Hello!

I am a postdoctoral fellow at BI Norwegian Business School in Oslo, Department of Economics, where I work with the Center for Applied Macroeconomics and Petroleum (CAMP). 

Research interests: Household finance, family economics, macro-labor, income inequality.

Reach me at helene.onshuus (a) bi.no, or check out my BI web page


Current research

Economies of scale and Family Insurance after job loss (WP available upon request)

ABSTRACT:

Do family members insure each other against income shocks? I study the consumption response to job loss in Norway from 1997 to 2011, and and present two empirical facts: First, married or cohabiting job losers without children exhibit a larger consumption response than single job losers without children. Second, while children reduce the consumption response to job loss, the difference between families with and without children i substantial for couples, but modest for singles. I construct a simple model of household consumption and saving decisions, with goods-specific economies of scale and subsistence points, and show that households with high subsistence consumption of goods with low economies of scale have low MPCs compared to households with lower subsistence points.

Divorcing into Wealth? Housing Expenditure and the Loss of Economies of Scale (WP available upon request)

ABSTRACT: 

I study household housing investment and risk-taking after divorce. I construct a model of family dissolution where divorced individuals lose access to economies of scale, and show that the loss of economies of scale in housing is an important mechanism in their adaption to single life. I use Norwegian administrative data to investigate how housing wealth, financial saving and net assets change after divorce, using an event study design. I find a substantial increase in housing investment, and subsequently in net wealth. The increase in housing investment is financed by increased debt, constituting a balance sheet expansion. Finally, I show that the increased housing expenditure dwarfs other responses to divorce, including earnings and financial saving.

The long-run unemployment consumption gap, with Malin Jensen and Sigmund Ellingsrud

Five Facts about income inequality in a resource rich economy, with Hilde Bjørnland, Yoosoon Chang, Paul Labonne, Julia Skretting and Leif Anders Thorsrud.

What happens when temporary contracts end? with Pietro Garibaldi

Published papers

PhD Dissertation

My PhD dissertation includes early version of the papers Divorcing into Wealth?, The consumption Expenditure Response to Unemployment,  and Family Insurance and the Consumption Expenditure Response to Unemplyment.