Hypothetical Bias

I'm #13! (i.e., self-love)

My paper, "Combining WTP and behavior data with limited information," formerly ranked the #3 download at Resource and Energy Economics had fallen to #18 in the third quarter of 2005. But in the 4th quarter report of the Top 25 "hottest articles" in Resource and Energy Economics it surged back to #13!

Bracketadamuses

From the WSJ's Daily Fix (3/28):

Yes Virginia, there are people in this great big land whose Final Four brackets are intact -- George Mason and all.

Of ESPN.com's three million-odd online brackets, four -- four! -- picked GMU, LSU, UCLA and Florida. Of more than a million filled out for Yahoo Sports, one had those teams. One! (CBS Sportsline bracket-fillers? Zero for two million.)

In the New York Times, Michael S. Schmidt tracks down one of the Bracketadamuses -- 46-year-old Omaha software engineer Russell Pleasant. So how'd he know GMU would be in the running for a glass slipper? He meant to pick George Washington, sent packing by Duke in the second round.

Oh.

"One night I was watching some of the games, and I saw George Washington," Mr. Pleasant recalls, um, pleasantly. "I said that team is good; I like them. … Man, all those Georges. I knew they were all from D.C. I like Georgetown, too."

Cities overpay for their pro teams

My name in lights! er, print. From the WaPo (Striking Out [scroll down]):

Here's more evidence that, when cities play ball with professional sports teams, they end up losing big.

Economists Bruce K. Johnson of Centre College in Kentucky, Michael J. Mondello of Florida State University and John C. Whitehead of Appalachian State University found the city of Jacksonville paid far more to attract a National Football League franchise to the city than residents say the team is worth to them.

These researchers surveyed local residents and found taxpayers were willing to spend about $25 million in taxes to keep the team in town -- only about a fifth of the $121 million in subsidies that the city actually spent to renovate the local stadium for the team.

That makes Jacksonville the third city in a row, after Minneapolis and Pittsburgh, where researchers have found that city fathers overpaid for their pro teams, they concluded.

Will the District make it 0-for-4?

Terrorism insurance

Twice in the past year, Muhammad Said has survived assassination attempts that left his car riddled with bullets. He works part time as a bodyguard for his father, a Baghdad city councilman, and helps a friend who has contracts with the American military. Both are very dangerous jobs.

So last month, Mr. Said, a slim, baby-faced 23-year-old, did what a small but growing number of Iraqis are doing: He walked into the offices of the Iraq Insurance Company and bought a terrorism insurance policy. It looked like an ordinary life insurance policy, but with a one-page rider adding coverage for "the following dangers: 1) explosions caused by weapons of war and car bombs; 2) assassinations; 3) terrorist attacks."

It cost him 125,000 dinars, about $90. Mr. Said paid more than most people because of his risky occupation. The payout, if he dies, is five million dinars, around $3,500, or about what an Iraqi policeman earns in a year.

Source: New Business Blooms ...

Cost of the Iraq War

Two papers on the cost of the Iraq war, both recently in the news, I think, have appeared in The Economists' Voice:

• The High Cost of The Iraq War, Joseph Stiglitz
• The Economic Cost of the Iraq War, Scott Wallsten

The downloads are free, but you must register first.