Research

Published Work

"Student Loans Under the Risk of Youth Unemployment," Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Review, Second Quarter 2016, Vol. 98, No. 2, 129-58.

"Student Loans and Repayment: Theory, Evidence and Policy". Handbook of the Economics of Education, Volume 5. (2016) (with Lance J. Lochner)

"Default and Repayment among Baccalaureate Degree Earners" in Brad Hershbein and Kevin Hollenbeck (eds.), Student Loans and the Dynamics of Debt, Chapter 8, Kalamazoo: W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research (2015) (with Lance J. Lochner)

"Credit Constraints in Education", Annual Review of Economics, August 2012, Vol. 4, pp. 225-256. (with Lance Lochner)

"The Nature of Credit Constraints and Human Capital", The American Economic Review, October 2011, Vol. 101, Issue 6, pp. 2487-2529 (with Lance Lochner)

"Learning and the Wealth of Nations", Econometrica, January 2011, Vol. 79, Issue 1, pp. 1-45 (lead article); (with Francisco Buera and Giorgio Primiceri)

"Foreign Know-How, Firm Control and the Income of Developing Countries" The Quarterly Journal of Economics, February 2009, Vol. 124, No. 1: 149--195.(with Ariel Burstein)

"Entrepreneurship and Firm Heterogeneity under Limited Commitment" The Annals of Finance, April 2009, Vol. 5, No. 3-4: 465-494.

"Economic Growth in Paraguay" in Sources of Growth in Latin America. What Is Missing? Inter American Development Bank, Fernández-Arias, E., Manuelli, R. and Blyde, J. eds. (January 2006) (with Carlos Fernandez-Valdovinos)

"Access to Credit and the Performance of Firms in Costa Rica" in Credit Constraints and Investment in Latin America. Galindo, A. and Schiantarelli,F. eds. Inter-American Development Bank, July 2003. (with Luis J. Hall)

"Enforcement Mechanisms, Default, and Contract Design: Exploring the Credit Markets in Costa Rica". in Defusing default : Incentives and Institutions. Pagano, Marco, editor. Washington, DC: Inter-American Development Bank. November 2001 (with Javier Cascante and Luis Hall)

Working Papers

"Of Cities and Slums," Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis Working Paper 2016-022A, October 2016. (with Pedro Cavalcanti and Luciene Torres)

"Natural Resources and Global Misallocation," Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis Working Paper 2015-036B, October 2015, updated July 2016. (with Juan Sanchez and Raul Santaeulalia-Llopis)

"Markets, Externalities, and the Dynamic Gains of Openness," Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis Working Paper 2016-023B, October

"Openness and the Optimal Taxation of Foreign Know-How," Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis Working Paper 2016-020A, October 2016.

"Education Policies and Structural Transformation," Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis Working Paper 2014-039A, October 2014. (with Pedro Cavalcanti and Luciene Torres)

Work In Progress

"Designing Efficient Student Loan Programs." (with Lance Lochner and Juan Sanchez) [SLIDES]

"Assignment and Aggregation of Human Capital." (with Veronica Mies and Matias Tapia) [SLIDES]

"“Industrial Revolutions and Global Imbalances,” (with Kenichi Ueda)

"Financial Liberalization and Top Income Inequality." (with Alexander Ludwig, Ctirad Slavik and Faisal Sohail) (Slides soon!)