Not conditioning on previous employment, we find large differences in the apparent effects of children on married women's labor supply among American-born white women and three ethnically distinct groups of newly arrived immigrants to the United States. When we account for labor supply in the...

This paper explores why many low-income households do not participate in the Food Stamp Program. By analyzing detailed income and asset data from a sample of low-income households, we find that many households that appear to be eligible for food stamps in fact are not eligible. By conducting an...

I test for welfare-induced migration by comparing AFDC participation in border counties to interior counties within states. If migration costs are lower for border-county residents, border counties on the high-benefit side of a state border should have higher welfare participation relative to...

This paper examines the performance of the JTPA performance system, a widely emulated model for inducing efficiency in government organizations. We present a model of how performance incentives may distort bureaucratic decisions. We define cream skimming within the model. Two major empirical...