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Essays in Experimental Economics: Labor Market Discrimination
Jibuti, Daviti ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Hamermesh, Daniel S. (referee) ; Deb, Partha (referee)
i Abstract The three chapters in this dissertation use field experiments to examine discrimination in various settings. Chapters I and II use a correspondence testing approach to study discrimination against applicants with visible tattoos in the German labor market. Previous empirical research has documented unfavorable treatment of tattooed applicants on the labor market. This may be because negative stereotypes are still associated with tattooed people, despite the increasing popularity of tattoos. However, the impact of tattoos on employment chances may be different across different occupations. Fictitious applications are sent to online job postings in the banking and IT sector. Otherwise identical applications differ only in the picture attached: in the treatment group the applicants have a visible tattoo. The extent of discrimination is measured by the difference in callback rates. The data indicates that the candidates without visible tattoos have, on average, a 13-percentage point higher callback rate in the banking sector, and in the IT sector applicants with visible tattoos are about 25% less likely to get a callback. In the third chapter we conduct a study of hiring bias on an online platform where we ask participants to make hiring decisions for a mathematically intensive task. Our findings...
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Essays in Experimental Economics: Discrimination and Education
Kudashvili, Nikoloz ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Suetens, Sigrid (referee) ; Zafar, Basit (referee)
CERGE Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education Charles University Essays in Experimental Economics: Discrimination and Education Nikoloz Kudashvili Dissertation Prague, August 2022 Abstract In the first chapter, I study the sources of discrimination. Preference-based discrimination is usually deep-seated and takes a long time to be dealt with. By contrast, statistical discrimination can be eliminated or reduced in a relatively shorter period. The latter type of discrimination is based on stereotypes, which can be overcome by providing relevant information. I conduct a field experiment to measure the extent and nature of discrimination in the Georgian land market. The experiment is designed to uncover sources of statistical discrimination due to different beliefs about foreign investors. Discrimination is measured by the difference in price offers to foreign and Georgian investors. I find that the magnitude of discrimination shrinks significantly once foreign investors signal their willingness to search and pay the lease price in advance. This suggests that discrimination is largely driven by stereotypes about search costs and the payment reliability of foreign investors - leaving no or very little preference-based discrimination. Knowing the source of discrimination can be helpful to policy...
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Essays on the Default of California Non-rated Land Secured B
Racheva, Anna ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Anderson, Ron (referee) ; Ranczyk, Joseph (referee)
This dissertation focuses on a specific area of local public finance, namely the non-rated land secured market in California as comprised primarily of the Community Facilities District (CFD) bonds. That market has become of growing importance but has not been widely studied until now. In this dissertation we analyze the performance and default experience of that market, examine its specific characteristics and determine the major factors contributing to the default of the non-rated CFD bonds. The results we present provide important new information for assessing the credit quality of the California non-rated land secured municipal bond market and should be beneficial for investors for the better understanding and analysis of that market.
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Essays in Applied Microeconomics: School Admission Mechanisms and Corporate Bankrupcy
Knot, Ondřej ; Roland, Gérard (advisor) ; Švejnar, Jan (referee) ; Filer, Randall (referee)
In my dissertation, I address two topics in applied microeconomics. First two chapters deal with the functioning of school admission mechanisms and their affects on student school choice behavior. Third chapter deals with the question of optimal bankruptcy law design. Pupil-school matching mechanisms play a critical role in the schooling system. They affect the behavior of students and-through the information they convey-also the behavior of the schools and the authorities responsible for education policy. In the first chapter (joint with Daniel Münich), using a computational simulation model, we analyze the functioning of an admission scheme used in the Czech Republic as a prototype of decentralized, ability-based admission schemes widely used in the world to assign pupils to upper-secondary schools. Our findings show large incidence of strategic misrepresentation of school preferences among applicants, large differences between revealed and trued demand, and large incidence of justified envy in the resulting matching. We point out several implication this could have for functioning of schooling systems. In the second chapter, I empirically study the behavior of students under the Czech pupil-school matching mechanism. Using district-level data on demand for public gymnasia, I find significant evidence...
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Essays on the Remittance Inflows Sent to Ukraine from Abroad
Kuntsevych, Iuliia ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Fungáčová, Zuzana (referee) ; Lubyová, Martina (referee)
This dissertation deals with topics of remittances in Ukraine and corruption in the Czech Republic. Chapter 1 analyzes remittances sent by Ukrainian emigrants to their country of origin. It explores the dependence on remittances of a household's spending on human capital, savings and donations, against the backdrop of the political situation in Ukraine in 2004. The paper also explores the effect of the political instability in Ukraine on how the households receiving remittances used them. The results of a Ukrainian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (ULMS) are used to explore households' decision to spend on human capital development, save, or donate money; depending on their political views and future expectations. The main hypothesis tested is whether the individuals who supported and/or were involved with the Revolution (``pro-orange"), and who were optimistic about the future of Ukraine after the Orange Revolution, saved/donated more money than those who did not support the Revolution `(`pro-blue-white"). In addition, the level of influence of remittances received from relatives or friends outside Ukraine on decisions to save and donate money is analyzed. The results show that the political views of respondents do not have a significant effect on decisions to save and/or donate money. However, respondents'...
