Clay weekly context brief for the Economics category (ISO week 2026-W37).

Clay tracks publications from the Economics feed list. Below are recent items from this category, each with its source and a short description of what the publication covers when one is available in the source feed.

Recent publications:
1. Natural Disasters and the Nonprofit Sector
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.04136
   When natural disasters strike, individuals, communities, and even entire countries can suffer.
2. How firms export: product assignment, export platforms, and hybrid firms
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.18684
   Firms differ in manufacturing and foreign commercialization capabilities.
3. Proof of Steady-State Multiplicity in Aiyagari
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.03730
   I provide the first analytic construction of a canonical Aiyagari economy exhibiting at least three steady states.
4. Breakdown Reliability for Saturated Fixed-Effect Inference
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.06053
   Fixed-effect saturation does not itself distort conventional inference, but classical measurement error does.
5. Structured Payment in Pawnshop Borrowing: Mandates vs. Choice
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.13775
   Pawn loans offer borrowers a substantial degree of repayment flexibility in exchange for a harsh penalty in case of default: forfeit of collateral worth more than the loan amount along with any payments made toward recovery.
6. Tournaments with Managerial Discretion
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.04068
   We study tournaments with managerial discretion in hiring.
7. Online Multivariate Regularized Distributional Regression for High-dimensional Probabilistic Electricity Price Forecasting
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.02518
   Probabilistic electricity price forecasting (PEPF) is vital for short-term electricity markets, yet the multivariate nature of day-ahead prices - spanning 24 consecutive hours - remains underexplored.
8. What shifts threshold distributions in social contagions?
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.04785
   Individual thresholds in social contagions capture what fraction of others must adopt a new product or behavior before an individual adopts it.
9. A characterization of the von Neumann and Morgenstern stable set in matching markets
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.00869
   This paper studies the structure and computation of von Neumann-Morgenstern (vNM) stable sets in one-to-one matching markets.
10. Difference-in-differences with "bad controls"
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.03881
   This paper considers difference-in-differences identification strategies when the parallel trends assumption holds after conditioning on covariates that may themselves be affected by the treatment (often referred to as "bad controls").
11. Watching Trade from Space: Measuring Maritime Trade Using Satellite Imagery
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.15444
   This paper combines synthetic aperture radar imagery, nighttime lights, and port characteristics to measure port-level maritime trade using only publicly available data.
12. Bundling Complements
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.07982
   I develop a duality-based multi-dimensional screening framework with a geometric characterization of combinatorial preferences.
13. Why Do We Need Travel Behavior Theory in the Age of AI? Multiple Goal Pursuit as an Illustrative Theory
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.29145
   Travel behavior and demand modeling seeks to understand the factors that motivate transportation decisions.
14. How Wasteful is Signaling?
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.14454
   Signaling is wasteful.
15. The Endogeneity of Miscalibration: Impossibility and Escape in Scored Reporting
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.07671
   An agent's probability report is paid for twice: by a strictly proper scoring rule, and by an approval rule for the decision it triggers.
16. When the Scaffold Stays On: AI, Practice Style, and Screening in Elite Skill Formation
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.06253
   Generative AI raises short-term productivity by completing tasks learners would otherwise practice on their own.
17. Competitive Market Behavior of LLMs
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.02580
   Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly deployed as economic agents, yet there is little evidence whether LLM agents are suited for participating in market mechanisms designed for humans, and whether these mechanisms deliver desired outcomes when faced with LLM agents.
18. Breaking the Chain: Division Norms and Criminal Deterrence
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.13327
   In organized crime, membership moves fastest, deterrence capacity moves more slowly, and division norms move slowest.
19. Moment Restrictions for Nonlinear Panel Data Models with Feedback
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.12569
   Many panel data methods, while allowing for general dependence between covariates and time-invariant agent-specific heterogeneity, place strong a priori restrictions on feedback: how past outcomes, covariates, and heterogeneity map into future covariate levels.
20. Dutch Books for Language Models
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.02797
   People increasingly use language models to support life decisions.
21. Course design in the age of AI
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.18735
   I develop a model of learning-by-doing and course design, and use it to study the impacts of artificial intelligence (AI).
22. Off-policy causal estimation in networks
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.02756
   In the presence of interference, where the treatment assigned to one unit can affect the outcomes of others, many causal estimands depend on the treatment-assignment policy under which the experiment is conducted.
23. Local Media and the Shaping of Social Norms: Evidence from the Ebola outbreak
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2210.15946
   Media's influence on norms and behavior is widely recognized.
24. Waiting for Trade in Markets with Aggregate Uncertainty
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.06132
   This paper studies learning in markets with aggregate uncertainty about whether trade is efficient.
25. Estimation risk in conditional expectiles
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.02673
   We establish the consistency and asymptotic normality of a two-step estimator of conditional expectiles in the context of conditional scale models.
26. Blameocracy: Causal Rhetoric in Politics
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.06550
   This paper studies the supply and returns of causal rhetoric in politics: politicians' language linking political actions to outcomes through blame and credit.
27. Sequential Pricing Mechanisms for Surplus Division
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.02773
   Extending the Price-and-Choose (P&C) mechanism of Echenique and Nunez (2025), we propose the Price-Accept-and-Choose (PA&C) mechanism, which preserves efficiency while eliminating P&C's first-mover advantage.
28. Headline Estimation with Multiple Research Designs
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.01943
   To study a scalar parameter, a researcher may consider multiple research designs.
29. How bad is time variability for users in mobility services? An economic framework under expected- and non-expected utility
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.09142
   Time variability is a pervasive feature of mobility services and a major source of welfare loss.
30. Strategic Centrality and the Emergence of Core-Periphery Networks
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.02357
   We study a network formation game in which agents sponsor links at a linear cost in order to maximize centrality, defined as a weighted sum of walk counts with positive and weakly decreasing weights.
31. Residential Price Modeling using Spatially Validated Machine Learning Methods: A Comparison Across Geographic Contexts
   Source: econ.EM (Econometrics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.00375
   Land use and transportation infrastructure are tightly linked systems, and residential property prices play a central role in transportation planning.
32. Individualized Algorithmic Advice as a Strategic Signal on Competitive Markets
   Source: econ.GN (General Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.09454
   As algorithms increasingly mediate competitive decision-making, their influence extends beyond individual outcomes to shaping strategic market dynamics.
33. How outside options are incorporated into payoff distributions
   Source: econ.TH (Theoretical Economics)
   Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.00799
   This paper examines how outside options are incorporated into payoff distributions in games with coalition structures.

Sources in this brief: econ.EM (Econometrics); econ.GN (General Economics); econ.TH (Theoretical Economics).
Selected 33 of 472 available items for this weekly brief.