Stress, Sharing & Scarcity: CERGE-EI Insights, Fall 2016

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Fall 2016 Online Version

A Digest of CERGE-EI Research and Events

Located in Prague, CERGE-EI is dedicated to excellence and innovation in economic research and education. Chartered by the State of New York, CERGE-EI is a joint workplace of Charles University and the Czech Academy of Sciences, with the support of numerous donors.

» Journal Articles » Working Papers » Dissertations » At CERGE-EI

	Selected Journal Articles
	Bribery Environments and Firm Performance: Evidence from CEE Countries Jan Hanousek and Anna Kochanova European Journal of Political Economy 43(June): 14-28 Is there a relationship between bureaucratic corruption and firm performance? Detailed analysis by sector, firm size and institutional environment in 14 CEE countries finds that while bribery is associated with lower firm performance on average, greater dispersion of firms’ bribes facilitates stronger aggregate performance. The results apply particularly to large construction and services sector firms. Read more

	Gambler's Fallacy and Imperfect Best Response in Legislative Bargaining Salvatore Nunnari and Jan Zápal Games and Economic Behavior 106(6):1437-1475 Alternating offer bargaining games show consistent deviation from predictions of non-cooperative game theory. Proposers do not fully exploit the advantages of their agenda setting power. Nunnari and Zápal show that models with imperfect best response fit the data well, but can be improved by assuming erroneous beliefs about the allocation of future proposal power, in the form of the gambler’s fallacy. Read more

	Risk Preferences under Acute Stress Jana Cahlíková and Lubomír Cingl Experimental Economics forthcoming Decisions made in stressful situations can have major economic implications. How do individual attitudes toward risk change when exposed to acute psychosocial stress? The authors introduce a novel experimental design to control for lab-induced stress and investigate risk aversion. They find risk aversion levels in men increase significantly when exposed to stress but the impact for women is markedly weaker. Read more

	More journal articles here


Selected Working Papers
The Life-saving Effect of Hospital Proximity Paola Bertoli and Veronica Grembi A new assessment of the life-saving effect of hospital proximity in emergency situations using road traffic accident data from Italy. Bertoli and Grembi's analysis shows that hospital proximity is particularly important in environments with low levels of road safety, poor emergency care and low quality of overall hospital care. Read more

Gender in Banking and Mortgage Behavior Štěpán Jurajda and Radek Janhuba How does the gender of banking professionals affect mortgage decisions? Using data from a large Czech bank where advisors were randomly assigned to clients, the authors explore mortgage issuance and insurance assurance probabilities. Female advisors are consistently more risk-averse and more likely to advise their clients in a manner consistent with their clients’ risk preferences. Read more

Criminal Response to Price Changes Tomáš Brabenec and Josef Montag The authors test the theory that a criminal act is a rational decision based on a cost-benefit analysis. The study examines how metal thieves respond to changes in non-ferrous scrap metal prices. They find the long-term elasticity of the supply of thefts with respect to resale value to be between 1.0 and 1.5, with rapid correction of disequilibrium in the system. Read more

More working papers here


	Selected Dissertations
	The Effects of Early School Tracking June 2016 Miroslava Federičová Federicová examines the impact of early school tracking on educational and labor outcomes, gender equality and pupil self-confidence. Teachers’ evaluation and grading heavily influence the decision to apply to selective schools independently of admission criteria or actual cognitive skills. Girls put more effort into preparing for selection exams than boys in a more competitive environment. Read more

	Essays in Behavioral and Development Economics August 2016 Vojtěch Bartoš Linking behavioral and development economics through field experiments in Afghanistan and Europe, Bartoš explores sources of poverty, under-development and inequality. He investigates how scarcity affects sharing in poor communities, how financial incentives and sanctions affect trust levels within and across ethnic groups, and how rational inattention reinforces discrimination against minorities.Read more

	Essays on Public Finance August 2016 Tomáš Lichard Lichard examines two widely-discussed issues in public finance: the shadow economy and financial transaction taxes. Using a new model for estimating the size of the shadow economy, he finds current estimates unrealistically low. He also challenges the effectiveness of flat taxes as a strategy for reducing tax evasion and investigates the impact of financial transaction taxes on market volatility. Read more

	More dissertations here

At CERGE-EI



CERGE-EI Mourns Prof. Jan Kmenta	CERGE-EI Foundation Teaching Fellows Program continues to grow		Impact for Society - 2016 Fellowships awarded

We announce with great sadness that long-time CERGE-EI supporter Professor Jan Kmenta died in July. A Visiting Professor since 1993 and member of our Executive and Supervisory Committee, Professor Kmenta was an outstanding and much-awarded economist who was totally dedicated to his students. We will be establishing a memorial fund in his name. Read more here	The generosity of our donors has again allowed us to expand the CERGE-EI Foundation Teaching Fellows Program which teaches market economics to undergraduates. Their support has allowed us to increase the number of Fellows on 3 year contracts by 20% for the 2016-2017 academic year. In all, 118 Teaching Fellows will teach almost 200 courses to undergraduates in 15 countries. Read more here	r	We are pleased to launch the Impact for Society Fellowship for exceptional applicants to our Masters in Applied Economics program. The Fellowship awards scholarships to students who have used their analytical skills to solve community problems and effect social change. To learn more about our Fellows and their projects in Afghanistan, Albania and Ghana, click here

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