We consider empirical measurement of equivalent/compensating variation resulting from price-change of a discrete good using individual-level data, when there is unobserved heterogeneity in preferences. We show that for binary and unordered multinomial choice, the marginal distributions of EV/CV...

Empirical welfare analyses often impose stringent parametric assumptions on individuals' preferences and neglect unobserved preference heterogeneity. In this paper, we develop a framework to conduct individual and social welfare analysis for discrete choice that does not suffer from these...

Sharp nonparametric bounds are derived for Hicksian compensating and equivalent variations. These 'i-bounds' generalize earlier results of Blundell, Browning and Crawford (2008). We show that their e-bounds are sharp under the Weak Axiom of Revealed Preference (WARP). They do not require...

A good transport network connects places better, but research traditionally contextualizes transportation as a line. Assessing transport connectivity's impact, we construct network indices derivable from Donaldson and Hornbeck's (2016) micro-foundations but propose better identification using a...

Individual heterogeneity is an important source of variation in demand. Allowing for general heterogeneity is needed for correct welfare comparisons. We consider general heterogenous demand where preferences and linear budget sets are statistically independent. We find that the dimension of...

Individual heterogeneity is an important source of variation in demand. Allowing for general heterogeneity is needed for correct welfare comparisons. We consider general heterogenous demand where preferences and linear budget sets are statistically independent. Only the marginal distribution of...

In this paper we develop theoretical criteria and econometric methods to rank policy interventions in terms of welfare when individuals are loss-averse. The new criterion for "loss aversion-sensitive dominance" defines a weak partial ordering of the distributions of policy-induced gains and...

This paper studies the welfare impact of reputation/feedback systems in markets where both adverse selection and moral hazard are present. Using a transaction-level dataset from an online credit market, I estimate a dynamic model of borrowers and lenders, in which borrowers are subject to...

We propose novel tools for the analysis of individual welfare on the basis of aggregate household demand behavior. The method assumes a collective model of household consumption with the public and private nature of goods specified by the empirical analyst. A main distinguishing feature of our...

We present a structural framework for the evaluation of public policies intended to increase job search intensity. Most of the literature defines search intensity as a scalar that influences the arrival rate of job offers; here we treat it as the number of job applications that workers send out....