Economics Research

Katrin Scharfenkamp, Bielefeld University (ROSES)
2022-04-01 14:30 - 16:00 (Europe/London) | Microsoft Teams

Arnaud Chevalier, Royal Holloway (ROSES)
2022-04-08 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
The Dynamics of Racial Discrimination: Evidence from Fantasy Football

Mario Lackner, Johannes Kepler University Linz (ROSES)
2022-06-10 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
Authors: Mario Lackner (Johannes Kepler University Linz) and Michael Weichselbaumer (Vienna University of Economics and Business)
Title: “Can barely winning lead to losing? Evidence for a substantial gender gap in psychological momentum”
Abstract: We use data from professional tennis to measure the causal effect of past on current performance for women and men. Identification relies on exogenous shocks to the probability of facing a contested game, which is a previous stage of competition with strong resistance. There are fundamental gender differences: whereas men’s performance is unaffected by previously experiencing and winning a contested game, women experience a sizeable deterioration of performance after barely winning the previous stage. This result is linked to gender differences in negative psychological momentum. Detailed analysis reveals heterogeneous effects by experience, ability and contest progression.
Link to paper: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3985125
For link to join event, contact James Reade at j.j.reade@reading.ac.uk

Jacob Bundrick, University of Central Arkansas (ROSES)
2022-06-17 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
Author: Jacob Bundrick, University of Central Arkansas
Title: Mixed Strategy and the Money Down: A Field Test from American College Football
Abstract: Field tests of mixed strategies have primarily focused on the play of experts, leaving to question whether players of moderate quality adhere to the predictions of mixed-strategy equilibrium. This paper fills that gap by examining the matching pennies game using third-down play calls in American college football. Specifically, I use the Firth logit to analyze data from the University of Central Arkansas’s (UCA) 476 offensive third-down plays from the team’s 33 contests played during the 2018-2020 seasons. Moreover, I exploit the offense’s discretization of third-down distances to observe whether decision makers alter their tactics to play mixed strategies when conditions change. Preliminary results indicate that play types are called in a manner consistent with the equalization of success rates across strategies, but tests of serial independence in play calls provide mixed results.

The 8th Annual Conference on “Contests: Theory and Evidence”
2022-06-20 - 2022-06-21
The Department of Economics and the Centre for Economic Institutions and Business History at the University of Reading are pleased to host the 8th annual conference “Contests: Theory and Evidence” on Monday 20 June and Tuesday 21 June in a hybrid (in-person and online – in the UK time zone) format.
We cordially invite theoretical, experimental, and empirical work on any aspect of contests including but not limited to economics, management, politics, psychology, sports, biology, neuroscience, computer science, etc.
This year the keynote speaker is Prof Debraj Ray, Julius Silver Professor and Professor of Economics, New York University.

Other confirmed speakers include Prof Luis Corchon (UC3 Madrid), Prof Kai Konrad (MPI Tax, Munich), Prof Dan Kovenock (Chapman University), and Prof Aner Sela (Ben Gurion University).

Submission: Please submit your paper or extended abstract here by Friday 22 April, 2022.
Registration: Please register here by 9 May 2022 (Presenters) / 20 May 2022 (Attendees)

Key dates:
Submission deadline: 22 April 2022
Acceptance decision: 30 April 2022
Registration deadline: 9 May 2022 (Presenters) / 20 May 2022 (Attendees)
Conference: 20 – 21 June 2022

Travel, accommodation, and things to do:
The beautiful town of Reading (of Berkshire county) is located very close to London. It takes about 25 minutes by taxi to arrive from London Heathrow airport, and about 50 minutes by bus. There also are frequent direct trains connecting London Gatwick airport that takes about 90 minutes. Arriving from Central London is also easy, since there are direct trains every 15 minutes from London Paddington station to Reading that can take about 25 minutes. Reading station is also connected with fast trains with other big cities of England with airport such as Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester etc.
There are many accommodation options available in Reading. The usual hotel websites would help.
Very many tourist attractions such as the Windsor Castle, Lego Land, Ascot Racecourse, the city of Oxford, Winchester, South Downs National Park, are also within half an hour commute from Reading.
Useful links: Visit University of Reading, University of Reading Map, Taxi company in Reading, Another taxi company in Reading, Great Western Railways, Bus from Heathrow, things to do in Berkshire.

