IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mlb/wpaper/1153.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Herding Among Bureaucrats

Author

Listed:
  • Branko Bo_skovic, David. P. Byrne, Arvind Magesan

Abstract

The herding of expert opinions is often rationalized as the outcome of social learning. However, experts are typically individuals with career concerns. As a result,herding can also arise from the fear of opposing consensus opinion and the potential career consequences of being wrong. We empirically test for social learning and career concerns using novel data on bureaucrats' expert opinions over whether to publicly provide health insurance for pharmaceuticals.We and robust evidence that career concerns are an important source of herd behavior in these policy choices. Our endings have implications for the delegation of policy-making to experts.

Suggested Citation

  • Branko Bo_skovic, David. P. Byrne, Arvind Magesan, 2012. "Herding Among Bureaucrats," Department of Economics - Working Papers Series 1153, The University of Melbourne.
  • Handle: RePEc:mlb:wpaper:1153
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://fbe.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/784352/1153.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kenneth Rogoff, 1985. "The Optimal Degree of Commitment to an Intermediate Monetary Target," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 100(4), pages 1169-1189.
    2. Besley, Timothy & Case, Anne, 1995. "Incumbent Behavior: Vote-Seeking, Tax-Setting, and Yardstick Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(1), pages 25-45, March.
    3. Alberto Alesina & Guido Tabellini, 2007. "Bureaucrats or Politicians? Part I: A Single Policy Task," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(1), pages 169-179, March.
    4. Foster, Andrew D & Rosenzweig, Mark R, 1995. "Learning by Doing and Learning from Others: Human Capital and Technical Change in Agriculture," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(6), pages 1176-1209, December.
    5. Besley, T. & Case, A., 1994. "Diffusion as a Learning Process: Evidence from HYV Cotton," Papers 174, Princeton, Woodrow Wilson School - Development Studies.
    6. Margaret K. Kyle, 2006. "The role of firm characteristics in pharmaceutical product launches," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(3), pages 602-618, September.
    7. Goolsbee, Austan & Klenow, Peter J, 2002. "Evidence on Learning and Network Externalities in the Diffusion of Home Computers," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 45(2), pages 317-343, October.
    8. Alan T. Sorensen, 2006. "Social learning and health plan choice," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(4), pages 929-945, December.
    9. Judith Chevalier & Glenn Ellison, 1999. "Career Concerns of Mutual Fund Managers," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 114(2), pages 389-432.
    10. Scharfstein, David S & Stein, Jeremy C, 1990. "Herd Behavior and Investment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(3), pages 465-479, June.
    11. Francisco J. Buera & Alexander Monge‐Naranjo & Giorgio E. Primiceri, 2011. "Learning the Wealth of Nations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(1), pages 1-45, January.
    12. Bikhchandani, Sushil & Hirshleifer, David & Welch, Ivo, 1992. "A Theory of Fads, Fashion, Custom, and Cultural Change in Informational Cascades," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(5), pages 992-1026, October.
    13. repec:pri:rpdevs:besley_case_diffusion is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Blume, Lawrence E. & Brock, William A. & Durlauf, Steven N. & Ioannides, Yannis M., 2010. "Identification of Social Interactions," Economics Series 260, Institute for Advanced Studies.
    15. Abhijit V. Banerjee, 1992. "A Simple Model of Herd Behavior," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 107(3), pages 797-817.
    16. repec:pri:rpdevs:besley_case_diffusion.pdf is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Alan T. Sorensen, 2006. "Social learning and health plan choice," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 37(4), pages 929-945, December.
    18. Armstrong, Kristy & Mitton, Craig & Carleton, Bruce & Shoveller, Jean, 2008. "Drug formulary decision-making in two regional health authorities in British Columbia, Canada," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 88(2-3), pages 308-316, December.
    19. Frank R. Lichtenberg & Tomas J. Philipson, 2002. "The Dual Effects of Intellectual Property Regulations: Within- and Between-Patent Competition in the U.S. Pharmaceuticals Industry," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 45(S2), pages 643-672.
