Lars P. Syll

The randomization tools economists use Preference-based discrimination is based on the fact that, for example, employers, customers, or colleagues have a dislike for those who belong to a certain group. Such discrimination can lead to wage differences between discriminated and non-discriminated groups. However, competition can undermine these wage differences, as non-discriminatory employers will make greater profits and drive discriminatory employers out...

He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother (personal) .[embedded content] In loving memory of my older brother Peter Pålsson (1955-2001) But in dreams, I can hear your name. And in dreams, We will meet again. When the seas and mountains fall And we come to end of days, In the dark I hear a call Calling me there I will go there And back again.

Contrary to the tenets of orthodox economists, contemporary research suggests that, rather than seeking always to maximise our personal gain, humans still remain reasonably altruistic and selfless. Nor is it clear that the endless accumulation of wealth always makes us happier. And when we do make decisions, especially those to do with matters of principle, we seem not to engage in the sort of rational “utility-maximizing” calculus that orthodox economic models take as a...

Diskriminering — en fråga om preferenser eller information? Preferensbaserad diskriminering bygger på att exempelvis arbetsgivare, kunder eller medarbetare hyser en motvilja mot dem som tillhör en viss grupp. Sådan diskriminering kan leda till löneskillnader mellan diskriminerade och icke-diskriminerade grupper. Löneskillnaderna kan emellertid undermineras av konkurrens, som gör att arbetsgivare utan diskriminerande preferenser kommer att göra större vinst...

Ed Leamer’s Tantalus on the Road to Asymptopia is one of my favourite critiques of econometrics, and for the benefit of those who are not versed in the econometric jargon, this handy summary gives the gist of it in plain English: Most work in econometrics is — still — made on the assumption that the researcher has a theoretical model that is ‘true.’ Based on this belief of having a correct specification for an econometric model or running a regression, one proceeds as if the...

Non-manipulability and the limits of potential outcome models The Potential Outcome framework starts by defining the potential outcomes with reference to a manipulation. In doing so it makes a distinction between attributes or pre-treatment variables which are fixed for the units in the population, and causes, which are potentially manipulable. This is related to the connection between causal statements and randomized experiments. The causes are...

Come give me love .[embedded content] Det är en tröst att Teds och Kenneths underbara texter och musik fortfarande finns kvar. Men att de inte vandrar vid min sida är svårt att förlika sig med. Första gången jag hörde Ted var jag femton år gammal. Under mina tonår var han en stor idol. Det kommer han alltid att vara.

Econometricians would like to project the image of agricultural experimenters who divide a farm into a set of smaller plots of land and who select randomly the level of fertilizer to be used on each plot. If some plots are assigned a certain amount of fertilizer while others are assigned none, then the difference between the mean yield of the fertilized plots and the mean yield of the unfertilized plots is a measure of the effect of fertilizer on agricultural yields. The...

.[embedded content] Ich glaub’ das zu träumen / die Mauer / Im Rücken war kalt / Die Schüsse reissen die Luft / Doch wir küssen / Als ob nichts geschieht / Und die Scham fiel auf ihre Seite / Oh, wir können sie schlagen / Für alle Zeiten / Dann sind wir Helden / Nur diesen Tag

Interpreting confounder and modifier coefficients The problem with a table presenting multiple estimated effect measures from the same model (“Table 2”) is that it encourages the reader to interpret all these estimates in the same way, typically as total-effect estimates. As illustrated above, the interpretation of a confounder effect estimate may be different than for the exposure effect estimate. Of course, it is possible that some secondary reported...