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Rational Models of Irrational Behavior
Can Small Deviations from Rationality Make Significant Differences to Economic Equilibria?
The Economic Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance
Labor Contracts as Partial Gift Exchange
This paper explains involuntary unemployment in terms of the response of firms to workers' group behavior. Workers' effort depends upon the norms determining a fair day's work. In order to affect those norms, firms may pay more than the market-clearing wage. Industries that pay consistently more than the market-clearing wage are primary, and those that pay only the market-clearing wage are secondary. Thus, this paper also gives a theory for division of labor markets between primary and secondary.
A Theory of Social Custom, of Which Unemployment May be One Consequence
This paper examines adherence to social customs. Models of social customs are found to be inherently multi-equilibrial. It is found that social customs which are disadvantageous to the individual may nevertheless persist without erosion, if individuals are sanctioned by loss of reputation for disobedience of the custom. One example of such a social custom is the persistence of a fair (rather than a market-clearing) wage. In this fashion, involuntary unemployment is explained.
Irving Fisher on His Head: The Consequences of Constant Threshold-Target Monitoring of Money Holdings
I. Introduction, 169. — II. Relation between payments flows and money demand with threshold-target monitoring, 173. — III. Comments on the model, 178. — IV. Agreement with empirical evidence, 180. — V. Summary and conclusion, 182. — Appendix, 182.
The Market for "Lemons": Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism
I. Introduction, 488. — II. The model with automobiles as an example, 489. — III. Examples and applications, 492. — IV. Counteracting institutions, 499. — V. Conclusion, 500.
Relative Wages and the Rate of Inflation
I. Introduction, 353. — II. A price-price inflation, 355. — III. A wage-wage inflation, 363. — IV. Spontaneous inflations and general equilibrium, 371. — V. Conclusions, 373.
Social Distance and Social Decisions
A model of social distance is presented that is useful for understanding social decisions. An example is constructed of class stability. Agents who are initially close interact strongly while those who are socially distant have little interaction. In this example, inherited social position, which may be interpreted as social class, plays a dominant role. The relevance of this model to social decisions, such as the choice of educational attainment and childbearing, is discussed in the context of specific ethnographic examples. Class position may play a dominant role in these decisions.