Internal Lunch Seminars

The long-term impact of religion on social capital: lessons from post-war Czechoslovakia

We exploit a historical experiment that occurred in Czechoslovakia after World War Two to study the drivers of social capital accumulation in an extremely unfavorable environment. Between 1945 and 1948, the Sudetenland became the scene of ethnic cleansing, with the expulsion of nearly three million German speakers and the simultaneous influx of nearly two million resettlers. Focusing on the areas where at least 90 % of the population was forced to leave, we show that the municipalities hosting a church built before 1945 developed significantly higher social capital under the communist rule, which persisted after the dissolution of Czechoslovakia and the current days.

The association between cognitive abilities, economic preferences and personality traits

This paper examines how cognitive and non-cognitive abilities relate to economic preferences. Cognitive abilities are a comprehensive structure of abilities (attention, memory, intelligence, etc.) that are interconnected. From the existing literature, it follows that the level of cognitive abilities has an influence on the decision-making of individuals and can positively or negatively affect their incomes and future economic planning. However, the level of cognitive abilities is not enough to fully understand the individual and his decisions. For this reason, we will also focus on non-cognitive abilities in the research. These are most often characterized by personality traits that are commonly measured by the Big Five test. This test assesses the following personality traits – neuroticism, extraversion, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. Personality traits are another factor that characterizes the overall individuality of a particular individual. However, it is currently unclear how non-cognitive abilities relate to economic preferences. In the presentation, we will introduce the study design and discuss how the relationship between cognitive abilities, personality traits and economic preferences will be investigated.

Competition in the Czech energy sector

With its current skyrocketing prices, electricity costs became one of the most discussed issues over the past year as it is an essential input for any economic activity. Unlike private businesses or consumers, public institutions cannot purchase electricity freely but are bound by a procurement framework and rules on how electricity contracts need to be concluded.

In principle, a public institution can purchase electricity through public tenders or through commodities exchanges. The key question is how the lowest prices can be achieved and which of these procurement options – competition in public tenders or trades at the commodities exchanges – prompts the desired outcome. This contribution aims to investigate this empirically.

We collected unique data on public institutions’ energy contracts in Czechia between 2013 and 2021 from the Czech public registry of procurement deals. The data allows us to distinguish between contracts concluded through public tender or through commodities exchanges, identify the size of the contract and its final price.

Our results suggest that there is generally a higher degree of competition at the commodity exchanges in comparison to public tenders and that the prices at commodity exchanges are lower. Although many factors might result in lower prices, our analyses suggest that the competitiveness of the environment in public tenders and on the commodities exchanges is the main driving factor.

Our findings have important implications for how electricity – an essential production input – should be purchased by public institutions. The results point to possible saving for public institutions when purchasing energy on commodities exchange as compared to public tenders.

Wealth inequality – survey experiment

The research explores relationship between perceived wealth inequality and political attitudes. Based on relative deprivation theory, I assume, that information treatment showing actual level of wealth inequality may increase willingness to take part in different political activities and even lead to higher level of anti-system attitudes.
The aim of the presentation is to introduce preliminary results based on collected data and discuss possibilities for further research. Crucial areas to assess are the form of information treatment, and possible narrowing of the target group (from representative sample of Czech population to its specific parts, for example people living in peripheral regions).

Options and Limits of Central Banks’ Policies in the Context of Climate Change

In recent years, the debate about central banking and climate change has gained significant momentum. It can be said that central bankers and regulators reached a consensus that climate change will affect central banking but there seems to be no consensus on what should central banks do in reaction. This paper analyses the current debate about the so-called green central banking. It classifies policies of European central banks and prudential regulators that were applied, discussed, or proposed as a reaction to the phenomenon of climate change. The paper is based on annual reports and other official statements of these institutions which are analyzed by textual analysis. The classification should clarify the debate in a broader socio-economic context and offer a common language for climate change-related policies of central banks.

Motivational Effects of Feeling Trusted

I investigate how workers respond to learning that a manager trusts them less than she does their peers. In a laboratory experiment, responsibility for a manager’s earnings is divided unequally between two workers. I vary whether this responsibility allocation decision is made by the manager, or by a random device on the manager’s behalf. Importantly, being entrusted with more/less responsibility for the manager's payoff does not change the workers' wages. Despite this, I find that workers are less generous toward the manager when they are intentionally, as opposed to randomly, assigned a lower level of responsibility. This effect is mediated by the emotional response to learning that the manager chose to place her trust in the other worker. I find no positive effect of being entrusted with higher responsibility. My results demonstrate that managerial decisions that are materially irrelevant for workers can generate a negative reciprocal response if they reveal to the worker that she is less trusted relative to her peers.

The Role of Social Identity and Perceived Discrimination in Human Capital Formation: Evidence from India

This study examines the role of historically defined social identity in human capital development over time by focusing on a region from India where social identities are defined along the lines of castes and religious groups. It investigates the evolution of gaps across social groups in children’s cognitive outcomes and parental investment in children’s education from ages 5 to 15. Significant gaps in test scores and parental investment are found between children from lower and upper Hindu castes. These gaps, which originate early in childhood and persist throughout the 10 years of the study period, cannot be completely explained by the differences in socioeconomic status across social groups. Moreover, the perception of social discrimination is also found to be a significant contributor to the gaps in cognitive outcomes and parental investment across social groups. While parents’ perceived social discrimination is associated with lower parental investment throughout childhood, it is negatively associated with children’s cognitive outcomes only at later ages.

Willingness To COVID-19 Vaccination: Empirical Evidence From EU

The unforgettable COVID-19 shock can only be reversed by a viable vaccination strategy. In this paper, we investigate the willingness to be vaccinated (WTV) against COVID-19. We provide first-of-its-kind empirical evidence on the citizens (N=11,932) of the EU-27 by employing recent data from the European Commission. Controlling for the correlations in the error terms, we utilize a simulated multivariate probit regression model. Our results show that amongst all the statistically significant drivers of the WTV, the positive perception (vaccination works and has no side effects); R&D information (clarity on how vaccination is developed, tested, and authorized) have the largest impact on the WTV. We find that the group of variables on social feedback, and trustworthy sources of information are to be considered for WTV policy. The counteracting policy gaps are also identified. Our work is novel and has implications for COVID-19 vaccination policies across the EU.

MS-Teams

Long-range dependence and option pricing

Abstract: Stochastic processes based on standard Brownian motions can't address an established "stylized fact" in finance: the long-range dependence or memory effect. This issue has stimulated the inclusion of alternative diffusion mechanisms in the price modeling, namely fractional Brownian motion and its relatives. Here, we will revisit the application of fractional-based diffusions for option pricing purposes and its relation with the efficient market hypothesis. Moreover, we will address some further extensions based on multifractional Brownian motions and their capabilities to mimic some financial features, proposing new results around them.

The seminar will be streamed online on MS Teams.

On the long-term intramarket dynamics of market efficiency

The seminar will be streamed online on MS Teams.

Abstract: In this paper, I investigate the long-term dynamics of informational market efficiency between portfolios of different levels of market capitalisation. The convergence in market efficiency between portfolios, represented by different S&P and FTSE indices, can be observed in time. However, the convergence was mostly completed by 2006. An asymmetrical response to shock is observed between portfolios. Lower capitalised portfolios were more negatively affected by them. A positive relationship between market efficiency and market capitalisation was observed for all indices, however, the market efficiency of S&P 500 was lower than that of S&P 400 and S&P 600 from 2006 onward.

Russia’s Ruble during the onset of the Russo - Ukrainian war: The role of Implied volatility and Attention

The seminar will be streamed online on MS Teams.

Abstract: This paper aims to verify if the price fluctuation of the Ruble during the onset of the Russo-Ukrainian crisis was predictable, as indicated via implied volatility and investor's (general population's) attention. It uses high-frequency attention, implied volatility, and price data and provides evidence that both attention and implied volatility are relevant for predicting price fluctuations in the short run.

