This paper combines data on current and future property-level physical risk from major climate-related perils (storms, floods, hurricanes, and wildfires) that owner-occupied single-family residences face with data on local economic characteristics to study the geographic and demographic distribution of such risks in the contiguous United States. Current expected damage from climate-related perils is approximately $19 billion per year. Severe convective storms and inland floods account for almost half of the expected damage. The central and southern parts of the U.S. are most exposed to climate-related physical risk, with hurricane-exposed areas on the Gulf and South Atlantic coasts being the riskiest areas. Relative to currently low-risk areas, currently high-risk areas have lower household incomes, lower labor market participation rates, and lower education attainment, suggesting that the distribution of climate-related physical risk is correlated with economic inequality. By 2050, under business-as-usual emissions, average expected damage is projected to increase monotonically with current average expected damage, which implies that long-term policies that aim to mitigate climate-related physical risk are likely to be progressive.

Lung cancer (LC) incidence rates and tumor characteristics among (non-Hispanic) Black and Hispanic detailed groups, normally characterized in aggregate, have been overlooked in the US. We used LC data from the Florida state cancer registry, 2012–2018, to compute LC age-adjusted incidence rates (AAIR) for US-born Black, Caribbean-born Black, Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Dominican, and Central and South American populations. We analyzed 120,550 total LC cases. Among Hispanics, Cuban males had the highest AAIR (65.6 per 100,000; 95%CI: 63.6–67.6), only 8% [Incidence Rate Ratio (IRR): 0.92; 95%CI: 0.89–0.95] lower than Whites, but 2.7 (IRR 95%CI: 2.31-3.19) times higher than Central Americans. Among Blacks, the AAIR for US-born Black males was over three times that of those Caribbean-born (IRR: 3.12; 95%CI: 2.80–3.40) and 14% higher than White males (IRR: 1.14; 95%CI: 1.11–1.18). Among women, US-born Blacks (46.4 per 100,000) and foreign-born Mexicans (12.2 per 100,000) had the highest and lowest rates. Aggregation of non-Hispanic Blacks or Hispanics obscures inherent disparities within groups. Understanding the distinct LC rates in US populations is crucial for targeting public health measures for LC diagnosis, prevention, and treatment. Further LC research exploring detailed race–ethnicity regarding LC in never-smokers is necessary, particularly among females and considering pertinent environmental factors.

I investigate race and gender differences in entrepreneurship participation in the US. I first confirm a finding from the previous literature that, among VC-backed firms, the proportion of females among Asian entrepreneurs is higher than the corresponding proportion among White entrepreneurs. I extend this finding to all types of entrepreneurs, including non-VC-backed ones. However, after controlling for basic non-race demographic variables, such as age, education, and marital status, I find no significant difference in entrepreneurship participation between Asian and White females. Instead, the difference is due to White males being more likely to be entrepreneurs than Asian males and White females. Moreover, exposure to an individualistic culture has a positive effect on male entrepreneurship participation, but no effect on female entrepreneurship participation.

Sparsely populated rural areas are susceptible to high levels of error in their data, making it difficult to examine patterns and trends across geographies. This article aims to advance research methods for rural researchers by offering guidelines for navigating high levels of error associated with the American Community Survey (ACS). The ACS presents a useful source of U.S. community level data for rural researchers to utilize in school–community research but not without its difficulties. The small population sizes of rural communities often translate to large margins of error in the data, presenting a degree of uncertainty in the actual measure. To illustrate challenges and best practice, the author conducts a case study of the relationship between the presence of schools and economic vitality of rural communities in Indiana using ACS data. The author demonstrates how to examine the error in the data, introduces options to reduce uncertainty, and ultimately, explains how to move forward with the data, working with the margin of error and acknowledging its presence in the analysis and results. This article offers suggestions and techniques to assist rural researchers in navigating ACS obstacles so that they might produce transparent results with as little uncertainty as possible.

New York City's crisis of housing affordability has reached unprecedented levels. The ratio of median rent to median household income in New York City is the second highest among the 25 largeWard, J. M., Zuo, G., & Katz, Y. (2023). Supporting Housing Affordability in New York City Through Increased Housing Production: A Policy Brief (pp. 1–28). RAND Corporation. https://doi.org/10.7249/RRA2775-1st cities in the country. Additionally, the number of single adults experiencing homelessness in New York City has more than doubled in the past ten years. These conditions arose despite concentrated policy efforts at the state and local levels to control the growth of rents and increase the supply of means-tested affordable housing units. Fundamentally, existing state and local policies — particularly those limiting rent increases — largely do not address the root problem behind the city's affordability crisis: Housing production has not kept pace with the growing demand to live in New York City. In this report, the authors address the issue of housing affordability in New York City by focusing on the role that broadly expanding the supply of housing can play in increasing affordability. They propose six policy reforms for increasing production and estimate that if fully enacted, these policies could lead to approximately 300,000 additional units of housing relative to the status quo level of housing production.

