Can AI help people overcome the information and administrative barriers involved in interacting with government—and will it reduce or widen existing inequalities? We examine these questions through a field experiment that gave Dallas County homeowners access to personalized AI assistance during the property tax appeals process.

Holz, J.; Perez-Truglia, R.; Simon, A. and Zentner, A. (2025). Taxpayer Behavior in the Age of AI: A Field Experiment on Property Tax Appeals. NBER Working Paper No. 35632.

How well does innovation diffuse across geographic boundaries, and what limits the reach of technological spillovers? We study these questions through a field experiment with 3,300 firms across twelve EU countries, examining how information about AI adoption at home and abroad shapes firms’ own investment plans.

Baumann, U.; Cullen, Z.; Faia, E.; Ferrando, A.; Perez-Truglia, R.; and Rariga, J. (2026). Innovation without Borders? The Geography of Technological Diffusion. NBER Working Paper No. 35314.

How do firms’ expectations about their competitors shape the diffusion of new technologies? We study this question through a field experiment with around 3,000 Italian firms, examining whether information about competitors’ adoption of AI and robotics changes firms’ own technology investment plans.

Cullen, Z.; Faia, E.; Guglielminetti, E.; Perez-Truglia, R. and Rondinelli, C. (2025). The Innovation Race: Experimental Evidence on Advanced Technologies. NBER Working Paper No. 34532.

Why do some workers negotiate their salaries while others do not, and what are the consequences for compensation and inequality? We examine these questions through two field experiments with more than 3,100 U.S. tech-sector job seekers, together with a theoretical model of negotiation under risk and incomplete information.

Cullen, Z.; Pakzad-Hurson, B. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2025). Pushing the Envelope: The Effects of Salary Negotiations. NBER Working Paper No. 33903. [Revise & Resubmit, Econometrica.]

Why are similar workers paid differently, even in competitive labor markets? We study whether employers’ uncertainty about market pay helps generate wage dispersion, using national payroll data and the rollout of a salary-benchmarking tool across U.S. firms, together with a model that explores the implications for competition and pay.

Cullen, Z.; Li, S. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2026). What’s My Employee Worth? The Effects of Salary Benchmarking. Review of Economic Studies, Volume 93 (4), pp. 2531–2573.

How do informal workplace relationships affect career advancement, and can unequal access to those relationships help explain the gender gap in promotions? We study these questions using administrative and survey data from a large financial institution, exploiting manager rotations to examine how face-to-face interactions shape employees’ careers.

Cullen, Z. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2023). The Old Boys' Club: Schmoozing and the Gender Gap. American Economic Review, Vol. 113 (7), pp. 1703–1740 (lead article).

How does pay inequality within organizations affect employee motivation? We study this question through a field experiment with 2,060 employees at a large financial institution, combining information about the salaries of managers and peers with administrative measures of employees’ effort and performance.

Cullen, Z. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2022). How Much Does Your Boss Make? The Effects of Salary Comparisons. Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 130 (3), pp. 766–822.

How do income comparisons shape well-being, and what happens when personal income information becomes widely accessible? We study these questions using Norway’s move to online public tax records as a natural experiment, examining how greater income transparency changed the happiness and life satisfaction of richer and poorer individuals.

Perez-Truglia, R. (2020). The Effects of Income Transparency on Well-Being: Evidence from a Natural Experiment. American Economic Review, Vol. 110 (4), pp. 1019–54.

Why does salary information spread so poorly among coworkers, even when employees want to know what others earn? We study whether privacy norms create these information frictions through a field experiment with 755 employees at a large financial institution, measuring their willingness to seek and share salary information.

Cullen, Z. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2023). The Salary Taboo: Privacy Norms and the Diffusion of Information. Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 222, 104890.

How much do workers value remote work, and do employers reflect those preferences in the wages they offer? We study these questions using real job choices by U.S. tech workers and detailed compensation data, comparing workers’ demand for remote arrangements with how employers pay for remote and in-person work.

Cullen, Z.; Pakzad-Hurson, B. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2025). Home Sweet Home: How Much Do Employees Value Remote Work? American Economic Association Papers & Proceedings, Vol. 115, pp. 276–81.