Ukrainian refugees and labour market discrimination (research proposal)

The role of investor attention in global assets price variation during the war in Ukraine

The seminar will be streamed online on MS Teams: Link

Abstract: In this proposal, we aim to briefly present several hypotheses of our recent research interest, which stems from an ongoing military conflict between Russia and Ukraine. The impact the conflict has on assets price variation cannot be doubted, and the information availability may play an integral part in assets high price variation as it did in no conflict before. Thus, we want to explore the magnitude of attention through google search queries and whether attention to the conflict may lead to higher asset price variation in global equity markets. We are also interested in the influence regarding asset prices and the proximity to the conflict. Current preliminary results suggest that the attention towards the conflict is significant in the after-invasion period and helps predict volatility.

Forecasting Day-ahead Expected Shortfall on the EUR/USD Exchange Rate: The (I)relevance of Implied Volatility

The seminar will be streamed online on MS Teams: Link

Abstract: The existing literature provides mixed results on the usefulness of implied volatility for managing risky assets, while evidence with respect to expected shortfall predictions is almost nonexistent. Given its forward-looking nature, implied volatility might be more useful than backward-looking measures of realized price fluctuations. On the other hand, the volatility risk premium embedded in implied volatility leads to overestimation of the observed price variation. This paper explores the benefits of augmenting econometric models used in forecasting the expected shortfall, a risk measured endorsed in the Basel III Accord, with information on implied volatility obtained from EUR/USD option contracts. The day-ahead forecasts are obtained with a two-step procedure, where the estimates of value-at-risk for several quantiles are combined to approximate the predicted expected shortfall. We consider several classes of econometric models: historical simulation, GARCH, quantile regression--based HAR and combination forecasts. Using formal statistical tests, we verify whether the resulting expected shortfall forecasts are well behaved and test the models' accuracy. Our results provide evidence that the information provided by forward-looking implied volatility is more useful than that in backward-looking realized measures. These results hold across multiple model specifications, are stable over time, hold under alternative loss functions and are more pronounced during periods of higher market uncertainty, when managing asset risk matters most.

Economic institutions and their role in the economic transformation (research proposal)

Institutional economy understands the institutions to be factors of economic growth. It also understands the inclination towards entrepreneurship as and institution. This creates a room for analysing the entrepreneurial contribution to economic growth. The idea is to study the connections between people's behaviour in terms of their desire to run a business, and the performance of the economy.

Using pubic opinion polls, I aim to define and quantify an entrepreneur as an institution, add the institution into a neoclassic growth model, and explore what role the entrepreneurs have in the Czech Republic and Austria. These two countries are similar in size and culture, however, one has a 40 years long experience with the entrepreneurial activity being forbidden. The study can therefore show another dimension of what needs to be changed in order to transform an economy.

MS Teams

Economic inequality and anti-system parties (research proposal)

Rising economic inequality has been a long-lasting trend across the world for the last few decades.  At the same time, we can observe the rise of extremist and populist political parties in many countries, including established democracies. Is it possible to identify a causal link between these phenomena? The coronavirus disease and consequent lockdown restrictions created a natural experiment that give us an opportunity to explore this link.

Many areas of the economy were affected heavily, meanwhile, others experienced only minor problems which resulted in heterogeneous development of economic inequality. In my research, I intend to use this heterogeneous impact of the pandemic and explore the voting behaviour and support for anti-system parties across regions of the Czech Republic.

MS Teams

Judging by the Colour of their Skin - Own-Race Bias among Judges in Professional Boxing

This paper reports the results of a study that examined racial biases among judges evaluating professional boxers during bouts in the U.S. Data were collected for 184 mixed-race bouts and contained extensive information on boxers and judges. The results showed that white boxers were more likely to receive top scores from white judges than from non-white judges, all else equal. The results also showed that white boxers were more likely to win a bout when the crew of judges was all white than when the crew was racially diverse. We attribute our findings to white own-race bias.

Website

The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Reducing Digital Financial Exclusion in Poland and the Czech Republic

The technological development that has occurred in the last two decades has resulted in the transfer of many activities to the digital space. Currently, access to the Internet and the use of digital services by consumers are not only facilitating but also a condition for full participation in social, cultural and professional life. Digitization is therefore extremely important in the context of social exclusion and its financial component. Research conducted around the world (Bayero, 2015; EFInA, 2013; Ouma, Odongo, & Were, 2017) indicates the enormous role played by the development and dissemination of mobile payments in reducing the scale of financial exclusion, especially in underdeveloped and developing countries. On the other hand, however, increasing digitization and concerns about using digital services or the inability to use them may contribute to financial exclusion in developed countries. The use of modern technologies may limit access to financial services and thus reduce the scale of financial inclusion (Martinez, 2013; Reddy, 2017). In this paper, I use survey data to identify factors influencing the digital financial inclusion of consumers.

MS Teams

The Promised Land: The Effects of the Land Restitution Program in Colombia

We estimate the causal effect of the Colombian land restitution program on access to microcredit for agriculture. We use the timing of the restitution as the source of identification in an event study approach. Using administrative data from the program and all formal credit transactions, we show a significant increase in access to agricultural microcredit. The effects are stronger two years after the restitution when individuals acquire full property rights. Impacts are mainly driven by loans through the Agrarian Bank and supported by guarantees from the Agricultural Guarantee Fund, which are institutions specifically designed to promote investment in agriculture.

MS Teams: https://muni.cz/go/62650c

Decisions under Risk: Dispersion and Skewness

When people take decisions under risk, it is not only the expected utility that is important, but also the shape of the distribution of utility: clearly the dispersion is important, but also the skewness. For given mean and dispersion, decision-makers treat positively and negatively skewed prospects differently. This paper presents a new behaviourally-inspired model for decision making under risk, incorporating both dispersion and skewness. We run a horse-race of this new model against six other models of decision-making under risk and show that it outperforms many in terms of goodness of fit and shows a reasonable performance in predictive ability. It can incorporate the prominent anomalies of standard theory such as the Allais paradox, the valuation gap, and preference reversals, and also the behavioural patterns observed in experiments that cannot be explained by Rank Dependent Utility Theory.

MS Teams: https://muni.cz/go/290799

20 years of emotions and risky choices in the lab: A meta-analysis

This paper is a meta-analysis of experimental studies dealing with the impact of incidental emotions on risky choices, so as to explain traditional heterogeneity of outcomes in the literature. After devising a standard search strategy and filtering out studies that do not comply with a list of eligibility criteria, we include 24 articles from which 109 observations are drawn at the treatment level. At this point, we code a set of moderator variables representing experimental protocols and adopt Hedges’s g as comparable metric. Subgroup analysis and meta-regressions find causal impact of both sadness and fear on risk aversion, albeit to a small extent, as well as highly contrasting patterns depending on the nature of incentives offered in the experiments. The use of monetary incentives turns out to reduce data variability and affects information processing by making subjects more susceptible to emotions. When studies provide real stakes, our results also show that emotions lead to take more risks in individualist countries than in collectivist societies. We discuss possible interpretations of our findings.

MS Teams: https://muni.cz/go/15793f

Offshoring and Well-Being of Workers

Using long panels of industry-specific offshoring information and subjectively reported well-being datasets from Germany, the UK, and Australia from 2000 to 2013, this paper aims to investigate the relationship between offshoring and workers’ well-being in the source country. We employ panel data fixed-effects models with time-variant personality measures and industry-specific measures to alleviate the bias stemming from the non-random sorting of individuals in industries. Our findings suggest that offshoring negatively affects workers’ well-being. The result is unexceptionally consistent across the countries with different labor markets, and the effect is larger in business services and among high-skilled workers. We extensively discuss how contextual “fear-factors” prevailing in the source countries interact with the angst generated by the negative framing of offshoring. To single out such angst, we first show that objective and subjective job security concerns, job characteristics, and labor market conditions only marginally relate to the well-being effect of offshoring. Then, we investigate how the effect of offshoring on well-being is amplified by a larger set of contextual factors pertaining to temporary economic shocks, negative narrative about offshoring during electoral cycles, partisan political preferences, and high immigration rates. Finally, we show that a recent skill upgrade significantly diminishes the negative effect of offshoring on well-being.

