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on History and Philosophy of Economics |
| By: | Davis (Department of Economics Marquette University); (Department of Economics Marquette University) |
| Abstract: | Hans-Michael Trautwein’s presidential address to the European Society raised provocative questions regarding the nature of current economics that should concern not just historians of economics but economists as well (Trautwein, 2017). Are the processes driving current research in economics creating a greater and greater specialization in subjects and economic thinking that is fragmenting and disunifying the field? Here I discuss Trautwein’s question and his answer to it particularly as bear on the future status and responsibilities of the history of economics as a field within economics. First, I give an account of what is involved in research specialization in science and economics. Second, I place increasing specialization in the subjects investigated in economics in an historical context, specifically, the postwar WWII history of the field. Third, I discuss Trautwein’s recommendations regarding a possible special, future role for the field of history of economics. Last, I offer praise for Trautwein for his perceptiveness and leadership as both an economist and historian of economics, and frame this in terms of what his insights can mean for thinking about the state of pluralism in economics. |
| Keywords: | Trautwein, history economics, specialization |
| JEL: | B20 B31 B41 |
| Date: | 2025–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mrq:wpaper:2025-01 |
| By: | Marc Tabani (CREDO - Centre de Recherche et de Documentation sur l'Océanie - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - AMU - Aix Marseille Université - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | Critical essays by Joel Robbins have regularly taken aim at a certain anthropological culture that is too oriented towards "continuity thinking" (2007), in the wake of a discipline that in its early days was the perfect embodiment of a "science of continuity" (ibid.). Anthropologists were trained to be uncomfortable with the study of radical cultural change and rapid, drastic social transformation. Even today, Robbins adds, few anthropologists are capable of laying the foundations for an "anthropology of revolution" (ibid.: 10). While this observation may seem debatable for the contemporary period, epistemic conservatism has long remained a feature of political anthropology of the Pacific. The absence of anthropological reflection on the social and cultural implications of nation-building policies in this part of the world until the 1980s was characteristic of the perpetuation of models that privileged the analysis of cultural continuities. A case representative of his era illustrates well the weight of conservatism that characterized Pacific anthropology until recently. When the first wave of decolonization in the Pacific began in 1962 with the accession to sovereignty of the Western Samoan Islands, anthropologists overwhelmingly preferred to focus on Marshall Sahlins' famous article Poor Man, Rich Man, Big Man, Chiefs:Political Types in Melanesia and Polynesia (1963). In fifteen pages, the author proposed a regional theory of power based on a classic colonial comparison, the ethnocultural opposition between Melanesia and Polynesia. A few years later, the Tongan-born anthropologist Epeli Hau'ofa was the first Pacific voice to criticize what he considered to be "a clever, thoughtless and insulting piece of writing [...] ; the whole article is a pseudo-evolutionary comparison, in Sahlins' terminology, between Polynesian polities and the 'underdeveloped' Melanesian ones (Hau'ofa 1975: 285)." 1 In the context of 1 The antagonism between these two great thinkers would fade, however, to change two decades later, as Tomlinson noted, into a perfect convergence with the respective publication of the essays Our Sea of Islands for Hau'ofa (1993) and The Economics of Develop-Man in the Pacific for Sahlins (1992): "Both authors share the core idea that there is a grounded set of values, practices, and interrelationships that enables Oceanic expansion. This expansion can be manifest as grander public adherence to tradition. |
| Keywords: | Socialism and post-socialism, vanuatu, ideology, development, sahlins |
| Date: | 2024–11–30 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05028326 |
| By: | John M. Barrios; Filippo Lancieri; Joshua Levy; Shashank Singh; Tommaso Valletti; Luigi Zingales |
| Abstract: | We study how conflicts of interest (CoI)—defined as financial, professional, or ideological stakes held by authors—affect perceived credibility in economics research. Using a randomized controlled survey of both economists and a representative sample of the U.S. public, we find that the presence of a CoI reduces trust in a paper’s findings by 28% on average, with substantial heterogeneity across conflict types. We develop a model in which this reduction in trust reflects both the prevalence of conflicted papers and the expected bias conditional on conflict. To isolate the latter, we introduce the CoI Discount: the perceived value of a conflicted paper relative to an otherwise identical, non-conflicted one. We estimate an average CoI Discount of 39%, implying that conflicted papers are valued at just 61% of non-conflicted ones. We validate these survey-based estimates through three complementary exercises: an empirical analysis of actual citation and disclosure patterns in economics, a meta-analysis of evidence from the medical literature, and simulations using large-language models. Our findings highlight a persistent credibility gap that is not eliminated by current disclosure practices and suggest a broader challenge for scientific trust in the presence of author conflicts. |
