US federal transfers to individuals are large, countercyclical, vary geographically, and are often credited for helping stabilize regional economies. This paper estimates the short-run effects of these transfers using plausibly exogenous regional variation in temporary stimulus packages and...

Previous literature suggests that leaders matter for growth in general. This paper asks which leaders matter and develops a methodology to estimate the growth contribution of individual leaders and calculate its precision. The findings show that few leaders have statistically significant...

To analyze the effect of an increase in the quantity or quality of public investment on growth, this paper extends the World Bank’s Long-Term Growth Model (LTGM), by separating the total capital stock into public and private portions, with the former adjusted for its quality. The paper...

Transfers to individuals were a larger part of the 2009 U.S. stimulus package than government purchases. Using a two-agent New Keynesian model, this paper shows analytically that the multiplier on targeted transfers to financially constrained households is (i) larger than the purchase multiplier...

This paper shows that in theory and BLS microdata, the prices of imported goods respond to the exchange rates (ER) of the producer's foreign competitors. In contrast, standard models have no role for competitors' ERs. Excluding the effects of competitors' exchange rates typically biases upwards...

COVID-19 not only represents a worldwide public health emergency but has become an international economic crisis that could surpass the global financial crisis of 2008–09. Right now, containment and mitigation measures are necessary to limit the spread of the virus and save lives. However,...

Should fiscal consolidations be front-loaded or proceed at a more steady pace, and how does this affect growth? We make an attempt to address this question using a three-step methodology. First, we modify a standard regression of growth on consolidation size to allow speed to affect the...

US federal transfers to individuals are large, countercyclical, vary geographically, and are often credited with helping to stabilize regional economies. This paper estimates the short-run effects of these transfers using plausibly exogenous regional variation in temporary stimulus payments and...

Transfers to individuals were a larger part of the 2009 US stimulus package than government purchases. Using a two-agent New Keynesian model, we show analytically that the multiplier on targeted transfers to financially constrained households is (i) larger than the purchase multiplier if the...

This paper shows that in theory and BLS microdata, the prices of imported goods respond to the exchange rates (ER) of the producer's foreign competitors. In contrast, standard models have no role for competitors' ERs. Excluding the effects of competitors' exchange rates typically biases upwards...