Economists have long been ambivalent about whether the discipline should focus on the analysis of markets or should be concerned with social interactions more generally. Recently the discipline has sought to broaden its scope while maintaining the rigor of modern economic analysis. Major theoretical developments in game theory, the economics of the family, and endogenous growth theory have taken place. Economists have also performed new empirical research on social interactions, but the empirical literature does not show progress comparable to that achieved in economic theory. This paper examines why and discusses how economists might make sustained contributions to the empirical analysis of social interactions.

have provided excellent research assistance. I thank Stephen Machin and three referees for

This paper focusses on survey expectations and discusses their uses for testing and modeling of expectations. Alternative models of expectations formation are reviewed and the importance of allowing for heterogeneity of expectations is emphasized. A weak form of the rational expectations hypothesis which focusses on average expectations rather than individual expectations is advanced. Other models of expectations formation, such as the adaptive expectations hypothesis, are briefly discussed. Testable implications of rational and extrapolative models of expectations are reviewed and the importance of the loss function for the interpretation of the test results is discussed. The paper then provides an account of the various surveys of expectations, reviews alternative methods of quantifying the qualitative surveys, and discusses the use of aggregate and individual survey responses in the analysis of expectations and for forecasting.

Abstract This article introduces a new source of survey data, namely the Bank of England Survey of External Forecasters. The survey collects point and density forecasts of inflation and GDP growth, and hence offers the opportunity of constructing direct measures of uncertainty. We present a simple statistical framework in which to define and interrelate measures of uncertainty and disagreement. The resulting measures are compared with other direct measures of uncertainty, nationally and internationally. A significant, sustained reduction in inflation uncertainty followed the 1997 granting of operational independence to the Bank of England to pursue a monetary policy of inflation targeting.

Household surveys often elicit respondents' intentions or predictions of future outcomes. The survey questions may ask respondents to choose among a selection of (ordered) response categories. If panel data or repeated cross-sections are available, predictions may be compared with realized outcomes. The categorical nature of the predictions data, however, complicates this comparison. Generalizing previous findings on binary intentions data, we derive bounds on features of the empirical distribution of realized outcomes under the "best-case" hypothesis that respondents have rational expectations and that reported expectations are best predictions of future outcomes. These bounds are shown to depend on the assumed model of how respondents form their "best prediction" when forced to choose among (ordered) categories. An application to data on income change expectations and realized income changes illustrates how alternative response models may be used to test the best-case hyp...

We test for precautionary saving and excess sensitivity of consumption to predicted income growth using a 1989-93 panel survey of Italian households that has measures of subjective income and inflation expectations. These expectations provide a powerful instrument for predicting income growth. The empirical specification controls for predictable changes in labor supply and allows a fairly general specification for the stochastic structure of the forecast error. We find that consumption growth is positively correlated with the expected variance of income and uncorrelated with predicted income growth. Overall, the results support the precautionary saving model. Key words: Subjective expectations, precautionary saving, excess sensitivity Jel Classification: E21 We thank two anonymous referees, the editor, Chris Carroll, Angus Deaton, Sydney Ludvigson and seminar participants at Dartmouth College, the New York Fed and Princeton University for helpful comments. We retain responsibility f...

Abstract: This paper investigates if decisions to drop out of high school are sub-optimal, and whether students benefit from policies, such as a minimum school leaving age, that oblige them to finish school beyond the time they choose on their own. I use changes in minimum school-leaving laws in Great Britain and Ireland, which were remarkably influential, to measure pecuniary and non-pecuniary gains from education. I find, similar to previous studies, students compelled to take an extra year of schooling experienced an average increase of 12 percent in annual earnings. I also find significant effects from education on health, leisure and labor activities, and subjective measures of well-being, which hold up against a wide array of specification checks. Comparing these estimates with intertemporal models of educational choice, the main conclusion of this paper is that it is very difficult to justify an optimal decision to drop out early without the presence of time inconsistent preferences, misguided expectations, or disutility from identifying with a social group that considers dropping out the norm. To prefer dropping out early, the one-year cost from attending school would have to exceed a dropout’s maximum lifetime annual earnings by a factor of five to seven.

According to rational choice theory, people will choose their careers, level of work effort or investment based in part on their expectations of success. But are people’s expectations of their likelihood of success accurate? Evidence accumulated by psychologists suggest that on average people underestimate their risks and overestimate their abilities relative to others. We test for such optimistic bias in experiments where people must predict their relative or absolute success in incentivebased verbal and maximization contests. We ask subjects to provide initial and revised point estimates of their success rates, either hypothetically or with a scoring rule that rewards forecast accuracy. We then passively measure the quantity and quality of subjects ’ efforts and subsequent outcomes. Bias in forecasts is evaluated at the aggregate level as done by psychologists, but also at the individual level using realized outcomes. We find limited evidence of excess optimism only in relative maximization contests when encountered first, and excess pessimism or accuracy elsewhere. Experience across contests and updating does not always increase the accuracy of self-assessed forecasts, and even when accuracy improves biases are rarely eliminated entirely. Methodologically, we find no evidence that a modest quadratic scoring rule introduces moral hazard for own-outcome forecasts, but neither does it increase forecast accuracy or lower variance.

Americans may be uncertain of their future Social Security benefits for several reasons, including uncertainty about their future labor earnings, the formula now determining Social Security benefits, and the future structure of the Social Security system. To learn how Americans perceive their benefits, we have elicited Social Security expectations from respondents to the Survey of Economic Expectations. We have also performed a more intensive face-to-face survey on a small sample of respondents. We find clear and striking evidence of substantial uncertainty and heterogeneity of beliefs about the long-term existence of the Social Security system and about the level of benefits provided should the system survive.

Wisconsin Survey Center for enabling collection of the telephone survey data and to Jora Stixrud for assistance in performance of the face-to-face survey. We have benefited from the comments of participants in seminars at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Northwestern University, and