Working Papers

We analyze a fundamental dilemma and time-inconsistency problem facing a climate coalition producing natural gas. In the short term, it is tempting to export more to outcompete coal. When this policy is anticipated, however, investments in…

Randomized controlled trials are often run in settings with many subpopulations that may have differential benefits from the treatment being evaluated. We consider the problem of sample selection, i.e., whom to enroll in a randomized trial, such…

While agency theory has strongly influenced real-world compensation plans, most observed compensation plans are not explicit about their economic assumptions. In this study, we derive closed-form expressions to infer the cost of effort, the…

Many empirical studies of labor market questions rely on estimating relatively simple predictive models using small, carefully constructed longitudinal survey datasets based on hand-engineered features. Large Language Models (LLMs), trained on…

Traditional dynamic programming requires a mathematical model of the transition function for the state vector. Leveraging reinforcement learning techniques, we develop a framework to solve dynamic optimization problems that does not require…

We formulate the problem of constructing multiple simultaneously valid confidence intervals (CIs) as estimating a high probability upper bound on the maximum error for a class/set of estimate-estimand-error tuples, and refer to this as the error…

Democratic values are eroding just as citizens perceive increasing corruption, with numerous cases implicating the highest-level politicians. Could perceived increases in apex corruption be weakening democracy? We first present event study…

Politicians invest heavily in social media to amplify narratives about their nations, but the effectiveness of such approaches remains unclear. Analyzing 758,222 posts from US and UK politicians on X (formerly Twitter), we found that right-wing…

In the face of rising interest rates in 2022, banks mitigated interest rate exposure of the accounting value of their assets but left the vast majority of their long-duration assets exposed to interest rate risk. Data from call reports and SEC…

In influencer marketing, the differing incentives of advertisers and influencers necessitate a delicate balance between control and creativity. Investigating this trade-off, we explore the impact of contractual constraints on advertiser outcomes…

We examine the effects of stock market access, and in particular trading hours, on retail investment performance. Using discontinuities around time zone borders, we find that plausibly exogenous decreases in waking trading hours are associated…

While reliance on human discretion is a pervasive feature of institutional design, human discretion can also introduce costly noise (Kahneman, Sibony, and Sunstein 2021). We evaluate the consequences, determinants, and trade-offs associated with…

Advances in artificial intelligence (A.I.) are a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they may increase economic growth as A.I. augments our ability to innovate. On the other hand, many experts worry that these advances entail existential risk:…

We study how the assignment of intellectual property rights for successful innovations between inventors and their employers affect inventor-employer matching, the generality of innovation, and innovation disclosure. To do so, we examine the…

We identify a model of early-stage company growth persistence. Using seven commercial high growth company lists (either a Top 500 or Top 100 list of companies), we find that approximately 30% of companies remain on these lists for two consecutive…

When choosing whether and how much to donate, potential donors often observe a set of default donation amounts known as an “ask string.” In an experiment with more than 400,000 PayPal users, we replace a relatively unused donation amount ($75) on…

This study investigates the labor market value of credentials obtained from Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and shared on business networking platforms. We conducted a randomized experiment involving more than 800,000 learners, primarily from…

Re-examining field research findings about three critical episodes in Intel Corporation’s evolution we find that when autonomous strategic behavior significantly increased relevant organizational knowledge Intel top management provided sustained…

We introduce an approach to evaluate language model (LM) agency using negotiation games. This approach better reflects real-world use cases and addresses some of the shortcomings of alternative LM benchmarks. Negotiation games enable us to study…

We examine the role of assurance — third-party verification — on carbon accounting quality. We develop a measure of carbon accounting quality based on the deviation of reported emissions from a model-based expected level and use two other survey-…