Recent work documents declining business dynamism in the United States, with concerning implications for markups, innovation and productivity. Using import data for 146 countries over three decades we document a set of new stylized facts describing market dynamism world-wide. Market entry rates...

We show that firms' nominal required returns to capital (i.e., their discount rates) are sticky with respect to expected inflation. Such nominally sticky discount rates imply that increases in expected inflation directly lower firms' real discount rates and thereby raise real investment. We...

We develop a dynamic model of firm investment under uncertainty that captures firms' risk attitude using quantile preferences. The firm maximizes its present value, defined as current profits and investment plus the discounted value of the τ-quantile of its value next period. In our framework,...

When explaining the declining labor income share in advanced economies, the macro literature finds that the elasticity of substitution between capital and labor is greater than one. However, the vast majority of micro-level estimates shows that capital and labor are complements (elasticity less...

In agreements settling patent challenges in the drug industry, the plaintiff brand commonly licenses the defendant generic to sell prior to patent expiry. Some agreements require the generic to pay the brand royalties. Despite the superficial flow of profits, royalty terms may function as part...

We examine how public firms listed in North American stock exchanges acquire technology companies during 2010-2020. Combining data from S&P, Refinitiv, Compustat, and CRSP, and utilizing a unique S&P taxonomy that classifies tech M&As by tech categories and business verticals, we show that 13.1%...

The U.S. limits work visas for low-skill jobs outside of agriculture, with a binding quota that firms access via a randomized lottery. We evaluate the marginal impact of the quota on firms entering the 2021 H-2B visa lottery using a novel survey and pre-analysis plan. Firms exogenously...

The pandemic triggered a large, lasting shift to work from home (WFH). To study this shift, we survey full-time workers who finished primary school in 27 countries as of mid 2021 and early 2022. Our cross-country comparisons control for age, gender, education, and industry and treat the U.S....

We use data from a large panel survey of UK firms to analyze the economic drivers of price setting since the start of the Covid pandemic. Inflation responded asymmetrically to movements in demand. This helps to explain why inflation did not fall much during the negative initial pandemic demand...

We present several empirical facts about trends in marketing investment in the US. We also present estimates of the private value of brands to firms and aggregate intangible brand capital stocks created by these investments. These investments include the creation and maintenance of a brand name...