MS Teams: https://muni.cz/go/4db99d

Comparing the Behavior of Teams and Individuals in a Public Goods Game with Ostracism - A Null Result?

We provide evidence from a public goods game with ostracism, i.e. the possibility to vote and consequently ostracize others from the game. We focus on how the decisions of individuals and teams differ in this setup. Participants either form groups of individuals or they form groups of two-member-teams to play the public goods game. Concerning contributions, we find a null-result. Concerning earnings, however, we find differences. The ostracism mechanism does not increase average earnings for individuals, but for teams. This is the consequence of a different use of the ostracism mechanism. Teams play a trigger strategy. The mere threat of being punished triggers cooperative behavior, i.e. higher contributions. The punishment as such, however, is seldom really executed. Individuals exclude more and earlier, yielding less earnings since ostracized members’ contributions are missing.

MS Teams: https://muni.cz/go/002610

Gender discrimination and the backlash effect in recruitment and dismissal processes: Experimental evidence from Slovakia

Using a vignette experiment, the present study investigated implicit gender biases against female applicants and whether these biases affect females’ chances of being employed/dismissed and the pay they are offered. A total of 155 HR specialists participated in the study. In Task 1, they were randomly assigned to conditions and evaluated three candidates (all three either men or women) for the post of regional sales manager based on the applicant’s competences, hireability, likeability, and proposed salary. In Task 2, participants were showed a set of vignettes presenting six employees selected for potential dismissal. The paper contributes to the literature by pointing to differential treatment of men and women in the labour market context. While women are likely to be directly discriminated against by significantly lower pay offers, men may suffer from a strong backlash when they have lower educational attainment and display feminine working patterns.

MS Teams: https://muni.cz/go/f56933

Gender Identity, Race, and Ethnicity Discrimination in Access to Mental Health Care: Preliminary Evidence from a Multi-Wave Audit Field Experiment

The Fragmentation of Views in a Democracy

For the love of God? Proselytization, Religious Restrictions and Social Conflicts in India

Gender-based wage discrimination and the backlash effect in recruitment and dismissal processes: Experimental evidence from Slovakia

Abstract: A sample of 155 HR managers participated in an experimental vignette study. In Task 1, they evaluated three CV resumes in terms of the candidates’ competence, hireability, likeability and wage proposal of three candidates applying for a regional manager post. Half of the sample received CVs presented as females’ and half as males’, otherwise the CVs were identical. Generally, male and female candidates were evaluated similarly in terms of competence and hireability. Average and worst male candidates were evaluated as less likeable than identical females. However, wages offered to female candidates were significantly lower than those offered to male candidates. We were unable to identify moderators of the phenomenon other than female HR managers driving the effect. In Task 2, participants were showed a set of vignettes presenting six employees (3 men and 3 women) preselected to be dismissed due to the economic crisis. Apart from basic demographics, the employees were described in terms of age, years in the company and frequency of absences. Again, we switched employees’ gender for half of the sample. We have found that HR managers are more likely to dismiss male employees and that they are particularly unforgiving to male workers with frequent absences.

MS Teams link: http://tiny.cc/mues2020

Big data analytics and innovation performance: the role of dynamic capabilities view

Big Data Analytics (BDA) has become a crucial source of competition and over the last several years been ranked among the top agenda items of business and IT executives. While some research has been conducted to explore the link between BDA and its potential business value, current knowledge on the link between BDA and innovation performance remains unclear. To fill this gap, based on the dynamic capabilities view, this research proposes a conceptual model to explore how and under what mechanisms, using BDA can influence innovation performance. This research conceptualizes firm agility, in terms of dynamic capability, and introduces three related constructs (i.e., sensing agility, decision-making agility, and acting agility). We also consider the moderating roles of data-driven culture and BDA team sophistication. Using the survey data, we uncover that dynamic capabilities mediate the link between BDA use and innovation performance. Besides, we find out that data-driven culture moderates the link between sensing agility and decision-making agility; however, such a moderating effect is not observed on the relationship between BDA use and sensing agility. This research also supports the moderating role of BDA team sophistication on the link between BDA use and sensing agility. We conclude the paper by providing contributions and future research directions.

Adding fuel to the fire: Experiment on a role of provocation in conflict

Agents with extreme positions may take actions in order to trigger a conflict. In the degree of violence, these actions may range from violent riots to symbolic political acts and the creation of fake news. We develop experimental design that investigates whether a provocateur can trigger a conflict by making cheap-talk statements. The experiment consist of three treatments: control without provocateur, treatment with provocateur and treatment where provocateur's preferences are known.

Choosing the Mode of Transport - Case Study of Bratislava

We analyse commuting patterns in Bratislava's fast growing sub-urban region with sub-optimal developed infrastructure. Standardized discrete choice model is used to estimate demand for individual car transport as well as for public buses and trains and to obtain corresponding elasticities with respect to travel costs, times and income. We find low rate of substitution between available modes. Direct price elasticity for public modes is in accordance with often cited rule of thumb -0.3. Negative income elasticities of demand for buses and trains, together with low direct price elasticity for car transport can be hard to overcome when looking for solution of current traffic problems in the region. We use modelled demand to predict effects of two recently proposed policies - new parking system in Bratislava city and construction of highway D4R7. In case of first policy, we expect massive reduction in car usage due to increased costs for car commuters. On the other hand, new highway would have only limited impact on mode choice and could reduce number of train commuters.

Secessionism and Foreign Trade: The Case of Catalonia

The paper aims to determine whether the political conflict between Catalonia and Spain leads to higher foreign exports in the region. Empirical analysis, based on the gravity model approach, indicates that the trade and intrastate conflict in Catalonia are related. Both the Poisson model with country and time fixed effects, and the fixed-effects panel data model show that Catalan foreign exports are positively associated with the past values of conflict in the region. Testing for endogeneity fails to support the view of a reciprocal relationship between domestic conflict and foreign trade.

Rejection stings! How does being deliberately chosen to be (less or more) relevant affect performance?

with Ondřej Krčál

Previous literature has explored how agents respond to a signal of perceived distrust and shows that it lowers the agent’s motivation to act in the trustor’s (or principal’s) best interests. Distrust, in these studies is conveyed through either limiting the agent’s choice set or increasing the extent to which the agent is monitored. The proposed study is based on the idea that distrust may also be conveyed when a principal deliberately reduces the power of an agent to influence a given outcome based on the agent’s past track-record of performance. This may occur in situations in which a superior should decide, based on the past performance of the workers reporting to her, how to allocate responsibility among them. In such situations, the level of responsibility allocated to a worker may reflect the superior’s expectations of that worker’s performance relative to others. In other words, it may convey a signal of the extent to which a superior (dis)trusts how well one worker would perform relative to others. While it may seem natural for superiors to place the most responsibility possible with the worker that performed the best in the past, this could backfire if there is a large drop in the performance of the employee who feels he has been made needlessly irrelevant. This is because this worker might perceive the allocation decision as a signal that he has been distrusted as a result of a superior having an (unreasonably) low expectation of his performance. In the real world, it could be that this feeling that one has been made (disproportionately) less relevant is actually independent of the level of responsibility one has. In order to measure the pure effect of being made to feel less relevant (or feeling distrusted), we propose a lab experiment that varies the deliberate nature of the allocation decision while keeping the level of responsibility constant. Based on the previous literature, our hypothesis is that workers who are deliberately made less relevant will perform worse than those for whom the decision was not deliberate, keeping the level of responsibility constant. Additionally, we predict that this effect will be stronger for males than females and so we plan to gender balance the experimental treatments.

