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Research
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Working Papers
Working Papers
Abstract. This paper studies how wealth affects workers’ ability to move to higher-paying jobs. Using microdata from the SIPP, I document two facts: workers with low liquid wealth are less likely to change jobs but, conditional on moving, experience significantly larger wage gains. To explain these patterns, I develop a job ladder model with incomplete markets and risk-averse workers, in which changing jobs resets tenure and raises the risk of job loss. This generates a job security premium, the additional compensation workers require to switch jobs, which declines with wealth and increases with tenure. Consistent with the model, data from the SCE show that wealth reduces the gap between reservation and actual wages for high-tenure workers, with no effect at low tenure. Quantitatively, the model accounts for nearly 60% of the observed wealth gap in job mobility, and shutting down this mechanism yields both higher mobility and lower income inequality. More generous unemployment insurance reduces the job security premium and provides a way out of the job trap: the optimal policy raises welfare by an additional 25% relative to a model with constant layoff risk.
Awards: Econ JM Best Paper Award by EEA and UniCredit , AEA Summer Economics Fellowship, GSAS Dissertation Fellowship
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Abstract. We provide new evidence on the drivers of assortative marriage in the United States. Using four decades of microdata from the American Community Survey, we document substantial spatial variation in assortative mating over income: it is strongest in areas with higher housing costs and a larger share of college-educated workers. To interpret these patterns, we develop a spatial marriage-market model that embeds a search-and-matching framework within a superstar-city environment, characterized by heterogeneous housing supply elasticities and returns to productivity. The model replicates observed wage and housing price differentials across cities and generates spatial and marital sorting patterns consistent with the data. In equilibrium, skilled workers endogenously sort into more productive, high-cost cities, where they are more likely to meet and marry other high earners. Preliminary quantitative results suggest that assortative mating on income is substantially stronger in superstar cities than in the average metropolitan area.
Unemployment Insurance and Wage Dynamics in the Post-Pandemic Labor Market, with Carter Bryson [Draft available upon request]
Unemployment Insurance and Wage Dynamics in the Post-Pandemic Labor Market, with Carter Bryson [Draft available upon request]
Abstract. This paper studies how the unprecedented expansion of unemployment insurance during the Covid pandemic affected wage dynamics and their passthrough to inflation. Using microdata from the Current Population Survey (CPS), we show that the post-pandemic increase in aggregate wage growth was driven primarily by wage gains among job stayers rather than by job-to-job reallocation. At the same time, wage growth was disproportionately concentrated among lower-wage workers, leading to a temporary compression of the wage distribution. Complementary evidence from the Survey of Consumer Expectations (SCE) indicates that reservation wages rose sharply during the period of expanded UI benefits and declined in states that terminated these programs early. These findings point to a central role for UI in shaping workers’ outside options and firms’ wage-setting behavior. We interpret the evidence through the lens of a general equilibrium wage-posting framework with incomplete markets, in which more generous UI raises reservation wages and induces firms to increase wages within ongoing matches, particularly for lower-wage workers. Ongoing work uses this framework to quantify the contribution of different UI policies to wage growth, labor reallocation, and inflation during the post-pandemic recovery.
Work in Progress
Work in Progress
Income Inequality and Bargaining Power: the Massachusetts Equal Pay Act
Income Inequality and Bargaining Power: the Massachusetts Equal Pay Act
Abstract. I study how pay transparency and equal pay legislation affect within-firm wage inequality and workers’ bargaining power. Specifically, I examine the 2018 Massachusetts Equal Pay Act (MEPA), which prohibits employers from requesting salary histories, bans pay-secrecy policies, and mandates equal pay for comparable work. Using matched employer–employee data, I plan to implement a difference-in-differences design to estimate the causal impact of MEPA on within-firm wage dispersion among comparable roles. To interpret the empirical results, I develop a search-and-matching model in which workers and firms bargain under asymmetric information about outside offers. MEPA’s restrictions reduce informational asymmetries, shifting bargaining power toward workers and compressing the within-firm wage distribution. The model provides a framework to quantify the welfare and efficiency effects of transparency policies. This project aims to shed light on the role of information frictions in wage setting and to evaluate how institutional reforms that promote pay transparency can reduce inequality within firms.
Discussions
Discussions
prepared for the 4th DC Search and Matching Workshop, April 2025
prepared for the 4th DC Search and Matching Workshop, April 2025
The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Labor Market Outcomes, by Lorien Rice, Hsiaohuey Ivy Lee, Samuel Evans, and Zhichun Chai [slides];
The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Labor Market Outcomes, by Lorien Rice, Hsiaohuey Ivy Lee, Samuel Evans, and Zhichun Chai [slides];
prepared for the CSWEP sessions at WEAI, June 2025
prepared for the CSWEP sessions at WEAI, June 2025
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