Further information:
In the case of any other questions, please contact Joo Young Jeon (j.jeon@reading.ac.uk) or Subhasish M. Chowdhury (s.m.chowdhury@bath.ac.uk).
The conference organisers are Joo Young Jeon (University of Reading), Subhasish M. Chowdhury (University of Bath), Ted Turocy (University of East Anglia), and Steven Bosworth (University of Reading).

4th Reading Experimental and Behavioural Economics Workshop (REBEW)
2022-06-22 | Edith Morley 124
The Department of Economics at the University of Reading is pleased to continue the 4th Reading Experimental and Behavioural Economics Workshop in person this year. The workshop will be held at the University of Reading on 22 June 2022.

This year, the keynote speaker is Professor Sanjit Dhami (University of Leicester), and 9 presenters will present their work. Please find the details of the programme: REBEW2022.

To join the workshop, please register here by 31 May 2022.
If you have any queries, please contact to organisers, Joo Young Jeon (j.jeon@reading.ac.uk) or Steven Bosworth (s.j.bosworth@reading.ac.uk).

Martin Ellison, "The Ends of Thirty Big Depressions" (GEAR Quarterly)
2022-06-23 14:00 - 15:30
Speaker: Prof Martin Ellison, University of Oxford.
Title: “The Ends of 30 Big Depressions”
Abstract: How did countries recover from the Great Depression? In this paper we explore the argument that
leaving the gold standard helped by boosting inflationary expectations and lowering real interest
rates. We do so for a sample of 30 countries, using modern nowcasting methods and a new
dataset containing more than 230,000 monthly and quarterly observations for over 1,500
variables. In those cases where the departure from gold happened on clearly defined dates, it
seems clear that inflationary expectations rose in the wake of departure. IV regressions and
synthetic matching techniques suggest that the relationship is causal.
Link: https://users.ox.ac.uk/~exet2581/30_big.pdf
This is a Hybrid event. If you are not a member of the University of Reading and would like to attend via Microsoft Teams, please contact Alex Mihailov on a.mihailov@reading.ac.uk.

9th Mathsport International Conference July 11-13 2022
2022-07-11 - 2022-07-13
MathSport International has been bringing leading academic and industry experts together since 2007 to present and discuss their work.
This year we meet in England during the UEFA Women’s European Championships. We thus particularly encourage submissions that focus on women’s sport.
Keynote Speakers: Lotte Bransen (KU Leuven), Stefan Szymanski (Michigan).
Topics: Mathematical and physical models in sport, performance measures and models, optimisation of sport performance, statistical and probability models, match and scoreline outcome models, competitive strategy, game theoretical models, optimal contest design and scheduling, decision support systems, analysis of rules and adjudication, econometrics in sport, analysis of sporting technologies, mathematics education and sport, financial valuation in sport, e-sports (gaming), betting and sport, and quantitative sports marketing.
Conference Proceedings Draft: Link. Please inform me (j.j.reade@reading.ac.uk) if you spot typos.
Outline Programme (subject to change, all UK times, detailed programme with speakers here (link)):
Monday July 11
9:30-10:00 Conference Registration and Coffee
10:00-10:15 Opening Remarks – James Reade and Dries Goossens
10:15-11:30 Keynote One (LT1) – Lotte Brandsen (Lueven)
11:45-13:15 Parallels 1a (LT1) and b (LT2)
13:15-14:30 Lunch
14:30-16:30 Parallels 2a (LT1) and b (LT2)
7-9pm Conference Dinner – Patio behind Eat at the Square.
Tuesday July 12
09:30-10:00 Pre-match Coffee
10:00-12:00 Parallels 3a (LT1) and b (LT2)
12:00-14:00 Lunch
14:00-15:30 Parallels 4a (LT1) and b (LT2)
16-23 Travel to and from Brentford Community Stadium for 8pm Spain v Germany match (tickets not included).
Wednesday July 13
09:00-11:00 Parallels 5a (LT2) and b (LT3)
11-11:30 Coffee
11:30-13:00 Parallels 6a (LT2) and b (LT3)
13:00-14:00 Lunch
14:00-15:15 Keynote II
15:15-15:30 Closing Remarks
15:30 Conference Close
Link to most up-to-date conference schedule.
Important Dates
EXTENDED Abstract Submission: 13 May https://easychair.org/my/conference?conf=mathsport22
Notification of Acceptance: 15 May
Submission of accepted paper for proceedings July 1 2022
Registration: Please register here (. Please register by July 1 2022.
Conference Location: Chemistry Building, Whiteknights Campus, University of Reading (map).
Travel: The University of Reading’s Whiteknights Campus is a 30 minute walk from Reading railway station, which is well linked to from London’s Paddington Station (just under 30 minutes and multiple services each hour), London’s Heathrow Airport via RailAir Bus (about 45 minutes, frequent services 24-7), and also London’s Gatwick Airport via a direct train (about 90 minutes, hourly)
Accommodation: We recommend the following hotel options:

Cedars Reading (on campus but limited availability).
Premier Inn Reading Central,
Hotel Ibis Styles,
Hotel Novotel Reading Centre,
Hotel Ibis Reading Centre,
Pentahotel Reading
Travelodge Reading Central.
For a more unique Reading experience, try The Great Expectations.

Apart from Cedars, all hotel options are in central Reading, which is either about a 30 minute walk to our Whiteknights Campus, or a convenient bus ride on the very frequent 21 service.
Questions: James Reade at j.j.reade@reading.ac.uk
Proceedings: Each Mathsport conference has produced a Proceedings Volume, a collection of 6-page short papers to accompany each of the presentations. Please submit this to j.j.reade@reading.ac.uk in LaTeX format by July 1. This will be produced electronically in time for the conference.

Roundtable on Gender-Based Violence in South Africa (hybrid)
2022-09-14 | Co-organised by Florent Dubois in South Africa (hybrid)
We are pleased to invite you to a Roundtable on gender-based violence in South Africa at the University of the Witwatersrand on September 14, 2022.
The event will be hosted by the University of the Witwatersrand which is celebrating 100 years of ground-breaking research that have changed Africa for the better. This event contributes to the celebrations by perpetuating academic excellence on such an important topic as gender-based violence.
This Roundtable aims at discussing the recent trend in gender-based violence in South Africa from the perspective of a wide spectrum of key actors. These discussions will highlight past experiences, existing challenges, and research avenues to make progress on our collective understanding of gender-based violence.

Participation in the Roundtable is free, and the lunch will be covered for all the participants. The number of participants at the venue is limited to 40 on-site and online attendance is possible. For logistical reasons, registration to the event is compulsory.
We invite you to register before September 6 at midnight (23:59 UTC/GMT +2) here:
https://economix.fr/en/colloques-et-worksho/roundtable-on-gender-based-violence-in-south-africa/

This Roundtable is supported by the research project PHC Protea “Domestic violence in South Africa: A social and economic issue” jointly funded by the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs and the South African National Research Foundation. We also thank the following generous sponsors that have contributed to make this event possible: EconomiX – University of Paris Nanterre and CNRS (UMR 7235), the University of Reading, the Faculty of Commerce Law and Management at Wits University, UNDP (the United Nations Development Programme), IFAS (Institut Français d’Afrique du Sud), and OXFAM.
If you have questions, feel free to contact the organizers.
We are looking forward to meeting you!

With kind regards,
The Organizers
Miracle Benhura, University of the Witwatersrand, miracle.benhura@wits.ac.za
Florent Dubois, University of Reading, and EconomiX, f.m.g.dubois@reading.ac.uk
Eliane El Badaoui, EconomiX and Université Paris Nanterre, eliane.badaoui@parisnanterre.fr
Prudence Magejo, University of the Witwatersrand, prudence.magejo@wits.ac.za
Laurine Martinoty, CES and Université Paris 1, laurine.martinoty@univ-paris1.fr

Chryssi Giannitsarou, “Multinationals, Investment and Stock Market Comovement” (GEAR Quarterly)
2022-09-15 16:00 - 17:30 | London Road L22
3rd GEAR Quarterly Lecture (hybrid)

ROSES: Anastasia Nebolsina, New Economic School
2022-09-16 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“Hosting sports mega-events: The costs of ensuring rotation”
See the recording.