Why gender matters and how to approach it in economic research

The presentation introduces the issue of gender in economics. I will show why gender matters in economic research and how should it be investigated. I will discuss three working papers: one on the approaches to measure gender-related self and gender differences and two showing possible applications of the approach in the research practice. I will start with explaining what a good “gender measure” is and which conditions it should satisfy. Then, I will proceed with discussing pitfalls of the dominating simplistic “gender as a variable” paradigm contrasting it with a “gender as an influence” approach. The main aim of the presentation is to point out possible gains from abandoning the traditional perspective treating biological sex as an explanation of observed differences in favour of a more sensitive, gender-oriented approach.

Social Capital and Mobility: An Experimental Study

(with Ondřej Krčál and Štěpán Mikula)

Theoretical models of social capital (David et al., 2010; Bräuninger and Tolciu, 2011) provide an explanation for the different outcomes of integration efforts documented by the recent empirical literature. The models show that communities may find themselves in two different equilibria, one with a high level of social capital and low outmigration or one with a low level of social capital and high outmigration. However, empirical tests of this explanation based on quasi-experiments typically suffer from the selection of immigrants which makes the identification challenging. In order to address this issue, we take the setup used in the theoretical models into the laboratory. We implement a treatment in which we change the initial level of social capital without affecting the equilibrium outcomes. In a finitely repeated game, most of the experimental communities end up in one of the two equilibria predicted by the theoretical models, with a higher proportion of the treatment communities attaining the equilibrium with a high level of social capital and low migration. This suggests that the initial levels of social capital might facilitate the effect of immigration on community levels of social capital.

Do People Prefer Inefficient Rules Over Discretion?

(with Rostislav Staněk and Katarína Čellárová)

When lawmakers create laws, they must decide not only on the substance but also the form of the law. The choice of the legal form may be described as a choice between rules and discretion. Although the discretion may more efficient, recent studies suggest that individuals value institutions and procedures for their intrinsic value. i.e. beyond the expected utility associated with the achieved outcome. The aim of our experiment is to identify discretion aversion. Our design combines an effort provision experiment and a voting experiment. Despite the fact that discretion regime is more efficient than the strict rule regime in our experiment, subjects vote significantly more often for the strict rule regime. In order to distinguish whether the unpopularity of the discretionary regime is driven by the presence of the human factor, we ran additional treatment where the human officer is replaced by the computer. The discretionary regime remains unpopular even in the treatment with the computer officer.  

Retirement Savings of the Self Employed - Experimental Desing

Calculation of retirement savings shows that vulnerable subgroup of the self-employed does not save enough to cover their pensions at an acceptable level. Their status in the Czech tax and savings system allows them, within limits, to choose their own level of savings. It might, therefore, be possible to provide a nudge to influence the decision making of the self-employed in order to increase their savings rate. An experiment to test the most promising route - to increase the information level - will utilize the life cycle experiment in ztree. Details of the experiment will be discussed in the presentation.

Neither more nor less: Responsiveness to performance feedback and subsequent performance

In spite of certain contradictory findings and missing details on the process itself, performance feedback literature can largely explain why and when the organization prefers change or rigidity. While understanding organizational behavior has enormous value, we are still unsure of its performance consequences. This research aims to contribute to answering the question of the relationship between responsiveness to performance feedback (intensity with which organization reacts to a given performance feedback message) and subsequent performance. Using data from U.S. manufacturing firms, the findings support the inverted U shape relationship between responsiveness and performance and the notion that less responsiveness is ceteris paribus preferred to equivalently more responsiveness.

Finance and Behavior: Best Practices in Italy

The aim of my research is to investigate the relationship between financial literacy and behavior in the face of the growing challenge of FinTech. To do so, I personally set-up a financial education program for high-school students called “Futuro Sicuro” in order to understand if it could change financial habits among millennials. This program provides two types of randomized treatment at the class level, a theoretical rule-of-thumb based one with the presence of financial advisors, and a high digitized one based on the learn-by-playing rule through App and websites. The empirical research is carried out using personally collected data during the pilot of the program aforesaid involving 650 students.

Website

A field intervention experiment – behavioral intervention aiming for (avoidable) food waste reduction

Food waste is a phenomenon associated with substantial economic (inefficient use and misallocation of resources) and social consequences (environmental impacts and consumption of limited resources). Food waste is caused neither by a single factor nor a single group, and (likely) is not resulting from intentional act such as “I like to waste food”. Certain percentage of food loss and even food waste is present in all stages of food chain. Yet there are significant differences in the food waste intensity along the food chain stages – with the final stages being major sources of food waste. The key culprit seem to be households’ behavior, despite the fact food waste is commonly viewed as undesirable. The research area of the project at hand is to design and empirically test procedures that would be applicable by subjects responsible for waste management (foremost municipalities), leading to a reduction of food waste through behavioral change. A field intervention experiment, targeting local population in Brno is the main method. The population is divided into three groups: control group, antecedent-intervention experimental group and feedback-intervention experimental group, with each group being represented by 4 different locations with presumed influential population characteristics.

Specifics of labor mobility in Slovakia

In June of this year, an amendment to the Act on Employment Services came into force in Slovakia, to make the conditions for entitlement to a work-related allowance and a work mobility allowance more attractive. However, in addition to the costs of labor mobility also other determinants influence the decision-making of individuals on the allocation of time to the commuting to and from work. We quantify the average weekly time spent on commuting in the Slovak Republic at NUTS 2 level and identify the differences in the determinants affecting the labor mobility in the surveyed areas. From the source database, which is the result of a questionnaire survey conducted in April 2017, we use data on employed respondents aged 15-64 in a total of 1 537.

The support of the grant scheme VEGA 1/0621/17 “Decision-making Process of Slovak Households about Allocation of Time for Paid and Unpaid Work and Household Strategies’ Impact on Selected Areas of the Economic Practice”.

Performing and outsourcing unpaid domestic work in Slovakia

In Slovakia people traditionally devote lots of time to perform a variety of work in their households. However, a lot of goods and services, which households produce themselves, are offered by the market as well, so households can buy them, instead of doing them by themselves. On the basis of data obtained by a primary research done in Faculty of Economics Matej Bel University on the sample of 1,142 households, the types of housework which are mostly outsourced by Slovak household are identified. The main factors households perceive as important for making decisions about outsourcing housework and barriers to outsourcing them are also examined.

The support of the grant scheme VEGA 1/0621/17 “Decision-making Process of Slovak Households about Allocation of Time for Paid and Unpaid Work and Household Strategies’ Impact on Selected Areas of the Economic Practice”.

Optimal monetary policy with zero lower bound when agents are learning

Tips not kept

Waiters often pool their tips and in some restaurants, waiters do not get to keep their tips, but forfeit them to their employer. We use a variation of the dictator game to explore if and how these scenarios may affect tipping behavior if customers are aware of them. Lab experiment participants are divided into dictators and servers. Servers solve an effort intensive task and earn their dictator a lower or higher amount of money based on their performance (money earned is a proxy for service quality.) In the baseline treatment, dictators then decide if they want to tip their server and how much. In the pooling treatment, dictators decide if and how much to tip their server knowing that the tips will be pooled. In the third treatment, where waiters do not get to keep their tips, dictators choose if and how “big” and expensive a Thank you message to send to their server, knowing he will not receive any of the money it cost.