How do social pressure and peer behavior shape political participation, and can these forces deepen political polarization? We examine these questions through a field experiment with 92,000 Democratic and Republican campaign contributors, studying how the visibility and behavior of neighbors influence subsequent political giving.

Perez-Truglia, R. and Cruces, G. (2017). Partisan Interactions: Evidence from a Field Experiment in the United States. Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 125 (4), pp. 1208–1243.

Do people become more politically active when they live among like-minded neighbors, and does this reinforce geographic polarization? We study these questions using administrative data on 45,000 campaign contributors, tracking how their political giving changes after they move to communities with different partisan compositions.

Perez-Truglia, R. (2018). Political Conformity: Event-Study Evidence from the United States. Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 100 (1), pp. 14–28.

How divided are Democrats and Republicans in their preferences for redistribution—and does the apparent gap depend on how those preferences are measured? We combine national survey responses with administrative and survey evidence on property tax appeals, contrasting abstract political statements with concrete choices involving households’ own tax bills.

Nathan, B.; Perez-Truglia, R. and Zentner, A. (2022). Is the Partisan Divide Real? Polarization in Preferences for Redistribution. American Economic Association Papers & Proceedings, Vol. 112, pp. 156–62.

Do people distort their beliefs about others to justify acting selfishly? We study this question through a series of laboratory experiments that vary people’s opportunities to behave selfishly and the ambiguity surrounding others’ actions, allowing us to observe how self-interest reshapes both beliefs and behavior.

Di Tella, R., Perez-Truglia, R., Babino, A., Sigman, M. (2015). Conveniently Upset: Avoiding Altruism by Distorting Beliefs About Others’ Altruism. American Economic Review, Vol. 105 (11), pp. 3416–42.

How accurately do people understand their place in the income distribution, and do those perceptions shape support for redistribution? We investigate these questions through a representative household survey and an embedded information experiment in Greater Buenos Aires, examining how correcting people’s beliefs about their income rank changes their redistributive preferences.

Cruces, G., Perez-Truglia, R. and Tetaz, M. (2013). Biased Perceptions of Income Distribution and Preferences for Redistribution: Evidence from a Survey Experiment. Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 98, pp. 100–112.

Superstar firms are increasingly central to modern economic life. What drives public support for antitrust action against dominant firms? We study this question through a preregistered information experiment with 4,000 American households, using five real antitrust cases to examine how different beliefs shape demand for enforcement.

Perez-Truglia, R. and Yusof, J. (2026). Who Wants to Break Up Big Firms? Harm, Fairness, and the Demand for Antitrust. NBER Working Paper No. 35503.

What shapes public support for taxing billionaires and the companies they created? We investigate this question through a preregistered survey experiment with 9,000 Americans, examining how information about billionaires’ wealth, lifestyles, paths to success, and tax payments changes perceptions and demand for taxation.

Perez-Truglia, R. and Yusof, J. (2024). Billionaire Superstar: Public Image and Demand for Taxation. NBER Working Paper No. 32712. [Revise & Resubmit, American Economic Journal: Economic Policy.]

Some of today’s most heated policy debates—on Brexit, trade wars, climate change abatement, and migration—concern the redistribution of resources between countries. Do individuals know where they stand in the global income distribution, and does this belief matter for their policy preferences? We study these questions through a two-year survey experiment with a representative sample of Germans.

Fehr, D.; Mollerstrom, J. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2022). Your Place in the World: Relative Income and Global Inequality. American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, Vol. 14 (4), pp. 232–68.

Do people treat their political contributions and charitable donations as substitutes for one another? We study this question using two natural experiments and administrative donation records from the American Red Cross and Federal Election Commission, examining how shocks to one form of giving affect the other.

Yildirim, P.; Simonov, A.; Petrova, M. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2024). Are Political and Charitable Giving Substitutes? Evidence from the United States. Management Science, Vol. 70 (11), pp. 8030–8043.

How does religious participation within a community affect charitable giving and the provision of social services? We study this question using U.S. Catholic clergy abuse scandals as a natural experiment, tracing how local shocks to religious participation affect religious beliefs, prosocial behavior, and donations over time.