ROSES: James Reade, University of Reading
2022-09-23 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“On away fans at football matches”, work with Brad Humphreys, Dominik Schreyer and Carl Singleton
Abstract: The number of people watching a sporting event has long held significant interest for economists. Although imperfect, it is a measure of the demand for a peculiar type of good or service — a sporting event. It also provides some measure of the extent of social pressure exerted on the individuals performing. That pressure can be supportive, but it can also contribute to negative outcomes like choking on the part of performers. The extent to which a crowd is supportive or otherwise, however, is usually quite hard to be sure of. While in many contexts, such as for example many team sports in North America, the attendance may safely be categorised as entirely supporting the home team, this is not necessarily the case in some European contexts. One such context is English football, where historically fans have travelled often significant distances to observe their team.Does it matter for measurable outcomes if a non-trivial proportion of the attendance at a match vocally supports the visiting, or ‘away’, team? Additionally, can more be understood about the motivations of people to attend sporting events by better characterising their team allegiance?
Since the 1970s, these ‘home’ and ‘away’ fans have been segregated into different parts of the stadium in the top four divisions. In this paper we introduce a novel dataset detailing reported numbers of away fans at matches in England over recent years. We spend time characterising the dataset, and considering potential uses for it. One such example might be an evaluation of the public resource impact of significant numbers of fans travelling significant distances at particular points in the week, and another might be the environmental impact. We then perform some exploratory analysis, considering some basic explanatory variables for attendances disaggregated into home and away contingents, and we also look at a basic question of concern to football fans, and one considered in the literature previously: to what extent does fan presence influence outcomes? We consider a slight twist, by considering whether the likelihood of an away win is influenced by the number of away fans in attendance.
We find evidence of different preferences for home vs away fans; for home fans, the population of the visiting team’s local area is irrelevant, while for away fans the population of the home team’s local area is important. For away fans, whether or not the team remains in contention for any of the end-of-season prizes matters much more than for home fans, reflecting the greater cost of attending away matches. We find some evidence that the number of away fans may have a small impact on match outcomes.
MS Teams link to join.

ROSES: Dave Berri, Southern Utah University
2022-09-30 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“Gender Bias in Perceived Quality. An Experiment with Elite Soccer Performance”

External Seminar: Rob Taylor
2022-10-05 14:30 - 15:45

ROSES: Gergely Csurilla, Hungarian University of Sports Science
2022-10-07 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“Uncertainty or luck? Unexplainability in the results of Olympic sports”

External Seminar: Kalyan Kameshwara
2022-10-12 14:30 - 15:45

ROSES: Thomas Warrener, Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto
2022-10-14 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“The Relationship Between Financial and Sporting Performance of Professional Football Clubs: Empirical Evidence from Brazilian Football”

External Seminar: Zhenya Liu
2022-10-19 14:30 - 15:45

ROSES: Johannes Kasinger, Goethe University Frankfurt
2022-10-21 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“Shrouding and the incidence of sin taxes in online betting markets”

ROSES: Markus Dertwinkel-Kalt, University of Münster
2022-10-28 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“Skewness Preference: Evidence from Online Poker”

External Seminar: Beata Javorcik
2022-11-02 14:30 - 15:45

ROSES: Sandro Heiniger, University of St. Gallen
2022-11-04 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“A general framework to quantify the event importance in multi-event contests”

External Seminar: Wolfgang Luhan
2022-11-09 14:30 - 15:45

ROSES: Jean-Louis Foulley, IMAG, Université de Montpellier
2022-11-11 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“How to adjust probability forecasts of football match outcomes in one-legged knock out tournaments with an application to the FIFA World Cup”

External Seminar: Daniel Schaefer
2022-11-16 14:30 - 15:45

ROSES: Pete Groothuis, Appalacian State University
2022-11-18 14:30 - 16:00 | Microsoft Teams
“Positional Segregation and Career Length in Major League Baseball in the 1990s”

