New IZA DPs -- Behavior & Preferences
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IZA DP Alerts
May 27, 2026, 9:09:23 AMMay 27
to it...@umich.edu
New IZA Discussion Papers brought to you by IZA@LISER
Dear Italo Gutierrez,
These new IZA Discussion Papers are now available online.
DP 18489 - Forestra/Megalokonomou/Vlassopoulos:
Crisis Narratives and Judicial Enforcement: Evidence from the Greek Fiscal Crisis
DP 18541 - Breulet/Grund:
Reviewed at Work, Restless at Night? Performance Appraisals and Sleep Satisfaction
DP 18554 - Astruc--Le Souder/Bargain/Knecht:
How Everyday Threats Undermine Trust and Hope: Experimental Evidence
DP 18557 - Gorodnichenko/Kudlyak/Lobozynska/Skomorovych/Vladychyn/Kovalyuk/Snovydovych:
Risk Preferences and the Willingness to Relocate to Danger: Evidence from Wartime Ukraine
DP 18602 - Kosar/Melcangi:
Subjective Uncertainty and the Marginal Propensity to Consume
Please find the abstracts and download links below.
IZA DP No. 18489
Alessandra Forestra, Rigissa Megalokonomou, Michael Vlassopoulos:
Crisis Narratives and Judicial Enforcement: Evidence from the Greek Fiscal Crisis
Abstract:
This paper investigates whether crisis narratives affect how the judiciary handles tax evasion. We study this question in the context of the Greek debt crisis, in which tax evasion was publicly blamed for the fiscal collapse, and judges themselves experienced substantial salary cuts as part of the resulting austerity programme. Using a novel dataset compiled from Greek Supreme Court rulings between 2006 and 2014, we compare tax evasion appeals with appeals in other serious crimes not directly related to the fiscal crisis, such as homicide and rape, in a difference-in-differences framework. We find that the probability that the Supreme Court rejects tax-evasion appeals increases by about 25 percentage points relative to these control offences after January 2010—about a 43% increase relative to the pre-crisis baseline. Effects are larger in months with greater public attention to tax evasion, as measured by Google Trends, suggesting a role for salience. Our findings suggest tha t crisis narratives, particularly when coupled with personal economic shocks to judges, can influence the judicial treatment of tax offences.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18489.pdf
IZA DP No. 18541
Anaïs Breulet, Christian Grund:
Reviewed at Work, Restless at Night? Performance Appraisals and Sleep Satisfaction
Abstract:
Performance appraisals are one of the most widely used human resource management practices. This study investigates the relationship between performance appraisals and sleep satisfaction using large-scale, representative data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP). Sleep satisfaction is used as a comprehensive measure of perceived restfulness and sleep quality. The results show that performance appraisals are negatively associated with sleep satisfaction, even after controlling for a wide range of socio-demographic, work-related, and personality characteristics. This negative relationship is particularly pronounced when evaluations are tied to short-term financial outcomes. These findings highlight that performance evaluation processes may generate psychological pressure that undermines employee´s ability to rest and recover.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18541.pdf
IZA DP No. 18554
Mael Astruc--Le Souder, Olivier B. Bargain, Niclas Knecht:
How Everyday Threats Undermine Trust and Hope: Experimental Evidence
Abstract:
Trust in others is essential for the well-functioning of societies. While economists often study its longer-term determinants, short-term fluctuation may be equally critical, particularly during pivotal moments (e.g, elections) or periods requiring social cohesion (e.g., pandemics). Hope plays a similarly vital role in shaping individual well-being, behavior, and societal stability. We investigate the short-run plasticity of trust and hope by reactivating threat exposure similar to that encountered in media coverage. In an online experiment, individuals are randomly exposed to short videos depicting terrorism, natural disasters, or war. Both social trust and hope are significantly malleable, declining by 12%-28% of a standard deviation (across models) in response to these brief interventions. We observe strong heterogeneity in these effects, particularly along lines of political orientation and social media usage, and explore their co-movements with basic emotions. Our findings suggest that routine exposure to threatening content can destabilize the emotional underpinnings of trust and hope, with potential implications for key individual and collective behaviors.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18554.pdf
IZA DP No. 18557
Yuriy Gorodnichenko, Marianna Kudlyak, Sophia Lobozynska, Iryna Skomorovych, Ulyana Vladychyn, Andriy Kovalyuk, Iryna Snovydovych:
