In recent years, field experiments have reshaped policy worldwide, but scaling ideas remains a thorny challenge. Perhaps the most important issue facing policymakers today is deciding which ideas to ...

We develop and quantify a novel growth theory in which economic activity endogenously shifts from material production to quality improvements. Consumers derive utility from goods with differing ...

This disagreement reflects a 60-year history of misapplication of the neoclassical theory of investment to interpret empirical work and guide policy analysis. In this article I reconsider the ...

Using data on 2.5 million great-grandchildren linked to their great-grandfathers in the US (1850–1940), we show that economic gaps persisted strongly across four generations despite major structural ...

A college degree offers a pathway to economic mobility for low-income students. Using a multi-site randomized controlled trial combined with administrative and survey data, we demonstrate that ...

Using a regression discontinuity design and administrative data, we study a Danish policy that cut welfare benefits for refugees, increasing crime among affected individuals. Linking refugees to ...

Social desirability bias (SDB) is a pervasive threat to the validity of survey and experimental data. Respondents might often misreport sensitive attitudes and behaviors to appear more socially ...

Housing prices across much of America have hit historic highs, while less housing is being built. If the U.S. housing stock had expanded at the same rate from 2000-2020 as it did from 1980-2000, there ...

U.S. and European banking institutions were hit by a wave of distress in March 2023. Policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic reacted with an array of interventions, some targeting individual ...

This paper uses two large datasets built from quarterly labor force surveys to provide a global perspective on labor market downturns. The distribution of the severity and duration of labor market ...

In this paper, we establish a causal connection between two of the most salient social developments in the United States over the past decades: the opioid epidemic and the political realignment ...

Using confidential administrative data from the U.S. Census Bureau we revisit how the rise in Chinese import penetration has reshaped U.S. local labor markets. Local labor markets more exposed to the ...