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Professor Sanjit Dhami

Professor of EconomicsSanjit Dhami

Fellow CESifo, LMU, Munich

Fellow Kiel Institute for the World Economy, Kiel

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Personal details

I hold a Masters and a PhD degree in Economics (1997) from the University of Toronto, Canada and an MPhil from the Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, India. Before coming to Leicester in 2003, I worked at the University of Essex and Newcastle University for six years.

I am delighted to announce my new book, jointly with Professor Cass R. Sunstein. The title is Bounded Rationality: Heuristics, Judgement, and Public Policy, and it is to be published by MIT Press, hopefully by the end of 2021. It is designed as a research monograph on bounded rationality for an interdisciplinary audience that examines open problems, challenges, and the way forward for the social and the behavioral sciences.

I took about 10 years to write my book 'Foundations of Behavioral Economic Analysis' which was published by Oxford University Press in November 2016. You can view videos from my Book Launch event on YouTube (the 2016 Book Errata File)

The 2016 book has just been published in seven volumes. Relative to the 2016 book, the seven volumes correct errors and typos, clarify the material in many places, improve readability, and update the material to bring it up to date in a separate chapter on guide to further reading in each volume. In other words, the 7 volumes offer a distinct and significant improvement over the 2016 book. Here is the list of the 7 volumes:

  • Volume 7: Topics in Behavioral Economics

Selected endorsements for the book:

"The Foundations of Behavioral Economic Analysis is a masterpiece. It covers the whole field of behavioral economics. And it is also an easy read, as beautiful examples throughout lead readers to appreciate behavioral decisions from the perspective of their own lifetime experience." George A. Akerlof, Daniel E. Koshland, Sr. Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Economics, University of California at Berkeley and 2001 Nobel laureate in economics

"The publication of this book is a landmark occasion for the field of behavioural economics. Until now there has been no comprehensive survey of the field suitable for graduate students. Professor Dhami has thoroughly and rigorously filled that gap. The book will be placed in a handy place in my office since I plan to consult it regularly" Richard H. Thaler, Charles R Walgreen Distinguished Service Professor of Economics and Behavioral Science and 2017 Nobel Laureate in Economics, University of Chicago.

"For someone, like myself, who started by being ignorant of the richness of the conversation within behavioral economics on a variety of issues, this magisterial volume is the ideal introduction, at once lucid and sophisticated." Abhijit V. Banerjee, Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics, M.I.T., and 2019 Nobel Laureate in Economics

Teaching

  • EC3089 Behavioral Economics
  • EC7094 Behavioral Finance

Administrative responsibilities

In the past, I have undertaken a range of administrative responsibilities in University of Leicester. These include senior tutor for the business school, Head of the Learning and Teaching Committee, Degree Program Director, and Admissions Tutor.

I am currently an external examiner for Cambridge and Nottingham. In the past I have filled this role for Lancaster and Manchester.

Research

In my research, I am mainly interested in the theoretical foundations of Behavioural Economics. While my earlier work has been in neoclassical economic theory, recent work has been exclusively in behavioral economic theory that also incorporates stringent empirical testing of the proposed theoretical models. I have published research in the areas of behavioral decision theory, other-regarding preferences, behavioral time discounting, behavioral game theory, and bounded rationality. This includes work on the foundations of prospect theory, time discount functions, equilibrium concepts in game theory, and other-regarding preferences.

Supervision

I have supervised many PhD students in the past who have gone on to do well in their academic careers. I am currently open to supervising in any area of behavioral economics.

Publications

(2021) Book Review of the Handbook of Experimental Game Theory. Forthcoming in the Journal of Economic Literature, June 2021 issue.

(2021) “Identity and Redistribution: Theory and Evidence.” Economica, 88(350): 499-531. (with Emma Manifold and Ali-al Nowaihi).

(2019) The Behavioral Foundations of New Economic Thinking (with Eric Beinhocker). INET Oxford Working Paper.

(2019) Quantum decision theory, bounded rationality and the Ellsberg paradox. Studies in Microeconomics, special issue on Behavioral and Experimental Economics in Practice. Volume 7, Issue 1: 110-139. (joint with Ali al-Nowaihi and Mengxing Wei).

(2019) Heuristics and Public Policy: Decision Making Under Bounded Rationality. Discussion Paper No. 06/2018, Harvard Law School, John M. Olin Centre for Law, Economics and Business. (with Ali al-Nowaihi and Cass Sunstein) also published in Studies in Microeconomics, special issue on Behavioral and Experimental Economics in Practice.Volume 7, Issue 1: 7-58.

(2019) Public goods games and psychological utility: Theory and evidence. Published in the special issue on Psychological Game Theory in Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, vol. 167(C), pages 361-390 (with Menging Wei and Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2019) Human Ethicality: Evidence and Insights from Behavioral Economics.  Handbook of Ethics and Economics. Oxford University Press: Oxford.

