this has a good overview of the recent Fiscal Studies symposium to which @papiteide.bsky.social and I contributed. Our paper here: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/..., more on the symposium here: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/14755890...

Are you preparing a randomized controlled trial? Don't miss a special symposium of Fiscal Studies (onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/1475...) with three articles on power and sample size calculations. (1/3) @theifs.bsky.social

nice little thread of our recent work highlighting the crime-reducing benefit of combining hotspot policing methods with spatial network models

First draft of a new paper out today [link: brendonmcconnell.github.io/pdf/plasma.p..., where we document the impact of plasma donation centers on crime in US cities. We find large and sustained effects of these centers on crime, notably property crime and drugs possession. Short thread below..

The Tony Blair Institute's report on climate change is pro-fossil fuels, pro-CCS, pro-AI, pro-carbon markets, pro-nature-based solutions, and pro-nuclear. These are not solutions to the climate crisis. But they are everything his clients are asking of him. reddmonitor.substack.com/p/tony-blair...

I'm organizing a two-day summer school on networks (10-11 September) at Monash University where Matt Jackson (@JacksonmMatt ), Sanjeev Goyal, and myself will teach a 12 hours course. It is free and anybody interested can apply here: www.monash.edu/business/eve...

first draft out today: how to use the spatial network structure of crime in a city to improve upon the standard hot spot policing approach, joint with @corrradogiulietti.bsky.social and Yves Zenou. [1/3]

After a long time of battling with Stata, I finally figured out how to change the aspect on a cmogram graph (I wanted a square format). Sharing in case useful. The line after the cmogram command, I typed "graph display, xsize(1) ysize (1)". Before/After pic attached.

Our IFS report on air pollution is out! Good news first: air pollution (PM2.5) has HALVED in England since 2003, with a big drop during Covid. There's no rebound post Covid, somewhat puzzlingly. We use DEFRA data, monitoring station data shows the same thing. (1/7) ifs.org.uk/publications...