All Outputs (24)

Sixty Years of the Voting Rights Act: Progress and Pitfalls (2024)
Journal Article

We review the literature on the effects of the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA), which removed formal restrictions to Black political participation. After a brief description of racial discrimination suffered by Black Americans since Reconstruction, we i... Read More about Sixty Years of the Voting Rights Act: Progress and Pitfalls.

Gender Differences in Reference Letters: Evidence from the Economics Job Market (2023)
Journal Article

Academia, and economics in particular, faces increased scrutiny because of gender imbalance. This paper studies the job market for entry-level faculty positions. We employ machine learning methods to analyze gendered patterns in the text of 12,000 re... Read More about Gender Differences in Reference Letters: Evidence from the Economics Job Market.

Are political and economic integration intertwined? (2023)
Journal Article

Economic incentives play a key role in the decision to run for office, but little is known on how they shape immigrants' self-selection into candidacy. We study this question using a two-period Roy model, and show that if returns to labour market exp... Read More about Are political and economic integration intertwined?.

Opening Heaven's Door: Public Opinion and Congressional Votes on the 1965 Immigration Act (2023)
Journal Article

The 1965 Immigration Act represented a radical shift in US policy, which has been credited with dramatically expanding the volume and changing the composition of immigration. Its passing has often been described as the result of political machination... Read More about Opening Heaven's Door: Public Opinion and Congressional Votes on the 1965 Immigration Act.

Race, Representation, and Local Governments in the US South: The Effect of the Voting Rights Act (2023)
Journal Article

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 redefined race relations in the United States. Yet evidence on its effect on Black office holding remains scant. Using novel data on Black elected officials between 1962 and 1980, we assess the impact of the Voting Right... Read More about Race, Representation, and Local Governments in the US South: The Effect of the Voting Rights Act.

Countering Public Opposition to Immigration: The Impact of Information Campaigns (2021)
Journal Article

Is opposition to immigration deeply entrenched or is it open to updating in the face of new information? We explore this question by examining how attitudes of native citizens shift following exposure to information that points to potential upsides o... Read More about Countering Public Opposition to Immigration: The Impact of Information Campaigns.

The Political Economy of Preferential Trade Agreements: An Empirical Investigation (2021)
Journal Article

We develop a political economy model to study the decision of representative democracies to join a preferential trading agreement (PTA), distinguishing between free trade areas (FTA) and customs unions (CU). Our theoretical analysis shows that bilate... Read More about The Political Economy of Preferential Trade Agreements: An Empirical Investigation.

The rhetoric of closed borders: quotas, lax enforcement and illegal immigration (2021)
Journal Article

Governments do not always enforce their laws, even when they have the means of doing so, and lax enforcement is common in the domain of immigration policy. To explain this paradox we develop a political agency model where gains from migration are une... Read More about The rhetoric of closed borders: quotas, lax enforcement and illegal immigration.

The political economy of trade and migration: Evidence from the U.S. Congress (2019)
Journal Article

We compare the drivers of U.S. congressmen's votes on trade and migration reforms since the 1970's. Standard trade theory suggests that trade reforms that lower barriers to goods from less skilled-labor abundant countries and migration reforms that l... Read More about The political economy of trade and migration: Evidence from the U.S. Congress.

Coercive trade policy (2019)
Journal Article

Coercion is used by one government (the sender") to influence the trade practices of another (the target"). We build a two-country trade model in which coercion can be exercised unilaterally or channeled through a “weak" international organization wi... Read More about Coercive trade policy.

Academic Salaries and Public Evaluation of University Research: Evidence from the UK Research Excellence Framework (2019)
Journal Article

We study the effects of public evaluation of university research on the pay structures of academic departments. A simple equilibrium model of university pay determination shows how the pay-performance relationship can be explained by the incentives i... Read More about Academic Salaries and Public Evaluation of University Research: Evidence from the UK Research Excellence Framework.

China's "Great Migration": the impact of the reduction in trade policy uncertainty (2019)
Journal Article

We analyze the effect of China's integration into the world economy on workers in the country and show that one important channel of impact has been internal migration. Specifically, we study the changes in internal migration rates triggered by the r... Read More about China's "Great Migration": the impact of the reduction in trade policy uncertainty.

South-South migration and the labor market: evidence from South Africa (2018)
Journal Article

Using census data for 1996, 2001 and 2007 we study the labor market effect of immigration to South Africa. We exploit the variation – both at the district and at the national level –in the share of foreign–born male workers across schooling and exper... Read More about South-South migration and the labor market: evidence from South Africa.

What drives the legalization of immigrants?: evidence from IRCA (2018)
Journal Article

We develop a model to understand the trade–offs faced by an elected representative in supporting an amnesty when a restrictive immigration policy is in place. We show that an amnesty is more desirable the more restricted are the occupational opportun... Read More about What drives the legalization of immigrants?: evidence from IRCA.

Illegal immigration and media exposure: evidence on individual attitudes (2017)
Journal Article

Illegal immigration has been the focus of much debate in receiving countries, but little is known about the drivers of individual attitudes towards illegal immigrants. To study this question, we use the CCES survey, which was carried out in 2006 in t... Read More about Illegal immigration and media exposure: evidence on individual attitudes.

Corruption and bicameral reforms (2016)
Journal Article

© 2016, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. During the last decade unicameral proposals have been put forward in fourteen US states. In this paper we analyze the effects of the proposed constitutional reforms, in a setting where decision making is sub... Read More about Corruption and bicameral reforms.

A model of firm heterogeneity in factor intensities and international trade (2015)
Journal Article

© 2015 Canadian Economics Association. Empirical evidence suggests that exporters are, in addition to being more productive, significantly more skilled-labour intensive than non-exporters. In a setting that captures both these features, we show that... Read More about A model of firm heterogeneity in factor intensities and international trade.

A model of firm heterogeneity in factor intensities and international trade (2015)
Journal Article

Empirical evidence suggests that exporters – besides being more productive – are significantly more skilled labor intensive than non–exporters. In a setting which captures both these features, we show that the firm selection induced by trade liberali... Read More about A model of firm heterogeneity in factor intensities and international trade.

Lobbying expenditures on migration: a descriptive analysis (2015)
Journal Article

In this paper we carry out a descriptive analysis of lobbying expenditures on migration in the US between 1998 and 2005. While PAC contributions and lobbying are in general positively correlated, our results suggest that this is not the case when it... Read More about Lobbying expenditures on migration: a descriptive analysis.

The political economy of migration enforcement: domestic versus border control (2015)
Journal Article

We study migration policy enforcement by an elected government. The policy-maker faces uncertainty on the supply of migrants, but has more information than the public on its preferences and the extent and effectiveness of its enforcement activities.... Read More about The political economy of migration enforcement: domestic versus border control.