Highlighted Publications




 

Garthwaite et al. (2025) examine who benefits from the economic rents generated by college sports under amateurism. They ask how revenue from football and men’s basketball is redistributed within athletic departments. They analyze panel data on revenues and expenditures from Power Five athletic programs (2006–2019), along with player-level demographic data. They find substantial rent-sharing: about $0.31 of each additional dollar is reinvested in revenue sports, while roughly

Geruso and Spears (2026) ask whether persistently low global fertility is likely to continue and potentially lead to long-term population decline. They analyze United Nations fertility data, historical birth trends, and cohort fertility data from sources like the Human Fertility Database and Demographic and Health Surveys. They find that global fertility has fallen from about 4.85 in 1950 to roughly 2.25 today, with 67% of the world living below replacement levels. They show

Starr (2026) examines whether noncompete clauses benefit or harm workers, firms, and markets. He synthesizes evidence from surveys, administrative datasets, natural experiments, and field experiments, including nationally representative worker surveys and state-level policy changes. The central question is whether noncompetes function as efficient contracts or anticompetitive restraints. He finds that noncompetes are widespread across occupations and typically reduce worker m

Cardoso, Salant, and Daubanes (2025) ask whether price caps on Russian oil exports reduce Russia’s profits once it can evade sanctions by expanding a “shadow fleet.” They use a calibrated dynamic simulation model based on global oil market data and observed export patterns. They find that sanctions reduce Russia’s profits by over 20%, but tighter caps can paradoxically increase long-run profits by raising global oil prices and accelerating fleet expansion. For example, a serv

Johnson (2026) examines whether occupational licensing in the United States improves service quality or mainly raises costs and wages for licensed workers. She draws on national labor force data, prior empirical studies, and policy evidence across occupations and states. The evidence shows that licensing is associated with higher wages—often around 15 percent—and in some cases about 4 percent higher over time, while its effects on employment are mixed. Most studies find littl

Reinmuth and Rockall (2025) examine whether stronger enforcement of non-compete agreements reduces innovation. They analyze U.S. state-level changes in enforceability from 1991–2016, using patent data from the USPTO, firm data from Compustat, and business formation data. They find that increases in enforceability significantly reduce innovation, with patenting declining by about 14% after five years for an average policy change. The negative effects are larger for more novel

Bendtsen (2026) examines whether reducing administrative burdens increases the take-up of social benefits. He analyzes data from 51 field experiments covering 187 treatment effect sizes across multiple countries and programs. Using a meta-analytic framework, he compares interventions that reduce learning demands (information) versus compliance demands (assistance), and distinguishes between application and actual receipt outcomes. He finds that interventions raise application

Weil (2026) asks how continued low fertility would affect the US standard of living, especially age-adjusted consumption per capita. He uses demographic models, stable population simulations, National Transfer Accounts data, and projections of fertility, age structure, and economic variables. He finds that lower fertility modestly reduces long-run living standards, mainly through higher old-age dependency, but this is partly offset by lower investment needs. Quantitatively, r

Clemens, Montenegro, and Pritchett (2019) ask whether international migration can help match countries with shrinking labor forces to those with rapidly growing working-age populations. They examine global demographic projections and economic data on labor supply, migration flows, and wage differences across countries. Their analysis shows that many high-income countries will experience large declines in working-age populations, while many lower-income countries will see larg

Jensen and Zhang (2024) study whether the death of a parent affects the labor market outcomes of adult children. They ask whether parental loss leads to changes in earnings, employment, or work behavior. They analyze large administrative data linking Danish adults to their parents, tracking employment and earnings before and after a parent’s death. They find that parental death causes measurable declines in labor market performance. Adult children experience short-term earnin

Hase and Kasinger (2025) examine whether organized retail crime leads stores to raise prices and how those increases affect consumers. They study the Washington State cannabis market, matching store-level robbery and burglary data to detailed scanner data covering every retail transaction between 2018 and 2021. Using a difference-in-differences design, they find that victimized stores raise prices by about 1.8 percent within four months of a crime. Nearby rival stores raise p

Jacobs et al. (2026) ask whether collaborative robots (cobots) can be used to raise productivity while preserving jobs, rather than displacing workers. They examine existing research, industry case examples, and prior empirical studies on automation, worker safety, ergonomics, and labor markets, rather than analyzing a new dataset. They find that cobots tend to automate specific tasks instead of whole jobs, reducing physical strain and workplace injuries while increasing outp

Agan et al. (2025) ask whether clearing or sealing criminal records improves employment outcomes. They examine linked administrative court records from Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Texas merged with IRS tax data on earnings, employment, and gig work. They find that criminal charges—both convictions and non-convictions—are followed by large and persistent employment declines. However, removing records through Fair Credit Reporting Act rules or Clean Slate laws has l

Darolia and Turner (2026) ask whether the rapid expansion of apprenticeships in the United States is being matched by credible evidence on program quality, outcomes, and skill development. They examine administrative data from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Registered Apprenticeship system, state-level apprenticeship records, and postsecondary enrollment and completion data. They find that apprenticeships have grown substantially since 2011, expanded into new industries, and

Gupta, Mittal, and Van Nieuwerburgh (2022) examine how the shift to remote work has affected the value of commercial office real estate. They ask whether work-from-home practices have permanently reduced office demand, rents, and building values. They analyze lease-level data from CompStak covering 105 U.S. office markets from 2000–2023, combined with office occupancy data, firm remote-work policies, and REIT returns. They find that remote work caused large declines in lease

Bloom, Dahl, and Rooth (2025) examine whether the post-pandemic rise in working from home causally increased employment for people with physical disabilities. They ask whether expanded access to remote work explains the sharp increase in disability employment after COVID-19. They use U.S. Current Population Survey data from 2018–2019 and 2022–2024, combined with occupation-level measures of work from home. They find that a 1 percentage point increase in work from home raises

Dahl and Knepper (2025) examine why workplace sexual harassment is frequently underreported and whether fear of employer retaliation plays a central role. They use administrative data on sexual harassment charges filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission from 1995 to 2016, combined with county-level unemployment data and major reductions in unemployment insurance benefits, especially in North Carolina. They find that weaker labor market conditions discourage repo

Federle et al. (2025) ask how wars affect economies in the country where fighting occurs and in nearby or connected countries. They assemble a new 150-year, 60-country dataset containing macroeconomic indicators and war casualty data. They find that an average-intensity war causes output in the war-site economy to fall by about 10 percent, consumer prices to rise roughly 20 percent, and capital stock and productivity to decline. They also show that countries trading with the

Baker, Halberstam, Kroft, Mas, and Messacar (2025) ask whether faculty unionization changes the distribution of wages in Canadian higher education. They analyze longitudinal administrative salary data from 1970–2022 and link it to the staggered rollout of faculty unions. They find that unionization raises wages at the bottom of the distribution by roughly 10 percent while leaving top salaries unchanged, compressing inequality. On average, salaries rise about 2 percent in the

Pathania and Netessine (2026) ask whether opening Amazon distribution facilities increases local economic well-being. They examine county-level data from 2011–2019, including employment-to-population ratios, poverty rates, and median household income, and they use midsized counties as treatment cases. They combine matching with Callaway–Sant’Anna difference-in-differences to address selection and staggered treatment. They find that after Amazon enters a county, the employment