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Essays on Conflicts and Human Capital Accumulation
Kovač, Dejan ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Manacorda, Marco (referee) ; Akbulut-Yuksel, Mevlude (referee)
vi Abstract In the first chapter of the dissertation, parental mortality is associated with a range of negative child outcomes. This paper studies the effect of paternal mortality on children's health and schooling outcomes using the universe of veterans' children born in Croatia, and all of the paternal deaths and injuries resulting from the 1991-1995 Croatian-Serbian war. Using linked administrative data, I find large negative effects of paternal death on high-school GPA, school absences, behaviour problems, and hospitalisations. I address potentially non-random selection into paternal death by using within-military unit differences in the extent of injury or death, essentially assuming that the members of a military unit all had similar probabilities of being killed or injured because they fought in the same battles. I am also able to shed light on an important mechanism underlying the estimated effects. Surviving spouses of those killed or injured were well compensated, so that the death of a father did not have a negative effect on household incomes. I find that a death or injury that occurred during the in-utero period has much larger effects than a death or injury in early childhood, suggesting that much of the negative effect is due to maternal stress In the second chapter, we answer the following...
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Essays on the Remittance Inflows Sent to Ukraine from Abroad
Kuntsevych, Iuliia ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Fungáčová, Zuzana (referee) ; Lubyová, Martina (referee)
This dissertation deals with topics of remittances in Ukraine and corruption in the Czech Republic. Chapter 1 analyzes remittances sent by Ukrainian emigrants to their country of origin. It explores the dependence on remittances of a household's spending on human capital, savings and donations, against the backdrop of the political situation in Ukraine in 2004. The paper also explores the effect of the political instability in Ukraine on how the households receiving remittances used them. The results of a Ukrainian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (ULMS) are used to explore households' decision to spend on human capital development, save, or donate money; depending on their political views and future expectations. The main hypothesis tested is whether the individuals who supported and/or were involved with the Revolution (``pro-orange"), and who were optimistic about the future of Ukraine after the Orange Revolution, saved/donated more money than those who did not support the Revolution `(`pro-blue-white"). In addition, the level of influence of remittances received from relatives or friends outside Ukraine on decisions to save and donate money is analyzed. The results show that the political views of respondents do not have a significant effect on decisions to save and/or donate money. However, respondents'...
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Essays on cost-containment measures in health care
Hromádková, Eva ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Deb, Partha (referee) ; Kaestner, Robert (referee)
The topic of this dissertation is cost-containment measures in health care and their effects on various aspects of a patient's behavior. The dissertation consists of three chapters. In the first chapter I assess the ability of gatekeeping restrictions within insurance plans to control the utilization of medical care through their influence on the choice of the initial provider. Empirical results are based on individual-level utilization panel data from the 2001-2006 US Medical Expenditure Panel Survey. I find only small differences between the types of initial provider chosen by individuals enrolled in gatekeeping and non-gatekeeping plans. Further, within gatekeeping plans, 21 percent of patients self-refer to specialists. Taken together, these findings imply that the intended cost-containment of gatekeeping - restriction of the utilization of specialist care - is surprisingly weak. The second and third chapters make use of a unique natural experiment - a policy change that implemented patient cost-sharing in the Czech Republic starting in 2008. In the second chapter, my coauthor and I investigate the effects of the introduction of lump sum copayments on the utilization of prescription drugs by elderly patients. We find that after the introduction of copayments the number of...
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Economic Impact of Voting and Procurement Rules
Palguta, Ján ; Filer, Randall (advisor) ; Guriev, Sergei (referee) ; Gylfason, Thorvaldur (referee)
In the first chapter of this dissertation, I examine the impact of increasing the number of parties in political representation bodies on public spending and selection of politically-connected suppliers in public procurement. By exploiting plausibly exogenous variation in the vote share of parties near the representation threshold in Czech municipal elections, I find that municipalities having more parties represented in their councils allocate fewer procurements to corporate donors of political parties, attract more suppliers to procurement tenders and reduce procurement prices. The impact of broader party representation is pronounced in politically competitive councils, but is not related to whether marginally represented parties are incumbent or not. The second chapter presents evidence of how policies that create opportunities to avoid open competition in procurement lead to the manipulation of procurement values. We exploit a policy reform in which public bodies were given autonomy to preselect potential contractors below newly defined discretionary thresholds. Manipulation is revealed through bunching of procurements just below the thresholds in construction works and services, and to a lesser degree, in goods. Among manipulated contracts, we document a threefold increase in the probability...
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Three Essays on Post-Conflict Reintegration
Levely, Ian Vandemark ; Bauer, Michal (advisor) ; Filer, Randall (referee) ; Van Koten, Silvester (referee) ; Kovařík, Jaromír (referee)
Three Essays on Post-Conflict Reintegration Abstract This dissertation consists of three essays which explore the effects of conflict and the post- conflict reintegration process, each using a different methodology to study a different facet of these issues, including an analysis of survey data, an artefactual economic experiment conducted in the field, and an laboratory experiment. The research presented here demonstrates how these methods complement one another in contributing to our understanding of how conflict affects individuals' well-being and behavior. In the first essay, I analyze an existing data set from a survey of ex-combatants in Liberia to estimate the effect of a reintegration program for former soldiers on participants' income and employment status, using propensity score matching to account for self-selection bias. The second chapter also deals with the reintegration of ex-soldiers, but focuses on social capital, using a set of experiments, including trust and dictator games, to study the effects of forced military service for a rebel group on social capital in northern Uganda. In the third chapter, we study cooperation within and between groups in the laboratory, by modeling conflict with an inter- group Tullock rent-seeking contest, and manipulating groups' conflict history to measure...
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