.238.71.33/…
New paper with @caryfrydman in Management Science. Summary: Slow choices generally signal uncertainty. So, when people see others choosing slowly, they tend to ignore those choices and follow their own private information. This helps them to avoid “herding” on bad choices. 1/5
New bite-sized working paper, joint with my @UChicago peers: Ivan Kirov & James Traina.
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…
Our main point: production approach markup estimators often measure input wedges, rather than markups.
Thread 🧵
Does marijuana legalization harm babies?
Naw.
"our findings implied modest or no adverse effects of marijuana liberalization policies on the array of perinatal outcomes considered."
nber.org/papers/w29296
Thrilled to see our paper coming out with @SakiBigio
Standard macro models assume the central bank controls a single interest rate that guides all saving/borrowing decisions of all agents.
But the target rate for the Fed and many central banks is the interbank market rate.
Econometrica @ecmaEditors
Despite a massive increase in demand for higher ed over the last 30 years, "supply" at elite colleges has stayed basically the same.
When ranked on SAT scores, colleges in the 1-98% range have met demand while elite colleges' share of total enrollment has been shrinking.
you've heard me talk about this patent-to-paper citation dataset (relianceonscience.org), but the accompanying article is now available open-access📣onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/je…. not-so-brief 🧵of why the paper might be worth reading even if you already have the data... 1/
Public goods
I'm going to write a blog post on the pros and cons that economists (PhD students, post-docs & faculty) considering joining Twitter should know about. #EconTwitter, what are your biggest pros and cons?
(The ability to pose questions like these will clearly be listed as a pro!)
^replies, with the results discussed here and blog post here
Excited & slightly terrified that all materials & videos of my MIT undergrad psychology & economics course (aka behavioral econ) from Spring 2020 are online on OCW!
As an undergrad, I loved browsing OCW classes. I hope this one will be useful for others!
A new data base of banking-crisis interventions since the 13th century across 100+ countries!
See working paper by Metrick and Schmelzing:
nber.org/papers/w29281#… #econtwitter
Interesting discussions
A lot of macro this week: inflation expectations, exchange rate regimes, more inflation expectations
After advising PhD & Master students for over a decade, there is one thing I find most students need to unlearn: the half-ass work mentality acquired during years of tests and homework. Let me explain (thread 🧵). 1/N #AcademicTwitter
The discussion around this thread suggests that many economists use “utility” in senses other than what the theory supports.
Economics is not based on the idea that people maximize life satisfaction, or maximize pleasure minus pain.
vNM utility is not hedonic utility!
Itai Sher @itaisher
This is completely wrong but in an interesting way. See if your principles or intermediate micro students can answer. #EconTwitter
Joe Weisenthal @TheStalwart