| JEL: | A11 A14 B59 |
| Date: | 2025–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:33645 |
| By: | Francisca M. Antman; Sheng Qu; Trevon D. Logan; Bruce A. Weinberg |
| Abstract: | We conduct a long-run evaluation of one of the oldest professional mentoring programs for underrepresented groups in economics, the American Economic Association Mentoring Program (AEAMP). The AEAMP was established to address the underrepresentation of racial/ethnic minority groups by mentoring doctoral students and new Ph.D.s in economics. We compare professional outcomes of mentees with similar individuals from the same Ph.D. cohort who did not participate in the program. While there are no differences for many outcomes, mentees are more likely to hold a tenure-track or tenured position. Our results point to the potential for mentoring programs to address persistent racial/ethnic disparities. |
| JEL: | I23 J15 |
| Date: | 2025–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:33689 |
| By: | Martin Meier (University of Bath); Andres Perea (EpiCenter and Department of Quantitative Economics, Maastricht University) |
| Abstract: | We propose a new rationalizability concept for dynamic games with imperfect information, forward and backward rationalizability , that combines elements from forward and backward induction reasoning. It proceeds by applying the forward induction concept of strong rationalizability (also known as extensive-form rationalizability ) in a backward inductive fashion: It first applies strong rationalizability from the last period onwards, subsequently from the penultimate period onwards, keeping the restrictions from the last period, and so on, until we reach the beginning of the game. We argue that, compared to strong rationalizability, the new concept provides a more compelling theory for how players react to surprises. We show that the new concept always exists, and is characterized epistemically by (a) first imposing common strong belief in rationality from the last period onwards, then (b) imposing common strong belief in rationality from the penultimate period onwards, keeping the restrictions imposed by (a), and so on. It turns out that in terms of outcomes, the concept is equivalent to the pure forward induction concept of strong rationalizability, but both concepts may differ in terms of strategies. In terms of strategies, the new concept provides a refinement of the pure backward induction reasoning as embodied by backward dominance and backwards rationalizability . In fact, the new concept can be viewed as a backward looking strengthening of the forward looking concept of backwards rationalizability. Combining our results yields that every strongly rationalizable outcome is also backwards rationalizable. Finally, it is shown that the concept of forward and backward rationalizability satisfies the principle of supergame monotonicity : If a player learns that the game was actually preceded by some moves he was initially unaware of, then this new information will only refine, but never completely overthrow, his reasoning. Strong rationalizability violates this principle. |
| Date: | 2024–01–19 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eid:wpaper:58183 |
| By: | Flores Zendejas, Juan; Altamura, Carlo Edoardo |
| Abstract: | Few events have attracted so much attention before being relegated to academic neglect like the 1980s debt crisis. For almost a decade, a considerable number of developing countries underwent serious macroeconomic shocks and profound social dislocations. These phenomena attracted the interest of a wide range of scholars from the field of economics, political science and sociology who published a substantial number of books and articles on the multi-faceted crises. As capital returned to the region in the early 1990s and neo-liberalism seemed victorious on the global scene, the crisis appeared to gradually disappear from the academic debate. Notably, historians only seem to appear on the sidelines of the academic debate until the Great Recession of the late 2000s. The contribution will follow the academic debate on the 1982 debt crisis from multiple disciplines to understand where, how and why the crisis gradually disappeared from the academic scene after the Brady Plan of 1989 before making its reappearance following the Great Recession, the European debt crisis and the Covid pandemic. |
| Keywords: | Debt crises, Neoliberalism, Great Depression, Debt defaults |
| JEL: | N16 N20 N26 N40 G15 G21 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gnv:wpaper:unige:184772 |
| By: | James A. Robinson |
| Abstract: | My research suggests that world inequality is explained by the incidence of extractive and inclusive institutions. But why do some countries have extractive institutions? I distinguish between two main reasons; first, power relations; second, the “normative order.” Normative orders provide justifications and legitimacy for institutions which may not generate prosperity, but may achieve other goals. These distinctions are critical because they create very different challenges in trying to make institutions more inclusive and create prosperity. I show how countries move from the economic periphery as a consequence of changing both. My own intellectual journey has been in the other direction, however, hence the title of the paper: I was fortunate to be born in Britain, but I have had to unlearn much of my own experience, socialization and training in order to see other societies on their own terms. That’s crucial to be able to help them, but also to learn from them. |
