We estimate the size of the likely unofficial income of a household with a government official by the difference between the income that would be necessary to explain their observed home purchase behavior and the official income. Using unique and comprehensive administrative records on the House...

Corrupt officials can use their positions to enrich themselves in two ways. They can steal from the state budget--embezzling or misspending funds--or they can demand extra payments from citizens in return for services--bribery. In many circumstances, embezzlement is less distortionary than...

In 1955 only a few states had laws governing collective bargaining by public employees. By 1984 only a few states were without such laws. The emergence of these policies coincides with a dramatic increase in unionization among public employees, and an important puzzle is the direction of...

Municipal unions may often use their own votes and those of sympathetic fellow citizens to promote increases in demand for municipal services. If successful, this strategy can increase member employment levels without sacrificing compensation. Municipal employee unionization significantly...

Engaging in paid employment after claiming retirement benefits may be an important avenue for individuals to work longer as life expectancies rise. After separating from one's career employer, individuals may engage in paid work to stay active or to supplement their current level of retirement...

Competitive exams are a standard method for selecting civil servants. Yet, evidence on the effectiveness of such approach is mixed, and lack of personnel data limits our understanding of the mechanisms underlying this varying success. We digitize personnel and financial data to study the impacts...

The "Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Act of 2003" (JGTRA03) contained a number of significant tax provisions, but the most noteworthy may have been the reduction in dividend tax rates. The political debate over the dividend tax reductions of 2003 took a number of surprising twists and turns....

Revolving door laws restrict public officials from representing private interests before government after leaving office. While these laws mitigate potential conflicts of interest, they also may affect the pool of candidates for public positions by lowering the financial benefits of holding...

While major stock market indices are followed by large monetary investments, we document that membership decisions for the S&P 500 index have a nontrivial amount of discretion. We show that firms' purchases of S&P ratings appear to improve their chance of entering the index (but purchases of...

We study bank supervision by combining a theoretical model distinguishing supervision from regulation and a novel dataset on work hours of Federal Reserve supervisors. We highlight the trade-offs between the benefits and costs of supervision and use the model to interpret the relation between...