Research

Works in Progress

• "Income Inequality and Segregation in College Towns in America"

• "Stigma and the Take-up of Social Services"

• "Segregation Academies and Racial Attitudes in the U.S. South"

• "Policing and Political Identity: Evidence from LGBTQ+ U.S. History"

Publications

• Kramer, Dennis A., Michael R. Holcomb, and Robert Kelchen. (2018). "The Costs and Consequences of Excess Credit Hours Policies."  Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis 40(1): 3 - 28. 

  • • • The growth of public discourse on college completion and student debt has pushed policymakers and institutional leaders to implement a variety of policies aimed at incentivizing student completion. This article examines the impact of state-adopted excess credit hour (ECH) policies on student completion and median debt outcomes. Using a quasi-experimental approach, we find little evidence that ECH policies positively affect student completion. However, we find statistically large estimates that adoption of ECH policies increase median student debt. 

• Choi, Dong Beom, Michael R. Holcomb, and Donald P. Morgan. (2020). "Bank Leverage Limits and Regulatory Arbitrage: New Evidence on a Recurring Question" Journal of Money, Credit, and Banking 52(S1): 241-266. 

  • • • We study the supplementary leverage ratio (SLR) finalized in the U.S. in 2014, which requires equal capital against assets with unequal risk. This presents an arbitrage opportunity by shedding safer assets and/or adding riskier ones. Using difference-in-differences, we find higher risky (risk-weighted) asset shares and security yields at SLR banks relative to the next largest set of banks after the SLR was finalized in 2014. The effects tend to be larger at more leverage-rule-constrained banks, and some are substantial; mean yields at SLR banks rose (relatively) about 30 basis points. While this arbitrage might have, perversely, increased overall bank risk, we find no evidence that it did.