This paper studies competing sources of declining dynamism. Evidence shows that an important component of this decline is accounted for by the reduction in the response of employment to shocks in US establishments. Using a plant level dynamic optimization problem as a framework for analysis,...

This paper studies household financial choices in four euro area countries. The goal of the analysis is to understand the sources of the differences in these choices and their implications for the impact of monetary policy on consumption. The estimation of key parameters uses a simulated method...

This paper studies the determination of income taxes in a dynamic setting with human capital accumulation. The goal is to understand the factors that support an outcome without complete redistribution, given a majority of relatively poor agents. In the analysis, the internal dynamics of income...

Barber and Odean study the relationship between trading activity and returns. They find that households who trade more have a lower net return than other households. They argue that these results cannot emerge from a model with rational traders and instead attribute these findings to...

This project studies the impact of education mismatch on labor outcomes. Across our sample of OECD countries, there is evidence of mismatch in education choices and labor markets. Labor market outcomes are not independent of education mismatch. Our framework for analysis is a dynamic choice...

This paper studies the determinants of TFPR, a revenue based measure of total factor productivity. Recent business cycle models are built upon the countercyclical dispersion of TFPR. But, the distribution of TFPR is endogenous, dependent upon other exogenous shocks and the endogenous...

This paper studies the exporting decision of Chinese manufacturing firms. The economic framework stresses the dynamic decision by both state controlled and private entities to export in a model with labor adjustment costs. In this complex environment, a simple decision rule whereby export status...

Applications for new businesses from the U.S. Census Bureau's monthly and weekly Business Formation Statistics (BFS) fell substantially in the early stages of the pandemic but then surged in the second half of 2020. This surge has continued through May 2021. The pace of applications since...

How are applications to start new businesses related to aggregate economic activity? This paper explores the properties of three monthly business application series from the U.S. Census Bureau's Business Formation Statistics as economic indicators: all business applications, business...