样式: 排序: IF: - GO 导出 标记为已读
-
School Spending and Student Outcomes: Evidence from Revenue Limit Elections in Wisconsin American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 E. Jason Baron
This study examines the impacts of two distinct types of school spending on student outcomes. State-imposed revenue limits cap the total amount of revenue that a school district in Wisconsin can raise unless the district holds a referendum asking voters to exceed the cap. Importantly, Wisconsin law requires districts to hold separate referenda for operational and capital expenditures, which allows
-
The Rising Value of Time and the Origin of Urban Gentrification American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Yichen Su
In recent decades, gentrification has transformed American central city neighborhoods. I estimate a spatial equilibrium model to show that the rising value of high-skilled workers’ time contributes to the gentrification of American central cities. I show that the increasing value of time raises the cost of commuting and exogenously increases the demand for central locations by high-skilled workers
-
How Do Households Value the Future? Evidence from Property Taxes American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Hans R.A. Koster, Edward W. Pinchbeck
Despite the near ubiquity of intertemporal choice, there is little consensus on the rate at which individuals trade present and future costs and benefits. We contribute to this debate by estimating discount rates from extensive data on housing transactions and spatiotemporal variation in property taxes in England. Our findings imply long-term average net of growth nominal discount rates that are between
-
Yellow Vests, Pessimistic Beliefs, and Carbon Tax Aversion American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Thomas Douenne, Adrien Fabre
Using a representative survey, we find that after the Yellow Vests movement, French people would largely reject a tax and dividend policy, i.e., a carbon tax whose revenues are redistributed uniformly to each adult. They overestimate their net monetary losses, wrongly think that the policy is regressive, and do not perceive it as environmentally effective. We show that changing people’s beliefs can
-
Adaptation to Environmental Change: Agriculture and the Unexpected Incidence of the Acid Rain Program American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Nicholas J. Sanders, Alan I. Barreca
The Acid Rain Program (ARP) cut sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions from power plants in the United States, with considerable benefits. We show this also reduced ambient sulfate levels, which lowered agriculture productivity through decreased soil sulfur. Using plant-level SO2 emissions and an atmospheric transport model, we estimate the relationship between airborne sulfate levels and yields for corn and
-
Reducing Frictions in College Admissions: Evidence from the Common Application American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Brian Knight, Nathan Schiff
College admissions in the United States are decentralized, creating frictions that limit student choice. We study the Common Application (CA) platform, under which students submit a single application to member schools, potentially reducing frictions and increasing student choice. The CA increases the number of applications received by schools, reflecting a reduction in frictions, and reduces the yield
-
Increasing Hours Worked: Moonlighting Responses to a Large Tax Reform American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Alisa Tazhitdinova
Moonlighting is increasingly popular in OECD countries, with 5 to 10 percent of workers holding two or more jobs. However, little is known about the responsiveness of moonlighting to financial incentives due to the lack of identifying variation. This paper studies a unique reform in Germany that allowed workers to hold small secondary jobs tax-free, decreasing the marginal tax rate by between 19.5
-
The Effect of Charter Schools on School Segregation American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Tomás Monarrez, Brian Kisida, Matthew Chingos
We examine the impact of the expansion of charter schools on racial segregation in public schools, defined using multiple measures of racial sorting and isolation. Our research design utilizes between-grade differences in charter expansion within school systems and an instrumental variables approach leveraging charter school openings. Charter schools modestly increase school segregation for Black,
-
The Effects of Mortgage Credit Availability: Evidence from Minimum Credit Score Lending Rules American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Steven Laufer, Andrew Paciorek
This paper uses changes in mortgage lenders’ minimum credit score thresholds to credibly identify the effects of access to household credit. Falling under these thresholds has very large negative effects on borrowing for up to two years, and these effects fail to reverse within four years. The effects are particularly concentrated among individuals who have relatively high credit demand and face relatively
-
Removing Welfare Traps: Employment Responses in the Finnish Basic Income Experiment American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Jouko Verho, Kari Hämäläinen, Ohto Kanninen
This paper provides evidence that replacing minimum unemployment benefits with a basic income of equal size has minor employment effects at best. We examine an experiment in Finland in which 2,000 benefit recipients were randomized to receive a monthly basic income. The experiment lowered participation tax rates by 23 percentage points for full-time employment. Despite the considerable increase in
-
Technology, Taxation, and Corruption: Evidence from the Introduction of Electronic Tax Filing American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Oyebola Okunogbe, Victor Pouliquen
Many e-government initiatives introduce technology to improve efficiency and avoid potential human bias. Using experimental variation, we examine the impact of electronic tax filing (to replace in-person submission to tax officials) using data from Tajikistan firms. E-filing reduces the time firms spend on taxes by 40 percent. Further, among firms previously more likely to evade, e-filing doubles taxes
