Marital institutions are rules governing marriages and divorces. Most work to date has focused on unilateral and no-fault divorce reforms. Theoretical discussions generally hinge on the applicability of the Coase theorem. Empirical evidence is mixed, but generally indicates that those reforms...

There has been considerable recent interest in earnings instability-the variability of workers' earnings around their expected earnings paths. While previous work has measured trends in instability, often to illuminate trends in inequality, this paper investigates the variation across workers....

Coasian reasoning predicts that the conditions under which parties may terminate a partnership will affect bargaining between partners, but not the durability of partnerships. This paper endeavors to test both predictions in an experimental setting that allows agents to form and end partnerships...

Many countries impose restrictions on some immigrants' job mobility, likely reducing their wages. We quantify such effects for Mexican-born men in the U.S. by recognizing that immigrants who marry U.S. natives receive expedited “green cards” (Permanent Residency). Robust IV estimates...

This paper extends previous work by showing that consumption constraints typically increase individuals' risk-aversion even if the illiquid good (e.g., leisure) has good substitutes. Calibrations indicate time-use constraints may raise risk-aversion considerably under many common scenarios.