External Seminar: Bouke Klein Teeselink
2022-11-23 14:00 - 15:45

External Seminar: Sonia Fegernas
2022-12-07 14:30 - 15:45

2nd Reading Football Economics Workshop
2022-12-13 - 2022-12-14
On December 13 and 14 2022, the Sport Cluster of the Department of Economics at the University of Reading will host the 2nd Reading Football Economics Workshop.
We invite submissions for presentation from authors of work that uses football (however liberally defined), and has some economic content or motivation (again, the definition will be liberal). Please submit abstracts here (link).
We are very pleased that Christina Philippou of the University of Portsmouth, Jorge Tovar of Universidad de Los Andes in Colombia, and Justus Haucap of Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf will be our keynote speakers.
This two day event will take place on the two days of the FIFA Men’s World Cup Semi Finals, and social events will involve viewing those two events. We anticipate watching the two games in The Dairy, which serves food and good beer options at the heart of our London Road Campus.
Draft Schedule

Tuesday December 13

G01, Building L22, London Road Campus, University of Reading

10:30-11:00
Coffee

11:00-12:30
Keynote 1
Jorge Tovar
On Fairness, Justice, and VAR

12:30-13:30
Lunch

13:30-14:00
Session 1
Dennis Coates
Visiting Team Fans and Attendance

14:00-14:30

Jessica Hargreaves
Is the home advantage constant? Investigating soccer’s home advantage
using varying coefficient models

14:30-15:00

Thadeu Gasparetto
Multicultural Teams: Does National Diversity Impact Performance in
Professional Football? (Teams)

15:00-15:30

Sebastian Otten
Racial Discrimination in the Labor Market: Evidence from Fantasy League Soccer

15:30-16:00
Coffee

16:00-16:30
Session 2
Johan Rewilak
The perversity of mild failure: Evidence from the UEFA Champions League

16:30-17:00

Maxence Franceschi
What’s a football player worth? A conceptualisation on football players’ value.

18:00-c.21:30
Dinner* and World Cup Semi Final 1

The Dairy, London Road Campus

Wednesday December 14

G01, Building L22, London Road Campus, University of Reading

10:30-11:00
Coffee

11:00-12:30
Keynote 2
Christina Philippou
Finances, governance, and the search for practical solutions

12:30-13:30
Lunch

14:00-14:30
Session 3
Robert Simmons
Determinants of goalkeeper salaries (Teams)

14:30-15:00

Maxence Franceschi
Positional dominance of football intermediaries

15:00-15:30

Matthew Yeo
On the quality of sporting facilities and a range of economic and social outcomes

15:30-16:00

James Reade
Has the World Cup impacted domestic football attendances?

16:00-16:30
Coffee

16:30-18:00
Keynote 3
Justus Haucap
Title TBC

18:00-c.21:30
Dinner* and World Cup Semi Final 2

The Dairy, London Road Campus

*dinner at participants’ own expense, except for keynote speakers

Important Dates
Registration: https://forms.office.com/r/yAXAP7kLKw.
Conference Location: London Road Campus, University of Reading.
Travel: The University of Reading’s London Road Campus is a 15 minute walk from Reading railway station, which is well linked to from London’s Paddington Station (just under 30 minutes and multiple services each hour), London’s Heathrow Airport via RailAir Bus (about 45 minutes, frequent services 24-7), and also London’s Gatwick Airport via a direct train (about 90 minutes, hourly)
Accommodation: We recommend the following hotel options:

Cedars Reading (on our Whiteknights campus but limited availability).
Premier Inn Reading Central,
Hotel Ibis Styles,
Hotel Novotel Reading Centre,
Hotel Ibis Reading Centre,
Pentahotel Reading
Travelodge Reading Central.
For a more unique Reading experience, try The Great Expectations.

Apart from Cedars, all hotel options are in central Reading.
Questions: James Reade at j.j.reade@reading.ac.uk

External Seminar: Henrik Sievertsen
2023-01-11 14:30 - 15:45
