Staff working papers
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Inequality in Parental Transfers, Borrowing Constraints and Optimal Higher Education Subsidies
This paper studies optimal education subsidies when parental transfers are unequally distributed across students and cannot be publicly observed. After documenting substantial inequality in parental transfers among US college students with similar family resources, I examine its implications for how the education subsidy should vary with schooling level and family resources to minimize inefficiencies generated by borrowing constraints. -
The Distributional Effects of Conventional Monetary Policy and Quantitative Easing: Evidence from an Estimated DSGE Model
This paper compares the distributional effects of conventional monetary policy and quantitative easing (QE) within an estimated open-economy DSGE model of the euro area. -
Corporate Debt Composition and Business Cycles
Based on empirical evidence, I propose a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model with two financial sectors to analyze the role of corporate debt composition (bank versus bond financing) in the transmission of economic shocks. -
Frictional Capital Reallocation I: Ex Ante Heterogeneity
This paper studies dynamic general equilibrium models where firms trade capital in frictional markets. Gains from trade arise due to ex ante heterogeneity: some firms are better at investment, so they build capital in the primary market; others acquire it in the secondary market. -
Can Capital Deepening Explain the Global Decline in Labor’s Share?
We estimate an aggregate elasticity of substitution between capital and labor near or below one, which implies that capital deepening cannot explain the global decline in labor's share. Our methodology derives from transition paths in the neo-classical growth model. -
The Productivity Slowdown in Canada: An ICT Phenomenon?
We ask whether a weaker contribution of information and communication technologies (ICT) to productivity growth could account for the productivity slowdown observed in Canada since the early 2000s. To answer this question, we consider several methods capturing channels through which ICT could affect aggregate productivity growth. -
A Framework for Analyzing Monetary Policy in an Economy with E-money
This paper considers an economy where central-bank-issued fiat money competes with privately issued e-money. We study a policy-setting game between the central bank and the e-money issuer and find (1) the optimal monetary policy of the central bank depends on the policy of the private issuer and may deviate from the Friedman rule; (2) multiple equilibria may exist; (3) when the economy approaches a cashless state, the central bank’s optimal policy improves the market power of the e-money issuer and can lead to a discrete decrease in welfare and a discrete increase in inflation; and (4) first best cannot be achieved. -
Limited Commitment, Endogenous Credibility and the Challenges of Price-level Targeting
This paper studies the cost of limited commitment when a central bank has the discretion to adjust policy whenever the costs of honoring its past commitments become high. Specifically, we consider a central bank that seeks to implement optimal policy in a New Keynesian model by committing to a price-level target path. -
Inference in Games Without Nash Equilibrium: An Application to Restaurants’ Competition in Opening Hours
This paper relaxes the Bayesian Nash equilibrium (BNE) assumption commonly imposed in empirical discrete choice games with incomplete information. Instead of assuming that players have unbiased/correct expectations, my model treats a player’s belief about the behavior of other players as an unrestricted unknown function. I study the joint identification of belief and payoff functions.