This is the first paper to test the asset pricing implication of leverage in a laboratory. We show that as theory predicts, leverage increases asset prices: when an asset can be used as collateral (i.e., when the asset can be bought on margin), its price goes up. This increase is significant,...

Corruption (the abuse of entrusted authority for illicit gain) is pervasive, hard to measure, and damaging both to economic growth and human rights. Corruption is also intimately associated with trade. However, the international organization governing trade, the WTO, says nothing about...

In this paper we argue that support for the policy of petroleum autarky cannot be fully understood by relying on an "industry preferences" model, or on explanations rooted in electoral politics that emphasize the economic interests of constituents in oil-producing regions. While these variables...

Multidimensional measures provide an alternative lens through which poverty may be viewed and understood. In recent work we have attempted to offer a practical approach to identifying the poor and measuring aggregate poverty (Alkire and Foster 2011). As this is quite a departure from traditional...

Sunday birth rates in Ecuador have sharply declined, and the drop is larger among young cohorts in urban areas. These trends are attributed to an increase in cesarean births, which are generally scheduled during regular hospital hours. Multiple rounds of Health Surveys confirm that mothers with...

The Hukou system restricts rural-urban migration in China. This paper proposes positive impact of the Hukou system on education: rural people have stronger incentives to pursue higher education, treating it as a means to obtain urban identity and escape from under-developed areas. Applying the...

This paper uses data from a randomized controlled trial to study the impacts of food supplementation and medical treatment on the receipt of human recognition by malnourished, HIV-infected adults in Kenya. Questions specially designed to measure human recognition were included in the trial,...

We provide evidence of the Peltzman effect by tracking the professional path of each hockey player that ended up in the National Hockey League from 2001 to 2006. We take advantage of the fact that visor use has not always been compulsory throughout a player's career, which allows us to compare...

The literature on leverage until now shows how an increase in volatility reduces leverage. However, in order to explain pro-cyclical leverage it assumes that bad news increases volatility. This paper suggests a reason why bad news is more often than not associated with higher future volatility....

The WTO system has democratic rights spillovers. In this paper, we show how GATT and WTO rules induce memberstates to advance several democratic rights: specifically political participation, due process and access toinformation. We use qualitative and quantitative tools to examine this process....