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Journal Article
Home Production Activity during the COVID-19 Shutdown
An increase in household activities—including child care and cooking—between January and April coincides with job losses during the coronavirus pandemic.
Journal Article
College Freshman Enrollment Drops during Pandemic
First-time college enrollment declined significantly in 2020—a stark contrast with what traditionally happens during recessions.
Journal Article
The Changing Role of Family Income in College Selection and Beyond
Previous literature has established that the role of family income has grown substantially at predicting college entry decisions when comparing the 1979 and 1997 National Longitudinal Surveys of Youth (e.g., Belley and Lochner (2007)). In this article, I further examine the changing role of family income as a determinant of college quality choice, degree attainment, and post-schooling earnings. I document that the role of family income has remained important and relatively stable at explaining college quality choice, its importance increasing only for the choice of four- over two-year ...
Working Paper
On Expanding Public Funding of Selective Colleges
As college attainment expanded in the U.S., the fraction of public funds allocated to selective colleges and universities declined. Does this make sense from an efficiency standpoint, given that the majority of college entrants face the highest financial returns at selective colleges? Should the states instead be expanding access to high quality colleges? In this paper, we examine reallocating public funds from low quality to high quality colleges in a spending-neutral way. We find that this policy leads to a decline in aggregate earnings and intergenerational income mobility. Public spending ...
Working Paper
Extended Supplement to “Insurance and Inequality with Persistent Private Information”
This supplement contains auxiliary technical results and proofs omitted from Bloedel, Krishna, and Leukhina (2025) (henceforth BKL) and its Supplemental Appendix (henceforth SA). First, Section I proves parts (a)–(c) and (e)–(f) of Theorem 3 from Appendix B.1 of BKL. (Part (d) of Theorem 3 is proved in SA-E.1 of BKL.) Second, Section J proves Proposition 3.2 from Section 3.3 of BKL and Lemma B.2 from Appendix B.2 of BKL. Finally, Section K proves supporting facts for Properties (a)–(e) from Section 5.2 of BKL. Throughout, we follow the numbering and labeling conventions from BKL and its ...
Working Paper
Imperfect Information Transmission from Banks to Investors: Macroeconomic Implications
Our goal is to elucidate the interaction of banks' screening effort and strategic information production in loan-backed asset markets using a general equilibrium framework. Asset quality is unobserved by investors, but banks may purchase error-prone ratings. The premium paid on highly rated assets emerges as the main determinant of banks' screening effort. The fact that rating strategies reflect banks' private information about asset quality helps keep this premium high. Conventional regulatory policies interfere with this decision margin, thereby reducing signaling value of high ratings and ...
Journal Article
Imperfect Information Transmission from Banks to Investors: Macroeconomic Implications
Our goal is to elucidate the interaction of banks' screening effort and strategic information production in loan-backed asset markets using a general equilibrium framework. Asset quality is unobserved by investors, but banks may purchase error-prone ratings. The premium paid on highly rated assets emerges as the main determinant of banks' screening effort. The fact that rating strategies reflect banks' private information about asset quality helps keep this premium high. Conventional regulatory policies interfere with this decision margin, thereby reducing signaling value of high ratings and ...
Working Paper
Imperfect Information Transmission from Banks to Investors: Macroeconomic Implications
We study the interaction of information production in loan-backed asset markets and credit allocation in a general equilibrium framework. Originating banks can screen their borrowers, but can inform investors of their asset type only through an error-prone rating technology. The premium paid on highly rated assets emerges as the main determinant of screening effort. Because the rating technology is imperfect, this premium is insufficient to induce the efficient level of screening. However, the fact that banks know their asset quality and produce ratings accordingly helps keep the premium ...
Working Paper
Expanding Access to Selective Colleges
This paper studies the effects of expanding high-quality public university capacities on student earnings and welfare. Using a quantitative model of college choice, we find that expanding the most selective colleges by 20 percent increases skilled labor supply by 5.3 percent, aggregate earnings by 0.8 percent, and welfare by 2.2 percent. The gains arise because a large number of high ability students are rationed out of selective colleges. When admitted, these students graduate at high rates and enjoy substantial earnings gains. The earnings gains generated by expanding college capacity are ...
Working Paper
Expanding Access to Selective Colleges
This paper studies the effects of expanding high-quality public university capacities. Using a quantitative model of college choice, we find that expanding the most selective colleges by 20 percent increases aggregate earnings by 0.8 percent and welfare by 2.2 percent. The gains arise because a large number of high-ability students are rationed out of selective colleges. When admitted, these students graduate at high rates and enjoy substantial earnings gains. These earnings gains are eight times larger than the fiscal cost of financing the expansion. Our findings remain robust when we ...