-
The Impact of the Affordable Care Act: Evidence from California’s Hospital Sector American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Mark Duggan, Atul Gupta, Emilie Jackson
We exploit changes in the discontinuity in health insurance coverage at age 65 induced by the implementation of the Affordable Care Act to examine effects on coverage, hospital use, and patient health. We then link these changes to effects on hospital finances. We show that a substantial share of the federally funded Medicaid expansion substituted for existing locally funded safety net programs. Despite
-
Dominated Options in Health Insurance Plans American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Chenyuan Liu, Justin Sydnor
Prior research documents that there are sometimes dominated options in health plan menus, but is that common? We analyze Kaiser Family Foundation data on health plans that firms offer to their employees. For firms offering both a high-deductible and lower-deductible health plan, 62 percent of the time the high-deductible option has lower maximum spending risk for the employee. We estimate that the
-
Improving Preferential Market Access through Rules of Origin: Firm-Level Evidence from Bangladesh American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Tobias Sytsma
In countries where there exist limited opportunities to source inputs locally, rules of origin undermine access to preferential trade agreements for final goods exporters. I analyze the 2011 revision to the rules of origin associated with the European Union’s Generalized System of Preferences, which allowed apparel producers in least developed countries to use internationally sourced textiles in exported
-
Issuance and Incidence: SNAP Benefit Cycles and Grocery Prices American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Jacob Goldin, Tatiana Homonoff, Katherine Meckel
Many safety net programs issue benefits as monthly lump-sum payments. We investigate how the timing of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefit issuance affects food purchases and the incidence of the transfer. Using scanner data from a large sample of grocery stores and state and time variation in SNAP issuance schedules, we document large, SNAP-induced intramonth cycles in food expenditures
-
Semesters or Quarters? The Effect of the Academic Calendar on Postsecondary Student Outcomes American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2022-02-04 Valerie Bostwick, Stefanie Fischer, Matthew Lang
There exists a long-standing debate in higher education on which academic calendar is optimal. Using panel data on the near universe of four-year nonprofit institutions and leveraging quasi-experimental variation in calendars across institutions and years, we show that switching from quarters to semesters negatively impacts on-time graduation rates. Event study analyses show that the negative effects
-
Disclosure and Subsequent Innovation: Evidence from the Patent Depository Library Program American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Jeffrey L. Furman, Markus Nagler, Martin Watzinger
How important is access to patent documents for subsequent innovation? We examine the expansion of the USPTO Patent Library system after 1975. Patent libraries provided access to patents before the Internet. We find that after patent library opening, local patenting increases by 8–20 percent relative to similar regions. Additional analyses suggest that disclosure of technical information drives this
-
The Effects of the 1930s HOLC “Redlining” Maps American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Daniel Aaronson, Daniel Hartley, Bhashkar Mazumder
This study uses a boundary design and propensity score methods to study the effects of the 1930s-era Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC) “redlining” maps on the long-run trajectories of urban neighborhoods. The maps led to reduced home ownership rates, house values, and rents and increased racial segregation in later decades. A comparison on either side of a city-level population cutoff that determined
-
Network Externality and Subsidy Structure in Two-Sided Markets: Evidence from Electric Vehicle Incentives American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Katalin Springel
This paper uses new, large-scale vehicle registry data from Norway and a two-sided market framework to show nonneutrality of different subsidies and estimate their impact on electric vehicle adoption when network externalities are present. Estimates suggest a strong positive connection between electric vehicle purchases and both consumer price and charging station subsidies. Counterfactual analyses
-
Market Power and Income Taxation American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Louis Kaplow
This article analyzes concerns about market power and inequality in a model with multiple sectors, heterogeneous abilities, endogenous labor supply, and nonlinear income taxation. Proportional markups with no profit dissipation have no effect on the economy, and a policy that reduces a nonproportional markup raises (lowers) welfare when it is higher (lower) than a weighted average of other markups
-
Why Are Relatively Poor People Not More Supportive of Redistribution? Evidence from a Randomized Survey Experiment across Ten Countries American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Christopher Hoy, Franziska Mager
We test a key assumption underlying seminal theories about preferences for redistribution, which is that relatively poor people should be the most in favor of redistribution. We conduct a randomized survey experiment with over 30,000 participants across 10 countries, half of whom are informed of their position in the national income distribution. Contrary to prevailing wisdom, people who are told they
-
Program Recertification Costs: Evidence from SNAP American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Tatiana Homonoff, Jason Somerville