(2019) Behavioral economics and rationality. Forthcoming in Handbook of Rationality. MIT Press: Massachusetts.

(2018) Behavioural Economics and the theory of crime, punishment and litigation. In The Research Handbook on Behavioural Law and Economics. Edited by Joshua Teitelbaum and Kathryn Zeiler. Edward Elgar. ISBN: 1849805679 (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2017) Book review of Herbert Gintis. Individuality and Entanglement: The Moral and Material Bases of Human Social Life. In Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture. Vol 1, No. 2.

(2017) The Ellsberg paradox: A challenge to quantum decision theory? Journal of Mathematical Psychology. 78: 40-50. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2016) The Foundations of Behavioral Economic Analysis. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

(2015) Evidential equilibria: Heuristics and biases in static games of complete information, in Games 6(4), 637-677. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2015) Strategic monetary and fiscal policy interaction in a liquidity trap. In The Handbook of Post Crisis Financial Modelling. Edited by Emmanuel Haven et al. Palgrave Macmillan. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2013) An extension of the Becker Proposition to non-expected utility theory, Mathematical Social Sciences, 65: 10-20 (with Ali al-Nowaihi). Science Direct Top 25 Paper. DOI:10.1016/j.mathsocsci.2012.06.005

(2012) Hyperbolic Punishment Functions, Review of Law and Economics (Berkeley Electronic Press Journals). 8: 759–787 (joint with Ali al-Nowaihi). DOI:10.1515/1555-5879.1570.

(2012) 'Behavioral Economics.' in the Encyclopaedia of Human Behavior, Elsevier. ISBN: 978-0-08-096180-4. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2011) ' Strategic Monetary and Fiscal Policy Interaction and Optimal Institutional Design when there is the Possibility of a Zero Lower Bound on Interest rate', Oxford Economic Papers. 63: 700-721. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2011) 'Probability weighting functions'. In Wiley Encyclopaedia of Operations Research and Management Science, John Wiley & Sons, New Jersey. Online ISBN: 9780470400531. (with Ali al-Nowaihi)

(2010) Redistributive policy with heterogenous social preferences of voters , with Ali al-Nowaihi, Lead article in European Economic Review, 54 (6), pp. 743–759

(2010) Optimal income taxation in the presence of tax evasion: Expected utility versus prospect theory, with Ali al-Nowaihi. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 75: 313-337.

(2010) The existence of a Condorcet winner when voters have other regarding preferences, (with Ali al-Nowaihi) Journal of Public Economic Theory, 12 (5), pp. 897-922.

(2009) A value function that explains the magnitude and sign effects, (with Ali al-Nowaihi), Economics Letters. 105, 224-229.

(2008) A note on the Loewenstein-Prelec theory of intertemporal choice: Corrigendum, Mathematical Social Sciences. 52, 99-108 (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2008) The Utility Function Under Prospect Theory, Economics Letters 99, p.337–339 (with Ali al-Nowaihi and Ian Bradley). Science direct Top 25 paper, April June 2008.

(2007) Optimal distribution of powers in a federation: a simple unified framework, Bulletin of Economic Research 59(3), p. 197-229. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2007) Corruption in a hierarchical asymmetric information game, Journal of Public Economic Theory, 9 (4) pp. 727-755. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2007) Why do people pay taxes: Expected utility versus prospect theory, Journal of Economic Behaviour and Organization Vol. 64, pages 171–192. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2006) A Note On The Loewenstein-Prelec Theory Of Intertemporal Choice Mathematical Social Sciences, Volume 52, Issue 1, Pages 99-108 (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2006) A simple derivation of Prelec’s probability weighting function, Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 50 (6), pages 521-524 (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2006) A simple model of optimal tax systems: taxation, measurement and uncertainty, Manchester School, 74 (6), pp. 645-669. (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2004) An Invitation to Behavioural Environmental Economics forthcoming in Guljit Arora, Sustainable Development: An Interdisciplinary Perspective (Research and Publishing House: New Delhi). (with Ali al-Nowaihi).

(2003) The Political Economy of Redistribution Under Asymmetric Information, Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 87/9-10: 2069-2103.

(2002) Optimal Consumption Taxes And Social Security Under Tax Measurement Problems And Uncertainty, International Tax And Public Finance, Volume 9, Number 6, pp. 673-85.

(2001) The Economics of Information in Jonathan Michie (eds.) 'Readers Guide to the Social Sciences', Vol. I, Fitzroy-Dearborn Publishers.

(2001) Economics And Politics in Jonathan Michie (eds.) 'Readers Guide to the Social Sciences', Vol. I, Fitzroy-Dearborn Publishers.

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