We use two approaches to examine the macroeconomic consequences of disruptions in global food commodity markets. First, we embed a novel quarterly composite global production index for the four basic staples (corn, wheat, rice and soybeans) in a standard vector autoregression (VAR) model, and we...

When traditional methods for measuring economic welfare are scarce or unreliable, heights and BMIs are now well accepted measurements that represent biological conditions during economic development. Weight, after controlling for height, is an alternative measure to BMI for current net...

The Atkinson-Stiglitz theorem on uniform consumption taxation breaks down if prices are endogenous. This paper investigates the implications for optimal food subsidies in China. To do so, we build a general equilibrium model where low-skilled workers have a comparative advantage in the...

Many community organizations provide services similar to government programs, but there is limited evidence how increased government assistance affects the use of charitable services. We examine how greater access to federal nutritional aid through schoolwide free meal programs affects food bank...

We study the capacity to meet food demand under conditions of climate change, economic and population growth. We take a novel approach to quantifying climate impacts, based on a model of the global economy structurally estimated on the period 1960 to 2015. The model integrates several features...

Biotic factors such as pests create biodiversity effects that increase production risks and decrease land productivity when agriculture becomes more specialized. We show in a Ricardian two-country trade setup that production specialization is incomplete under free trade because of the decrease...

This paper adopts an instrumental variable approach to uncover the impact of variations in minimum temperature on emergence and severity of actual violence through the effect on food availability, captured by rice crops per capita. The link between increase in minimum temperature and rice crops...

We compare trends in mortality, nutritional status and food supply to other living standard indicators for the early years of the Nazi period. We find that Germany experienced a substantial increase in mortality rates in most age groups in the mid-1930s, even relative to those of 1932, the worst...

This study provides evidence that the over-export of grains aggravated the severity of China's Great Famine. We collect county-level data for the 1953-1965 period on death rates, birth rates, amounts of grain procured, output of different types of grain, crop productivity, weather conditions,...

How would climate change affect India’s agriculture which accounts for sixty percent of employment? We study the impact of climate change on the level and variability of yields of rice (India’s major food crop) and two key millet crops (sorghum and pearl millet), using an all India district...