Using CPS data for 1976 to 2022 we explore how wage inequality has evolved for married couples with both spouses working full time full year, and its impact on household income inequality. We also investigate how marriage sorting patterns have changed over this period. To determine the factors driving income inequality we estimate a model explaining the joint distribution of wages which accounts for the spouses’ employment decisions. We find that income inequality has increased for these households and increased assortative matching of wages has exacerbated the inequality resulting from individual wage growth. We find that positive sorting partially reflects the correlation across unobservables influencing both members’ of the marriage wages. We decompose the changes in sorting patterns over the 47 years comprising our sample into structural, composition and selection effects and find that the increase in positive sorting primarily reflects the increased skill premia for both observed and unobserved characteristics.

We provide the first quasi-experimental estimates of variation in suicide impulsivity by age by examining the impact of firearm purchase delay laws by age. Prior studies of firearm purchase delay laws use traditional two-way-fixed-effects estimation, but we demonstrate that bias due to heterogenous treatment effects may have inflated previous estimates relative to our stacked-regression approach. We also develop a triple-difference stacked-regression estimator to confirm the robustness of our results. We find that purchase delay laws reduce firearm suicide for the overall adult population, but this effect is largely driven by a 6.1 percent reduction in firearm suicides for young adults ages 21-34. We demonstrate that the relationship between purchase delay laws and firearm suicide reduction weakens with age and is not driven by gun ownership rates. We argue that this is due to the impulsiveness of young adults in committing suicide, indicating that removing firearm access for young adults may provide a critical deterrent to suicide.

High labor demand for physician assistants/associates (PA) has led to substantial PA workforce and wage growth. During this growth period, states have adopted reforms to reduce PA scope of practice restrictions and reports of significant gender and race wage disparities have emerged. This study examined data from the American Community Survey to investigate the influence of demographic characteristics, human capital, and scope of practice reforms on PA wages from 2008 to 2017. Using an ordinary least squares two-way fixed effects estimator, a significant association between reforms and PA wages could not be established. Rather, wages were found to be strongly associated with human capital and demographic characteristics. Gender and race wage disparities persist, with female PAs earning 7.5% lower wages than male PAs and White PAs earning 9.1% to 14.5% higher wages than racial and ethnic minority PAs. These findings suggest a minimal influence of prior scope of practice reforms on PA wages.

We evaluate progress in the War on Poverty as President Johnson defined it, which established a 20 percent baseline poverty rate and adopted an absolute standard. While the official poverty rate fell from 19.5 percent in 1963 to 10.5 percent in 2019, our absolute Full-income Poverty Measure, which uses a fuller income measure and updates thresholds only for inflation, fell from 19.5 to 1.6 percent. However, we also show that relative poverty reductions have been modest. Additionally, government dependence increased over this time, with the share of working-age adults receiving under half their income from market sources more than doubling.

The logistics industry in the United States has faced significant labor shortages for the last couple of decades. Women are a source of labor that has been traditionally underrepresented in the major logistics sectors, transportation, and warehousing. We study the workforce composition and potential gender wage gap across these sectors. Using data from the U.S. Census Bureau from 2003 to 2020, we show that women comprise about 4% of the workforce for truck drivers and 21% for warehouse workers. As traditionally measured by economists, there is a 17% gender wage gap among truck drivers and an 11% wage gap among warehouse workers. A regression analysis suggests that the gap is smaller for warehouse workers, which is consistent with theory that an occupation's stability and predictability can reduce or eliminate wage gaps. Further analysis is carried out on specific occupations within the logistics industry and measures the variation across truck transportation and warehousing industries. There is evidence for a declining gender wage gap across both over time, although the gap remains sizable. This paper provides insight on the trends and status of gender differences in labor outcomes in the logistics industry.

