The most familiar interpretation for the large and unpredictable swings that characterize common stock price indices is that price changes represent the efficient discounting of quot;new informationquot; It is remarkable given the popularity of this interpretation that it has never been...

Real stock prices seem to overreact to changes in long-term interest rates. That is, real stock prices drop when long-term interest rates rise (and rise when they fall) more than would be implied by a rational expectations present value model where expectations are based on a vector...

Behavioral economics has played a fundamental role historically in innovation in economic institutions, even long before behavioral economics was recognized as a discipline. Examples from history, notably that of the invention of workers' compensation, illustrate this point. Though scholarly...

The establishment recently of risk management vehicles for home prices is described. The potential value of such vehicles, once they become established, is seen in consideration of the inefficiency of the market for single family homes. Institutional changes that might derive from the...

The life-cycle accounts proposal for Social Security reform has been justified by its proponents using a number of different arguments, but these arguments generally involve the assumption of a high likelihood of good returns on the accounts. A simulation is undertaken to estimate the...