More News from IWER

A recent study by senior lecturer Mark Kritzman and co-author found that, irrespective of their high market concentration, heavily weighted stocks aren't necessarily riskier investments. It's a "fallacy" to equate market weight with risk. A highly concentrated market is a "natural consequence" of growth, not an "aberration," they said.

Senior lecturer Robert C. Pozen wrote: "The refund debate underscores the need for clear rules. Who is entitled to a refund: the plaintiffs in this case, all the businesses that paid import duties or all consumers who paid higher prices for imported goods? When a president relies on expansive readings of emergency statutes and rapidly changes tariff rates on an ad hoc basis, the result is litigation and political chaos."

Professor Catherine Wolfram wrote: "A report that I co-authored with colleagues from the Global Climate Policy Project at Harvard and MIT shows that a coalition of countries pricing carbon in heavy industries could generate billions of dollars in revenue, while also meaningfully reducing global emissions."

In a recent paper, associate dean for climate and sustainability Christopher Knittel, professor Catherine Wolfram, and co-author estimated that Americans are paying between $400 and $900 per person annually because of global warming. "We're likely at this inflection point where costs are going to start growing more rapidly," Knittel said. "The observed costs have been fairly linear so far. Going forward, that's going to start increasing at an increasing rate."

The future of commerce won't be driven by better filters or keywords, said professor Vivek Farias. It will be driven by agents trained on large language models to reason, recall and recommend.

Senior lecturer Robert C. Pozen wrote: "Since returning to the presidency, Donald Trump has governed with the same volatility that defined his first term — but now with a new tool in hand: federal ownership stakes in private companies. This unprecedented economic power grab, coupled with opaque decision-making and conflicts of interest, has created a climate of instability for investors and companies."

Institute Professor Daron Acemoglu argued that while Trump's authoritarian tendencies are weakening the country's institutions, the president is not the root cause of the broader structural problems. "If we go down this path of destroying jobs and creating more inequality, U.S. democracy is not going to survive," he said.

Professor Emeritus Robert B. McKersie wrote: "It was clear during those early years of the 1960s that Jesse Jackson was a brilliant and visionary leader."

In a field study by professor Kate Kellogg and co-authors, 70 consultants from Boston Consulting Group used GPT-4 for a complex financial analysis task. Participants were asked not just to create output, but to validate that output. Instead of correcting the mistake, the AI frequently responded with more detail, more data, emotional affirmation, and even more confident language, almost like it was trying to win the argument.

Before being tapped for Fed chair, Kevin M. Warsh characterized the A.I. boom as "the most productivity-enhancing wave of our lifetimes — past, present and future." Professor of the practice Athanasios Orphanides noted: "I don't think we are anywhere close yet to having evidence that A.I. has increased potential output significantly. That's why it's tricky to use this argument to say this clearly justifies lower rates today."