Research
(with Francisca Antman and Paul Kim)
Submitted
Abstract: American colleges and universities have seen a notable increase in the share of international students in recent years, raising the question of how these demographic shifts might affect domestic students. This paper explores this question by examining the impact of international students on the academic outcomes of domestic peers in introductory economics courses. We address the potential endogeneity of class selection by focusing on first-year students enrolling in a large public flagship university, for whom class assignment is likely to be quasi-random, conditional on a rich set of control variables for the class and individual. Results suggest an increased share of international student peers reduces the likelihood of majoring in economics for domestic White and Asian men while increasing the likelihood of majoring in economics for domestic men from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups. There is also evidence that higher shares of international student peers may decrease the likelihood of dropping out for domestic men. Additional analyses point to introductory course grades and language differences as possible mechanisms to explain these results. Together, these findings highlight potential implications of educational policies which affect international and domestic student composition as well as the importance of disaggregating impacts by gender, race, and ethnicity.
(with Francisca Antman and Nick Flores)
Revise and Resubmit: Southern Economic Journal
Abstract: Employing both observational and experimental approaches, this paper considers the impacts of grades and information on gender gaps in college major and college dropout rates at a large public flagship university. Using a class fixed effects model and a rich set of individual controls, our observational study finds that the decision to major in economics is heavily influenced by grades within and outside of the major, and that women are relatively more responsive to introductory economics grades than men. However, this pattern is reversed for the college dropout decision, where men are relatively more responsive to introductory economics grades than women. To test whether grade sensitivities can be altered with better information about the link between introductory coursework and the likelihood of success in the major, we conducted an experimental study. We find that women who were randomly asked to recall and interpret their introductory economics grades are less likely to major in economics relative to the control group while men in the same treatment group are more likely to drop out of college. Providing better information about grade distributions appears to somewhat mitigate these effects. These results suggest better information may blunt the impact of relative grade sensitivities on college gender gaps, but may not fully outweigh the saliency of grades. Finally, we consider the extent to which aligning economics grading standards with those of competing disciplines would reduce the gender gap in economics graduates, but find relatively limited impacts.
J Popul Econ 37, 20 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00148-024-01003-0
Abstract: Women bear a disproportionate share of the unpaid labor within a household, which contributes to gender gaps in life and relationship satisfaction. This paper examines how an exogenous shock that increases workload within the household impacts the burden of unpaid labor. By exploiting a rich longitudinal dataset from Australia, I estimate the gendered impacts to parental workload and stress, life and relationship satisfaction, and household division of labor when parents have a child with a significant health shock. I find evidence that women experience a decrease in their satisfaction with parenting and their life and relationship satisfaction, and these results are most pronounced for households where the mother is less active in the labor market or less educated. Point estimates indicate that men may not experience the same negative effects.
Abstract: The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement was a prominent social movement largely focused on raising awareness of and reducing police use-of-force and fatal interactions with police. However, opponents of the movement have feared it could lead to decreased proactive policing and increased crime. Using a state-by-month fixed effects model, I find evidence that an additional protest in the preceding month leads to a decrease of 0.225 fatal interactions between blacks and police per 10 million black population. In addition, I find no evidence supporting increased crime or decreased arrests as a result of the BLM movement. (JEL Codes: J15, D91, Z13)