Jonathan A. Libgober
Assistant Professor of Economics, University of Southern California
Welcome to my website!
I am a microeconomic theorist studying the acquisition, transmission or dynamics of information. I am particularly focused on the design of optimal policies, and am interested in both pure and applied theory.
I received my PhD in Economics from Harvard in May 2018. I have been at USC since the start of 2019.
Curriculum Vitae
Contact me for more info
(Last update: January 26th, 2021)
Working Papers
Comments welcome!
Evolutionarily Stable (Mis)specifications: Theory and Applications
with Kevin He NEW PAPER!
We introduce a selection criterion on behavioral biases in environments with learning, and show that it need not select for a bias-free worldview in some common applications.
See a recorded presentation of it here.
Machine Learning for Strategic Inference
with In-Koo Cho NEW VERSION!
We exhibit an algorithm which ensures that agents play a Bayesian best reply (approximately).
Research Registries: Taking Stock and Looking Forward
with Eliot Abrams and John A. List NEW VERSION!
We empirically study pre-registration patterns in economics, and discuss the implications of policies related to the timing of registration. The Mathematica notebook referenced in the Appendix can be found here.
Iterative Weak Learnability and Multi-Class AdaBoost
with In-Koo Cho NEW PAPER!
We propose a classification algorithm with generalizes AdaBoost to a multi-class, which requires an intuitive and simple to check condition to be valid.
Unlearning via Retractions
with Duarte Gonçalves and Jack Willis (Draft to be posted shortly--available upon request)
We experimentally document the distinct ways in which retractions of information influence beliefs.
Publications
I heard it was this or perish...
False Positives
and Transparency
American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, Forthcoming
Lack of transparency over research methods can induce bias. But the incentive to de-bias may lead to more informative experiments.
The model introduced is one of costly communication with partial (sender) commitment.
Informational Robustness in Intertemporal Pricing
(with Xiaosheng Mu)
Review of Economic Studies,
Forthcoming
Constant price paths deliver the optimal profit guarantee when a seller does not know how buyers learn about a product.
Formally, this paper introduces an informationally robust approach into the dynamic pricing literature.
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