Best of #econtwitter - Week of September 20, 2020

Welcome readers old and new to this week’s (late!) edition of the Best of Econtwitter. Recommendations always welcome over email or on Twitter @just_economics.

New papers

Justin Sandefur @JustinSandefur

How the 'China shock' saved American universities -- and Trump's trade war may cost them $1B in tuition Paper: cgdev.org/sites/default/… Join via Zoom, 2pm on Tue, with @econgaurav and @BilgeErten: cgdev.org/event/trade-li…

Justin Sandefur @JustinSandefur

New with @dev_a_patel: A “Rosetta Stone” for Comparing Test Scores Around the World (and Across the Global Income Distribution) Paper: cgdev.org/sites/default/… Blog: cgdev.org/blog/rosetta-s… 1/

^US (and Russia?) look surprisingly good based on this?

Arun Advani @arunadvaniecon

So, what does all this mean for inequality? 85% of rise in the 1% share has gone to migrants. 2/3 to 1/2 of rise in top 0.1 and smaller shares. (UK is "importing" ineq) ⚠️this is NOT a claim that migrants *cause* inequality. just laying out where the money is going right now⚠️

Peter Zorn @_peterzorn

Aggregate investment responds sluggishly to shocks or changes in policy. E.g., investment spending peaks with 8-quarter delay after Fed policy rate cut. Puzzling b/c returns higher at time of rate change. Why? My paper Investment under Rational Inattention offers an explanation

Kirill Borusyak @borusyak

New WP: “Non-Random Exposure to Exogenous Shocks” (w/ @autoregress). Summary 🧵: Papers often estimate causal effects by leveraging exogenous shocks that affect many observations jointly, to different extents We show problems w/this & offer new solutions dropbox.com/s/brhuxe1b1k8x…

Anna Stansbury @annastansbury

Drenik, @simon_jaeger, Plotkin and @Schoefer_B use Argentinian data to study the degree to which temp agency workers receive firm-specific pay premia. They find they receive on average *half* of the premia of full time/regular workers. [1/3]

Benjamin Schoefer @Schoefer_B

New version of "Paying Outsourced Labor:" Temp-agency workers' inherit ~50% of the pay premia (AKM firm FEs) of regular workers. That is, >0%, yet <100%. Key: Arg'n data shows temps' workplace (client firms). w/ Andres Drenik, @pascuel, @simon_jaeger PDF: https://t.co/8Fp4wpb90A https://t.co/Igob8svBEh

Michael Ewens @startupecon

TL;DR: Control of the VC-backed startup board shifts from entrepreneur, to shared between VC and entrepreneur, to VC. VC control is sticky. The *independent director* plays a central role in this transition and acts as a mediator between the entrepreneur and VC. 2/13

Other paper summaries

Anthony Lee Zhang @AnthonyLeeZhang

Suppose you are a robust decision maker. You care about the highest and lowest estimate of an effect, across different model specifications. The researcher has incentives to find an upper bound. The replicator, a lower bound. The real effect should be in between!

John B. Holbein @JohnHolbein1

Null hacking [v]: the process by which replicators seek to get a "failure to replicate" because they believe these types of replications are more likely to be published. How do we address incentives to null hack in observational work? 👇👇👇 https://t.co/R4LbSAzCFE https://t.co/LRkrPY9kx2

John B. Holbein @JohnHolbein1

The minimum wage reduces racial income inequality. Important new work just out at @QJEHarvard. academic.oup.com/qje/advance-ar…

Florian Scheuer @Florian_Scheuer

Happy to presenting today for the last time my paper "Signaling to Experts" with @KurlatPablo at this exciting new online seminar series in economic theory: (1/9)

sites.google.comSeminars in Economic Theory

Martin Fiszbein @MartinFiszbein

We are glad that our paper on Frontier Culture is receiving attention outside economics, but based on the comments here it is clear we need to make some clarifications. Thread [1/12]

econometrica @ecmaEditors

The American Frontier shaped a culture of rugged individualism. It attracted individualistic types and made settlers more individualistic over time; its effects persist today as more exposed counties show greater opposition to government https://t.co/jl9651Njs9 https://t.co/oYAk8YXVnT

^history twitter got angsty

Public goods

Anthony Lee Zhang @AnthonyLeeZhang

(1/n) A few possibly useful public goods, available on my website

anthonyleezhang.github.ioNotes

^recommended

Sam Carter @samicart

I recently put together a list of organizations where people interested in (non-academic) jobs in behavioral economics/applied microeconomics should look. I figured it would be worth sharing more broadly! (1/n)

Coly Elhai @ColyElhai

🥕🥕Public resource announcement! 🥕🥕 With input from almost 40 folks in econ, @qlquanle, @mathematikai, @tsaocaro, and I have compiled a guide to econ RAships! raguide.github.io #econtwitter [1/5]

raguide.github.ioEcon RA GuideA community guide for research assistants in economics

Antonin Bergeaud @a_bergeaud

Hi #EconTwitter, #InnovTwitter, #InnovEcon and other patent geeks. With @CyrilVerluise , we are thrilled to announce several new features regarding the #PatentCity project See patentcity.xyz and thread below ⬇️⬇️

Antonin Bergeaud @a_bergeaud

With @CyrilVerluise we are very excited to release the first version of #PatentCity, a new open source framework to geolocalize 🇺🇸 patents at the county level since 1836. See the Github of the project and thread below ⬇️ https://t.co/htWlpfvPXd

Rebecca Wolfe @rebeccajwolfe

Decided to put down on paper some of my thoughts on non-academic careers for those with a PhD: medium.com/@rebeccajaynew…. I describe the two main paths I see, plus some suggestions of the transferrable skills you develop in a PhD program.

medium.comConsidering a Non-Academic Career: Some Musing from a Scholar-PractitionerEven before the pandemic, I received numerous requests from PhD students, postdocs and at times, junior faculty, for conversations about…

Good discussion in the replies

Otis Reid @otis_reid

Does anyone have an intuitive explainer for matrix completion? I read the Athey et al paper but could use an MC for Dummies companion piece.

^Athey replies here

Iván Díaz @ildiazm

In the past week or so I was involved in a few twitter conversations about the use of parametric models in randomized studies. Do you want to know when you can use parametric models in RCTs, and how to use them correctly? A thread: 1/