| JEL: | D70 O10 P52 |
| Date: | 2025–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:33671 |
| By: | Capra, C. Monica (Claremont Graduate University); Kniesner, Thomas J. (Claremont Graduate University) |
| Abstract: | Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman's last published paper is an adversarial collaboration in which he and Matthew Killingsworth reconcile conflicting empirical results from their previous research on income and reported happiness, with Barbara Mellers as a facilitator. The empirical results use quantile regression to allow for measured income heterogeneity effects that include notch points in the estimated marginal utilities of income. Our analysis examines Kahneman's last paper's conceptual innovations and challenges to assumptions about diminishing marginal utility of income. We review his contributions to emotional well-being measurement and employ a novel AI-simulated dialogue between the late Amos Tversky and Sir Angus Deaton to explore interdisciplinary perspectives on the findings. Our paper demonstrates how Kahneman's final research undermines recent arguments for incorporating income redistribution simply into benefit-cost analysis, suggesting that such objectives remain better addressed through fiscal policy rather than regulatory interventions. His final published work exemplifies Kahneman's commitment to empirical precision and theoretical flexibility, even when contradicting his earlier conclusions. |
| Keywords: | marginal utility, quantile regression, adversarial collaboration, well-being, income satiation, social welfare weights, simulated dialogue with AI |
| JEL: | D12 D61 H23 I31 |
| Date: | 2025–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17841 |
| By: | Yueran Ma; Andrei Shleifer |
| Abstract: | The analysis of corporate governance begins with a central feature of modern capitalism—the separation of ownership and control in large corporations—first empirically documented by Berle and Means (1932). Such separation entails several agency problems reflecting conflicts between managers and shareholders, such as self-dealing by managers, low effort, consumption of perquisites, and excessive growth and diversification. Berle and Means saw self-dealing as the central agency problem and stressed the law as the fundamental mechanism of addressing it. Jensen and Meckling (1976) considered the consumption of perquisites and emphasized private mechanisms, such as financial incentives for managers, to counter wasteful perks. Jensen (1986) instead focused on excessive growth and diversification, which led him to count on leverage and takeovers. The combination of public corporate governance mechanisms, mostly the law, and market governance shaped both theory and practice. |
| JEL: | G0 G3 |
| Date: | 2025–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:33710 |
| By: | Weißmüller, Kristina Sabrina (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) |
| Abstract: | Corruption remains a persistent issue in public bureaucracies worldwide. Administrative behavior results from the complex interplay of motivational and contextual factors that lead to individual corruptibility. Current anti-corruption strategies often combine compliance and integrity-based approaches but fail to fully integrate behavioral insights on the biases and social psychology that influence moral justification for unethical actions. This conceptual study addresses this gap by focusing on moral licensing, a psychological bias in which individuals justify corrupt actions based on prior moral behavior (real or imagined). The study explores how past moral behavior can paradoxically lead to either consistent ethical conduct or subsequent unethical behavior, and emphasizes the need for anti-corruption strategies to account for these self-serving biases. By connecting previously separate debates on the micro-foundations of corruptibility, this study provides essential behavioral insights for designing effective anti-corruption measures, synthesized into six propositions to inform and motivate future research and reform in public sector ethics management. This novel contribution advances the theoretical understanding of the socio-psychological dynamics of corruptibility, informing both theory and practice in combating administrative corruption. |
| Date: | 2025–03–19 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:osfxxx:kt2v7_v1 |
| By: | Adrien Bilal; James H. Stock |
| Abstract: | This paper surveys the literature that links macroeconomics and climate change. We organize our review into three categories: (i) loss and damage, which assesses long-run economic costs and non-market impacts from climate change; (ii) mitigation and the energy transition, which evaluates the macroeconomic consequences of shifting away from fossil fuels toward renewable energy; and (iii) adaptation, which explores the economic adjustments necessary to manage heat stress, more frequent severe weather events and rising seas. We discuss macroeconomic frameworks that quantify these structural shifts as well as empirical estimates that guide their calibration. We suggest areas in which macroeconomic research on climate is needed. |
| JEL: | E60 F55 H23 H41 Q43 Q50 R10 |
| Date: | 2025–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:33567 |