The effects of corporate social responsibility on labor supply: Evidence from a field experiment with gig-workers

Tommaso Reggiani (Masaryk University) & Rainer Michael Rilke (WHU - Otto Beisheim School of Management

We investigate the influence of pro-social incentives on workers' labor supply in a natural field experiment. We recruited workers to take part in a survey for a fixed compensation. Having finished the survey, a bonus payment is offered in order to perform an additional optional task. In different treatments, the bonus payment generates (i) a standard private gain, (ii) an equivalent donation or (iii) different combinations of private gain and donation. We observe that high donations in combination with no or only small individual gains lead to negative or null effects on labor supply. Bonus combinations of small donations and generous private gains increase labor supply. Effort provision, as well as job satisfaction, are not systematically affected by the different incentive schemes. The experiment sheds lights on widely accepted claims that corporate philanthropy measures are effective tools to motivate employees. When firms consider the design of pro-social incentives schemes, they should be vigilant about employees' distributional concerns.

Does homeownership hinder labor market activity? Evidence from housing privatization in Brno

(joint work with Josef Montag)

This paper uses housing privatization in Brno as a quasi-experiment producing exogenous assignment of homeownership status. We do not find homeownership to be causing higher unemployment. In fact, our estimates are consistently negative and economically substantively, ranging from -3 to -8 percentage points. We find no evidence that homeownership lowers labor force participation.

Conventional vs. Digital Vigilante Practices in the Far Right and Anti-Far Right Strategies

Abstract: The lecture will focus on the concept of vigilantism in the strategies of far right groups in Slovakia as well as in the context of the response from the civil society initiatives. While in the case of far right groups we can see various examples of conventional vigilante strategies used as a tool of political struggle, the civil society is adopting especially diverse digital vigilante practices in order to actively challenge the presence of far right agenda in the public discourse. In both cases, the interaction of online and offline world will be explored, with special attention to the role of the government and state authorities in the equation. 

The effect of anchors on task duration estimates

(Coffee and sandwiches will be available at the seminar)

Abstract: The ability to accurately estimate the duration of planned tasks is the cornerstone of successful time and project management. It is naturally appealing to expect that the accuracy of estimates increases with estimators' professional experience. However, contrary to the intuition, many companies keep estimating over-optimistically. Projects then run late and trigger budget extensions. We hypothesize that project time estimates can be influenced by anchors such as managerial suggestions or customer expectations. Suggestions driven by wishful thinking can cause the estimates to become too optimistic.  Moreover, in the absence of estimation feedback, the effect of anchor can persist over time and influence subsequent estimates of the same or similar task. Even when there is no anchor before the first estimate available, the first estimate itself can serve as an anchor for future estimates and cause systematic bias. We experimentally test the influence of numerical anchors on duration estimates of a simple real effort task. In addition, we test the interplay between anchor and task experience by repeating the task estimation and performance process in multiple rounds. We find strong anchoring effects which persist over time. We also find an evidence of a self-anchoring effect.

Old sins cast long shadows: Long-term effects of social capital destruction on residential migration

(Cake will be available from 12:40 with the seminar starting promptly at 12:50)

Abstract: The theoretical models suggest there is a negative relationship between social capital and migration (Glaeser et al 2002, David et al 2010, Bräuninger and Tolciu 2011). The simultaneity between investment in social capital and residential mobility decisions leads to an identification problem for empirical analysis. In this paper we exploit the post-war resettlement process in Czechoslovakia as a natural experiment to confirm the causal effect of social capital on residential mobility. After World War II over 3 million Germans (some 29% of the total population in Czech lands) were forcibly expelled leaving behind empty villages and their property. Abandoned lands were swiftly resettled with Czech inhabitants creating new communities in former German villages. Our identification strategy exploits the variation in migration behavior along the historical dividing line between formerly Czech (refereed to as old) and German (new) settlements. For the analysis we employ administrative data on changes of permanent residency in the Czech Republic during 1971–2015. Our results document the enduring effects of social capital destruction in the settlements influenced by the resettlement process. We show a consistently higher migration rates in the new communities vis-a-vis the old communities. A set of falsification tests validates the interpretation of the results.

Financial Decision-Making among Finance Students

Making sound financial decisions is an essential skill which can have an impact on life of each consumer of financial products. The aim of this paper is to examine decision-making concerning financial matters and personal finance. The selected target group was university students majoring in finance related fields.

Unveiling the factors of student mobility: The case study of Armenia

This research will concentrate on studying the major pushing and pulling factors that underlie the decisions of Armenian students to pursue education abroad.

The Metropolisation Processes – A Case of Central Europe and the Czech Republic

The contribution deals with the strategically important problems of metropolisation. In this context, it presents a theoretically based method of assessment of metropolises, the explanatory power of which was verified on the example of the Central Europe. This method is based on three components: population size (initial assumption), economic profile (ties to economic performance) and general attractiveness (the perception of development potential). The results of the evaluation of the 27 identified metropolises were generalized using a typology of their inclusion within the framework of the listed components: most metropolises were classified as type B – an established metropolis, followed by type C – an elementary metropolis, and type A – a dominant metropolis. A practically targeted conceptualization is then demonstrated on the example of the Czech Republic. The main attention was focused on the intensity of the economic links of Prague (and two further Czech centres) with other Central European metropolises. The corresponding complementary contribution is focused on verification of metropolisation axes on express/highspeed transportation modes.

Do the politicians work for us or someone else?

“Should I tell you / or should I not?” The (neutral) effect of Transparency on Information Disclosure Nudge

With the increasing popularity and application of the nudging concept, several ethical objections against it have also emerged. In order to contribute to the debate whether nudging is objectionable or not, this paper examines nudging in the light of transparency.
A transparent nudge is when the citizen being nudged knows the intention behind it and the means adopted to pursue the nudging object. A non-transparent nudge works in a way that the citizen cannot reconstruct the object of the intervention and the means by which the behavioral change is pursued.
Wide - philosophical - consent claims how nudging can only be regarded as ethically appropriate when the nudge is transparent (Fischer & Lotz 2014; Sunstein 2015). Hausman & Welch (2010) demand for nudging transparency, even if it potentially undercuts the effectiveness of the nudge. However, empirical research on nudging often shies away from incorporating explicit transparency.
We design a survey-experiment to examine whether transparency has negative impacts on nudging effectiveness in its configuration of information disclosure nudging (Loewenstein et al. 2014b; Altmann & Traxler 2014; Wisdom et al. 2010). In partnership with the German Federal Centre for Health (BZgA), we address the very salient and relevant case of the voluntary participation into the German organ donation initiative. We do not find evidence that transparency inhibits the effectiveness of information disclosure nudges. Our finding supports the policy-relevant claim that information disclosure nudges can be transparent and yet very effective, reconciling at the same time philosophical problems. This result is in line with recent findings by Bruns et al. (2016): In a lab experiment, focusing on default nudge applied to contributions to carbon emission reduction, they do not find evidence that transparency inhibits the effectiveness of a default nudging strategy. Similarly, Loewenstein et al (2014a) testing the interaction between transparency and defaults, get to similar conclusions according the analysis of an online-study focused on health-care related choices.

