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- 15 Jan 2013
- Working Paper Summaries
The Promise of Positive Optimal Taxation: A Generalized Theory Calibrated to Survey Evidence on Normative Preferences Explains Puzzling Features of Policy
Keywords: by Matthew Weinzierl
- July 2021
- Article
Redistribution through Markets
By: Piotr Dworczak, Scott Duke Kominers and Mohammad Akbarpour
Policymakers frequently use price regulations as a response to inequality in the markets they control. In this paper, we examine the optimal structure of such policies from the perspective of mechanism design. We study a buyer-seller market in which agents have private... View Details
Keywords: Optimal Mechanism Design; Redistribution; Inequality; Welfare Theorems; Market Design; Equality and Inequality
Dworczak, Piotr, Scott Duke Kominers, and Mohammad Akbarpour. "Redistribution through Markets." Econometrica 89, no. 4 (July 2021): 1665–1698. (Authors' names are in certified random order.)
- June 2020
- Article
Understanding Different Approaches to Benefit-Based Taxation
By: Robert Scherf and Matthew C. Weinzierl
The normative principle of benefit-based taxation has exerted substantial influence on many areas of public finance, but it has been largely set aside in the modern theoretical approach to optimal income taxation, where welfarist objectives dominate. A prerequisite for... View Details
Scherf, Robert, and Matthew C. Weinzierl. "Understanding Different Approaches to Benefit-Based Taxation." Fiscal Studies: The Journal of Applied Public Economics 41, no. 2 (June 2020): 385–410. (Also Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-070, August 2019. (Revised January 2019), and NBER Working Paper Series, No. 26276, September 2019.)
- 1989
- Other Unpublished Work
Optimal Portfolio Rules in Continuous Time When the Nonnegativity Constraint on Consumption is Binding
By: Robert C. Merton
Merton, Robert C. "Optimal Portfolio Rules in Continuous Time When the Nonnegativity Constraint on Consumption is Binding." December 1989. (In Chapter 6 of Continuous-Time Finance.)
- April 2014
- Article
Awards Unbundled: Evidence from a Natural Field Experiment
By: Nava Ashraf, Oriana Bandiera and Scott S. Lee
Organizations often use non-monetary awards to incentivize performance. Awards may affect behavior through several mechanisms: by conferring employer recognition, by enhancing social visibility, and by facilitating social comparison. In a nationwide health worker... View Details
Keywords: Social Comparison; Awards; Optimal Expectactions; Zambia; Status and Position; Performance Expectations; Motivation and Incentives; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; Zambia
Ashraf, Nava, Oriana Bandiera, and Scott S. Lee. "Awards Unbundled: Evidence from a Natural Field Experiment." Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 100 (April 2014): 44–63.
- September 2020 (Revised March 2022)
- Case
JOANN: Joannalytics Inventory Allocation Tool
By: Kris Ferreira and Srikanth Jagabathula
Michael Joyce, Vice President of Inventory Management at JOANN, championed an effort to develop and implement an inventory allocation analytics tool that used advanced analytics to predict in-season demand of seasonal items for each of JOANN’s nearly 900 stores and... View Details
Keywords: Analytics; Machine Learning; Optimization; Inventory Management; Mathematical Methods; Decision Making; Operations; Supply Chain Management; Resource Allocation; Distribution; Technology Adoption; Applications and Software; Change Management; Fashion Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Retail Industry; United States; Ohio
Ferreira, Kris, and Srikanth Jagabathula. "JOANN: Joannalytics Inventory Allocation Tool." Harvard Business School Case 621-055, September 2020. (Revised March 2022.)
- Article
The Relationship Between Workplace Stressors and Mortality and Health Costs in the United States
By: Joel Goh, Jeffrey Pfeffer and Stefanos A. Zenios
Even though epidemiological evidence links specific workplace stressors to health outcomes, the aggregate contribution of these factors to overall mortality and health spending in the United States is not known. In this paper, we build a model to estimate the excess... View Details
Goh, Joel, Jeffrey Pfeffer, and Stefanos A. Zenios. "The Relationship Between Workplace Stressors and Mortality and Health Costs in the United States." Management Science 62, no. 2 (February 2016): 608–628.
