|
on Evolutionary Economics |
| By: | Oded Galor; Viacheslav Savitskiy |
| Abstract: | This research explores the origins of loss aversion and the variation in its prevalence across regions, nations and ethnic group. It advances the hypothesis and establishes empirically that the evolution of loss aversion in the course of human history can be traced to the adaptation of humans to the asymmetric effects of climatic shocks on reproductive success during the epoch in which subsistence consumption was a binding constraint. Exploiting regional variations in the vulnerability to climatic shocks and their exogenous changes in the course of the Columbian Exchange, the research establishes that consistent with the predictions of the theory, individuals and ethnic groups that are originated in regions marked by greater climatic volatility have higher predisposition towards loss-neutrality, while descendants of regions in which climatic conditions tended to be spatially correlated, and thus shocks were aggregate in nature, are characterized by greater intensity of loss aversion. |
| JEL: | D81 D91 Z10 |
| Date: | 2018–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:25273&r=evo |
| By: | Nicolas Vallois (CRIISEA - Centre de Recherche sur l'Industrie, les Institutions et les Systèmes Economiques d'Amiens - UPJV - Université de Picardie Jules Verne); Dorian Jullien (GREDEG - Groupe de Recherche en Droit, Economie et Gestion - UNS - Université Nice Sophia Antipolis - UCA - Université Côte d'Azur - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | Experimental economists increasingly apply econometric techniques to interpret their data, as suggests the emergence of " experimetrics " in the 2000s. Yet statistics remains a minor topic in historical and methodological writings on experimental economics (EE). This article aims to address this lacuna. To do so, we analyze the use of statistical tools in EE from early economics experiments of the 1940s-1950s to the present days. Our narrative is based on qualitative analysis of papers published in early periods and quantitative analysis of papers published in more recent periods. Our results reveal a significant change in EE' statistical methods, namely an evolution from purely descriptive methods to more sophisticated and standardized techniques. We also highlight that, despite the decisive role played by statistics in the way EE estimate the rationality of individuals or markets, statistics are still considered as involving non-methodological issues, i.e., as involving only purely technical issues. Our historical analysis shows that this technical conception was the result of a long-run evolution of the process of scientific legitimization of EE, which allowed experimental economists to escape from psychologist's more reflexive culture toward statistics. |
| Keywords: | Methodology,History of Economic Thought,Experimental Economics,Statistics,Econometrics |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01651070&r=evo |
| By: | James Andreoni; Deniz Aydin; Blake Barton; B. Douglas Bernheim; Jeffrey Naecker |
| Abstract: | In settings with uncertainty, tension exists between ex ante and ex post notions of fairness (e.g., equal opportunity versus equal outcomes). In a laboratory experiment, the most common behavioral pattern is for subjects to select the ex ante fair alternative ex ante, and switch to the ex post fair alternative ex post. One potential explanation embraces consequentialism and construes the reversals as manifestations of time inconsistency. Another abandons consequentialism, thereby avoiding the implication that revisions imply inconsistency. We test between these explanations by examining the demand for commitment, and contingent planning. The hypothesis of time-consistent non-consequentialism receives strong support. |
| JEL: | D03 D63 |
| Date: | 2018–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:25257&r=evo |
| By: | Michalopoulos, Stelios; Papaioannou, Elias |
| Abstract: | As Africa's role on the global stage is rising, so does the need to understand the shadow of history on the continent's economy and polity. We discuss recent works that shed light on Africa's colonial and precolonial legacies. The emerging corpus is remarkably interdisciplinary. Archives, ethnographic materials, georeferenced censuses, surveys, and satellite imagery are some of the sources often combined to test influential conjectures put forward in African historiography. Exploiting within-country variation and employing credible, albeit mostly local, identification techniques, this recent literature has uncovered strong evidence of historical continuity as well as instances of rupture in the evolution of the African economy. The exposition proceeds in reverse chronological order. Starting from the colonial period, which has been linked to almost all of Africa's post-independence maladies, we first review works that uncover the lasting legacies of colonial investments in infrastructure and human capital and quantify the role of various extractive institutions, such as indirect rule and oppression associated with concessionary agreements. Second, we discuss the long-lasting impact of the "Scramble for Africa" which led to ethnic partitioning and the creation of artificial modern states. Third, we cover studies on the multi-faceted legacy of the slave trades. Fourth, we analyze the contemporary role of various precolonial, ethnic-specific, institutional and social traits, such as political centralization. We conclude by offering some thoughts on what we view as open questions. |
| Keywords: | Africa; Borders; Development; Ethnicity; History; Human Capital; institutions; Political Centralization; Slavery |
| JEL: | N00 N9 O10 O43 O55 |
| Date: | 2018–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:13309&r=evo |
| By: | Quamrul H. Ashraf; Oded Galor; Marc Klemp |
| Abstract: | "The exploration of the impact of the prehistoric migration of anatomically modern humans from Africa on comparative economic development has been the focus of a vibrant research agenda in the past decade. This influential literature has attracted the attention of scholars from other disciplines, and in light of existing methodological gaps across fields, it has perhaps unsurprisingly generated some significant misconceptions. In particular, Rosenberg and Kang (2015) suggest that the hump-shaped effect of interpersonal population diversity on population density in the year 1500 is statistically insignificant in an extended sample of genetic diversity that was released more recently. Unfortunately, this assertion is based on elementary statistical errors. In fact, the hump-shaped effect of diversity on population density is even more pronounced in this extended sample of Pemberton et al. (2013), and it is present not only in the year 1500 but over the entire precolonial period for which population data are available (i.e., the 10,000BCE to 1500CE timeframe)." |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bro:econwp:2018-14&r=evo |
| By: | Quamrul H. Ashraf; Oded Galor; Marc Klemp |
| Abstract: | "The importance of the prehistoric migration of anatomically modern humans from Africa for comparative economic development has been the focus of a vibrant research agenda in the past decade. This influential literature has attracted the attention of some scholars from other disciplines, and in light of existing methodological gaps across fields, has perhaps unsurprisingly generated some significant misconceptions. This article examines the critical views expressed by some scholars from other disciplines, and establishes that they are based on fundamental misunderstandings of the statistical methodology, the conceptual framework, and the scope of the analysis that characterize this influential literature.. |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bro:econwp:2018-13&r=evo |