Research

Here I provide abstracts to all current working papers along with a simple list of my current works in progress. All working manuscripts are available upon request.

Working Papers

Sunk Costs in Performance Beliefs

Abstract: Can real-effort costs affect beliefs about ego-relevant performance and ability? In a novel experimental framework where we exogenously vary the cost and quality of feedback, we show that subjects who pay a real-effort cost to obtain performance-related feedback adjust their beliefs differently than those who pay nothing. When subjects receive highly accurate feedback about their performance, under-inference is moderate, and there are no significant differences between those who pay a cost and those who do not. However, when subjects receive less accurate feedback, those who receive the free feedback show extreme under-inference, but those who pay a cost are approximately Bayesian. We argue that behavioral costs can stimulate responsiveness to feedback in environments with information structures that would otherwise motivate significant conservatism.

JEL: C91, D81, D83

Art Is In the Eye of the Beholder: The Effects of Racial Protests on Experimental Evaluations (honourable mentions go to Oliver Hauser and Graeme Pearce)

Abstract: This paper exploits a unique panel of experimental data to study whether the George Floyd Protests and Kenosha Unrest affected race in worker evaluations. In order to manipulate race, we randomly assigned white and black-sounding names to worker-generated output. We establish that white individuals discriminate solely within in-group domains. Black names received lower ratings during the most active months of the George Floyd Protests and showed no racial differences around Kenosha Unrest. Outside active months of social unrest, black names instead received higher evaluations. The data suggest our findings are likely driven by taste rather than belief-based partiality.

JEL: C91, D91, J10, J15

Talent, Sorting, and Redistributive Uncertainty (with Oliver Hauser)

Abstract: We investigate how third-party observers (“spectators”) judge workers using talents for higher pay to donate parts. Workers make dictator allocations, later redistributed by spectators. We find that under payoff ambiguity spectators assume workers choose efficiently, so revealing efficient allocations does not further alter redistributive preferences. At the extensive margin, we observe that efficiency considerations are inelastic when deciding whether to intervene on extreme inequity, while equity faces increased odds of intervention only if inefficient. At the intensive margin, spectators punish inequity and reward equity; revealing inefficiency intensifies both punishment and reward. Spectators value punishing inequity more than punishing deviations from efficiency via inequity, and value rewarding sacrifice for equity more than simply choosing equity. These findings illuminate social preferences and trade-offs between equity, efficiency, and the possible veil that can occur between the two.

JEL: C91, D01, D63, D83

Selected Works in Progress

I Like Information, But Not From You: The Effects of Names on Self-Updating

• Data Collection in Progress