- March 2015 (Revised March 2023)
- Case
Immigration Policy in Germany (A)
By: Matthew Weinzierl, Katrina Flanagan and Alastair Su
Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel faced economic and moral pressure to encourage greater immigration from struggling European, and especially Eurozone, countries after the economic downturn that began in 2008. In fact, it was possible that both the Euro currency union... View Details
Keywords: Citizenship; Optimal Currency Unions; Globalized Economies and Regions; Immigration; Policy; Germany; European Union
Weinzierl, Matthew, Katrina Flanagan, and Alastair Su. "Immigration Policy in Germany (A)." Harvard Business School Case 715-029, March 2015. (Revised March 2023.)
- Article
Popular Acceptance of Inequality Due to Innate Brute Luck and Support for Classical Benefit-based Taxation
U.S. survey respondents' views on distributive justice differ in two specific, related ways from what is conventionally assumed in modern optimal tax research. When expressing their preferences over allocations in stylized, hypothetical scenarios meant to isolate key... View Details
Keywords: Optimal Taxation; Welfarism; Luck; Benefit-based Taxation; Taxation; Equality and Inequality; Attitudes
Weinzierl, Matthew C. "Popular Acceptance of Inequality Due to Innate Brute Luck and Support for Classical Benefit-based Taxation." Journal of Public Economics 155 (November 2017): 54–63. (Also Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 16-104, March 2016; revised July 2016, and NBER Working Paper Series, No. 22462, July 2016. See Notes on Fortune article.)
- March 2021
- Article
Assortment Rotation and the Value of Concealment
By: Kris J. Ferreira and Joel Goh
Assortment rotation—the retailing practice of changing the assortment of products offered to customers—has recently been used as a competitive advantage for both brick-and-mortar and online retailers. We focus on product categories where consumers may purchase multiple... View Details
Keywords: Assortment Optimization; Retailing; Imperfect Information; Sales; Strategy; Consumer Behavior
Ferreira, Kris J., and Joel Goh. "Assortment Rotation and the Value of Concealment." Management Science 67, no. 3 (March 2021): 1489–1507.
- 2019
- Article
Time-Driven Activity-Based Cost Analysis for Outpatient Anticoagulation Therapy: Direct Costs in a Primary Care Setting with Optimal Performance
By: Robert S. Kaplan, Rohit A. Bobade, Richard A. Helmers, Thomas M. Jaeger, Laura J. Odell and Derek A. Haas
Objectives: To determine how overall cost of anticoagulation therapy for warfarin compares with that of Novel Oral Anticoagulants (NOACs). Also, to demonstrate a scientific, comprehensive, and an analytical approach to estimate direct costs involved in monitoring and... View Details
Keywords: Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing; Activity Based Costing and Management; Health Care and Treatment; Analysis
Kaplan, Robert S., Rohit A. Bobade, Richard A. Helmers, Thomas M. Jaeger, Laura J. Odell, and Derek A. Haas. "Time-Driven Activity-Based Cost Analysis for Outpatient Anticoagulation Therapy: Direct Costs in a Primary Care Setting with Optimal Performance." Journal of Medical Economics 22, no. 5 (2019): 471–477.
- May 2020
- Article
Inventory Auditing and Replenishment Using Point-of-Sales Data
By: Achal Bassamboo, Antonio Moreno and Ioannis Stamatopoulos
Spoilage, expiration, damage due to employee/customer handling, employee theft, and customer shoplifting usually are not reflected in inventory records. As a result, records often report phantom inventory, i.e., units of good not available for sale. We derive an... View Details
Keywords: Shelf Availability; Inventory Record Inaccuracy; Optimal Replenishment; Retail Analytics; Performance Effectiveness; Analysis; Mathematical Methods
Bassamboo, Achal, Antonio Moreno, and Ioannis Stamatopoulos. "Inventory Auditing and Replenishment Using Point-of-Sales Data." Production and Operations Management 29, no. 5 (May 2020): 1219–1231.
- June 2024 (Revised August 2024)
- Case
Hospital for Special Surgery: Returning to a New Normal? (A)
By: Robert S. Huckman, Michael Lingzhi Li and Camille Gregory
Early on the morning of April 27, 2020, Justin Oppenheimer stood outside the entrance to the lobby of the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) Pavilion Building with mixed emotions. On one hand, Oppenheimer, HSS’ Enterprise Chief Operating Officer and Chief Strategy... View Details
Keywords: Operations Management; Scheduling; Optimization; COVID-19; Health Care and Treatment; Operations; Customer Focus and Relationships; Disruption; Health Industry; United States
Huckman, Robert S., Michael Lingzhi Li, and Camille Gregory. "Hospital for Special Surgery: Returning to a New Normal? (A)." Harvard Business School Case 624-092, June 2024. (Revised August 2024.)
