We develop a model that fleshes out, extends, and modifies existing models of reference dependent preferences and loss aversion while accommodating most of the evidence motivating these models. Our approach makes reference-dependent theory more broadly applicable by avoiding some of the ways...

Many people believe in the "Law of Small Numbers," exaggerating the degree to which a small sample resembles the population from which it is drawn. To model this, I assume that a person exaggerates the likelihood that a short sequence of i.i.d. signals resembles the long-run rate at which those...

Previous papers on time-inconsistent procrastination assume projects are completed once begun. We develop a model in which a person chooses whether and when to complete each stage of a long-term project. In addition to procrastination in starting a project, a naive person might undertake costly...

Within the expected-utility framework, the only explanation for risk aversion is that the utility function for wealth is concave: A person has lower marginal utility for additional wealth when she is wealthy than when she is poor. This paper provides a theorem showing that expected-utility...

This paper assesses and analyses Thorstein Veblin's works that critique the scientific basis of Economics.

The eighteenth-century introduction of the scientific method of the natural sciences to the study of social phenomena draws a line between moral philosophy Ethat aspect of ancient and medieval philosophy that dealt with social issues Eand the social sciences as known today. From the onset, the...

Bruce Caldwell (2004) “Hayek’s Challenge” tells the story of the evolution of Hayek’s methodological standpoint. In Caldwell’s account, Hayek is driven by the desire to identify a truly scientific approach to the study of society as a complex adaptive order which at the same time will...

The various subdisciplines within the emerging ‘new institutionalism’ in economics all draw special attention to the legal-political constraints within which economic and political agents choose and therefore represent a return of economics to its appropriate legal foundations. By changing...

A good deal of recent discussion among social scientists concerned with immigration is about the disadvantages faced by immigrants who enter the U. S. labor force with much-lower levels of skills than those possessed by the typical native white worker. Among contemporary immigrant groups, by far...

In 1913, the Cambridge logician W.E. Johnson published a famous article on demand theory in the Economic Journal. Although Johnson’s treatment of the subject strongly resembles the analysis set forth by Pareto in the Manual of Political Economy, Johnson does not cite the Italian economist....