Ongoing Projects

Abstract

 This paper investigates the impact of South Korea's rapid robotization, driven by the country's proactive robotization policies, on subjective well-being using individual and household-level panel data. We measure individual exposure to robotization by estimating the probability that individuals work in occupations susceptible to robotization. This approach allows us to study the effect of robotization at the individual level, including the unemployed and indirectly affected workers. Our findings indicate that the initial phase of automation adversely affected workers. However, this negative impact diminished during the subsequent phase of automation. This suggests that once workers adapt to an environment integrated with robots, they begin to experience the benefits of automation. 

Abstract

In this paper, we find evidence that the South Korean districts with high robot adoption rates tend to be vote more for both Right and Left-wing parties at the parliamentary elections level. This result highlights the emergence of politcal polarization as a result of robot adoption. At the presidential election, districts with high levels of robotization tend to have an increase in the Right as well as the Center-Left vote shares. We attempt to disentangle the mechanisms behind these results at both the presidential and parliamentary levels through a series of heterogeneity analysis at the district level. We find that our results are driven by the divide between older and younger generations who have been differentially impacted by by robot adoption. 

Abstract

Using a novel dataset in a difference-in-differences framework, I study the political implications of the change in policies protecting drought-impacted communities in Tunisia in 3088 districts. In 2016, the Tunisian government had drastically reduced support to farmers affected by droughts. I show that this resulted in lower vote share for the incumbent candidate in the second round of the 2019 presidential elections. The magnitudes are substantial: a one standard deviation increase in the district-level damage caused by droughts after the policy change leads to a decline in the incumbent’s vote share by 10 percentage points. I show that the likely mechanism is the rise of public discontent: the drought-affected districts had a higher number of riots or violent protests relative to the policy change. I find no significant effects either on voter turnout, closeness to incumbent party at the parliamentary elections or on trust in political parties at the parliament.