Of Mice and Merchants: Trade and Growth in the Iron Age with Steve Pischke and Stefan Maurer. Abstract The causal connection between trade and development is typically obscured by reverse causality, the endogenous location of economic activities, and confounding factors like institutions. To avoid these problems, we study this question...
Measuring the Distribution of Wealth: Methods and Estimates for France, 1800-2014 with Bertrand Garbinti and Thomas Piketty Abstract This paper aims to reconcile the different data sources and methods that can be used to estimate the distribution of wealth: capitalization method (using income tax data); estate multiplier method (using inheritance...
For Whom the Bell Curve Tolls: Demography and the Wealth of Nations Personal Website
State Capacity and Public Goods: Institutional Change, Human Capital, and Growth in Early Modern Germany with Ralph Meisenzahl. Abstract What are the origins and consequences of the state as a provider of public goods? We study legal reforms that established mass public education and increased state capacity in German cities...
Ethnic Diversity and Growth: Revisiting the Evidence with Jose G. Montalvo The relationship between ethnic heterogeneity and economic growth is a complex one. Empirical research working with cross section data finds a negative, or statistically insignificant, relationship. However, research at the city level finds usually a positive relationship between diversity...
Surviving the Killing Fields. The cultural and political heritage of the Khmer Rouge with Mathias Iwanowsky We use evidence from one of history’s worst genocides, the Khmer Rouge regime, to study the causal impact of indirect experience of war on political beliefs, behavior, and trust 35 years later and find...
News vs. Novelas: Can Entertainment Media Undermine Dictatorships? with A. Chong, C. Ferraz, F. Finan, L. Meloni This paper investigates the extent to which media vehicles are prone to political capture in the context of the Brazilian dictatorship. We study the effects of Rede Globo, the primary Brazilian television station,...
