We demonstrate the importance of distinguishing between the traditional use of labor for production, versus alternative uses of labor for overhead, marketing and other expansionary activities, for studying the distribution of both factor income and labor income. We use our framework to assess...

We develop an efficient and easy-to-use computational method for solving a wide class of general equilibrium heterogeneous agent models with aggregate shocks, together with an open source suite of codes that implement our algorithms in an easy-to-use toolbox. Our method extends standard...

Using panel data on individual labor income histories from 1957 to 2013, we document two empirical facts about the distribution of lifetime income in the United States. First, from the cohort that entered the labor market in 1967 to the cohort that entered in 1983, median lifetime income of men...

We revisit recent empirical evidence about the rise in top income inequality in the United States, drawing attention to four key issues that we believe are critical for an informed discussion about changing inequality since 1980. Our goal is to inform researchers, policy makers, and journalists...

We analyze changes in the gender structure at the top of the earnings distribution in the United States over the last 30 years using a 10% sample of individual earnings histories from the Social Security Administration. Despite making large inroads, females still constitute a small proportion of...

I structurally estimate an incomplete markets life-cycle model with endogenous labor supply using data on the joint distribution of wages, hours, and consumption. The model is successful at matching the evolution of both the first and second moments of the data over the life cycle. The key...