"Decision-Making Under Subjective Risk" Abstract: The primary objective of this paper is to develop a framework in which a decision-maker may have subjective beliefs about the "riskiness'' of prospects, even though the risk structure of these prospects is objectively specified. Put differently, we investigate preferences over risky alternatives by postulating that such preferences arise from…

"Overbooking" Abstract We consider optimal pricing policies for airlines when passengers are uncertain at the time of ticketing of their eventual realized willingness to pay for air travel. Auctions at the time of departure efficiently allocate space and a profit maximizing airline can capitalize on these gains by overbooking flights and repurchasing excess tickets from…

cancelled

"How Do Elected and Appointed Policymakers Act When in Office?Citizens, Candidates, and Leaders"

"When Warm Glow Burns: Motivational (mis)allocation in the non-profit sector"

"Equilibrium price of immediacy and infrequent trade" abstract The paper studies the equilibrium value of bid-ask spreads and time-to-trade in a continuous-time, intermediated financial market. The endogenous spreads are the price at which brokers are willing to offer immediacy. In case intermediaries pay trading costs, it includes them too. We determine equilibrium trading policies, returns…

"On the Identification of Production Functions: HowHeterogeneous is Productivity?" (Note: the seminar is on Thursday) abstract The estimation of production functions suffers from an unresolved identification problem caused by flexible inputs, such as intermediate inputs. We develop an identification strategy for production functions based on a transformation of the firm’s short-run first order condition that solves…

"Crime is Terribly Revealing: An Evaluation of Predictive Policing" abstract An increasing number of police departments around the world are trying to use predictive policing as a way to improve clearance rates at times of shrinking budgets. The police department of Milan has been working on a software that predicts future crime since 2008. This…

CANCELLED

"On the Historical and Geographic Origins of the Sicilian Mafia" Abstract     This research attempts to explain the large differences in the early diffusion of the mafia across different areas of Sicily. We advance the hypothesis that, after the demise of Sicilian feudalism, the lack of publicly provided property-right protection from widespread banditry favored the development…

"Informational Herding in the Provision of Public Goods"

"Do Performance Targets A ffect Financial Support to Schools? Evidence from Discontinuities in Test Scores"

"Bilateral Trust and the Ownership Structure of Foreign Direct Investments: Evidence from European Firm Level Data" abstract It is often argued that the foreign direct investments (FDIs) have positive effects on host countries. In particular, multinationals tend to have some competitive advantage based on superior technology or other firm-specic knowledge and, therefore, inward FDIs are…

"For a Fistful of Euros. Tales of Ordinary unemployment" abstract In most developed countries the insurance against involuntary unemployment is a pivotal policy in the support of workers. In Italy, it has just a marginal role; furthermore, it is currently questioned for the very low coverage it grants to its target population. In this paper we…

"Income Growth and Institutional Quality: Evidence fromInternational Oil Price Shocks"