Quantitative Analysis of Multi-Party Tariff Negotiations -- by Kyle Bagwell,...
This paper develops a model of international tariff negotiations to study the design of the institutional rules of the GATT/WTO. We embed a multi-sector model of trade between multiple countries into a...
View ArticleDebt Traps? Market Vendors and Moneylender Debt in India and the Philippines...
A debt trap occurs when someone takes on a high-interest rate loan and is barely able to pay back the interest, and thus perpetually finds themselves in debt (often by re-financing). Studying such...
View ArticleUnpacking a Multi-Faceted Program to Build Sustainable Income for the Very...
A multi-faceted program comprising a grant of productive assets, training, coaching, and savings has been found to build sustainable income for those in extreme poverty. We focus on two important...
View ArticleNew Evidence on Cyclical Variation in Labor Costs in the U.S. -- by Grace...
Employer-provided nonwage benefit expenditures now account for one-third of U.S. firms' labor costs. We show that a broad measure of real labor costs including such benefit expenditures has become...
View ArticleDeath by Pokemon GO: The Economic and Human Cost of Using Apps While Driving...
Using police accident reports for Tippecanoe County, Indiana, and exploiting the introduction of the augmented reality game Pokemon GO as a natural experiment, we document a disproportionate increase...
View ArticleStrong Employers and Weak Employees: How Does Employer Concentration Affect...
We analyze the effect of local-level labor market concentration on wages. Using Census data over the period 1977-2009, we find that: (1) local-level employer concentration exhibits substantial...
View ArticleHeard it Through the Grapevine: Direct and Network Effects of a Tax...
Tax enforcement may affect both the behavior of those directly treated and of some taxpayers not directly treated but linked via a network to those who are treated. A large-scale randomized field...
View ArticleHospital Pricing and Public Payments -- by Michael Darden, Ian McCarthy, Eric...
A longstanding debate in health economics and health policy concerns how hospitals adjust prices with private insurers following reductions in public funding. A common argument is that hospitals engage...
View ArticleDo Conditional Cash Transfers Improve Economic Outcomes in the Next...
Conditional cash transfer programs have spread to over 80 countries in the past two decades, but little is known about their long-term effects on the youth they target. This paper estimates the impact...
View ArticleDo Employee Spinoffs Learn Markets From Their Parents? Evidence From...
It is well established that employee spinoffs learn their parents' technologies, but little is known about their demand-side learning. We exploit the identification in international trade data of...
View ArticleThe Technological Elements of Artificial Intelligence -- by Matt Taddy
We have seen in the past decade a sharp increase in the extent that companies use data to optimize their businesses. Variously called the `Big Data' or `Data Science' revolution, this has been...
View ArticleMaking Big Changes: The Impact of Moves on Marriage among U.S. Army Personnel...
We use exogenously determined, long-distance relocations of U.S. Army soldiers to investigate the impact of moving on marriage. We find that marriage rates increase sharply around the time of a move in...
View ArticleAnalyzing the Risk of Transporting Crude Oil by Rail -- by Charles F. Mason
In this paper, I combine data on incidents associated with rail transportation of crude oil and detailed data on rail shipments to appraise the relation between increased use of rail to transport crude...
View ArticleCollateral Damage -- by Gary B. Gorton, Toomas Laarits
A financial crisis is an event in which the holders of short-term debt come to question the collateral backing that debt. So, the resiliency of the financial system depends on the quality of that...
View ArticleDo Proxies for Informed Trading Measure Informed Trading? Evidence from...
This paper exploits hand-collected data on illegal insider trades to test whether standard illiquidity measures can detect informed trading. Controlling for unobserved cross-sectional and time-series...
View ArticleIntergenerational Spillovers in Disability Insurance -- by Gordon B. Dahl,...
Does participation in a social assistance program by parents have spillovers on their children's own participation, future labor market attachment, and human capital investments? While...
View ArticleNatural Gas Price Elasticities and Optimal Cost Recovery Under Consumer...
Half of American households heat their homes with natural gas furnaces and 43% use it to heat their water. Hence, understanding residential natural gas consumption behavior has become a first-order...
View ArticleEarnings Test, Non-actuarial Adjustments and Flexible Retirement -- by Axel...
In response to the challenges of increasing longevity, an obvious policy response is to gradually increase the statutory eligibility age for public pension benefits and to shut down pathways to early...
View ArticleDecision Fatigue and Heuristic Analyst Forecasts -- by David Hirshleifer,...
Psychological evidence indicates that decision quality declines after an extensive session of decision-making, a phenomenon known as decision fatigue. We study whether decision fatigue affects...
View ArticleUsing Online Prices for Measuring Real Consumption Across Countries -- by...
We show that online prices can be used to construct quarterly purchasing power parities (PPPs) with a closely-matched set of goods and identical methodologies in a variety of developed and developing...
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