The consumption of Sugar-Sweetened Beverages (SSBs) has been linked to the global epidemic of obesity and chronic disease. Following the economic growth, urbanization, and attractive market for beverage companies, the consumption of SSBs is a rising public health challenge in low and middle-income countries. Hence, this study aimed to assess the magnitude of SSBs consumption and associated factors among women of reproductive age group in two SSA countries. This cross-sectional study used data from Integrated Public Use Micro Data Series-Performance Monitoring for Action (IPUMS-PMA) with a total sample of 3759 women aged 15–49 years old in Burkina Faso and Kenya. The data was collected on June - August 2018 in Burkina Faso, and May -August 2018 in Kenya. SSBs consumption was measured by asking a woman if she drank SSBs yesterday during the day or night, whether at home or anywhere else. A mixed-effect logistic regression model was employed to identify associated factors. Half (50.38%) [95%CI; 46.04, 54.71] of women consumed SSBs. Sociodemographic characteristics like primary education (AOR = 1.35; 95%CI: 1.05–1.74), secondary education (AOR = 1.46; 95%CI: 1.13–1.90), being employed (AOR = 1.28; 95%CI: 1.05–1.56),and dietary characteristics like consumption of savory and fried snack (AOR = 1.61; 95%CI = 1.24–2.09), achieved minimum dietary diversity (AOR = 1.67; 95%CI: 1.38–2.01), moderate household food insecurity (AOR = 0.74, 95% CI: 0.58, 0.95), and sever household food insecurity (AOR = 0.71, 95% CI: 0.56, 0.89) had significant statistical association with SSBs consumption. Consumption of SSBs among women in two Sub-Saharan African countries (Burkina Faso and Kenya) is high. Having higher educational status, being employed, achieved minimum dietary diversity, and having low/no household food in-security were found to be significantly associated with SSBs compared with their counterparts. We recommend for further study in other African countries using objective measurements of SSBs consumption.

To understand the persistence of racial disparities in the United States, inequality scholars have increasingly focused attention on historic regimes of violence and social control. In particular, a burgeoning literature examines the legacy of slavery, generally finding that where slavery was deeply entrenched, today racial inequalities and African-American deprivation are more acute. However, taking seriously the notion that history matters means considering not only the lingering effects of dehumanizing social control institutions like slavery but also the ramifications of antebellum institutions and cultures of resistance and resilience African Americans built for survival. Using quantitative methods, I examine the relationship between antebellum free African-American populations and racial inequalities in modern state-sanctioned social control. Focusing on the understudied Northeast, a region where free African-American communities flourished despite coexisting with slavery, I find that where free African Americans were more prevalent—and, thus, resistance to White’s social control efforts and resilience in the face of White hostility more robust—those same areas today display reduced levels of racial inequality in social control (i.e., lower Black–White arrest rate disparities) and reduced absolute levels of minority social control (i.e., lower African-American arrest rates). Mediation analyses reveal contemporary civil rights infrastructure, Black congregations, and Black political power operate as structural safeguards and are important components of the legacies of resistance and resilience left by free African Americans.

Objective: To examine the independent and interdependent effects of race and social determinants of health (SDoH) and risk of all-cause and cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality in the US. Data Source/Study Design: Secondary analysis of pooled data for 252,218 participants of the 2006–2018 National Health Interview Survey, linked to the National Death Index. Methods: Age-adjusted mortality rates (AAMR) were reported for non-Hispanic White (NHW) and non-Hispanic Black (NHB) individuals overall, and by quintiles of SDoH burden, with higher quintiles representing higher cumulative social disadvantage (SDoH-Qx). Survival analysis was used to examine the association between race, SDoH-Qx, and all-cause and CVD mortality. Findings: AAMRs for all-cause and CVD mortality were higher for NHB and considerably higher at higher levels of SDoH-Qx, however, with similar mortality rates at any given level of SDoH-Qx. In multivariable models, NHB experienced 20–25% higher mortality risk relative to NHW (aHR = 1.20–1.26); however, no association was observed after adjusting for SDoH. In contrast, higher SDoH burden was associated with up to nearly threefold increased risk of all-cause (aHR, Q5 vs Q1 = 2.81) and CVD mortality (aHR, Q5 vs Q1 = 2.90); the SDoH effect was observed similarly for NHB (aHR, Q5:all-cause mortality = 2.38; CVD mortality = 2.58) and NHW (aHR, Q5:all-cause mortality = 2.87; CVD mortality = 2.93) subgroups. SDoH burden mediated 40–60% of the association between NHB race and mortality. Conclusions: These findings highlight the critical role of SDoH as upstream drivers of racial inequities in all-cause and CVD mortality. Population level interventions focused on addressing adverse SDoH experienced by NHB individuals may help mitigate persistent disparities in mortality in the US.