Participants in means-tested programs must periodically document eligibility through a recertification process. If all cases that fail recertification are ineligible, the exact timing of this process should be irrelevant. We find that later recertification interview assignments for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which leave less time to reschedule missed interviews, decrease
-
Democracy and Aid Donorship American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Angelika J. Budjan, Andreas Fuchs
Almost half of the world’s states provide bilateral development assistance. While previous research takes the set of donor countries as exogenous, this article introduces a new dataset on aid giving that covers all countries in the world, both rich and poor, and explores the determinants of aid donorship. It argues and shows empirically that democratic institutions support the setup of an aid program
-
Collaborative Tax Evasion in the Provision of Services to Consumers: A Field Experiment American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Annabelle Doerr, Sarah Necker
We conduct a field experiment with sellers of home improvement services on two German online markets. We take the role of consumers and vary whether we request an invoice for the delivery of the service. In a market that allows anyone to sell anonymously, a willingness to evade is prevalent. In a market that keeps track of credentials, sellers are only willing to evade when a willingness to collude
-
The Long-Run Impacts of Special Education American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Briana Ballis, Katelyn Heath
Over 13 percent of US students participate in special education (SE) programs annually, at a cost of $40 billion. However, due to selection issues the effect of SE placements remains unclear. This paper uses administrative data from Texas to examine the long-run effect of reducing SE access. Our research design exploits variation in SE placement driven by a unique state policy that required school
-
The Internet as a Tax Haven? American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 David R. Agrawal
If online transactions are tax free, increased online shopping may lower tax rates as jurisdictions seek to reduce tax avoidance; but, if online firms remit taxes, online sales may put upward pressure on tax rates because internet sales help enforce destination-based taxes. I find that higher internet penetration generally results in lower municipal tax rates but raises tax rates in some jurisdictions
-
Fiscal Transfers in the Spatial Economy American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Marcel Henkel, Tobias Seidel, Jens Suedekum
Many countries shift substantial public resources across jurisdictions to mitigate spatial economic disparities. We use a general equilibrium model with multiple asymmetric regions, labor mobility, and costly trade to carve out the aggregate implications of fiscal transfers. Calibrating the model for Germany, we find that transfers indeed deliver smaller disparities across regions. This comes at the
-
Urban Water Disinfection and Mortality Decline in Lower-Income Countries American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Sonia R. Bhalotra, Alberto Diaz-Cayeros, Grant Miller, Alfonso Miranda, Atheendar S. Venkataramani
Historically, improvements in municipal water quality led to substantial mortality decline in today’s wealthy countries. However, water disinfection has not consistently produced large benefits in lower-income countries. We study this issue by analyzing a large-scale municipal water disinfection program in Mexico that increased water chlorination coverage in urban areas from 58 percent to over 90 percent
-
Do Value-Added Taxes Affect International Trade Flows? Evidence from 30 Years of Tax Reforms American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-10-29 Youssef Benzarti, Alisa Tazhitdinova
This paper uses all value-added tax (VAT) changes across EU Member States from 1988 to 2016 to estimate the effect of VATs on trade flows. We find small elasticities of trade flows with respect to VATs, even when VAT changes are large. These elasticities are substantially smaller than the elasticities of trade flows with respect to tariffs estimated in the trade literature. This finding holds across
-
Using Labor Supply Elasticities to Learn about Income Inequality: The Role of Productivities versus Preferences American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Katy Bergstrom, William Dodds
Using a general labor supply model in which individuals choose how much to work conditional on productivities and preferences for consumption relative to leisure, we show that the mapping from earnings and hours worked to productivities and preferences can be expressed entirely in terms of reduced-form labor supply elasticities. We investigate the roles that productivities and preferences play in driving
-
Horizontal Differentiation and the Policy Effect of Charter Schools American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Michael Gilraine, Uros Petronijevic, John D. Singleton
While school choice may enhance competition, incentives for public schools to raise productivity may be muted if public education is imperfectly substitutable with alternatives. This paper estimates the aggregate effect of charter school expansion on education quality while accounting for the horizontal differentiation of charter programs. Our research design leverages variation following the removal
-
Deterring Illegal Entry: Migrant Sanctions and Recidivism in Border Apprehensions American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Samuel Bazzi, Gordon Hanson, Sarah John, Bryan Roberts, John Whitley
During the 2008 to 2012 period, the US Border Patrol enacted new sanctions on migrants apprehended while attempting to enter the United States illegally. Using administrative records on apprehensions of Mexican nationals that include fingerprint-based IDs and other details, we detect if an apprehended migrant is subject to penalties and if he is later reapprehended. Exploiting plausibly random variation
-
The Effect of Leaded Gasoline on Elderly Mortality: Evidence from Regulatory Exemptions American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Alex Hollingsworth, Ivan Rudik
