Publications:

1. The Gender Gap in Household Bargaining Power: A Revealed-Preference Approach, with Cameron Peng and Weilong Zhang

     [Review of Financial Studies, 2024 ] [Media Coverage: The Conversation, U of Essex News, Science X, ScienMag] [IFS Working Paper WP21/11]

Abstract When members of the same household have different risk preferences, whose preference matters more for investment decisions and why? We propose an intrahousehold model that aggregates individual preferences at the household level as a result of bargaining. We structurally estimate the model, analyze the determinants of bargaining power, and find a significant gender gap. Gender differences in individual characteristics, as well as gender effects, partially explain the gap. These patterns hold broadly across Australia, Germany, and the United States. We further link the distribution of bargaining power to households’ perceived gender norms in a cross-sectional analysis.


2. Human Capital and the Business Cycle Effects on the Postgraduate Wage Premium

     [Review of Economic Dynamics, 2023] [Media Coverage: LSE Business Review, Royal Economic Society, IFS Comment] [IFS Working Paper WP19/26]

Abstract Postgraduate degree holders experience lower cyclical variation in real wages than those with undergraduate degrees. Moreover, postgraduate jobs require more specific human capital and take longer to adapt to. Using an equilibrium search model with dynamic incentive contracts, this paper attributes the cyclicality of the postgraduate-undergraduate wage gap to the differences in specific capital. Greater specific capital leads to lower mobility, thereby improving risk-sharing between workers and firms. The estimates of the model reveal that specific capital can explain the differences both in labour turnover and in real wage cyclicality between education groups.


3. Effects of Stay-at-home Orders on Skill Requirements in Vacancy Postings, with Ling Zhong

     [Labour Economics, 2023]

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic and containment policies have had profound economic impacts on the labor market. Stay-at-home orders (SAHOs) implemented across most of the United States changed the way of people worked. In this paper, we quantify the effect of SAHO durations on skill demands to study how firms adjust labor demand within occupation. We use skill requirement information from the 2018 to 2021 online job vacancy posting data from Burning Glass Technologies, exploit the spatial variations in the SAHO duration, and use instrumental variables to correct for the endogeneity in the policy duration related to local social and economic factors. We find that policy durations have persistent impacts on the labor demand after restrictions are lifted. Longer SAHOs motivate management style transformation from people-oriented to operation-oriented by requiring more of operational and administrative skills and less of personality and people management skills to carry out standard workflows. SAHOs also change the focus of interpersonal skill demands from specific customer services to general communication such as social and writing skills. SAHOs more thoroughly affect occupations with partial work-from-home capacity. The evidence suggests SAHOs change management structure and communication in firms.


Working Papers:

1. Durables and Lemons: Private Information and the Market for Cars, with Richard Blundell, Soren Leth-Petersen, Hamish Low, and Costas Meghir

     [Quantitative Economics, Conditionally Accepted]

[Media Coverage: The Economist, NEP-DGE blog] [NBER Working Paper w26281]

Abstract We examine the aggregate implications and distributional consequences of asymmetric information in durable goods markets, with a focus on the car market. Private information introduces a lemons penalty, a wedge between the sale price and the average car value in the population, consequently reducing turnover. We estimate an equilibrium model of car ownership with private information using Danish linked registry data on car ownership, income, and wealth. In the first year of ownership, we estimate the lemons penalty is 12% of the price. The penalty declines sharply with the length of ownership. The penalty reduces the self-insurance value of cars and leads to a large reduction in transaction volumes and the rate of turnover of cars. The market does not collapse: income shocks induce individuals to sell their cars, even if they are of good quality, and this helps mitigate the lemons problem. The size of the lemons penalty declines when income uncertainty in the economy increases and when the credit limit decreases.


2. Does the “right to request” flexible work policy influence men’s and women’s uptake of flexible working and well-being, with Baowen Xue, Heejung Chung, and Anne McMunn

     [Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, Revise and Resubmit]

Abstract This paper investigates the impact of the UK's 2014 "right to request" flexible working policy on the uptake of flexible working arrangements and the resulting effects on employee health and well-being. We use a doubly robust difference-in-differences (DiD) method, comparing the outcomes of employees who became eligible for flexible working after the 2014 policy reform with those who were already eligible. The key findings reveal that the 2014 policy reform increased women's uptake of reduced-hours arrangements but did not have the same effect on men. The reform also led to a reduction in women's psychological distress and improved life satisfaction for both men and women. The study concludes that while flexible working arrangements can benefit both men and women in terms of improved well-being, gender-neutral policies may inadvertently exacerbate gender inequalities in labour force participation, possibly due to persistent traditional gender norms and expectations.


3. Housing Energy Efficiency and the Horizon Effect, with Egle Jakucionyte and Swapnil Singh

Abstract This paper examines how the investment horizon effect influences energy-efficiency investments, showing that older individuals have lower incentives to invest in energy efficiency. Using detailed microdata from England, we document that properties occupied by older households are systematically more energy inefficient. We develop a two-period model where households make energy-efficiency investment decisions under mortality risk, generating predictions about both individual and neighborhood-level investment patterns. Testing these predictions using historical instruments for neighborhood age structure, we find that a one-year increase in neighborhood mean age causes a 0.7 percentage point increase in energy inefficiency.


Work in Progress:

1. Unemployment Insurance Extensions and the Dynamics of Labour Force Participation, with Similan Rujiwattanapong


My co-authors:

Richard Blundell
Heejung Chung
Egle Jakucionyte
Soren Leth-Petersen
Hamish Low
Anne McMunn
Costas Meghir
Cameron Peng
Similan Rujiwattanapong
Swapnil Singh
Weilong Zhang
Ling Zhong
Baowen Xue