Existing development literature has argued that natural-resource endowments ``curse'' economic prosperity by reducing expenditures on education. According to this theory, public and private agents lack sufficient foresight to make optimal economic decisions and become poor as a result. Using a...

Over the past decade, the production of shale oil and gas significantly increased in the United States. This paper uniquely examines how this energy boom has affected regional crime rates throughout the United States. There is evidence that, as a result of the ongoing shale-energy boom,...

A surprising feature of resource-rich economies is slow growth. It is often argued that natural-resource production impedes development by creating market or institutional failures. This paper establishes an alternative explanation - a slow-growing resource sector. A declining resource sector is...