Selected Publications

Labor mobility and the Affordable Care Act: heterogeneous impacts of the preexisting conditions provision (with Laura Connolly and Matt Hampton; 2024, Journal of Policy Analysis and Management)

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA)preexisting conditions provision ensures that insurance companies can no longer deny coverage, charge higher premiums,or exclude coverage due to a preexisting health condition. In this paper, we evaluate the impact of the provision on labor mobility. We use data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics for years 2009 through 2019 and estimate difference-in-differences models to determine whether the provision improved labor mobility for individuals with chronic conditions. While females respond along the extensive margin by being less likely to work, males experience broader labor mobility improvements. Men are more likely to start a new job, become employed in a different industry, and move to a different state in the post-policy period.Labor mobility improvements are largest among males with household incomes greater than 138% of the federal poverty level, males ages 35 to 49, and males with conditions first diagnosed more than 10 years ago. Last, we show that the pol-icy improved access to health insurance coverage and reduced the likelihood that health impacts the amount or type of work, which ultimately increased labor market flexibility. Our results highlight the heterogenous impacts of the provision on different subgroups of the population.

Conflicting Economic Policies and Mental Health: Evidence from the UK National Living Wage and Benefits Freeze (with Lateef Akanni and Alec Morton; 2024; Journal of Policy Analysis and Management)

This study evaluates the mental health effects of two simultaneously implemented but conflicting policies in the UK: the National Living Wage and the benefits freeze policy. We employed the Callaway and Sant’Anna (2021) DID estimator to evaluate the heterogeneous policy effects, and we found that NLW leads to positive improvements in mental health. Also, we find the negative impact of the benefits freeze policy constricts the NLW effects. Our result is robust to the sensitivity analysis of the parallel trend assumption and the comparison group definition. Additional results support the psychosocial hypothesis that increased job satisfaction is strongly correlated with improvements in mental health. Also, we found evidence of substitution effects between work hours and leisure. Overall, our findings suggest that the effects of the NLW cannot be understood in isolation from the way the entire suite of policy instruments operates on earnings and liveable income for affected low wage workers.

Paid family leave and the fight against hunger: evidence from New York (with Jiyoon Kim; 2024, Health Economics)

We examine the effects of New York’s paid family leave (PFL) policy, introduced in January 2018, on food security. While researchers evaluating PFL policies in the past have mostly focused on employment and health outcomes, we believe that an improved understanding of potential impacts on food security is pivotal as it is directly related to the health and well-being of mothers and new-borns during the postnatal months. Our analysis uses two primary data sets—Current Population Survey Food Security Supplement (CPS-FSS) and Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Estimating difference-in-differences and triple difference models, we show that New York’s PFL reduced the prevalence of low food security by 36% in both datasets. The positive effects are more sizable for households with low-educated heads and families with incomes under 185% of the Federal Poverty Line. These findings highlight that paid leave benefits lead to a larger reduction in food insecurity among disadvantaged families and thus have the potential to reduce existing societal inequalities. When examining potential mechanisms through which New York’s PFL law improves food security, we show that the policy increased food expenditures, increased labor force participation, particularly by mothers, and improved parental health.

The Earned Income Tax Credit and Food Insecurity (2023, American Journal of Agricultural Economics)

Although previous work on the earned income tax credit (EITC) has established that the program improves health outcomes of people from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, not much is known about the possible pathways through which higher EITC benefits affect health. This study contributes to the literature by evaluating the role of food insecurity as a mechanism underlying the relationship between the EITC and health. Using the 2009 federal EITC expansion, which increased benefit generosity for eligible families with three or more children, I estimate difference-in-differences (DD) and difference-in-difference-in-differences (DDD) models to evaluate whether the policy change is associated with improvements in food security. My analysis finds that the program expansion, which increased predicted annual EITC benefits by $496, is associated with a reduction in the likelihood of experiencing food insecurity by 8.1% for low-educated households with three children. The observed improvements in food security are larger for non-married households, a group that has previously been shown to be strongly affected by EITC changes. An evaluation of variations in state-level EITC laws provides further indication that more generous benefits reduce food insecurity. The results, which are robust to estimating several alternative specifications, provide evidence that higher EITC benefits improve the well-being of low-income households by reducing food insecurity.

The Effect of the Affordable Care Act Preexisting Conditions Provision on Marriage (with Matt Hampton; 2019, Health Economics)

This paper investigates the effect of the Affordable Care Act preexisting conditions provision on marriage. The policy was implemented to prevent insurers from denying insurance coverage to individuals with preexisting health conditions. We test whether the implementation of the provision led to decreases in marriage among affected adults. We add to earlier work on how marital behavior is influenced by spousal health insurance and examine for the presence of “marriage lock,” a situation in which individuals remain married primarily for insurance. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics from 2009 to 2017 and estimating difference-in-differences models, we find that male household heads with preexisting conditions are 7.12 percentage points (8.9 percent) less likely to be married after the policy. Using information on insurance status prior to the policy change, we find significant reductions in marriage among individuals with preexisting conditions who were previously insured by spousal health insurance plans. The findings suggest that the inability to attain individual coverage and reliance on spousal insurance provided incentives to remain married before 2014.

The Effects of State-Level Earned Income Tax Credits on Suicides (2019, Health Economics)

This study examines the relationship between state-level Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) laws in the U.S. on suicides. Following findings in previous work showing that the EITC is associated with lower depression rates and reduced number of risky biomarkers, I estimate the effects of state EITC generosity on suicide rates. Using data for the years 1996 to 2016, a period with 74 state-level EITC policy changes, I find that introducing a high state EITC rate reduces suicide rates for adults aged 25 or above by 3.91 percent. The results are consistent across four different measures of EITC generosity.

The Effects of Income on Health – New Evidence from the Earned Income Tax Credit (2019, Review of Economics of the Household)

This study examines the relationship between income and health by using an expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), which increased benefits to households with at least two children, as a source of exogenous variations of earnings. The paper adds to previous work by: (1) estimating treatment effects on the treated using simulated EITC benefits and longitudinal data; (2) testing whether health effects vary across the three different parts of the EITC schedule; (3) examining the role of food expenditures and health insurance as potential mechanisms. The study finds that income improves the likelihood of affected heads of households reporting to be in excellent or very good health by 6.9 to 8.9 percentage points. The effects are largest in the plateau phase of the EITC schedule, where previous researchers have identified pure income effects of the program. The results are robust to several additional specifications, including a semi-parametric DD model and specifications that account for the potential endogeneity of sample. When examining potential channels underlying the relationship between income and health, I find that affected household increase their food expenditures by 10.5 to 20.3 percent and are 1.52 percent more likely to have health insurance coverage.