Publications

Throughout American history, formal laws and social norms have discouraged interracial romantic relationships. Interracial relationships blur the boundaries between racial groups, challenging the essentialized racial categories that define…

We follow a representative panel of U.S. borrowers to study the suspension of household debt payments (debt forbearance) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Between March and October of 2020, loans worth $2 trillion entered forbearance. On average,…

A writing system is a graphic code, i.e., a system of standardized pairings between symbols and meanings in which symbols take the form of images that can endure. The visual character of writing implies that written characters have to fit…

The study of voter competence has made significant contributions to our understanding of politics, but at this point there are diminishing returns to the endeavor. Voter competence is unlikely to improve dramatically enough to make much of a…

We use textual analysis of high-dimensional data from patent documents to create new indicators of technological innovation. We identify important patents based on textual similarity of a given patent to previous and subsequent work: these…

We construct a novel measure of disclosure choice by firms. Our measure is computed using linguistic analysis of conference calls to identify whether a manager’s response to an analyst question is a “non-answer.” Using our measure, about 11% of…

The American child welfare system is in crisis. Given its history, the beleaguered state of the system evokes little surprise. There is an urgent need for new and creative approaches to problem-solving and transformation in child…

Interest rate caps are widespread in consumer credit markets, yet there is limited evidence on their effects on market outcomes and welfare. The effects of this policy are ambiguous and depend on a trade-off between consumer protection…

We formulate a private learning model to study an intrinsic tradeoff between privacy and query complexity in sequential learning. Our model involves a learner who aims to determine a scalar value 𝑣∗ by sequentially querying an external…

We study how endogenous innovation and technology diffusion interact to determine the shape of the productivity distribution and generate aggregate growth. We model firms that choose to innovate, adopt technology, or produce with their existing…

Long-acting reversible contraceptives are highly effective in preventing unintended pregnancies, but take-up remains low. This paper analyzes a randomized controlled trial of interventions addressing two barriers to long-acting reversible…

We investigate whether firms manage stock prices in anticipation of share issuance. Warrant exercise results in share issuance and warrant expiration dates are fixed years in advance, which precludes market timing. We predict firms manage stock…

Each year, eligible individuals forgo billions of dollars in financial assistance in the form of government benefits. To address this participation gap, we identify psychological ownership of government benefits as a factor that significantly…

We evaluate the quantitative effect of ESG divestitures on the cost of capital of affected firms. We derive a simple expression for the change in the cost of capital as a function of three inputs: (1) the fraction of socially conscious capital, (…

Empirical models play a distinctive role in the study of matching markets. They provide a quantitative framework for measuring heterogeneity in preferences for schools (Hastings et al., 2009), comparing school assignment mechanisms (…

We examine whether and how firms structure their merger and acquisition (M&A) deals to avoid scrutiny from antitrust regulators. There are approximately 40% more M&As than expected bunching just below thresholds that trigger antitrust…

We present an approach to automate the bidding and budgeting of multi-unit digital advertising campaigns. Such campaigns typically involve groups of ad-units that span multiple user segments, ad-delivery channels and media that together are meant…

In this Closer Look, we examine a new industry that has arisen in recent years to facilitate the financing of stock-option exercises for employees and executives of pre-IPO companies. These capital providers allow individuals to exercise and…

It has become increasingly common for data to be collected adaptively, for example using contextual bandits. Historical data of this type can be used to evaluate other treatment assignment policies to guide future innovation or experiments.…

We survey over one thousand venture capitalists (VCs) on how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected their decisions and investments. VCs expect aggregate returns to be largely unchanged because winners have offset losers. This suggests the primary…