We empirically and theoretically study the effects of capital flows on resource allocation within sectors and cross-sectors. Novel data on service firms - in addition to manufacturing firms - allows us to assess two channels of resource reallocation. Capital inflows lower the relative price of...

We develop a simple menu-cost model with non-constant elasticity of demand that features idiosyncratic productivity and demand shocks. The model is calibrated to match firm-level productivity and demand processes estimated from U.S. data. Despite its simplicity, the calibrated model delivers...

Uncertainty triggers two confounding effects: a realization and an anticipation effect. By using the 2019 riots in Chile as a quasi-natural experiment, we show that the pricing behavior of supermarkets is consistent with a pure anticipation effect: during the 31-day period following the start of...

We study the role of firms' political influence on the effectiveness of government spending using ARRA as a laboratory. Through an IV approach, we show that a 10 percentage points increase in the share of politically connected spending lowers the job creation effect of stimulus by 33 percent at...

We use unique firm-level data from Mexico to document that non-financial corporations engage in carry trades by borrowing in foreign currency (FX) and lending in domestic currency, largely in the form of trade credit, accumulating currency risk in the process. We show at a quarterly frequency...

Are financial crises a negative shock to demand or a negative shock to supply? This is a fundamental question for both macroeconomics researchers and those involved in real-time policymaking, and in both cases the question has become much more urgent in the aftermath of the recent financial...

The unexpected outbreak of the U.S.-China trade war led to dramatic increases in the import and export tariffs confronting Chinese firms. Due to firm-level differences in trade engagement, customs trade data combined with tariff changes allow us to measure firm-level exposure to the trade war....

Bullying is a behavioral phenomenon that has received increasing attention in recent times. This paper uses a structural model with latent skills and longitudinal information from Korean youths to identify the determinants and effects of bullying. We find that, unlike cognitive skills,...

Our findings show that the SGL program increased the probability of enrollment and reduced the probability of dropping out from tertiary education: SGL reduced the first year dropout rate by 6.8% for students enrolled in five-year colleges and by 64.3% for those enrolled in institutions offering...

We introduce a general framework to analyze the trade-off between education and family size. Our framework incorporates parental preferences for birth order and delivers theoretically consistent birth order and family size effects on children's educational attainment. We develop an empirical...