AbstractThis paper quantifies preferences for income equality and mobility by generating statistics that are uncorrelated with beliefs and can be interpreted as marginal rates of substitution (MRS). All things being equal, U.S. residents are willing to…
AbstractWe show that the cyclicality of output growth is a sufficient predictor for the cyclicality of markups in models that micro-found variable markups through dynamic trade-offs. We use data on markups from the U.S. as well as survey data on firms’…
AbstractWe study the effects of the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP)—an institution that pools patents across geographical markets—on the licensing and adoption of life-saving drugs in low- and middle-income countries. We show the presence of an immediate a…
AbstractI examine the economic consequences of prisons on local communities using two complementary approaches. The first uses prison openings during the 1990s across the United States, and the second exploits the results of the prison site-selection c…
AbstractWe find that sin-good purchases are highly concentrated, with 10% of households paying more than 80% of taxes on alcohol and cigarettes. Total sin-tax burdens are poorly explained by demographics (including income) but are well explained by eig…
AbstractWe collect data on prices, travel costs, and farmer decisions to quantify market access for chemical fertilizer and its impact on agricultural productivity in 1,180 villages in Northern Tanzania. Villages at the bottom of the travel cost-adjust…
AbstractThis paper examines whether higher earnings for frontline workers affects the quality of employees’ output. I leverage increases in the statutory minimum wage, combined with worker, consumer, and firm outcomes in the nursing home sector. I find…
AbstractSelection forces often confound the effects of policy changes. In the immigration enforcement context, we tackle this challenge tracking arrested immigrants along the deportation pipeline, isolating local and federal efforts. 80% of counties ex…
AbstractThis paper examines the impact of retail e-commerce on pricing behavior and welfare. Using Japanese data, we find that e-commerce lowered relative inflation rates for goods sold intensively online. We use long time series and historical catalog…
AbstractWe develop a framework for measuring under- and overreaction in expectation formation. The basic insight is that under- and overreaction to new information is identified (up to sign) by the impulse response function of forecast errors. Our meas…