Embedded Agents, Embedded Video

by Will Wilkinson on January 29, 2008

BhTV now has an embeddable Flash player, so let’s give it a try. Here’s Tim Harford and me talking about behavioral economics and rational choice….

Tim and Will place humans on the Homer Simpson to Mr. Spock continuum

Sara

Hi Will, I left this comment over at bloggingheads, but I thought I'd leave it here too.

Are we to believe that employers are just acting irrationally when not calling back equally qualified "black" applicants? Especially because if this cycle Tim describes is real, then they should be able to hire such people at a discount. It seems more likely that employers are behaving rationally and discounting "black" applicants resumes because they know affirmative action is rampant and thus do not believe that these "black" applicants with similar education/experience are in fact similarly qualified. This would be particularly true if most elite education is more signaling-related than skills-acquiring-related as many economists have argued. Thus, it would seem affirmative action is the CAUSE of this negative feedback loop rather than a RESULT.