Events

01. June 2026, 16:00 until 17:30

Economic Theory & Policy Seminar / A. Wabitsch (WU Vienna) / Incentivizing Inflation Expectations

Seminar

Alena Wabitsch will give a talk at our Economic Theory and Policy Seminar.

Alena Wabitsch (Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU)

„Incentivizing Inflation Expectations“ (co-authored with Sergii Drobot, Daniela Puzzello and Ryan Rholes)

Accurate inflation expectations are central to economic modeling and policy. Yet major surveys elicit them without performance-based marginal incentives, despite their well-established importance to belief data quality in experimental economics. We show that marginal incentives raise effort and fundamentally reshape reported inflation expectations: lowering upward bias by 3.4 percentage points, reducing disagreement by one-third, closing the gender gap, and tripling learning rates in an RCT. Incentivized expectations are more consistent and better predict spending. Calibrating a simple New Keynesian model, we demonstrate that these differences matter: marginal incentives sharpen empirical inference and improve policy guidance - without increasing participant remuneration.

Calendar entry
Event location
TU Wien
1040 Vienna
Wiedner Hauptstr. 8-10, Seminarroom: Sem.R. DA grün 04 (Freihaus Building, green area, 4th floor)
Organiser
ECON
Julia Hutter
julia.hutter@tuwien.ac.at
Public
Yes
Entrance fee
No
Registration required
No