- 2025
- Working Paper
Balancing Engagement and Polarization: Multi-Objective Alignment of News Content Using LLMs
By: Mengjie Cheng, Elie Ofek and Hema Yoganarasimhan
We study how media firms can use LLMs to generate news content that aligns with multiple objectives—making content more engaging while maintaining a preferred level of polarization/slant consistent with the firm’s editorial policy. Using news articles from The New York... View Details
Keywords: Large Language Models; Content Creation; Media; Polarization; Generative Ai; Direct Preference Optimization; AI and Machine Learning; News; Perspective; Digital Marketing; Policy; Media and Broadcasting Industry
Cheng, Mengjie, Elie Ofek, and Hema Yoganarasimhan. "Balancing Engagement and Polarization: Multi-Objective Alignment of News Content Using LLMs." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 25-051, April 2025.
- December 2006
- Article
Europe vs America: Institutional Hysteresis in a Simple Normative Model
By: Rafael Di Tella and Robert MacCulloch
We show how the differences in US and European institutions can arise in a normative model. The paper focuses on the labor market and the government's decision to set unemployment benefits in response to an unemployment shock. The government balances insurance... View Details
Keywords: Optimal Unemployment Benefits; Labor Market Institutions; Hysteresis; Europe; United States
Di Tella, Rafael, and Robert MacCulloch. "Europe vs America: Institutional Hysteresis in a Simple Normative Model." Journal of Public Economics 90, no. 12 (December 2006): 2161–86.
- March 2022
- Article
Learning to Rank an Assortment of Products
By: Kris Ferreira, Sunanda Parthasarathy and Shreyas Sekar
We consider the product ranking challenge that online retailers face when their customers typically behave as “window shoppers”: they form an impression of the assortment after browsing products ranked in the initial positions and then decide whether to continue... View Details
Keywords: Online Learning; Product Ranking; Assortment Optimization; Learning; Internet and the Web; Product Marketing; Consumer Behavior; E-commerce
Ferreira, Kris, Sunanda Parthasarathy, and Shreyas Sekar. "Learning to Rank an Assortment of Products." Management Science 68, no. 3 (March 2022): 1828–1848.
- February 2014 (Revised August 2015)
- Case
The Estate Tax Debate
By: Matthew Weinzierl, Katrina Flanagan and Valerie Galinskaya
Per dollar of revenue, no tax policy generates more sound and fury than the taxation of estates. To supporters, the tax is a break on the concentration of wealth and power and an easy way to fund redistribution. To opponents, the tax is an unjust punishment of the... View Details
Keywords: Atkinson-Stiglitz; Optimal Capital Taxation; Bequest Motives; Taxation; Family and Family Relationships; Property
Weinzierl, Matthew, Katrina Flanagan, and Valerie Galinskaya. "The Estate Tax Debate." Harvard Business School Case 714-032, February 2014. (Revised August 2015.)
- Article
Total Cost Control in Project Management via Satisficing
By: Joel Goh and Nicholas G. Hall
We consider projects with uncertain activity times and the possibility of expediting, or crashing, them. Activity times come from a partially specified distribution within a family of distributions. This family is described by one or more of the following details about... View Details
Keywords: Project Management; Time And Cost Control; Robust Optimization; Satisficing; Linear Decision Rule; PERT; Management; Cost Management; Projects
Goh, Joel, and Nicholas G. Hall. "Total Cost Control in Project Management via Satisficing." Management Science 59, no. 6 (June 2013): 1354–1372.
- March 2018
- Case
EKOL Logistics: Thinking Outside the Box
By: Willy C. Shih and Esel Çekin
This case describes Ekol, an intermodal transportation and logistics company, and how it manages capacity planning. Its busiest routes linked motor vehicle assemblers in Germany and Turkey with many of their parts suppliers, but it had also developed key links in... View Details
Keywords: Growth And Development; Strategy; Intermodal Transportation; Short-sea Transportation; Capacity Management; Capacity Planning; Delivery Planning; Route Optimization; Car Spare Part; Auto Manufacturing; Automotive Supply Chain; Europe; Turkey; Service Design; Fast Fashion; Near-shoring; Supply Chain; Supply Chain Management; Operations; Performance Capacity; Performance Efficiency; Logistics; Transportation Industry; Auto Industry; Turkey; Germany; Spain; European Union; Europe
Shih, Willy C., and Esel Çekin. "EKOL Logistics: Thinking Outside the Box." Harvard Business School Case 618-037, March 2018.