Bottan, N. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2015). Losing my Religion: The Effects of Religious Scandals on Religious Participation and Charitable Giving. Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 129, pp. 106–119.

Why do people prefer social assistance programs with work requirements, and how do beliefs about recipients’ effort shape support for redistribution? We investigate these questions through survey experiments with U.S. adults and a model of redistribution, examining whether sympathy for diligent recipients creates demand for workfare over unconditional assistance.

Drenik, A. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2018). Sympathy for the Diligent and the Demand for Workfare. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, Vol. 153, pp. 77–102.

Does knowing how the government spends tax revenue affect people’s willingness to pay taxes? We test this question through a field experiment with homeowners in Dallas County, combining an information intervention about property taxes and public schools with administrative records of households’ subsequent decisions to file tax appeals.

Giaccobasso, M.; Nathan, B.; Perez-Truglia, R. and Zentner, A. (2025). Where Do My Tax Dollars Go? Tax Morale Effects of Perceived Government Spending. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, Vol. 17 (4), pp. 223–59.

Could making the tax schedule more progressive affect tax compliance? We study this question using two property tax reforms in Argentina, combining quasi-experimental evidence with large-scale field experiments.

Ajzenman, N.; Cruces, G; Perez-Truglia, R.; Tortarolo, D. and Vazquez-Bare, G. (2024). From Flat to Fair? The Effects of a Progressive Tax Reform. NBER Working Paper No. 33286.

Does tax avoidance by the wealthy encourage similar behavior among the broader public? We test this question through a field experiment with U.S. homeowners, examining whether information about property tax appeals by the richest households changes perceived fairness, expected savings, and households’ own appeal decisions.

Holz, J.; Perez-Truglia, R. and Zentner, A. (2025). Does Tax Avoidance Trickle Down? Evidence from a Field Experiment. NBER Working Paper No. 34209.

Do firms respond to tax audits by carefully weighing the odds and penalties, or do audit threats work like scarecrows—deterring evasion through fear? We investigate this question through a large-scale field experiment with more than 20,000 Uruguayan firms, varying the information they received about audit probabilities, penalties, and enforcement.

Bergolo, M.; Ceni, R.; Cruces, G.; Giaccobasso, M. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2023). Tax Audits as Scarecrows: Evidence from a Large-Scale Field Experiment. American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, Vol. 15 (1), pp. 110–153.

Why do some households challenge their property taxes while others leave savings unclaimed? We investigate this question through a field experiment and a quasi-experiment in Dallas County, examining how expected financial gains and filing frictions shape tax appeals and whether low-cost assistance can reduce disparities in access to the appeal process.

Nathan, B.; Perez-Truglia, R. and Zentner, A. (2025). My Taxes are Too Darn High: Why Do Households Protest their Taxes? American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, Vol. 17 (1), pp. 273–310.

Does tax compliance depend on whether people believe others are paying their fair share? We test this question through a field experiment with homeowners in Dallas County, combining randomized information about other households’ tax rates with administrative appeal records to examine how perceived fairness influences real-world tax compliance.

Nathan, B.; Perez-Truglia, R. and Zentner, A. (2023). Paying Your Fair Share: Perceived Fairness and Tax Compliance. Journal of Accounting & Economics, Vol. 81 (2), 101838.

Can public shaming persuade people to repay delinquent taxes, or might it backfire? We test this question through a field experiment with 34,000 tax delinquents across three U.S. states, varying the visibility of their delinquency along with reminders about financial penalties and their peers’ debts.

Perez-Truglia, R. and Troiano, U. (2018). Shaming Tax Delinquents. Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 167, pp. 120–137.

What explains why some people evade taxes while others comply: personal honesty, economic incentives, or peer behavior? We investigate this question by linking administrative tax records for Uruguayan taxpayers to a tailored survey, comparing how well social preferences, financial factors, and the behavior of coworkers predict real-world tax evasion.

Bergolo, M.; Leites, M.; Perez-Truglia, R. and Strehl, M. (2020). What Makes a Tax Evader? Review of Economics and Statistics, accepted.

