Paul Nightingale
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paulnightingale.bsky.social
Paul Nightingale
@paulnightingale.bsky.social

Professor of Strategy at SPRU.

Associate Dean of Research, University of Sussex Business School. #1 in UK for research income.

Editor Research Policy.

Acting Director HSP.

Views mine, not my employer. Politics unfashionable since 1654 .. more

Business 41%
Economics 31%
Pinned

Reposted by Paul Nightingale

Interesting paper on the effects of taxing unrealized capital gains on entrepreneurship, discussing the trade-off between upside potential and insurance motives. Especially relevant for the Nordic discussion. www.nber.org/papers/w34512
ICYMI: New paper for causal effects with panel data, subsuming other approaches. We generate realistic synthetic data based on commonly studied datasets, showing our method substantially outperforms others and providing insight about what in the data-generating process corresponds to gains.

Reposted by Paul Nightingale

@afinetheorem.bsky.social has made this super useful list of econ and business JMPs in innovation, entrepreneurship, or Econ of AI" kevinbryanecon.com/2025innovati...
Innovation, Entrepreneurship, AI Job Candidates 2025
kevinbryanecon.com

Congratulations. Looks wonderful.
My interview with Joe Stiglitz in which we talk about, among other things, how bankruptcy and intellectual property laws were structured to make billionaires richer (correct link) www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW5c...
Faculty searches at Harvard Kennedy School in applied microeconomics and in technology and public policy www.hks.harvard.edu/more/about/l...
Faculty Appointments
The Academic Deans' Office recruits new faculty members who have strong teaching and research records and are intellectual leaders in their field.
www.hks.harvard.edu

Reposted by Paul Nightingale

Best comment on #ashes so far: “Test cricket is ok but I prefer the slightly longer 50 over format” 😂

This is very good on why the UK can't get is act together on infrastructure.

Also great on history and China's 19 bridges big enough to connect England and France.
I really cannot recommend this excellent piece on Hammersmith Bridge highly enough
Hammersmith Bridge
Where did 25,000 vehicles go?
nickmaini.substack.com
I really cannot recommend this excellent piece on Hammersmith Bridge highly enough
Hammersmith Bridge
Where did 25,000 vehicles go?
nickmaini.substack.com

Reposted by Paul Nightingale

In case you are feeling too cheerful at the start of the weekend this @richardaljones.bsky.social piece on the likely future breakdown of consensus on science/R&D should take care of that
softmachines.org?p=3192
UK Science in a post-liberal world – Soft Machines, by Richard Jones
softmachines.org
Today on Volts: the subset of cleantech known as "electrotech" -- solar, batteries, heat pumps, etc. -- is marching toward inevitable victory, not because it's low-emissions (though it is), but because it's more efficient & cheaper. I discuss the good news with @kingsmillbond.bsky.social.
Clean electrification is inevitable
Kingsmill Bond explains why the global march of "electrotech" has moved beyond the reach of US political interference.
www.volts.wtf

Reposted by Daniel Wincott

Good journals are swamped with this stuff and lower tier journals struggle to get reviewers who can see through the methods section

It gets cited (a lot!) so editors who should know better let it through.

I would add.

A) very standardised format
B) section w robustness checks that don't test anything
C) often very well written - AI now but maybe paid team before???
D) odd citation patterns.
E) atypical author connections.

I'll send it on but it might take a while to double check everything.

It's like that for normal academia but it's catnip for predatory journals.

This is exactly it!
 "so deep was the fiscal crisis that public spending was cut and taxes on the rich went up. The result is that Britain’s top 10 per cent is the only segment paying more in taxes today than in 2010" on.ft.com/4a6clNL

if this were more widely understood, Reeves' job would be somewhat easier
Britain’s tax system combines the worst of the US and Scandinavia
The UK’s experiment in eating the rich while shrinking the state has left everyone worse off
on.ft.com
I am by no means a prominent public intellectual, but my inbox is increasingly filled with messages from people who have been convinced by sycophantic chatbots that they have discovered revolutionary theories that entirely upend our scientific understanding of the universe.
🙋‍♀️ @paulnightingale.bsky.social me too!

I call it: "The "Nexus" Nexus" 😅

Recipe

🟢 Pick 1 econ var
🟢 Pick 2+ "green" vars
🟢 Pick 3+ methods (unit root, cointegration, Granger causality, GMM, ECM, FMOLS, PMG, PVAR, wavelet)
🟢 Misinterpret results
🟢 Make absurd policy recommendations

Rinse & repeat!

"Nexus" has been an indicator of charlatans for at least a decade. It's the "everything is connected to everything else, let's cherry pick data to prove it" approach. I have a mini project on it.

Reposted by Paul Nightingale

you will be shocked - shocked! - to learn this mathematically impossible table of summary statistics comes from a paper:

🚩 about "green economics"
🚩 published in Frontiers
🚩 with "nexus" in the title
🚩 full of tortured phrases

www.frontiersin.org/journals/env...

This is interesting.

The UK national equivalents were pushed aside with the shift to basic research in universities in the 1980s.

The rationale behind the move proved mistaken and it (In my humble opinion) messed up the UK innovation system for decades.

So an interesting idea...
UK needs new ‘disruptive’ labs for frontier science, says think tank.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-p...
UK needs new ‘disruptive’ labs for frontier science, says think tank.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-p...
This exchange between Hancock and Johnson on 7th March 2020 speaks volumes about that government’s pandemic leadership.

Hancock: This is a clarion call for you to lead.

Johnson: Ok, I’m off to the rugby.

Reposted by Paul Nightingale

🧵 For International Men’s Day, @moreincommonuk.bsky.social has new research into a cohort of disillusioned men who have lost faith in the social contract & the idea that hard work will support a good life, don’t think politics respect them & who are turning away from mainstream politics
Kathleen Fisher to take over as Aria (the UK’s high risk, high reward innovation agency) CEO in February, joining from RAND. Previous work includes leading DARPA’s Information Innovation Office
ariaresearch.substack.com/p/introducin...
Introducing ARIA’s next CEO
Kathleen Fisher will join us in February 2026.
ariaresearch.substack.com

This is great.

This is really good on economics, culture and politics...
I will never forget having to edit Jamal’s final, posthumous piece for the Washington Post, after he was murdered.

He was calling for free expression in the Arab world. You can read it here :

www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/glo...
Opinion | Jamal Khashoggi: What the Arab world needs most is free expression
The Arab world needs a modern version of the old transnational media so citizens can be informed about global events.
www.washingtonpost.com

Strategic Realignment can be many many things.

But it's already an improvement as its externally focused and recognises trade offs that will make Prof Grant Needed unhappy.