ASSA 2022 Conference

The ASSA conference, organized by the American Economic Association, was held in early January. Special lectures were given by Nathan Nunn (Harvard University): “On the Dynamics of Human Behavior: The Past, Present, and Future of Culture, Conflict, and Cooperation” and Nobel Prize winner David Card (University of California, Berkeley): “Who Set Your Wage? “.

Jan Gromadzki presented the results of a study conducted with Przemysław Siemaszko (SGH) on the role of network effects in LGBTQ people’s decisions about disclosing their identity: “#IamLGBT: Social Networks and Coming Out in a Hostile Environment”. The authors use unique data from two spontaneous actions on the Twitter platform and show that observing the coming outs in the network of friends increases the likelihood of LGBTQ revealing their identity. The results suggest that the main mechanism of network effects is to change the perceived cost of discrimination. The results were presented during the inaugural session of the Committee on the Status of LGBTQ + Individuals in the Economics Profession of the American Economic Society.

Moreover, Jan Gromadzki presented a poster presenting the results of research conducted with Katarzyna Sałach (University of Warsaw) and Michał Brzeziński (University of Warsaw) on the impact of the Family 500+ benefit on support for the Law and Justice party (IBS Working Paper 02/2022, link): ” When Populists Deliver on Their Promises: The Electoral Effects of a Large Cash Transfer Program in Poland ”. The authors show that the introduction of the benefit had a significant positive impact on support for the ruling party.