This study models the importance respondents place on saving for retirement as a function of time preference using a sample of 6812 undergraduate and graduate students. Individual time preference is measured by comparing dollar values over time and through a combination of intertemporal behaviors that may be the most theoretically appropriate measurement of the discount rate for utility over ti...

A key open question in economics is the practical, portable modeling of bounded rationality. In this short note, I report ongoing progress that is more fully developed elsewhere. I present some results from a new model in which the decision-maker builds a simplified representation of the world. The model allows to model boundedly rational dynamic programming in a parsimonious and quite tractabl...

We examine a model that blends the neoclassical theory of investment with an intertemporal efficiency wage model with turnover costs. Investment decisions in capital are associated with the allocation of labor and the determination of efficiency wages. The model relates Tobin’s q to efficiency wages and, in particular, to the Solow condition. It provides a general framework to analyze firm’s in...

We construct an intertemporal model of rent-maximizing behaviour on the part of a timber harvester under potentially multi-dimensional risk as well as geographical heterogeneity. Subsequently, we use recursive methods (in particular, the method of dynamic programming) to characterize the optimal policy function, the rent-maximizing timber-harvesting profile. One noteworthy feature of our applic...

Intertemporal budget policies are assessed in an endogenous growth model with nominal assets. The paper provides relative rankings of policies and policy instruments in terms of the tax liabilities of the private sector necessary to guarantee intertemporal government budget solvency and in terms of the welfare of the representative agent. The role of nominal assets is shown to be of relative im...

We consider the evolutionary basis of intertemporal choice and time discounting, in particular, when there are intergenerational transfers. We show that the notion of “reproductive value” from biology provides the utility criterion for a parent to optimize the allocation of resources between transfers to offspring and for promoting her own survival to the next period. This optimization has a na...

This paper studies determinants of project choice in online crowdsourcing contests using a unique dataset from the world’s largest competitive software development portal. Particular attention is given to the strategic roles of learning and forward-looking behavior in influencing contestants’ decisions. We use a structural dynamic discrete programming (DDP) model to conduct our analysis and ado...

The paper describes a system for 6 degree of freedom intertemporal stochastic mapping of an unknown environment using only odometery and omni-directional vision. The method uses a feature-based stochastic map where vanishing points and line segments are extracted and tracked in the omni-directional video sequence. To track lines, we use a novel dynamic programming approach to improve ambiguity ...

Similar to research on risky choice, the traditional analysis of intertemporal choice takes the view that an individual behaves so as to maximize the discounted sum of all future utilities. The well-known Allais paradox contradicts the fundamental postulates of maximizing the expected value or utility of a risky option. We describe a violation of the law of diminishing marginal utility as well ...