Risk Preferences and the Willingness to Relocate to Danger: Evidence from Wartime Ukraine
Abstract:
We elicit reservation wage premia for relocating to two Ukrainian cities, using a household survey conducted in mid-April to mid-July 2024 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine: high-risk Kharkiv (near the frontline) and moderate-risk Kyiv. Risk tolerance is a strong predictor of willingness to move to Kharkiv - the most risk-averse have roughly half the odds of the most risk-tolerant - but matters much less for Kyiv. This asymmetry is difficult to reconcile with the hypothesis that risk tolerance merely proxies for general mobility preferences. Separately estimating the elasticity of intertemporal substitution (EIS~0.04), we find that including it renders risk tolerance insignificant for Kyiv but not for Kharkiv - a pattern illuminated by the Epstein-Zin separation of risk aversion and the EIS: risk aversion adds predictive power only when danger is high, while the EIS operates equally for both cities as a common relocation-cost channel. The very low EIS implies that reloca tion incentives structured as future benefits may be ineffective; frontloaded subsidies are more likely to influence behavior.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18557.pdf
IZA DP No. 18602
Gizem Kosar, Davide Melcangi:
Subjective Uncertainty and the Marginal Propensity to Consume
Abstract:
Earnings uncertainty is central to most heterogeneous-household models. Yet, there is little evidence on how subjective uncertainty, the uncertainty individuals actually perceive, is related to consumption behavior. Using unique data from the Survey of Consumer Expectations, we show that the marginal propensity to consume (MPC) is increasing and concave in individual–specific earnings growth uncertainty. In the workhorse consumption–savings model augmented with risk heterogeneity, MPCs decline with earnings uncertainty, contrary to the empirical evidence. We pinpoint which mechanisms, central to the model, create this disconnect. Embedding empirically disciplined biased beliefs in the canonical model reconciles the theory with the empirical findings.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18602.pdf
These new IZA Discussion Papers are now available online.
DP 18489 - Forestra/Megalokonomou/Vlassopoulos:
Crisis Narratives and Judicial Enforcement: Evidence from the Greek Fiscal Crisis
DP 18541 - Breulet/Grund:
Reviewed at Work, Restless at Night? Performance Appraisals and Sleep Satisfaction
DP 18554 - Astruc--Le Souder/Bargain/Knecht:
How Everyday Threats Undermine Trust and Hope: Experimental Evidence
DP 18557 - Gorodnichenko/Kudlyak/Lobozynska/Skomorovych/Vladychyn/Kovalyuk/Snovydovych:
Risk Preferences and the Willingness to Relocate to Danger: Evidence from Wartime Ukraine
DP 18602 - Kosar/Melcangi:
Subjective Uncertainty and the Marginal Propensity to Consume
Please find the abstracts and download links below.
IZA DP No. 18489
Alessandra Forestra, Rigissa Megalokonomou, Michael Vlassopoulos:
Crisis Narratives and Judicial Enforcement: Evidence from the Greek Fiscal Crisis
Abstract:
This paper investigates whether crisis narratives affect how the judiciary handles tax evasion. We study this question in the context of the Greek debt crisis, in which tax evasion was publicly blamed for the fiscal collapse, and judges themselves experienced substantial salary cuts as part of the resulting austerity programme. Using a novel dataset compiled from Greek Supreme Court rulings between 2006 and 2014, we compare tax evasion appeals with appeals in other serious crimes not directly related to the fiscal crisis, such as homicide and rape, in a difference-in-differences framework. We find that the probability that the Supreme Court rejects tax-evasion appeals increases by about 25 percentage points relative to these control offences after January 2010—about a 43% increase relative to the pre-crisis baseline. Effects are larger in months with greater public attention to tax evasion, as measured by Google Trends, suggesting a role for salience. Our findings suggest tha t crisis narratives, particularly when coupled with personal economic shocks to judges, can influence the judicial treatment of tax offences.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18489.pdf
IZA DP No. 18541
Anaïs Breulet, Christian Grund:
Reviewed at Work, Restless at Night? Performance Appraisals and Sleep Satisfaction
Abstract:
Performance appraisals are one of the most widely used human resource management practices. This study investigates the relationship between performance appraisals and sleep satisfaction using large-scale, representative data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP). Sleep satisfaction is used as a comprehensive measure of perceived restfulness and sleep quality. The results show that performance appraisals are negatively associated with sleep satisfaction, even after controlling for a wide range of socio-demographic, work-related, and personality characteristics. This negative relationship is particularly pronounced when evaluations are tied to short-term financial outcomes. These findings highlight that performance evaluation processes may generate psychological pressure that undermines employee´s ability to rest and recover.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18541.pdf
