Understanding and overcoming confusion in consumer financial decisions. This project aims to develop consumer-centred approaches to reducing the harmful effects of confusion in financial decisions by studying superannuation investment and home loan decisions where confused choices are individually and collectively costly. The project intends to develop comprehensive models to capture the full complexity of financial products and the diverse preferences and capability of consumers, then to use ad ....Understanding and overcoming confusion in consumer financial decisions. This project aims to develop consumer-centred approaches to reducing the harmful effects of confusion in financial decisions by studying superannuation investment and home loan decisions where confused choices are individually and collectively costly. The project intends to develop comprehensive models to capture the full complexity of financial products and the diverse preferences and capability of consumers, then to use advanced statistical methods to estimate the benefits of clearer decision-making. The outcomes of this project includes new models of complex financial decisions, and a better understanding of where confusion arises and the effects it may have. Decreased confusion will raise financial well-being and help communities become more resilient to financial shocks.Read moreRead less
Honesty and efficiency in the provision of expert services: doctors and other experts as participants in economic experiments. Experts serve us when we see the doctor, the financial planner or the car mechanic. In all these case the expert can take advantage of his superior knowledge and sell us something we do not need. This research will inform policy makers about the underlying motives of real world experts and allow them to design better institutions.
Estimating the impact of fiscal stimulus on household expenditure. The tax bonus payments of the $42 billion Nation Building and Jobs Plan were among the largest fiscal policy packages in the developed world. This project applies a new methodology to estimate the short-term impact of this cash handout on consumer spending, allowing better modelling of the Australian economy.
Computational methods for solving modern asset pricing models. This project aims to solve a broad range of asset pricing models. Movements in asset prices affect private investors, public sector finances, wealth distribution and business activity levels. Economists have tried to build better models of asset prices, moving away from hyper-rationality and towards realistic features including heterogeneity, habit persistence and bounded rationality. These models’ additional complexity makes them di ....Computational methods for solving modern asset pricing models. This project aims to solve a broad range of asset pricing models. Movements in asset prices affect private investors, public sector finances, wealth distribution and business activity levels. Economists have tried to build better models of asset prices, moving away from hyper-rationality and towards realistic features including heterogeneity, habit persistence and bounded rationality. These models’ additional complexity makes them difficult to solve or to apply to real world problems. The project will use modern hardware and computational tools, insights from economics literature and numerical analysis to provide a set of solution methods for such asset pricing models. This is expected to improve policy analysis and decision making under uncertainty.Read moreRead less