Leaded gasoline is still used globally for aviation and automotive racing. Exploiting regulatory exemptions and a novel quasi-experiment, we find that leaded gasoline use in racing increases ambient lead, elevated blood lead rates, and elderly mortality. The mortality estimates indicate that each gram of lead added to gasoline exceeds $1,100 in damages. Our setting allows us to rule out potential confounders
-
The Effect of SNAP on the Composition of Purchased Foods: Evidence and Implications American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Justine Hastings, Ryan Kessler, Jesse M. Shapiro
We use detailed data from a large retail panel to study the effect of participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) on the composition and nutrient content of foods purchased for at-home consumption. We find that the effect of SNAP participation is small relative to the cross-sectional variation in most of the outcomes we consider. Estimates from a model relating the composition
-
The Labor Market for Teachers under Different Pay Schemes American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Barbara Biasi
Compensation of most US public school teachers is rigid and solely based on seniority. This paper studies the effects of a reform that gave school districts in Wisconsin full autonomy to redesign teacher pay schemes. Following the reform some districts switched to flexible compensation. Using the expiration of preexisting collective bargaining agreements as a source of exogenous variation in the timing
-
Consumer Myopia in Vehicle Purchases: Evidence from a Natural Experiment American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Kenneth T. Gillingham, Sébastien Houde, Arthur A. van Benthem
A central question in the analysis of fuel economy policy is whether consumers are myopic with regards to future fuel costs. We provide the first evidence on the consumer valuation of fuel economy from a natural experiment that provides exogenous variation in fuel economy ratings. We examine the short-run equilibrium effects of a restatement of fuel economy ratings that affected 1.6 million vehicles
-
Wired and Hired: Employment Effects of Subsidized Broadband Internet for Low-Income Americans American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 George W. Zuo
I present evidence on the relationship between broadband pricing and labor market outcomes for low-income individuals. Specifically, I estimate the effects of a Comcast service providing discounted broadband to qualifying low-income families. I use a triple differences strategy exploiting geographic variation in Comcast coverage, individual variation in eligibility, and temporal variation pre- and
-
Unit Sales and Price Effects of Preannounced Consumption Tax Reforms: Micro-level Evidence from European VAT American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Thiess Buettner, Boryana Madzharova
We study the effects of consumption tax changes on prices and unit sales of durables utilizing micro-level product data. The results show that tax rate changes are fully shifted into prices. An anticipated tax rate change causes a temporary shift in unit sales shortly before implementation, which is more than offset by adjustments upon and after implementation. If the tax rate increases by 1 percentage
-
The Electric Vehicle Transition and the Economics of Banning Gasoline Vehicles American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Stephen P. Holland, Erin T. Mansur, Andrew J. Yates
Electric vehicles have a unique potential to transform personal transportation. We analyze this transition with a dynamic model capturing falling costs of electric vehicles, decreasing pollution from electricity, and increasing vehicle substitutability. Our calibration to the US market shows a transition from gasoline vehicles is not optimal at current substitutability: a gasoline vehicle production
-
Women’s Suffrage and Children’s Education American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Esra Kose, Elira Kuka, Na’ama Shenhav
While a growing literature shows that women, relative to men, prefer greater investment in children, it is unclear whether empowering women produces better economic outcomes. Exploiting plausibly exogenous variation in US suffrage laws, we show that exposure to suffrage during childhood led to large increases in educational attainment for children from disadvantaged backgrounds, especially Blacks and
-
Political Alignment, Attitudes Toward Government, and Tax Evasion American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Julie Berry Cullen, Nicholas Turner, Ebonya Washington
We ask whether attitudes toward government play a causal role in the evasion of US personal income taxes. As turnover elections move voters in partisan counties into and out of alignment with the party of the president, we find with alignment (i) taxpayers report more easily evaded forms of income; (ii) suspect EITC claims decrease; and (iii) audits triggered and audits found to owe additional tax
-
Preferred Pharmacy Networks and Drug Costs American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-07-27 Amanda Starc, Ashley Swanson
Selective contracting is an increasingly popular tool for reducing health care costs, but any savings must be weighed against consumer surplus losses from restricted access. Recently, many prescription drug plans (PDPs) utilize preferred pharmacy networks to reduce drug prices. Our results suggest that Medicare Part D plans with preferred pharmacy networks pay lower retail drug prices, while subsidized
-
Heterogeneous Workers and Federal Income Taxes in a Spatial Equilibrium American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Mark Colas, Kevin Hutchinson
We study the geographic incidence and efficiency of an income tax by estimating a spatial equilibrium model with heterogeneous workers. The US income tax shifts households out of high-productivity cities, leading to locational inefficiency of 0.25 percent of output. Removing spatial tax distortions increases inequality because more educated households are more mobile and own larger shares of land.
