How does patent examination influence access to finance for innovative firms? We exploit a reform to the UK's patent system that introduced substantive examination to the patent application process, improving the information available to potential investors on the value of firms' patents. Using...

The key question in multi-dimensional screening problems is how prices, incentives, or marginal tax rates in one economic activity should vary with other activities. We develop a theory of tax reforms in a setting with multidimensional heterogeneity amongst agents who take two economic...

We study optimal taxation in economies with general equilibrium market clearing, where agents with privately known labor skills and entrepreneurial abilities choose between deterministic labor income and risky firm operation. The government observes labor income and realized dividends but not...

In markets for experience goods where sellers cannot build reputations, buyers may refrain from purchasing, leading to low efficiency. A product testing institution can mitigate this problem by offering buyers a noisy but informative signal about product quality for a fee before they decide...

This study examines the determinants of equity crowdfunding (ECF) campaign success in Malaysia through the lens of quality signaling theory and behavioral herding dynamics. Using a manually collected dataset of 335 completed campaigns launched on pitchIN, MyStartr, and AtaPlus between 2016 and...

The key question in multi-dimensional screening problems is how prices, incentives, or marginal tax rates in one economic activity should vary with other activities. We develop a theory of tax reforms in a setting with multidimensional heterogeneity amongst agents who take two economic...

This paper examines the potential for pre-play communication to shorten the duration of two-player incomplete-information wars of attrition. If players' types constitute costlessly verifiable information, then all types of players disclose their types, resulting in the war of attrition having...

Sticky-price firms do not merely underreact to ambiguous competitor prices - they actively lean against them. Above an inflation threshold, signals clear and firms reverse to follow. Existing information-friction models restrict weights between zero and one, ruling out this negative...

This study introduces a novel machine learning-based methodology for detecting and forecasting the strength of weak signals in the labor market, using Greece as a case study and utilizing Eurostat time series data (2000-2023). Weak signals, conceptualized as subtle anomalies within otherwise...

Awards are widely used as incentives. This paper situates awards in the broader incentives landscape and shows how the motivational value of awards can be understood through a framework that considers three sources of value: the tangible component of an award, the social signals it emits, and...

As tertiary education expands, employers increasingly rely on academic distinctions to screen among similarly qualified graduates. We study the labor-market effects of honors using administrative and survey data on Sorbonne master's graduates. We exploit France's fixed GPA thresholds for honors...

We study how public disclosure of politicians' outside income affects their behavior. We exploit a disclosure reform targeting German federal MPs and tax-return data in a differencein-differences setup using unaffected state MPs as controls. MPs increase their outside income by 24%, driven by...

In two studies with 1,275 participants, we examine how values are associated with wine cues and how these associations shape selection across private and professional contexts. Building on signaling theory and identity economics, we propose a utility framework in which choice utility is a...

This research examines Jordanian risk disclosure policies and how board size, meeting frequency, CEO duality, and board expertise affect them, exploring how political ties moderate the link between board features and risk disclosure. In 2014-2023, the research examined 90 non-financial...

Bayesian Persuasion assumes that a sender can commit ex ante to an information structure and then release the realized signal ex post. This paper asks when that commitment technology can itself be implemented. After observing the state, a sender who also observes the realized signal can suppress...

Economists and management scholars have argued that the scope of incentives to increase cooperation in organizations is limited as their use signals the prevalence of free-riding among employees. This paper tests this hypothesis experimentally, using a sample of managers and employees from a...

A pre-condition for employer learning is that signals at labor market entry do not fully reveal graduates' productivity. I model various distinct sources of signal imperfection-such as noise and multi-dimensional types-and characterize their implications for the private return to skill...

In dynamic models of asset markets with asymmetric information and endogenous screening, the anticipation of signaling through delayed sales incentivizes originators to exert greater effort ex ante. A central prediction in those models is a positive relationship between screening effort and the...

We explore the association between signaling and conducting innovation collaborations with public research organizations and firms’ revenues from firm and market novelties. Based on data from the German Community Innovation Survey 2023 and web-based indicators, firms conducting collaboration...

We study optimal auctions in a symmetric private values setting, where bidders have signaling concerns: they care about winning the object and a receivers inference about their type. Signaling concerns arise in various economic situations such as takeover bidding, charity auctions, procurement...

This study investigates the impact of child-related absence from work on the income of working mothers and fathers, addressing a significant research gap in sociology and labour economics. While previous research has established that gender and parenthood significantly influence income levels,...

Transparency initiatives are well-known tools to foster trust and empower citizens. To explain why some governments introduce them but others do not, we model these initiatives as a signal that complements the information provided by visible government performance and conduct a randomized survey...