In this paper, I show how hiring constraints affect firm valuation through the discount-rate channel in both the cross-section and the time series. Constructing portfolios based on firms’ discussion of labor shortages in SEC filings, I find that hiring-constrained firms earn lower average stock returns. The effect is strongest among high-hiring firms: within the constrained group, those that hire most aggressively have the lowest average returns. This pattern is consistent with basic capital-budgeting logic—when firms continue to hire aggressively despite binding labor constraints, their cost of capital must be sufficiently low to justify that hiring when profitability alone cannot. I formalize the mechanism in a Q-theory model with state-dependent hiring adjustment costs and show that hiring frictions generate the observed cross-sectional and time-series return patterns, linking labor-market conditions to asset pricing.

Priceless consumption (PC) is a type of consumption that is not available in the marketplace and, therefore, is absent from aggregate consumption measures. We propose an estimation methodology to recover PC from its effects on the composition of observable consumption. The estimation shows that PC is economically significant: It is highly volatile and has become increasingly scarce and valuable over the past decades. As an application, we show that using the recovered true aggregate consumption series, which includes PC, significantly improves the fit of the standard consumption-CAPM with power-utility. 

This paper explores the impact of supply shocks on investment dynamics and Q. Without shocks to investment costs, fluctuations in demand for investment dictate equilibrium investment and Q along a predictable path. However, when investment costs vary significantly, the relationship between investment and Q becomes more complex. Analogous to price and quantity in demand-supply systems, Q influences investment behavior. This paper demonstrates that in a dynamic investment model, demand shocks lead to positive investment-Q correlations under certain conditions, while supply shocks result in negative correlations when investment is less responsive to supply fluctuations. The elasticity of investment to shocks depends on their persistence. Numerical simulations reveal that the correlation between investment and Q is influenced by the volatility and persistence of supply shocks. Even moderate supply shock volatility can yield low or negative investment-Q correlations.

This paper shows that since the 2008 global financial crisis, U.S. agricultural trade has become unusually vulnerable to dollar fluctuations. Using nearly fifty years of monthly data, I document a structural break. Before 2008, the dollar and the agricultural trade balance moved largely independently. Afterward, appreciations consistently reduced exports and deepened trade deficits. Evidence from futures markets suggests that this shift reflects changes in commercial hedging behavior and the capacity of financial intermediaries to absorb risk. Periods of high hedging pressure coincide with stronger trade sensitivity to the dollar, indicating that derivatives markets shape how exchange-rate shocks pass into real outcomes. The results highlight a financial origin of agricultural vulnerability and point to a systemic channel through which currency volatility can undermine the resilience of global food supply chains and long-term food security.