Price Transmission and Market Power in a Vertically Integrated Industry: Evidence from the Hungarian Gasoline Market

The pricing behavior of vertically-integrated firms is a heavily investiga- ted topic in economic literature. While most research in this context focuses on network industries, the present paper investigates a similar set-up on the retail gasoline market. We provide the first examination of asymmetric cost- pass through on a gasoline market with a dominant upstream firm which is also active as a retailer. Furthermore, we differentiate explicitly between local markets on which the firm is present exclusively as a wholesale seller and those on which it participates at both market levels.
While upstream competition is common place on the US market, in Europe gasoline wholesale tends to be dominated by recently privatized large pro- ducers, which are also active in the retail market. The optimal behavior of such upstream monopolists facing competition downstream has been subject of rigorous academic debate. On the one hand, such a firm has an incentive to exercise its power by passing on cost changes asymmetrically and sustai- ning high prices in order to raise its competitors’ costs (Salop and Scheffman, 1983). Such firms are likely to combine this wholesale strategy with aggres- sive pricing at the retail level in order to push competitors out of the market. Conversely, the firm may choose to set low prices and transmit cost changes quickly if it seeks to foster demand downstream, even if this increase in de- mand for the product is detrimental to its own downstream business. Sibley and Weisman (1998) argue that such a firm will be willing to forfeit per-unit profitability in order to increase overall sales volume, hence resulting in in- significant anti-competitive behavior.
We investigate this process empirically using weekly data for over 900 stati- ons for two years from the Hungarian gasoline market. An error correction model is estimated to measure the speed and asymmetry of cost pass-through at the wholesale and retail level. We find that a firm with a dominant up- stream position is likely to charge high prices on the wholesale market and act competitively at the retail level. This applies both to mark-up levels and to the level of asymmetry in cost pass-through.
While upstream decisions affect all firms equally, the influence of retail pri- cing behavior is likely to wane with distance. In order to determine how the aggressive retail pricing scheme of the firm will affect its rivals, we analyze a) the local market characteristics in areas where a retail outlet of the upstream monopolist is present and b) the pricing behavior of competing stations in those markets. This allows us to determine what type of market is most likely to be affected by the presence of the vertically integrated seller, as well as what the precise effect on pricing is likely to be. The analysis of the results allows us to determine to what extent the disciplining retail effect of the monopolists’ competitive pricing offsets the negative effect of his wholesale mark-up.

Killing two birds with one stone: Reducing fiscal and welfare loss of tax evasion

Tax evasion constitutes a fiscal loss to the tax authority and a welfare loss for the society because it induces socially wasteful activities during which taxpayers spend real resources in order to hide their undisclosed income. We develop a theoretical model that explores the effect of audit selection rules on the losses from tax evasion. In the proposed experimental design, we test the main prediction of the model, that the competitive audit selection mechanism reduces both the fiscal and welfare loss of tax evasion. Furthermore, our model shows that a higher basic audit probability motivates taxpayers to increase their socially wasteful activities. Our experimental results confirm the predictions of the model. Our paper shows not only that the competitive audit selection mechanism provides an additional benefit if socially wasteful activities are possible, but also its relative advantage compared to an increase in the audit probability. 

Old sins cast long shadows: Long-term effects of Aussiedlung of ethnic Germans from Czech Republic on migration

There were over 3.000.000 (29 % of total population) of ethnic Germans in current Czech Republic prior to the Second World War living mostly in ethnicaly segregated villages of Sudetenland -- German-speaking regions often close to national borders. They were forcibly expeled after the end of the Second World War leaving behind empty villages and almost all their personal belogings including fully-equipped farms and factories. Abandoned lands were swiftly resettled by over a million colonizers from inland regions of Czechoslovakia (current Czech Republic and Slovakia) creating new communities in former German villages. Expulsion (Aussiedlung) and resettelment created a shock which allow us to identify differences in migration behavior between newly established and traditional communities. Empirical results indicate that emigration rate in former German villages is significantly higher even 70 years after Aussiedlung.

World Tax Index: What is the real tax burden?

The World Tax Index (WTI) combines hard tax data available from world-respected sources and national tax laws with soft data expressing Qualified Expert Opinion (QEO). The QEO is gained from annual large-scale questionnaire survey conducted among tax specialist from all OECD countries. The methodology of creating WTI and questionnaire were rebuilt this year and the pilot was sent to the experts in the Czech Republic.

Transformation of Labour Market in Europe and Voting for Far-Right and Far-Left Parties

The literature suggests that there is a significant gender gap in the support of far right parties. Male voters exhibit a higher propensity to voting for them. The probability of voting for these political parties is even higher with young and pensioner males. Far right voters are overrepresented among manual workers, routine non-manual workers, the self-employed and the unemployed. The voters usually have lower level of education and are less skilled. All these findings are based on social-survey data. Are they consistent with hard economic data, however? In order to answer this question, we analyse the set of 28 EU member states from 2000 to 2014. We extend our research to voting results of far right, far left and populist parties in parliamentary elections. We focus on diverse specifications of employment rates which are offered by the Eurostat database (by gender, age, education attainment, occupation, working time, etc.). In our model, we also include other variables of the labour market, economic activity, and variables in demographics and politics. We estimate the Heckit model with the maximum likelihood estimator because of many left censored dependent observations. During the observed period, Europe was affected by three phenomena: structural changes in the labour market, the aging of population and an economic crisis. The number of economically active men between 15 and 39 years of age diminished, many of them lost their jobs during the economic crisis and they have a lower chance of going back to work in the future because of their lower skills. They may feel frustrated and therefore turn to extreme and populist parties.

Optimism bias: The evidence from betting market

People often exhibit so called optimism bias. When predicting what will happen in the future, they overestimate a likelihood of postitive events and underestimate a likelihood of negative events. This paper shows that there is an evidence of an optimism bias in the betting market. I model optimism bias as an elevation in the probability weighting function. Using data from Czech bettingmarket I estimate how the elevation di ers between league matches and matches of the Czech national team. The results show that Czech bettors are overly optimistic when predicting the outcome of Czech national team match.

Fiscal Multipliers and the Zero Lower Bound

This paper studies implications of the zero lower bound (ZLB) on interest rates for the size of fiscal multipliers. The analysis is carried out in extended ECB’s New Area-Wide Model that contains various fiscal instruments. The results show that the most effective tool of fiscal policy at ZLB is government consumption. If  the economy is expected to stay longer in liquidity trap, this multiplier is much higher and can exceed value of two. Behaviour of multiplier for government investment is rather tricky. Its value is amplified but only when the economy stays at ZLB for few years. Very significant amplification effect was found for consumption taxes multiplier, but its value stays below unity. Also government transfers multiplier increased a lot in relative terms, nevertheless its absolute value remains very small. Other fiscal instruments were influenced only negligibly.

Collateral constraint, asymmetries and zero lower bound

This paper deals with asymmetry between house prices and consumption that is present in data of the Czech economy. We use small open economy model with housing sector and collateral constraint on loans. The model is estimated by Bayesian techniques on Czech data and then simulated with toolbox for occasionally binding constraint. The mechanism works as follows. When the price of houses decreases, the value of collateral drops down and households are forced to reduce their borrowing and consumption. When house prices increase, households’ constraint becomes slack and consumption increases only partly. The asymmetrical relationship between the house prices and the consumption obtained  from simulations thus confirms the empirical findings. The contribution of the zero lower bound on interest rate was found insignificant as the fluctuations in house prices have negligible effect on behaviour of interest rate which equilibrium level was also quite high.

Czech District Heating Plants: Elasticities and Price-Cost Margins

In 2015, Czech Republic witnessed harsh debate about the future of lignite open-cast mining. The need of the price stability in district heating (DH) lignite power plants has been one of underlying argument in favor of mining continuation. DH delivers heating energy to roughly one third of Czech households relatively cheaply (compared to other sources). Thus the arguments such as “economic stability” of DH systems and the availability of cheap heat have been used frequently in the debate. Surprisingly enough, the actual micro-economic analysis of DH sector in Czech Republic is considerably underdeveloped. This paper aims to fill this gap. We focus at the power plants (PP) with combined output of heat and electricity of at least 100 TJ per year, where the heat production is dominant. This group consists of 36 PPs of variable characteristics (such as production capacity, ownership, consumer portfolio etc.). 9 of them have full economic data available open source. Despite the fact we find large inconsistencies in the data, we aim to calculate price and income elasticities of the PP in question and estimate the price-cost margins. There are multiple ways of approaching the elasticity estimations, but the initial look at the data indicates the results are likely highly dependent on the plant. For instance pooled estimate of SR elasticity is about -0.58, but if we allow for the fixed panel effects, we find the SR price elasticity −0.212. In the dynamic panel model distinguishing between SR and LR elasticities, we estimate the SR elasticity to be -0.086 and LR elasticity approximately -0.16. Given the peculiarity of the data, we do not primarily seek to generalize, but rather pinpoint what needs to done in further research.

