The quantitative effects and even the existence of "human capital depreciation" phenomena has been a subject of controversy in the recent literature. Prior work, however, was largely cross-sectional and theiotgitudina1 dimension, if any, was retrospective. Using longitudinal panel data (on...

We report the results of a field experiment in which treated employers could not observe the compensation history of their job applicants. Treated employers responded by evaluating more applicants, and evaluating those applicants more intensively. They also responded by changing what kind of...

Selective college admissions are fundamentally a question of tradeoffs: Given capacity, admitting one student means rejecting another. Research to date has generally estimated average effects of college selectivity, and has been unable to distinguish between the effects on students gaining...

We exploit an episode of plausibly-random debt discharge, due to the inability of National Collegiate to prove chain of title, to examine the effects of student debt relief on individual credit and labor market outcomes. We find that borrowers experiencing this debt relief shock reduce their...

This paper uses IRS tax data to evaluate the short- and long-term effects of California's 2004 Paid Family Leave Act (PFLA) on women's careers. Our research design exploits the increased availability of paid leave for women giving birth in the third quarter of 2004 (just after PFLA was...

In most organizations, promotions often require self-nomination and competition among applicants. However, research on gender differences in preferences for competition suggests that this process might result in fewer women choosing to participate. We study whether changing promotion schemes...

Do the retirement patterns of public-sector workers differ from those in the private sector? Most private-sector workers today face a do-it-yourself retirement income landscape characterized by an exposure to market forces through defined-contribution pension plans and private saving, and the...