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CV.University of Michigan
734.615.2327
R4344, 701 Tappan Street, 48109
PhD, economics, Yale University (2009)
BA, math and economics, University of Pennsylvania (2004)
Research interests: development economics, health economicsBE 300 (Applied Microeconomics; BBA)
BUSABRD 320 (Doing Business in India, BBA)
ECON 666 (Economic Development, PhD)
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Research.Publications | Working Papers | Work in ProgressWhen It Rains It Pours: The Long-run Economic Impacts of Salt Iodization in the United StatesIodized salt increased women's income and labor force participation in the 20th century US.pdf | Review of Economics and Statistics (forthcoming)Early Life Circumstance and Adult Mental HealthBooms, Busts, and Household Enterprise: Evidence from Coffee Farmers in TanzaniaHouseholds use small business activity to weather income shocks.pdf | World Bank Economic Review (forthcoming)Health, Enterprise, and Labor Complementarity in the Householdwith Anant NyshadhamEndowments at Birth and Parents' Investments in Childrenwith Anant NyshadhamReturns to Treatment in the Formal Health Care Sector: Evidence from Tanzaniawith Anant NyshadhamWhy is formal sector care better than self-treatment for sick children?
pdf | American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 2015, 7(3)
Firing Costs and Flexibility: Evidence from Firms' Labor Adjustments to Shocks in Indiawith Amalavoyal Chari and Siddharth SharmaSchooling, Child Labor and the Returns to Healthcare in Tanzaniawith Anant NyshadhamThe Long-Run Impacts of Adult Deaths on Older Household Members in Tanzaniawith Kathleen Beegle -
Research.Helping Children Catch Up: Early Life Shocks and the Progresa ExperimentCash transfers mitigate a large fraction of the negative impact of early life shocks on educational attainment.pdf | may 2018R&R, Journal of Political Economy
Dust and Death: Evidence from the West African Harmattan
Dust from the annual harmattan winds increases infant and child mortality in West Africa, but human adaptation has tapered these impacts over a 20 year period.pdf | january 2019R&R, Economic JournalThe Light and the Heat: Productivity Co-benefits of Energy-saving Technologywith Namrata Kala and Anant NyshadhamLED lighting flattens the temperature-productivity gradient on hot days in Indian garment factories.pdf | january 2019R&R, Review of Economics and StatisticsFetal Origins of Mental Health: Evidence from AfricaConflict and the Formation of Political Beliefs in Africawith James FenskeThe Skills to Pay the Bills: Returns to On-the-job Soft Skills TrainingSoft skills training on-the-job boosts worker productivity and generates large returns for the firm.pdf | december 2017(reject and resubmit, JPE)Managerial Quality and Productivity Dynamicswith Anant Nyshadham, and Jorge TamayoWhat makes a good manager good? We let the data tell us -- and find that hard-to-observe things like attention and control have large effects on productivity, and are drastically undervalued in manager pay.pdf | feb 2019More Money, More Problems: Expectations, Wage Hikes, and Worker Voicewith Teresa Molina and Anant NyshadhamA randomized evaluation of Hirschman's (1970) seminal theory. Workers quit when wage increases do not meet their expectations, but enabling voice mitigates this exit.pdf | january 2019Resources, Conflict, and Economic Development in Africa
No understanding of the economic development of modern Africa can be complete without an appreciation of the role of natural resources. Our study is at the nexus of resources, conflict, and development, using theory and high-resolution spatial data from sub-Saharan Africa. Our results help explain why the most resource-rich countries are no better off than the most resource-poor.pdf | january 2019Protecting Infants from Natural Disasters: The Case of Vitamin A Supplementation and a Tornado in Bangladesh
with Snaebjorn Gunnsteinsson, Parul Christian, Alain Labrique, Jonathan Sugimoto, Abu Ahmed Shamim, and Keith P. West, Jr.
Can policy protect against the often devastating human impacts of environmental shocks? We study this question by leveraging data from a situation in which a tornado tore through an area involved in a double-blind cluster-randomized controlled trial of at-birth vitamin A supplementation in Bangladesh.
pdf | december 2018
Management and Shocks to Worker Productivitywith Namrata Kala and Anant NyshadhamWhen workers face productivity shocks, managers reallocate tasks within teams, shifting workers away from jobs in which their performance is most affected.pdf | december 2018Hostel Takeover: Living Conditions, Reference Dependence, and the Wellbeing of Migrant Workers
with Anant Nyshadham and Huayu Xu
The effects of welfare interventions depend critically on how expectations are set. Migrant workers experienced large losses in subjective wellbeing when randomized improvements in hostel living conditions were more modest than expected.pdf | november 2018