-
Racial Divisions and Criminal Justice: Evidence from Southern State Courts American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Benjamin Feigenberg, Conrad Miller
The US criminal justice system is exceptionally punitive. We test whether racial heterogeneity is one cause, exploiting cross-jurisdiction variation in punishment severity in four Southern states. We estimate the causal effect of jurisdiction on arrest outcomes using a fixed effects model that incorporates extensive charge and defendant controls. We validate our estimates using defendants charged in
-
Do School Spending Cuts Matter? Evidence from the Great Recession American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 C. Kirabo Jackson, Cora Wigger, Heyu Xiong
During the Great Recession, national public school per-pupil spending fell by roughly 7 percent and persisted beyond the recovery. The impact of such large and sustained education funding cuts is not well understood. To examine this, first, we document that the recessionary drop in spending coincided with the end of decades-long national growth in both test scores and college-going. Next, we show that
-
Do People Respond to the Mortgage Interest Deduction? Quasi-Experimental Evidence from Denmark American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Jonathan Gruber, Amalie Jensen, Henrik Kleven
Using a major reform that scaled back the mortgage interest deduction for middle- and high-income households in Denmark, we study how tax subsidies affect housing decisions. We present four main findings. First, the mortgage deduction has a precisely estimated zero effect on homeownership for high- and middle-income households. Second, the mortgage deduction has a clear effect on housing demand at
-
Impacts of Private Prison Contracting on Inmate Time Served and Recidivism American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Anita Mukherjee
This paper examines the impact of private prison contracting by exploiting staggered prison capacity shocks in Mississippi. Motivated by a model based on the typical private prison contract that pays a per diem for each occupied bed, the empirical analysis shows that private prison inmates serve 90 additional days. This is alternatively estimated as 4.8 percent of the average sentence. The delayed
-
The Role of Electoral Incentives for Policy Innovation: Evidence from the US Welfare Reform American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Andreas Bernecker, Pierre C. Boyer, Christina Gathmann
How do governors’ reelection motives affect policy experimentation? We develop a theoretical model of this situation, and then test the predictions in data on US state-level welfare reforms from 1978 to 2007. This period marked the most dramatic shift in social policy since the New Deal. Our findings indicate that governors with strong electoral support are less likely to experiment than governors
-
The Macroeconomic Effects of Income and Consumption Tax Changes American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Anh D.M. Nguyen, Luisanna Onnis, Raffaele Rossi
This paper estimates the effects of exogenous changes in income and consumption taxes. The tax shocks are proxied with a narrative account of tax liability changes in the United Kingdom. Income tax cuts have large effects on GDP, private consumption, and investment. The effects of consumption tax cuts are modest and not statistically significant on GDP and its components. Shifting the burden of taxation
-
The Costs of Corporate Tax Complexity American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Eric Zwick
Does tax code complexity alter corporate behavior? We investigate this question by studying the decision to claim refunds for tax losses. In a sample of 1.2 million observations from the population of corporate tax returns, only 37 percent of eligible firms claim their refund. A simple cost-benefit analysis of the tax loss choice cannot explain low take-up, motivating an exploration of how complexity
-
Emissions, Transmission, and the Environmental Value of Renewable Energy American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Harrison Fell, Daniel T. Kaffine, Kevin Novan
We examine how transmission congestion alters the environmental benefits provided by renewable generation. Using hourly data from the Texas and midcontinent electricity markets, we find that relaxing transmission constraints between the wind-rich areas and the demand centers of the respective markets conservatively increases the nonmarket value of wind by 30 percent for Texas and 17 percent for midcontinent
-
Retail Prices in a City American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Alon Eizenberg, Saul Lach, Merav Oren-Yiftach