Justifying the unjustifiable: How the intangible benefits of information systems can be evaluated

Abstract: From the introduction of Brynjolfsson’s “Productivity Paradox” and Bannister’s and Remenyi’s “act of faith”, the scientists are tackling the challenge of evaluating intangible benefits of information systems. Not only companies are struggling with success of IT projects but they are usually unable to say, if the information system is proving to be beneficial. To this day, the solutions and suggestions are far from being useful or used, if the problem of evaluation of intangible benefits of information systems can be even solved. In order to try to organize the body of knowledge in this area, this talk will introduce and describe a preliminary taxonomy of information system evaluation methods and give some insights on current justification and evaluation practices that were gathered from interviews with practitioners during a case study.

Maximizing vs. Satisficing in decision making

Abstract: Some people, called Maximizers, do not settle for good enough choices – they want to make sure what they select is the best. To discover the best options possible, they can exert large amounts of time and effort, sometimes getting stuck in an obsessive search for more alternatives to compare. To Satisficers, good enough is simply good enough. In our experiment, subjects have the option to engage in an expansive search and just like in the real life, excessive searching in the experiment comes with opportunity costs. We look at how the Maximization Inventory score is related to the number of items uncovered and to the total payouts. Also we investigate the effectiveness of different approaches to help maximizers not to ruminate and over-think their decisions. As this is a work in progress, all comments and suggestions are warmly welcome!

Rocket and Feather Effect in Retail Gasoline Market : Evidence from the Czech Republic

This study investigate price adjustement in retail gasoline market in Czech Republic. Using weekly aggregated panel data of 1285 gas stations over years 2008-2013 error-corection model is estimated to provide the evidence for asymmetric pricing responses on positive and negative shocks from commodity stock market. Even though gas station operators defer reduce the retail price when stock market prices are falling, ultimate adjustment is more pronounced after stock price decrese than increase. Thus the consequent final effect on welfare is sporadic. What are the rationale for that behaviour and why does pricing policy differ across operators? These and other questions are subject to further research.

Endogenous Economic Cycles: An Agent-based Model Of Consumers’ Confidence

Abstract: The main goal of this paper is to present consumers’ confidence as an important source of cyclical economic activity. We use a simplified agent-based model with a single production sector and consumers (agents). The confidence (optimism/stableness/pessimism) spreads by interactions among consumers and according to the macro state of the economy on the lattice of consumers. The aggregate level of confidence in society reflects the consumers’ expectations about their future incomes together with their preferences between current and future consumption and determines aggregate demand for consumption spending. The aggregate supply is always formed with an attempt to satisfy aggregate demand, even at the price of growing amount of inventory goods. We found that the model is capable of generating persistent endogenous business cycles. Peaks of waves of optimism/pessimism in the society correspond to the peaks of growth rate rather than the level of economic activity. The variable marginal rate of sub- stitution between present and future consumption has a countercyclical and stabilizing influence on the growth rate of economic activity.

Keywords: ACE model; business cycle; consumer confidence.

Local perceptions of climate change impacts and migration patterns in Maledives

This study covers outcomes from our field research in Maldives in 2013. We investigated what are the most acute environmental and especially climate challenges generally and how they are perceived and evaluated by local inhabitants. We focused on how livelihood activities are affected by climate change, mainly due to sea-level rise and seasonal monsoons shifts. We also researched if migration from the country could be perceived as being a coping or adaptation strategy (or a combination) and the role of migration governance. That includes investigating whether local people are willing to move outside Maldives to neighbouring countries (such as Sri Lanka and India).
We applied quantitative questionnaires conducted mostly with ordinary people (N=347), living in the capital Malé and nearby islands. Our results suggest that among other environmental challenges, sea-level rise is perceived by both groups as being one of the key factors affecting Maldivian society and livelihoods in the future. More then 50% of respondents perceive future sea-level rise to be serious and migration from islands to other countries is a definite potential option for dealing with those changes in future. But Many other reasons play important roles (such as culture, religion, economics, and social aspects) in decision-making about migrating or not.

The marginal cost of justice: A theory of optimal use of alternative criminal procedures

Abstract: Criminal cases can be adjudicated via court trials or alternative criminal procedures, such as penal order and plea bargaining. We develop a model of optimal allocation of cases across these alternatives. The model predicts that the evidence standards—and thus the number of wrongful convictions and wrongful acquittals—fundamentally depend upon the cost structure of the criminal process as well as on the budget resources allocated to the criminal justice system. We call this phenomenon the marginal cost of justice. Our model offers explanations why the scope of plea bargaining in the United States has been traditionally broader than the scope of alternative procedures in Europe and why their use in Europe has recently expanded.

On the regularity of smooth production economies with externalities: Competitive equilibrium à la Nash

Abstract: We consider a general equilibrium model of a private ownership economy with consumption and production externalities. The choices of all agents (households and firms) may affect utility functions and production technologies. The equilibrium notion blends Arrow--Debreu with Nash, that is, agents (households and firms) maximize their goals by taking as given both commodity prices and choices of every other agent in the economy. We provide an example showing that under standard assumptions, such economies may have infinitely many equilibria. We present our model with firms' endowments following Geanakoplos, Magill, Quinzii and Drèze (1990). Firms' endowments consist of amounts of commodities held by the firms to generate receipts from sales of initially-held stocks of commodities and claims from debts, subsidies and taxes expressible in terms of them. We prove that almost all economies are regular in the space of endowments of households and firms.

Childcare arrangements: Parental preferences in the Czech Republic

The research explores how cultural values, policy arrangements and economic pressures influence the preference for childcare. We study the parents preferences towards the childcare arrangements of pre-school children living in middle-upper class and working class neighborhoods when different options were available.  The analysis is based on 40 semi-structured interviews with parents of first graders from two cities in the Czech Republic – Prague and Brno – collected within the project Parental Choice and Caring for Children in the Czech Republic and Slovakia supported by the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic.

Property rights predictability and FDI

This paper deals with the role of predictability of property rights protection in source countries on the bilateral stock of foreign direct investments allocated in OECD countries. The poor predictability undermines the transaction costs reducing and productivity enhancing effect of property rights. Empirical results suggest that lower predictability leads to increase of investments held abroad and to decrease the amount of resources allocated to investments.  The effect is driven by negative shocks when actual level of property rights protection is lower than expected. On the other hand there is no effect on FDI in the case positive shock where the lower predictability is compensated by positive effect of institutional innovations.

Do auctions improve public procurement? Evidence from the Czech Republic

Abstract: The paper explores the effect of different contract awarding procedures on the price of the contract. We provide a theoretical model that compares prices in different procurement procedures. The model predicts that 1) prices in auctions are lower than prices in negotiations and 2) prices in open procedures are lower than prices in closed procedures if and only if the procurer selects relatively inefficient bidders. Based on data from Czech public procurement, we test whether there is a significant price difference between auctions and negotiations and between closed and open procedures. The main result is that auctions and open procedures lead to significantly lower prices compared to negotiations and closed procedures.

External validity of prospect theory: Experimental estimates vs. evidence from football betting

Abstact: In this paper, we test whether the prospect theory parameters estimated from laboratory experiments correspond to behavior in betting markets. Using Czech sports betting data, we estimate the functional forms commonly used for experimental validation of prospect theory. We find that the data are best fitted if the representative bettor is risk-loving and has a close to linear weighting function. In addition to that, we show that the traditional inverse S-shaped weighting function cannot explain the observed price data, even if bettors may differ in their risk attitudes. Therefore, the observed betting behavior represents an important deviation from the prospect theory parameterization derived in laboratory experiments.

