I am an applied microeconomist studying how social and institutional environments shape beliefs, decisions, and responses to policy. My research combines causal inference, surveys, and experiments, with applications to health, immigration policy, political economy, and public economics.
with Augustine Denteh and Makayla Lavender
Under Review | Paper
Immigration enforcement is directed at non-citizens, but its effects can extend to U.S.-citizen children in mixed-citizenship households. We study the effects of Secure Communities on children's health and health care utilization using restricted-access National Health Interview Survey data and county-month variation in program adoption. We find limited evidence of changes in Medicaid or SNAP participation, but substantial evidence of worsening health and increased acute-care utilization, particularly among children living with at least one non-citizen family member.
We experimentally study whether social norms guide choices among risky prospects and whether adherence to these norms is rewarded. We find that Evaluators coordinate on social norms and that Selectors follow them, choosing more socially appropriate options even without monetary incentives. Recipients, however, base rewards and punishments primarily on realized outcomes rather than norm compliance, rewarding lucky norm violations while punishing unlucky norm adherence.
I compare two budget-balanced cost-sharing rules that account for network structure differently. Both increase access to the public good, but only a Local rule, which directs transfers toward individuals whose investments benefit more neighbors, consistently improves efficiency across networks. A Global rule that shares costs equally among beneficiaries improves equity but can generate redundant investment in unequal networks. The results show that effective cost-sharing institutions depend on the underlying social structure.
I study how global communication, where everyone can communicate, and local communication, where only neighbors can communicate, affect coordination in a networked public-goods game. Both improve efficiency in asymmetric networks, but global communication enables groups to take turns investing and reduces payoff disparities, while local communication reinforces the strategic advantage of well-connected individuals. In symmetric networks, only local communication improves efficiency. The results show that the effectiveness of communication depends on how communication is structured relative to the underlying network.
Political Behavior (2023) | Link
with Lucas Rentschler, John Pascarella, and Randy Simmons
In a laboratory setting, we study the effect of induced partisanship on costly information acquisition, information sharing, and voting decisions in an endogenous social network. We find social media significantly increases the quality of group decision making when information sharing on the platform is constrained to be truthful. However, when it is possible to share misinformation, social media has a deleterious effect and group decisions are worse than when there is no information sharing at all.
We experimentally compare individual fact-checking, platform-level fact-checking, and combinations of the two. Allowing individuals to fact-check improves group decisions and welfare, while platform fact-checking alone does not improve decision quality. We also find that simply flagging misinformation is sufficient to improve decisions; subjecting users who previously shared misinformation to persistent scrutiny provides no additional benefit and reduces engagement on the platform.
Seeing Is Not Believing: Experience, Misperceptions, and Immigration Policy Views (with Sakshi Upadhyay and Abhinaba Nandy)
Norms of Norms (with Dustin Tracy) - Preliminary draft available
"Upgrading in the Indian garment industry: a study of three clusters" (with Saon Ray and Mishita Mehra), Asian Development Bank Economics Working Paper Series No. 43, April 2016. Available at SSRN: (link)
"Normalizing India-Pakistan Trade" (with Taneja et al.), in India Pakistan Trade: Strengthening Economic Relations (pp. 13-45), Springer, August 2014
"India-Pakistan: Trade Perception Survey" (with Taneja et al.), in India-Pakistan Trade: Strengthening Economic Relations (pp. 71-126), Springer, August 2014