Ongoing Research Projects
Mental health spillovers in primary schools
with Ana Balsa, Marcos Vera Hernandez, Anders Holm, and Freja Thim
Abstract: In this paper we use Danish register data to study peer effects from students with mental health problems. Mental health problems are defined from health information in registers on medical prescriptions, contact with general practitioners and psychologist and psychiatrists. We follow classes from 1st to 9th grade between 2007 and 2013 and study mental health trajectories of incumbent students when receiving a new student with mental health problems. We use a time to event design, controlling for individual and grade fixed effects and using never treated classes as the control group. We condition on students being observed from grade 1 until treatment, and follow them after treatment irrespectively of the school or class they attend. Following the new difference-in-differences literature, we produce estimates that are robust to heterogeneity across cohorts and grades. As additional robustness check, we compare against classes that receive a new student without a mental health problem, and produce results adjusting for changes in diagnoses trends. We find that outcomes for incumbent students are affected by receiving a new student with mental health problems, an effect that is larger when first exposure occurs by grade 6. These effects are long-lasting irrespective of the gender of the mover and of the gender of the incumbent student. We are currently working with well-being data to identify whether the effect works through direct student-to-student contagion (behavioral effect) or through a higher likelihood of diagnosis due to parental awareness of the condition (information effect).
Slides, Working paper coming up soon
Worker mobility and labour market opportunities
with Robert Joyce, Fabien Postel-Vinay, Peter Spittal and Xiaowei Xu
Abstract: We develop a new empirical measure of worker-specific labour market tightness, grounded in a theoretical search and matching model where the matching technology accounts for differences in the intensity of competition workers face from different types of other job seekers. Our measure also captures the varying ability of workers to move into different lines of work, using historical patterns of job mobility to infer how suitable a worker with given experience is for dif- ferent types of jobs. We demonstrate that our measure outperforms more traditional measures of market tightness in predicting key workers’ outcomes such as job changes, wages and occupational progression.
Slides, IFS working paper (old version of working paperP, new version coming up soon)
Higher education sorting and social mobility
with Jack Britton and David Goll
Abstract: This paper investigates the role of sorting between students and higher education programmes in explaining heterogeneity in the returns to higher education, and the extent to which students from different socio-economic backgrounds (SES) and with different skill sets benefit from higher education depending on field of study and programme selectivity. Using rich administrative data for England, we document that students from disadvantaged backgrounds are less likely to enrol in higher education programmes than their equally skilled higher SES peers, particularly the most selective ones, and that low SES is associated with lower wages conditional on education and skills. To investigate the drivers of these gaps, we develop a life-cycle model of education, labour supply and earnings that allows for a rich characterisation of heterogeneity in the skills that students have and that different higher education programmes provide. A key feature of our model is that students and programmes meet in a matching market in equilibrium, where the assignment of students to programmes is determined. Exploiting geographic, school and cohort size variation in combination with the structural model, we can separate the preferences of students and programmes and identify the returns to heterogeneous programmes. Our model reproduces empirical patterns accurately. We use the model to describe sorting in the higher education market in England, quantify the returns to these investments and the role of higher education for social mobility. We find that students from poorer backgrounds benefit more from investing in higher education than better off students, but on the margin benefit less from enrolling in better quality, more selective programmes. We also find that low SES students are less willing to pay for a match that promises higher future earnings. However, students’ preferences cannot fully explain differences in higher education sorting by SES. Rather, systematic differences in skills and admission rules that favour better off students also play a role. We use the model to run counterfactual analysis of policies targeting the demand and supply sides of the higher education market. We conclude that demand side policies subsidising tuition fees or incentivising investments in STEM are insufficient to move the needle on social mobility; supply side policies could potentially be highly effective.
Slides, Working paper coming up soon
Welfare integration, labour supply, and take-up: the impact of Universal Credit
with Robert Joyce and Tom Waters
Abstract: In many developed countries the welfare system is comprised of a number of separate programmes, such as unemployment, housing, and child-contingent benefits, with claimants often entitled to more than one at once. This creates two potential problems. First, marginal effective tax rates can be very high as multiple benefits are withdrawn as earnings increase. Second, the complexity and transaction costs of applying for multiple benefits may result in eligible individuals not claiming their full entitlement. Several countries are considering integrating benefits together, and the UK is in the midst of a radical reform to integrate six existing benefits into one - Universal Credit, expected to be received by a quarter of the working-age population at any given time. We assess the consequences of benefit integration on labour supply and take-up, using Universal Credit as an example. To do this we build a model of family labour supply with take-up decisions in multiple programmes. We find that integration increases labour supply by removing the highest effective marginal tax rates, and reduces bunching at specific hours points by smoothing out the budget constraint. In addition, by reducing transactions costs for those entitled to multiple benefits, it incentivises workers to move from full- to part-time work (as they are typically entitled to fewer benefits in the latter state). Thus, while integration can simplify the process for claimants, it can increase the costs to the government.
Slides, Working paper coming up soon
Measuring assortativeness in marriage
with Pierre-Andre Chiappori and Costas Meghir
Abstract: Measuring the extent to which assortative matching differs between two economies is challenging when the marginal distributions of the characteristic along which sorting takes place (e.g. education) also changes for either or both sexes. We show how the use of different indices can generate different conclusions, and discuss their underlying, structural interpretation.
Working paper, R&R JPE
The Dynamic Effects of Health on the Employment of Older Workers
with Richard Blundell, Jack Britton, Eric French and Weijian Zou
Abstract: Using data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) and the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA), we estimate the impact of health on employment. Estimating the model separately by race and gender, we find that racial differences in employment can be partly explained by the worse health of minorities and the larger impact of health on employment for these groups.
Older Working Papers
Changes in Assortative Matching: Theory and Evidence for the US
with Pierre-Andre Chiappori and Costas Meghir
The payoff to work and how it is taxed: a dynamic perspective
with Mike Brewer and Jonathan Shaw
Lifetime inequality and redistribution
with Mike Brewer and Jonathan Shaw
Labour market programmes and labour market outcomes: a study of the Swedish active labour market interventions
with Jerome Adda, Costas Meghir and Barbara Sianesi