The key to identifying racial price differentials in housing markets is to test whether minority and non-minority buyers pay similar prices for comparable housing. The heterogeneous nature of the residential housing market and racial sorting of buyers into neighborhoods violates the...

Professional sports facilities and teams generate local amenity flows in cities that may affect property values. Previous research shows evidence of important positive and negative local amenity flows based on case studies of changes in residential property values in specific cities. We analyze...

We provide a new framework for using text as data in empirical models. The framework identifies salient information in unstructured text that can control for multidimensional heterogeneity among assets. We demonstrate the efficacy of the framework by re-examining principal-agent problems in...

We analyze the relationship between sports events and concerts, important hospitality demand drivers and key components of many urban renewal projects, in the Staples Center in Los Angeles, an arena home to three pro teams, and nearby hotel performance, exploiting exogenous daily variation in...

Faced with decreasing funds, increasing costs, and the inability to recruit and retain quality teachers, a growing number of school districts across the United States are switching to four-day school weeks. Because the four-day school week has historically been relegated to rural communities, no...

The constant-quality assumption in repeat-sales house price indexes (HPIs) introduces a significant time-varying attribute bias. The direction, magnitude, and source of the bias varies throughout the market cycle and across metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs). We mitigate the bias using a...

The number 8, pronounced like 'prosperity,' is lucky in Chinese culture; 4, pronounced like 'death' is unlucky. Superstitious beliefs may influence asset prices if transaction participants have cultural preferences for specific numbers. We analyze the relationship between the presence of 8s and...

The 'secondary effects' legal doctrine allows municipalities to zone, or otherwise regulate, sexually oriented businesses. Negative 'secondary effects' (economic externalities) justify limiting First Amendment protection of speech conducted inside strip clubs. One example of a secondary effect,...

Given the resurgence of cities as consumer centers and the importance of amenities, we revisit the differences in tipping in taxis between tourists and locals in New York City. Taxi service is an endogenous amenity; however, taxis also contribute to the demand and provision of other amenities....