We use a novel dataset and research design to empirically detect the effect of social interactions among neighbors on labor market outcomes. Specifically, using Census data that characterize residential and employment locations down to the city block, we examine whether individuals residing in...

Identification of the strength of human capital externalities at the aggregate level is still not fully understood. The existing method may yield positive or negative externalities even if wages reflect marginal social products. We propose an approach that yields positive average human capital...

Borrowers in U.S. cities where house prices boomed in the 2000s relied heavily on backloaded interest-only (IO) mortgages that require borrowers to only pay interest for the first few years of the loan. We develop a theory that encompasses common explanations for IO use, and show that while they...

Residential segregation has been blamed for causing adverse social and economic effects, and contradicting to the ideology of a free and equal society. However, studies have documented that psychological and cultural benefits of such clustering. If households believe that it would provide...

We use Texas's constitutional amendment in 1997 that expanded the scope of home equity loans as a source of exogenous variation to estimate the effects of relaxing credit constraints on small businesses. We find, using standard panel data methods and restricted-use micro-data from the US Census...

Accepting that successful 'development' is premised on a population's participation in a collective undertaking, we must understand urban residents'; interactions and ambitions. In African cities being transformed by geographic and social mobility, it is unclear what forms of inclusion,...

In this paper we explore the long term movement in the housing prices in select American cities. Using the monthly S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices, we look at the stability of housing prices in 14 selected large American cities. We undertake the ADF (GLS) unit root test for the index in each...

In this chapter we present an overview of the history of racial differences in schooling in the United States. We present basic data on literacy, school attendance, educational attainment, various measures of school quality, and the returns to schooling. Then, in the context of a simple model of...

Despite widespread concern about homelessness, fundamental questions about the size and characteristics of this hard to study population are unresolved, in large part because it is unclear whether existing data are sufficiently complete and reliable. We examine these questions as well as the...

This paper provides new evidence on the causal impacts of city-wide racial segregation on intergenerational mobility. We use an instrumental variable approach that relies on plausibly exogenous variation in segregation due to the arrangement of railroad tracks in the nineteenth century. Our...