Working Papers

How Magnetic can Welfare be?

View Abstract | Paper

Twenty states expanded Medicaid eligibility to low-income childless adults in 2014. Did this large and costly expansion of welfare attract these newly-eligible adults to expansion states? By merging administrative tax records, Medicaid enrollment records and survey data, I find that 4.7% of these adults move interstate annually, over twice the rate reported in the Current Population Survey. Nevertheless, both state-level and border-county difference-in-differences designs detect no statistically significant impact of Medicaid on migration over the first five years. These estimates are precise enough to reject meaningful budgetary or welfare costs or benefits from migration. In contrast, I find that the same subpopulation migrated substantially in response to Great Recession local shocks. This appears difficult to reconcile with the value of Medicaid. However, it may be explained by the fact that a newly-eligible adult gains less than 2 years of Medicaid enrollment in the 5 years after moving to an expansion state, or by the confusion about enrollment that I document in survey data. Regardless of the explanation, the welfare magnet effect of Medicaid expansion was negligible.

Publications

The Impact of Incarceration on Employment, Earnings, and Tax Filing

(with A. Garin, D. Koustas, S. Norris, M. Pecenco, E.K. Rose, Y. Shem-Tov and J. Weaver)
Econometrica (2025)
View Abstract | Paper | Pre-Print | Appendix | Replication Materials

We study the effect of incarceration on wages, self-employment, and taxes and transfers in North Carolina and Ohio using two quasi-experimental research designs: discontinuities in sentencing guidelines and random assignment to judges. Across both states, incarceration generates short-term drops in economic activity while individuals remain in prison. As a result, a year-long sentence decreases cumulative earnings over five years by 13%. Beyond five years, however, there is no evidence of lower employment, wage earnings, or self-employment in either state, as well as among defendants with no prior incarceration history. These results suggest that upstream factors, such as other types of criminal justice interactions or pre-existing labor market detachment, are more likely to be the cause of low earnings among the previously incarcerated, who we estimate would earn $5,000 per year on average if spared a prison sentence.
Minimum Wage Effects and Monopsony Explanations

(with J. Wiltshire [lead author], M. Reich and D. Sosinskiy)
Journal of Labor Economics (Forthcoming)
View Abstract | Paper

We present the first causal analysis of a seven-year run-up of minimum wages to $15. Using a novel stacked county-level synthetic control estimator and data on fast-food restaurants, we find substantial pay growth and no disemployment. Our results hold among lower-wage counties and counties without local minimum wages. Minimum wage increases reduce separation rates and raise wages faster than prices at McDonald’s stores; both findings imply a monopsonistic labor market with declining rents. In the tight post-pandemic labor market, when labor supply becomes more elastic, we find positive employment effects. These become larger and statistically significant after addressing pandemic-response confounds.

Is New Platform Work Different than Other Freelancing?

(with A. Garin, E. Jackson and D. Koustas)
AEA Papers and Proceedings (2020)
View Abstract | Paper | Appendix | Replication Materials

The rise of freelance work in the online platform economy (OPE) has received considerable media and policy attention in recent years, but freelance work is by no means a new phenomenon. In this paper, we draw on I.R.S. tax records to identify instances when workers begin doing online platform work versus other freelance/independent contractor “gig” work for firms. We find gig work occurs around major reductions in outside income, and document usage over the lifecycle. Our results provide suggestive evidence on motivations for entering into each type of work.

Selected Work in Progress

The Effects of the ACA on Job Lock and Mortality: Evidence from Tax Data

(with D. Koustas , I. Lurie and R. Kaestner)
IRS Approved Project. Presented at the 2023 NTAs
View Abstract

[Awaiting new draft and general disclosure permission.] Health insurance availability may affect work choices—often referred to as “job lock”—and is an important determinant of health. The Affordable Care Act in 2014 expanded insurance coverage via Medicaid expansions and the establishment of subsidized marketplaces, thus weakening the link between health insurance and employment. We study the effects of these policies, exploiting variation in the timing of expansions across states and using rich IRS longitudinal microdata. The universe of tax records allows us to estimate precise effects on a range of outcomes, including earnings, self-employment, job transitions, mortality, mobility and tax filing behavior. We examine heterogeneity by insurance status prior to 2014, including low-income wage earners and the self-employed without spousal coverage who would have benefited most from the policy change, as well as by income, age and gender.
Implicit Insurance for Job Loss in the United States

(with S. Kancherla and M. Unrath)
Census Approved Project
View Abstract

We study the joint effects of the tax system, government transfers, and self-insurance in mitigating earnings losses from job loss. Transfer payments imply smaller income losses relative to wage losses; behavioral responses (asset liquidation, self-employment, income misreporting, family members’ labor supply) mitigate household income losses relative to worker income losses; and progressive tax rates imply smaller after-tax income losses relative to pre-tax income losses. We leverage a novel merge between social safety net benefit takeup in 42 US states to population tax returns and earnings data to estimate these various margins of response in a single dataset. In doing so, we will be able to integrate the tax system, transfer payments, and household responses into a net measure of household and government insurance against job loss.
Who Gives to Whom? Charitable Giving in the United States

(with J. Brounstein , S. Kancherla , S. Karol , C. Landais , M. Muñoz and D. Reck )
IRS Approved Project