    20. David Dranove & David Meltzer, 1994. "Do Important Drugs Reach the Market Sooner?," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 25(3), pages 402-423, Autumn.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:clg:wpaper:2012-06 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. John Beshears & James J. Choi & David Laibson & Brigitte C. Madrian & Katherine L. Milkman, 2015. "The Effect of Providing Peer Information on Retirement Savings Decisions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(3), pages 1161-1201, June.
    3. Francisco J. Buera & Alexander Monge‐Naranjo & Giorgio E. Primiceri, 2011. "Learning the Wealth of Nations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(1), pages 1-45, January.
    4. Kishishita, Daiki & Yamagishi, Atsushi, 2021. "Contagion of populist extremism," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    5. Ruomeng Cui & Dennis J. Zhang & Achal Bassamboo, 2019. "Learning from Inventory Availability Information: Evidence from Field Experiments on Amazon," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(3), pages 1216-1235, March.
    6. Fishman, Arthur & Fishman, Ram & Gneezy, Uri, 2019. "A tale of two food stands: Observational learning in the field," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 101-108.
    7. Fang, Di & Richards, Timothy, 2016. "New Maize Variety Adoption in Mozambique: A Spatial Approach," 2016 Annual Meeting, July 31-August 2, Boston, Massachusetts 235388, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    8. Engström, Per & Forsell, Eskil, 2018. "Demand effects of consumers’ stated and revealed preferences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 43-61.
    9. Dasgupta, Amil & Prat, Andrea, 2008. "Information aggregation in financial markets with career concerns," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 143(1), pages 83-113, November.
    10. Clarke, Jonathan & Subramanian, Ajay, 2006. "Dynamic forecasting behavior by analysts: Theory and evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(1), pages 81-113, April.
    11. Bizer, Kilian & Meub, Lukas & Proeger, Till & Spiwoks, Markus, 2014. "Strategic coordination in forecasting: An experimental study," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 195, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    12. Ali, S. Nageeb, 2018. "Herding with costly information," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 713-729.
    13. Daron Acemoglu & Munther A. Dahleh & Ilan Lobel & Asuman Ozdaglar, 2011. "Bayesian Learning in Social Networks," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 78(4), pages 1201-1236.
    14. Ilan Lobel & Evan Sadler, 2016. "Preferences, Homophily, and Social Learning," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 64(3), pages 564-584, June.
    15. Frederik König, 2014. "Reciprocal social influence on investment decisions: behavioral evidence from a group of mutual fund managers," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 28(3), pages 233-262, August.
    16. Zitzewitz, Eric, 2001. "Measuring Herding and Exaggeration by Equity Analysts and Other Opinion Sellers," Research Papers 1802, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    17. Claudio Raddatz & Sergio Schmukler, 2013. "Deconstructing Herding: Evidence from Pension Fund Investment Behavior," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer;Western Finance Association, vol. 43(1), pages 99-126, February.
    18. Andrea Prat & Amil Dasgupta, 2005. "Reputation and Price Dynamics in Financial Markets," 2005 Meeting Papers 222, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    19. Mugerman, Yevgeny & Sade, Orly & Shayo, Moses, 2014. "Long term savings decisions: Financial reform, peer effects and ethnicity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 235-253.
    20. Ottaviani, Marco & Sorensen, Peter Norman, 2006. "The strategy of professional forecasting," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 441-466, August.
    21. Grant Miller & A. Mushfiq Mobarak, 2015. "Learning About New Technologies Through Social Networks: Experimental Evidence on Nontraditional Stoves in Bangladesh," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(4), pages 480-499, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Experts; Social learning; Career Concerns; Bureaucrats; Pharmaceuticals;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General
    • H77 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - Intergovernmental Relations; Federalism
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:mlb:wpaper:1153. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Dandapani Lokanathan (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/demelau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.