This study examines grocery price differentials across neighborhoods in a large metropolitan area (the city of Jerusalem, Israel). Important variation in access to affordable grocery shopping is documented using CPI data on prices and neighborhood-level credit card expenditure data. Residents of peripheral, nonaffluent neighborhoods are charged some of the highest prices in the city and yet display
-
Thy Neighbor’s Misfortune: Peer Effect on Consumption American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Sumit Agarwal, Wenlan Qian, Xin Zou
Using a large, representative sample of credit and debit card transactions in Singapore, this paper studies the consumption response of individuals whose same-building neighbors experienced personal bankruptcy. The unique bankruptcy rules in Singapore suggest liquidity shocks drive personal bankruptcy decisions, leading to a substantial drop in consumption for the bankrupt. Peers’ monthly card consumption
-
Does the Individual Mandate Affect Insurance Coverage? Evidence from Tax Returns American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Ithai Z. Lurie, Daniel W. Sacks, Bradley Heim
We estimate the effect of the ACA’s individual mandate on insurance coverage using regression discontinuity and regression kink designs with tax return data. We have four key results. First, the actual penalty paid per uninsured month is less than half the statutory amount. Second, nonetheless, we find visually clear and statistically signifi-cant responses to both extensive margin exposure to the
-
Long-Term Contextual Effects in Education: Schools and Neighborhoods American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Jean-William Laliberté
This paper estimates the long-term impact of growing up in better neighborhoods and attending better schools on educational attainment. First, I use a spatial regression-discontinuity design to estimate school effects. Second, I study students who move across neighborhoods in Montreal during childhood to estimate the causal effect of growing up in a better area (total exposure effects). I find large
-
Unemployment Insurance Generosity and Aggregate Employment American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-04-30 Christopher Boone, Arindrajit Dube, Lucas Goodman, Ethan Kaplan
This paper examines the impact of unemployment insurance (UI) on aggregate employment by exploiting cross-state variation in the maximum benefit duration during the Great Recession. Comparing adjacent counties located in neighboring states, there is no statistically significant impact of increasing UI generosity on aggregate employment. Point estimates are uniformly small in magnitude, and the most
-
The Sensitivity of Housing Demand to Financing Conditions: Evidence from a Survey American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-02-02 Andreas Fuster, Basit Zafar
Measuring the sensitivity of housing demand to mortgage rates and available leverage is challenging because there is generally no exogenous variation in these variables. This paper circumvents this issue by designing a strategic survey in which respondents report their willingness to pay (WTP) for a home under different financing scenarios. Relaxation of down payment constraints or an exogenous increase
-
The Impact of Paid Maternity Leave on Maternal Health American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-02-02 Aline Bütikofer, Julie Riise, Meghan M. Skira
We examine the impact of the introduction of paid maternity leave in Norway in 1977 on maternal health in the medium and long term. Using administrative data combined with survey data on the health of women around age 40, we find the reform improved a range of maternal health outcomes, including BMI, blood pressure, pain, and mental health. The reform also increased health-promoting behaviors, such
-
Can Successful Schools Replicate? Scaling Up Boston’s Charter School Sector American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-02-02 Sarah R. Cohodes, Elizabeth M. Setren, Christopher R. Walters
Can schools that boost student outcomes reproduce their success at new campuses? We study a policy reform that allowed effective charter schools in Boston, Massachusetts to replicate their school models at new locations. Estimates based on randomized admission lotteries show that replication charter schools generate large achievement gains on par with those produced by their parent campuses. The average
-
Influence and Information in Team Decisions: Evidence from Medical Residency American Economic Journal: Economic Policy (IF 6.067) Pub Date : 2021-02-02 David C. Chan
I study team decisions among physician trainees. Exploiting a discontinuity in team roles across trainee tenure, I find evidence that teams alter decision-making, concentrating influence in the hands of senior trainees. I also demonstrate little convergence in variation of trainee effects despite intensive training. This general pattern of trainee effects on team decision-making exists in all types