Augmenting short Cheap Talk scripts with a repeated Opt-Out Reminder in Choice Experiment surveys

Hypothetical bias remains a major problem when valuing non-market goods with stated preference methods. Originally developed for Contingent Valuation studies, Cheap Talk has been found to effectively reduce hypothetical bias in some applications, though empirical results are ambiguous. We discuss reasons why Cheap Talk may fail to effectively remove hypothetical bias, especially in Choice Experiments. In this light, we suggest augmenting Cheap Talk in Choice Experiments with a so-called Opt-Out Reminder. Prior to each single choice set, the Opt-Out Reminder explicitly instructs respondents to choose the opt-out alternative if they find the experimentally designed alternatives too expensive. In an empirical Choice Experiment survey we find the Opt-Out Reminder to significantly reduce total WTP and to some extent also marginal WTP beyond the capability of the Cheap Talk applied without the Opt-Out Reminder. This suggests that rather than merely adopting the Cheap Talk practice directly from Contingent Valuation, it should be adapted to fit the potentially different decision processes and repeated choices structure of the Choice Experiment format. Our results further suggest that augmenting Cheap Talk with a dynamic Opt-Out Reminder can be an effective and promising improvement in the ongoing effort to remedy the particular types of hypothetical bias that potentially continue to invalidate Choice Experiment surveys.Cheap talk, Opt-Out Reminder, Choice Experiments, hypothetical bias, stream re-establishment, opt-out effect

The Impact of Opt-In Privacy Rules on Retail Credit Markets: A Case Study of MBNA

U. S. privacy laws are increasingly moving from a presumption that consumers must object to ( opt out of) uses of personal data they wish to prohibit to a requirement that they must explicitly consent ( opt in ) to uses they wish to permit. Despite the growing reliance on opt-in rules, there has been little empirical research on their costs. This Article examines the impact of opt-in on MBNA Corporation, a diversified, multinational financial institution. The authors demonstrate that opt-in would raise account acquisition costs and lower profits, reduce the supply of credit and raise credit card prices, generate more offers to uninterested or unqualified consumers, raise the number of missed opportunities for qualified consumers, and impair efforts to prevent fraud. These costs would be incurred despite the fact that as of the end of 2000, only about two percent of MBNA\u27s customers had taken advantage of existing voluntary opportunities to opt out of receiving MBNA\u27s direct mail marketing offers. If Congress were to adopt opt-in laws applicable to financial information, the impact across the economy on consumers and businesses would be significant

Crowd Out or Opt Out: The Changing Landscape of Doctorate Production in American Universities

This paper addresses two issues arising from the changing pattern of doctorate production in American universities in last forty years. First, there has been a large increase in the number of doctorates awarded to foreign students. This leads to the concern that foreign doctorates have crowded out native doctorates especially certain groups of native doctorates such as native male and minorities. Second, graduate programs are increasingly becoming “feminine,” and some academic fields have already witnessed a ratcheting process toward female. This gives rise to concern about gender segregation among academic fields. Using data on the number of doctorates awarded in all academic fields from 1966 to 2002, this study examines the crowding-out effect and the tipping effect systematically. In science and engineering fields, there is no evidence of crowding-out between foreign doctorates and native doctorates. Outside of science and engineering, there is a strong negative correlation between the number of foreign doctorates and native male doctorates; however, non-science education accounts for almost all the negative association, suggesting the inappropriateness of aggregating fields in examining the crowding-out effect. Male students, especially native male students, exhibit strong “women-avoiding” behaviors in selecting academic fields of doctoral study, suggesting that native male students opt out of, instead of being crowded out of fields with a high proportion of female doctorates. As the gender composition of college graduates has started to stabilize in recent years, it is unlikely that those fields that already have a high proportion of female doctorates will be tipping toward all female

Opting Out of the Law of War: Comments on \u27Withdrawing from International Custom\u27

This paper is a response to Curtis A. Bradley & Mitu Gulati, Withdrawing from International Custom, 120 Yale LJ 202 (2010), which argues against the Mandatory View (according to which states are bound by customary international law with no possibility of opting out), and in favor of a Default View which permits states to opt out of international custom unilaterally. My response offers the following arguments: (1) Currently, the most significant contested issue about customary international law in U.S. discourse concerns the laws of war -- a topic that Bradley and Gulati treat only briefly and incidentally. Their proposal would make it possible for the United States to withdraw unilaterally from customary law-of-war limitations. (2) Part of Bradley and Gulati\u27s case for the Default View is that it actually represents the historical norm until the twentieth century. I argue that their sources don\u27t adequately support this claim. Their main source, Vattel, thought that states can opt out only of a customary rule that is indifferent in itself -- a category that excludes many important rules of customary international law, including the jus in bello rules of the law of war. I discuss other sources as well. (3) Bradley and Gulati believe that the Mandatory View was a colonialist invention to lock new nations into old rules, but I argue that the history they cite does not support this diagnosis. (4) Turning from history to policy, permitting states to opt out of the law of war would likely have immediate dangerous effects on the ground as the U.S. military rewrites its manuals and retrains officers and troops to respond to changes in law. The result of a US opt-out is more likely to be an unraveling of the law of war than a helpful revision leading to better rules