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Career Concerns and Ambiguity Aversion

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  • Eric Rasmusen

    (Department of Business Economics and Public Policy, Indiana University Kelley School of Business)

Abstract

Why do people have ambiguity aversion, preferring, a gamble with a 50% chance of success to one whose expected probability of success is 50% but where that 50% is an unbiased estimate? The answer modelled here, in the spirit of the career concerns literature, is learning: a risk-averse person does not wish observers to learn whether he is good or bad at estimating probabilities. He therefore prefers a gamble with objective probabilities.

Suggested Citation

  • Eric Rasmusen, 2008. "Career Concerns and Ambiguity Aversion," Working Papers 2008-12, Indiana University, Kelley School of Business, Department of Business Economics and Public Policy.
    • Handle: RePEc:iuk:wpaper:2008-12
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    File URL: http://kelley.iu.edu/riharbau/RePEc/iuk/wpaper/bepp2008-12-rasmusen.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Yoram Halevy & Vincent Feltkamp, 2005. "A Bayesian Approach to Uncertainty Aversion," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 72(2), pages 449-466.
    2. Gilboa, Itzhak & Schmeidler, David, 1989. "Maxmin expected utility with non-unique prior," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 141-153, April.
    3. Daniel Ellsberg, 1961. "Risk, Ambiguity, and the Savage Axioms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 75(4), pages 643-669.
    4. Peter Klibanoff & Massimo Marinacci & Sujoy Mukerji, 2005. "A Smooth Model of Decision Making under Ambiguity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 73(6), pages 1849-1892, November.
    5. Milbourn, Todd T & Shockley, Richard L & Thakor, Anjan V, 2001. "Managerial Career Concerns and Investments in Information," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 32(2), pages 334-351, Summer.
    6. Schmeidler, David, 1989. "Subjective Probability and Expected Utility without Additivity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(3), pages 571-587, May.
    7. Stephen Morris, 1997. "Risk, uncertainty and hidden information," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 42(3), pages 235-269, May.
    8. Heath, Chip & Tversky, Amos, 1991. "Preference and Belief: Ambiguity and Competence in Choice under Uncertainty," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 4(1), pages 5-28, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

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    Cited by:

    1. Anwar, Sajid & Zheng, Mingli, 2012. "Competitive insurance market in the presence of ambiguity," Insurance: Mathematics and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 79-84.
    2. Lien, Donald & Yu, Chia-Feng (Jeffrey), 2017. "Production and hedging with optimism and pessimism under ambiguity," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 122-135.
    3. Trautmann, Stefan T. & Zeckhauser, Richard J., 2013. "Shunning uncertainty: The neglect of learning opportunities," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 44-55.

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    Keywords

    time inconsistency; hyperbolic discounting;

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