IZA DP No. 18554
Mael Astruc--Le Souder, Olivier B. Bargain, Niclas Knecht:
How Everyday Threats Undermine Trust and Hope: Experimental Evidence
Abstract:
Trust in others is essential for the well-functioning of societies. While economists often study its longer-term determinants, short-term fluctuation may be equally critical, particularly during pivotal moments (e.g, elections) or periods requiring social cohesion (e.g., pandemics). Hope plays a similarly vital role in shaping individual well-being, behavior, and societal stability. We investigate the short-run plasticity of trust and hope by reactivating threat exposure similar to that encountered in media coverage. In an online experiment, individuals are randomly exposed to short videos depicting terrorism, natural disasters, or war. Both social trust and hope are significantly malleable, declining by 12%-28% of a standard deviation (across models) in response to these brief interventions. We observe strong heterogeneity in these effects, particularly along lines of political orientation and social media usage, and explore their co-movements with basic emotions. Our findings suggest that routine exposure to threatening content can destabilize the emotional underpinnings of trust and hope, with potential implications for key individual and collective behaviors.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18554.pdf
IZA DP No. 18557
Yuriy Gorodnichenko, Marianna Kudlyak, Sophia Lobozynska, Iryna Skomorovych, Ulyana Vladychyn, Andriy Kovalyuk, Iryna Snovydovych:
Risk Preferences and the Willingness to Relocate to Danger: Evidence from Wartime Ukraine
Abstract:
We elicit reservation wage premia for relocating to two Ukrainian cities, using a household survey conducted in mid-April to mid-July 2024 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine: high-risk Kharkiv (near the frontline) and moderate-risk Kyiv. Risk tolerance is a strong predictor of willingness to move to Kharkiv - the most risk-averse have roughly half the odds of the most risk-tolerant - but matters much less for Kyiv. This asymmetry is difficult to reconcile with the hypothesis that risk tolerance merely proxies for general mobility preferences. Separately estimating the elasticity of intertemporal substitution (EIS~0.04), we find that including it renders risk tolerance insignificant for Kyiv but not for Kharkiv - a pattern illuminated by the Epstein-Zin separation of risk aversion and the EIS: risk aversion adds predictive power only when danger is high, while the EIS operates equally for both cities as a common relocation-cost channel. The very low EIS implies that reloca tion incentives structured as future benefits may be ineffective; frontloaded subsidies are more likely to influence behavior.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18557.pdf
IZA DP No. 18602
Gizem Kosar, Davide Melcangi:
Subjective Uncertainty and the Marginal Propensity to Consume
Abstract:
Earnings uncertainty is central to most heterogeneous-household models. Yet, there is little evidence on how subjective uncertainty, the uncertainty individuals actually perceive, is related to consumption behavior. Using unique data from the Survey of Consumer Expectations, we show that the marginal propensity to consume (MPC) is increasing and concave in individual–specific earnings growth uncertainty. In the workhorse consumption–savings model augmented with risk heterogeneity, MPCs decline with earnings uncertainty, contrary to the empirical evidence. We pinpoint which mechanisms, central to the model, create this disconnect. Embedding empirically disciplined biased beliefs in the canonical model reconciles the theory with the empirical findings.
https://docs.iza.org/dp18602.pdf
IZA DP Alerts | www.iza.org
If you have trouble downloading the papers, or for any other questions regarding the IZA Discussion Paper Series, please contact iza...@liser.lu.
IZA@LISER Network
Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)
11, Porte des Sciences, L-4366 Esch-sur-Alzette / Belval
Privacy Policy | Manage your subscriptions
If you have trouble downloading the papers, or for any other questions regarding the IZA Discussion Paper Series, please contact iza...@liser.lu.
IZA@LISER Network
Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)
11, Porte des Sciences, L-4366 Esch-sur-Alzette / Belval
Privacy Policy | Manage your subscriptions
IZA DP Alerts
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