Local price competition: Evidence from the Czech retail gasoline market

Abstract: We analyze the effect of local competition on prices in the retail gasoline market in Czech Republic. Our analysis suggests that spatial clustering of gas stations of the same brand increases the equilibrium prices. Using a flexible measure of local density, we also find that the number of competing stations in the proximity of a station reduces its price and that the effect fades out with the distance. Furthermore, we demonstrate the importance of spatial competition in the Czech Republic using merger simulation.

Regulace trhu s hnědým uhlím v ČR

Abstract: Vláda ČR se vrací k otázce prolomení limitů těžby hnědého uhlí v severních Čechách. Nechává na toto téma zpracovat dílčí studii týkající se přímo trhu s hnědým uhlím a zvažuje zadání širší/obsáhlejší studie podporující konečné rozhodnutí zda a do jaké míry limity prolomit nebo neprolomit.
Neprolomení limitů by s sebou v horizontu dvou dekád přineslo transformaci energetického sektoru, protože snížení těžby by vedlo k vyšší konkurenci mezi spotřebiteli. Hlavními spotřebiteli jsou teplárny a elektrárny, které stát chápe jako strategické. Většina elektráren je v rukách ČEZ, teplárny jsou rozprostřeny mezi řádově desítky provozovatelů.
Otázkou do diskuse je, jak regulovat trh s hnědým uhlím, pokud by nabídka skutečně nedokázala pokrýt poptávku. Tedy jak rozhodnout o tom, kdo by uhlí dostal a kdo ne.

Ekonomické determinanty úspěchu stran krajní pravice a levice v zemích Evropské unie

Abstract: Aktuální úspěchy krajně pravicových a levicových stran jsou často dávány do souvislosti s ekonomickou krizí. Cílem empirické analýzy je ověřit, nakolik zhoršení výkonnosti ekonomik přispělo k nárůstu volební podpory těchto stran. Výzkum je proveden na souboru 23 zemí Evropské unie v období 1995-2012. Autoři dospěli k závěru, že v rozhodování voličů krajní pravice nehrál vývoj ekonomiky jako celku žádnou roli. Špatná výkonnost ekonomik však byla důležitou determinantou pro voliče, kteří dali svůj hlas stranám krajní levici. Citliví byli především na vývoj HDP a míry nezaměstnanosti.

Autocracies and property rights protection

Abstract: In this paper we seek an explanation of property rights protection under the rule of autocratic regimes. We hypothesise that increase in the transaction costs allows an autocrat to decrease the level of the property rights protection. We primarily focus on the effects of the transaction cost of taking collective action, which we assume is given by the state of social networks. We use regression analysis of aggregated empirical data to test the hypothesis.

Je couvert monopolistická praktika?

Abstract: Některé restaurace mají v určitých zemích zvláštní strukturu cen: pokud si zákazník objedná hlavní jídlo, zaplatí jeho cenu plus fixní poplatek, couvert. Prezentace používá data z 66 brněnských restaurací­, aby zjistila, zda je výše couvertu určena nákladově, nebo zda se jedná o monopolistický dvousložkový tarif. Přestože dotazníkové šetření­ naznačuje, že couvert je nákladová praktika, ekonometrická studie ukazuje, že se aspoň částečně jedná o monopolistickou praktiku a že restaurace jej používají k výběru zákazníka s nejvyšší ochotou platit.

Vysvětlení 360° smluv v hudebním průmyslu

Abstract: V posledních letech začali hudebníci s vydavateli uzaví­rat tzv. 360° kontrakty namí­sto běžných nahrávacích kontraktů. Při 360° kontraktu zajišťuje vydavatel nejen vydání­, ale i propagaci nahrávky. Na druhé straně vydavatel získává podíl na veškerých příjmech hudebníka, včetně příjmů z koncertů. Přednáška představuje mikroekonomický model, který vysvětluje vznik 360° kontraktů jako reakci na pokles příjmu z trhu nahrávané hudby.

Současné trendy v korupčním chování­ a odhad nákladů na daňového poplatníka

Abstract: Cílem příspěvku je snaha zachytit trendy v korupčním jednání­ a odhadnout náklady na jednoho poplatní­ka. V první­m kroku definujeme korupci, kterou obecně rozlišujeme na drobnou a velkou. Dále na statistikách ukážeme odhady rozsahu korupce v ČSR, její přičiny a současný trend. V závěru se pokusíme odhadnout, kolik na korupci tratí průměrný daňový poplatník.

Data Analysis and Modeling using LISREL

Abstract: My presentation will carry information about model development using LISREL 8.54 (Linear structural relations software) using a data gathered from 650 women shoppers from Bangalore city in India. Here I would be discussing about selection of constructs and model building technique practically demonstrating the LISREL 8.54 software. This would help understand how modeling can be used in different areas for solving higher research problems.

Vymezování­ relevantní­ho trhu v odvětví železniční­ dopravy - možnosti a problémy

Abstract: Problematika vymezení relevantního trhu je ve vyspělých zemích základem téměř každé soutěžní analýzy. Jednou z kvantitativních technik, která je využívána k tomuto účelu, je poměrně nový myšlenkový konstrukt SSNIP testu. Obsahem semináře bude představení této metodiky a následné posouzení možnosti její aplikace v českém dopravním prostředí. Součástí bude prezentace výsledků spotřebitelského šetření, které bylo provedeno v roce 2012 na železniční lince Praha-Brno, a jeho význam pro vymezení šířky relevantního trhu na této trase.

Aukce s platbou za příhoz - porovnání modelu a skutečných dat

Abstract: Aukce s platbou za příhoz jsou zajímavou inovací tradičního aukčního mechanismu. Prezentace představí princip jejich fungování a základní vlastnosti zjištěné ze sledování skutečných aukcí. Ty budou analyzovány také pomocí herně teoretického modelu, který se snaží zachytit jejich specifika. Pro vybrané předměty dražené na českém serveru Bonus.cz je model odhadnut a výsledky srovnány s reálnými daty.

Synchronizace hospodářského cyklu mezi českou ekonomikou a eurozónou - DSGE přístup

Abstract: Ztráta vlastní měnové politiky se považuje za hlavní náklad případného přistoupení ČR ke společné měně. Výše těchto nákladů závisí na synchronizaci hospodářského cyklu mezi ČR a eurozónou. V případě dokonale synchronizovaného hospodářského cyklu jsou tyto náklady minimální, v případě asynchronního chování obou ekonomik se tyto náklady zvyšují. Synchronizace hospodářského cyklu tedy patří mezi hlavní faktory ovlivňující případnou neoptimalitu společné měnové politiky. V prezentaci představím způsob zkoumání synchronizace a konvergence hospodářského cyklu mezi dvěma ekonomikami, který využívá strukturální DSGE model. Výhodou této metody oproti jiným je větší ekonomická interpretovatelnost dosažených výsledků. Tuto metodu aplikuji na případ ČR a eurozóny, s možná překvapivými výsledky.

Simulace fúzí v soutěžní politice

Abstract: V roce 2005 koupila společnost Procter and Gamble největšího výrobce mužských hygienických potřeb, společnost Gillette. Vznikl tak největší světový výrobce kosmetiky a produktů pro osobní hygienu. Protože by spojení vedlo k výraznému růstu koncentrace na trhu výroby a prodeje deodorantů, podmínil americký soutěžní úřad (FTC) tuto fúzi strukturálními závazky. Spojující se společnosti tak musely odprodat část svých obchodních aktivit na daném trhu třetím strám. Zabránil tento zásah růstu koncentrace trhu a následně tak tržní síly a spotřebitelských cen? Jaký dopad mělo toto soutěžní rozhodnutí pro spotřebitele?