Some Evidence on Race, Welfare Reform, and Household Income by Marianne P. Bitler, Jonah B. Gelbach and Hilary W. Hoynes. Published in volume 93, issue 2, pages 293-298 of American Economic Review, May 2003

Estimating Individual Discount Rates in Denmark: A Field Experiment by Glenn W. Harrison, Morten I. Lau and Melonie B. Williams. Published in volume 92, issue 5, pages 1606-1617 of American Economic Review, December 2002

The Home Mortgage Disclosure Act was enacted to monitor minority and low-income access to the mortgage market. The data collected for this purpose show that minorities are more than twice as likely to be denied a mortgage as whites. Yet variables correlated with both race and creditworthiness were omitted from these data, making any conclusion about race's role in mortgage lending impossible. The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston collected additional variables important to the mortgage lending decision and found that race continued to play an important, though significantly diminished, role in the decision to grant a mortgage.

Since my recent article, which cast considerable doubt on the statistical estimation approach to the derivation of cost functions, I have been expecting a comment from proponents of that approach. Instead, I am pleasantly surprised to be replying to disciples of the process analysis approach. J. R. Marsden, D. E. Pingry, and A. Whinston (MPW) feel that a linear programming application of process analysis to petroleum refining has basically the same disadvantages as the statistical cost function technique, but that these could be overcome with the adoption of their particular approach. They propose a more general formulation utilizing non-linear programming techniques and allowing for nonconvex production technologies. Let us begin by considering their four objections to my application of process analysis to petroleunm refining. First, MPW assert that the test of the classical cost function assumptions (i.e., marginal costs slope upward and average costs are U-shaped) was not really a test at all but proceeded directly from the convexity assumptions of the linear programming model of the refinery. Certainly, the fixed capital process constraints imply a finite output and a rising marginal cost curve, but the relevant question is over what output range do marginal costs rise. MPW apparently feel that because of the convexity assumption marginal costs must necessarily rise over a broad output range. To demonstrate the error in their assertion, one need only examine some output range from b74) to b(n+l) over which the basis x* does not change. Since the basis is unchanged, the dual solution vector y* will similarly not change, thereby proving that short-run marginal costs (given by the jth element of y*) are constant over the given output range. As an example, Figure 1 of my paper illustrates a case where a basis change did not occur over the output range 8.4 to 8.9 MMB/D and marginal costs are constant. Furthermore, the dots in Figure 1, indicating basis changes, suggest that even after basis changes, marginal costs need not necessarily increase as the basis changes. Therefore, under this standard linear programming problem where the production processes are convex, short-run marginal costs can either rise in a step-wise manner or remain horizontal over the output range up to the full utilization of the capital stock at which point marginal costs become vertical. Either rising short-run marginal costs or an inverted L-shaped short-run marginal cost can be obtained assuming a standard convex production technology. Since the same result may be found in statistical cost studies (i.e., constant short-run marginal costs over the observed output range), the results in both Figures 1 and 2 indicating a rising marginal cost function over a broad output range certainly do not follow from the convexitv assumptions as MPW assert. Secondly, MPW are apparently disturbed because the short-run marginal cost function as drawn in Figure 1 does not change in a step function manner. They argue that the use of parametric programming would have revealed these steps and other useful information regarding capacity limitations. Contrary to MPW's assertion, parametric programming with UNIVAC's Omega package was utilized which reports the activities entering and exiting the basis at each basis change. As indicated in footnote 10, page 49, the particular parametrics option chosen does not report the complete solution vector at each basis change within the 6 increment to the output constraint bj, but rather reports the solution values for the first basis change * Department of economics, University of Pennsylvania and the University of Houston.

We present the results of three large-scale randomized controlled trials (RCTs) carried out in Chicago, testing interventions to reduce crime and dropout by changing the decision making of economically disadvantaged youth. We study a program called Becoming a Man (BAM), developed by the nonprofit Youth Guidance, in two RCTs implemented in 2009–2010 and 2013–2015. In the two studies participation in the program reduced total arrests during the intervention period by 28–35%, reduced violent-crime arrests by 45–50%, improved school engagement, and in the first study where we have follow-up data, increased graduation rates by 12–19%. The third RCT tested a program with partially overlapping components carried out in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center (JTDC), which reduced readmission rates to the facility by 21%. These large behavioral responses combined with modest program costs imply benefit-cost ratios for these interventions from 5-to-1 up to 30-to-1 or more. Our data on mechanisms are not ideal, but we find no positive evidence that these effects are due to changes in emotional intelligence or social skills, self-control or “grit,” or a generic mentoring effect. We find suggestive support for the hypothesis that the programs work by helping youth slow down and reflect on whether their automatic thoughts and behaviors are well suited to the situation they are in, or whether the situation could be construed differently.

Standardized information disclosures aim to help people compare complex financial products and make better choices. We investigate the extent to which information shown in a regulator-mandated dashboard helps retirement savers choose between alternative pension plans. We conduct incentivized experiments that collect participants’ repeated choices between two pension plans using the mandatory dashboard, and subsequently test whether an even simpler dashboard improves choices, and by how much. Participants switch quickly from a high- to a low-fee pension plan when they see explicit nominal fees but are significantly more confused by percentage fees and adjust slower. When differences between plan performance arise from gross returns, not fees, we find that complex information formats can seriously hinder participants’ recognition and reactions. We present a Bayesian updating model which estimates the relative noisiness of the signals from fees and gross returns across different treatments and use this model to show how better information presentation raises retirement savings.

We provide a novel decomposition of changing gaps in life expectancy between rich and poor into differential changes in age-specific mortality rates and differences in “survivability.” Declining age-specific mortality rates increases life expectancy, but the gain is small if the likelihood of living to this age is small (ex ante survivability) or if the expected remaining lifetime is short (ex post survivability). Lower survivability of the poor explains half of the recent rise in inequality in the United States and the entire rise in Denmark. Declines in cardiovascular mortality benefited rich and poor, but inequality increased because of differences in lifestyle-related survivability.

We employ a unique data set and new time-series techniques to reexamine the existence of trends in relative primary commodity prices. The data set comprises 25 commodities and provides a new historical perspective, spanning the seventeenth to the twenty-first centuries. New tests for the trend function, robust to the order of integration of the series, are applied to the data. Results show that eleven price series present a significant and downward trend over all or some fraction of the sample period. In the very long run, a secular, deteriorating trend is a relevant phenomenon for a significant proportion of primary commodities.

Journal Article The Literature of Guild Socialism Get access Niles H. Carpenter Niles H. Carpenter Harvard University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 34, Issue 4, August 1920, Pages 763–776, https://doi.org/10.2307/1885166 Published: 01 August 1920