Working Papers
The Downmarket Impact of New Multifamily Housing: Evidence from a Honolulu Condo Tower
We test whether new condominium construction generates vacancies in a lo-cal housing market through induced moves. Using detailed address-history mi-crodata, we track households who moved into a newly built 512-unit condo-minium tower in Honolulu, Hawai’i, which included both market-rate and income-restricted units. We identify prior addresses and follow vacancy chains across multiple rounds of moves. […]
Read MoreEstimating a CPI-based regional price parity index for US cities
We use metropolitan area Consumer Price indexes (CPI) and the US CPI to calculate a CPI-based Regional Price Parity index (CPI-based RPP) for the 29 US cities with CPIs published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This CPI-based RPP can be used (along with the US CPI) to make fair comparisons of economic performance in […]
Read MoreCarbon benefits through fallow agricultural land transitions: the case of multi-strata agroforestry in Hawai‘i
There are growing efforts to incorporate agroforestry into ecosystem service incentive programs. Indigenous and other place-based multi-strata agroforestry systems are important conservation and agricultural strategies, yet their ecosystem services, including carbon sequestration benefits, have received little research attention. To fill this gap, we draw on interviews with agroforestry practitioners and ecosystem service modeling in Hawaiʻi […]
Read MoreWork-from-Home, Relocation, and Shadow Effects: Evidence from Sweden
In this paper, we explore some little-known, but significant, economic geography features of the work-from-home (WFH) revolution. The increased practice of work from home following the pandemic has prompted a redistribution of working populations between urban and rural locations. Using a uniquely detailed and comprehensive individual-level nationwide Swedish micro-dataset, we analyze shifts in commuting distances […]
Read MoreOptimal transmission expansion minimally reduces decarbonization costs of U.S. electricity
Solar and wind power are cost-competitive with fossil fuels, yet their intermittent nature presents challenges. Significant temporal and geographic differences in land, wind, and solar resources suggest that long-distance transmission could be particularly beneficial. Using a detailed, open source model, we analyze optimal transmission expansion jointly with storage, generation, and hourly operations across the three […]
Read MoreThe Effect of Front-end Vehicle Height on Pedestrian Death Risk
Pedestrian deaths in the US have risen in recent years. Concurrently, US vehicles have increased in size, which may pose a safety risk for pedestrians. In particular, the increased height of vehicle front-ends may present a danger for pedestrians in a crash, as the point of vehicle contact is more likely to occur at the […]
Read MoreThe Effect of Bus Rapid Transit on Local Home Prices
Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) systems have become increasingly common in US cities. BRT stations provide a local amenity by improving transportation options for local residents, but may also represent a local nuisance due to noise or displacement of other road users. We estimate whether BRT is priced into local real estate by studying a recently […]
Read MoreOnly the fit survive recessions: Estimating labor market penalties for the obese over the business cycle
Abstract: The obesity epidemic is a growing concern in the United States. Aside from the detrimental health effects of obesity, previous work has also documented a negative relationship between obesity and various labor market outcomes. Given that the American adult obesity rate is roughly 40%, obesity affects a large portion of the US labor market. […]
Read MoreVOG: Using Volcanic Eruptions to Estimate the Impact of Air Pollution on Student Learning Outcomes
This study pairs variation stemming from volcanic eruptions from Kilauea with the census of Hawai‘i’s public schools student test scores to estimate the impact of particulates and sulfur dioxide on student performance. We leverage spatial correlations in pollution in conjunction with proximity to Kilauea and wind direction to construct predictions of pollution exposure at each […]
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