How accurately do firms understand tax audits, and what explains their mistakes? We investigate these questions by combining survey responses from Uruguayan firms with tax-authority records, comparing perceived and actual audit probabilities and penalty rates and examining how firms’ characteristics and audit experiences relate to misperceptions.

Bergolo, M.; Ceni, R.; Cruces, G.; Giaccobasso, M.; Perez-Truglia, R. (2018). Misperceptions About Tax Audits. American Economic Association Papers & Proceedings, Vol. 108, pp. 83–87.

Do expectations about future home prices shape homeowners’ decisions in the housing market? We test this question through a field experiment with nearly 58,000 U.S. homeowners who listed properties for sale, using randomized information about local price trends to examine how expectations affect whether and when homes are sold.

Bottan, N. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2025). Betting on the House: Subjective Expectations and Market Choices. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, Vol. 17 (1), pp. 459–500.

Why do households disagree so much about inflation, and do those differences reflect rational inattention or cognitive limitations? We investigate these questions through survey experiments in the United States and Argentina, comparing how people form expectations from official inflation statistics and from their own memories of supermarket prices.

Cavallo, A.; Cruces, G. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2017). Inflation Expectations, Learning and Supermarket Prices: Evidence from Field Experiments. American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, Vol. 9 (3), pp. 1–35 (lead article).

How do people form expectations when official economic statistics may be deliberately biased? We investigate this question through a natural experiment and a survey experiment in Argentina during the period from 2007 to 2015, when the government manipulated official inflation statistics.

Cavallo, A.; Cruces, G. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2016). Learning from Potentially Biased Statistics. Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Spring 2016, pp. 59–108.

Do changes in macroeconomic expectations affect consumers’ real-world spending decisions? We test this question through a field experiment with 2,872 Malaysian credit card customers, combining randomized expert forecasts of inflation and exchange rates with transaction records to examine whether revised expectations translate into spending patterns predicted by standard economic models.

Galashin, M.; Kanz, M. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2026). Macroeconomic Expectations and Credit Card Spending. Review of Financial Studies, Vol. 39, pp. 2643–2690

Why do people hold different expectations, and would cheaper access to information reduce disagreement? We investigate these questions through a survey experiment in which U.S. households choose and purchase information about future home prices, allowing us to observe how they select, acquire, and incorporate competing signals into their beliefs.

Fuster, A.; Perez-Truglia, R.; Wiederholt, M. and Zafar, B. (2022). Expectations with Endogenous Information Acquisition: An Experimental Investigation. Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 104 (5), pp. 1059–1078.

Do people overestimate the effect of their income on their well-being? Does that misperception distort important life choices? We investigate these questions through a preregistered experiment that provides evidence about income and life satisfaction, then examines whether beliefs change how people trade higher income against time, working conditions, and other priorities.

Perez-Truglia, R. and Rubião, R. (2026). Is Money Overrated? Misperceived Satisfaction from Income. NBER Working Paper No. 35423.

Do people care about their income relative to those around them, and does that shape where they choose to live? We investigate these questions through a field experiment with 1,080 medical students, combining their residency rankings with randomized information about income distributions and living costs in the cities they considered.

Bottan, N. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2022). Choosing Your Pond: Location Choices and Relative Income. Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 104 (5), pp. 1010–1027.

Do people value actually being richer than others, or merely being seen as richer? We investigate this question through discrete-choice experiments with nearly 5,000 Americans, asking participants to make trade-offs involving their own income, their peers’ income, and how others perceive their income to distinguish self-perceived status from socially perceived status.

Bottan, Perez-Truglia, Shigeoka, H. and Yamada, K.(2025). Feeling Rich or Looking Rich? Quantifying Self-Image and Social-Image Motives. NBER Working Paper No. 34094. [Revise & Resubmit, Journal of Public Economics.]

Does information flow equally between husbands and wives, or does gender shape who learns from whom? We investigate these questions through a two-year experiment with a sample of German households, tracking how spouses’ beliefs change when information about household income rank is given to one partner but not the other.

Fehr, D.; Mollerstrom, J. and Perez-Truglia, R. (2024). Listen to Her: Gender Differences in Information Diffusion within the Household. Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 239, 105213.