We test the predictions of a behavioral model of transactional electoral politics in the context of a randomized anti-vote-selling intervention in the Philippines. We model selling one's vote as a temptation good: it creates positive utility for the future self at the moment of voting, but not...

This paper investigates the biological standard of living toward the end of Spanish rule. We investigate levels, trends, and determinants of physical stature from the birth cohorts of the 1860s to the 1890s using data on 23,000 Filipino soldiers enlisted by the U.S. military between 1901 and...

This paper explores firms' export dynamics in emerging economies where local firms face stiff foreign competition, both at home and abroad, and thus compelled to choose the level of quality in which to export. We develop and test a model of vertical product differentiation where the link between...

Using an economic model to assess welfare risk and resilience to disasters, this paper systematically tackles the questions: 1) How much asset and welfare risks does each region in the Philippines face from riverine flood disasters? 2) How resilient is each region to riverine flood disasters?...

We use a change in Iceland’s education system as a natural experiment to measure the effect of years spent in upper secondary school on subsequent first year outcomes at university. The duration of Iceland´s upper-secondary education was shortened by one year through compression of the...

We study whether female students benefit from being taught by female professors, and whether such gender match effects differ by class size. We use administrative records of a German public university, covering all programs and courses between 2006 and 2018. We find that gender match effects on...

Recent empirical analyses reveal substantial differences in the choices of college majors between demographic and socio-economic groups that are further amplified upon students' adjustment of their educational choices in the course of studies. The best documented and salient are the differences...

Underrepresented minority (URM) college students have been steadily earning degrees in relatively less-lucrative fields of study since the mid-1990s. A decomposition reveals that this widening gap is principally explained by rising stratification at public research universities, many of which...

We explore how socio-economic background shapes academia, collecting the largest dataset of U.S. academics’ backgrounds and research output. Individuals from poorer backgrounds have been severely underrepresented for seven decades, especially in humanities and elite universities. Father’s...

We analyse how state university competition to collect resources may affect both research and the quality of teaching. By considering a set-up where two state universities behave strategically, we model their interaction with potential students as a sequential noncooperative game. We show that...