The efficacy of the US antipoverty policy is shaped both by its reliance on categorical sorting and by its decentralized structure. To examine the implications of these features, this study introduces a novel disaggregation of poverty reduction instruments into four mechanisms: federal taxes and federal transfers (centralized) and state taxes and state transfers (decentralized). Using the Current Population Sur-vey's Annual Social and Economic Supplement data and a sequence-independent decomposition , this analysis assesses the relative effectiveness of the mechanisms at the national level between 1996 and 2016 and across the states in 2016. The study finds that absolute and relative poverty reduction is greater and has increased over time for working-age households with children compared with those without children. We also find cross-state variation in market-and disposable-income poverty and in the poverty reduction attributable to each of the redistributive mechanisms, highlighting the importance of examining poverty and antipoverty policy subnationally.

In the late 1930s, the NAACP launched a campaign to equalize Black and white teacher salaries in the de jure segregated schools of the American South. We estimate the effect of teacher pay on educational attainment exploiting variation in Black salary gains over time across southern counties with different Black enrollment shares, and across states by whether subsequent policy reinforced or resisted court rulings favorable to the NAACP. Using newly collected county panel data, we find that Black teacher salary gains contributed to the large reductions in racial inequality in school enrollment and grade progression in the South at mid-century.

This dissertation addresses important topics in labor economics, with a specific emphasis on the factors influencing labor and marriage markets. Chapter 2 (joint with Xiaoyin Li) investigates the effects of the relaxation of labor laws on youth employment. The study specifically targets 16-17-year -old youth in Wisconsin and utilizes the change in the working hour restriction in 2011 as a quasi-experiment. The study examines how extending working hours and days for teenagers can potentially influence their labor outcomes. The findings indicate that relaxing labor laws increase teen employment rates, while the labor force participation rate and hours worked show negligible changes. Chapter 3 (joint with John V. Winters) examines the causal effects of education on marriage outcomes. Economic theory suggests that causal effects of education on marriage are ambiguous and likely heterogeneous. We use individual-level data from the American Community Survey combined with cohort-level maternal education data from prior decennial censuses to estimate causal effects of education on marriage outcomes via two-stage least squares regression. The study reveals that formal education significantly decreases the probability of being married for younger individuals but not for older individuals. However, education does significantly increase the probability of never marrying even by ages 45-54. Chapter 4 analyzes the impact of unilateral divorce laws on marriage outcomes. A significant change in marriage law is the shift from mutual consent to unilateral divorce laws, allowing one spouse to terminate the marriage without the consent of the other party. This change had implications for various marriage outcomes. The findings provide evidence that the introduction of unilateral divorce laws has a negative impact on the likelihood of being married among certain age groups, while the effect is not uniform across age and gender.

Although labor market “mismatch” often refers to an imbalances in supply and demand across occupations, mismatch within occupations can arise if skill requirements are changing over time, potentially reducing aggregate matching efficiency within the labor market. To test this, we examine changes in employer education and skill requirements using a database of 200 million U.S. online job postings between 2007 and 2019. We find that the degree of persistence in educational upskilling lasted longer than was previously known and was not uniform but rather varied considerably across occupations and was often coupled with an increased demand for software skills. We also find evidence that upskilling contributed to reduced matching efficiency in certain segments of the US labor market as well as in the aggregate. In particular, matching efficiency was lower in higher-skilled occupations, potentially because they are becoming more specialized, and possibly explaining growing wage polarization and inequality.

With the increasing prevalence of hypertension-related cardiovascular deaths and depression, this study examined the associations of depression with hypertension, citizenship status, and interaction of hypertension and citizenship status among U.S. adults. Data from the 2015–2018 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), including 63,985 individuals, were analyzed. Depression status was the outcome, with hypertension and U.S. citizenship status as the main independent variables. Using odds ratio (OR) estimates, we evaluated the associations between hypertension and depression, and citizenship status. The result indicates that a higher proportion of U.S. adults with hypertension reported depression compared to those who did not have hypertension (42.9 % vs. 37.5 %). In terms of U.S. citizenship status, a higher proportion of U.S. citizens reported depression than non-citizens (39.6 % vs. 31.6 %). However, non-citizens with hypertension were more likely to report depression compared to U.S. citizens without hypertension (OR = 1.46; 95 % CI = 1.15, 1.86). While hypertension marginally increased the odds of depression among the general U.S. population, being a non-U.S. citizen with hypertension significantly increased the risk of depression by 46 %. The findings imply that the healthy immigrant paradox, in the context of hypertension-depression prevention and control, may not apply to non-citizens with hypertension. We therefore recommend community-based screenings and more tailored interventions to address these health disparities while taking into consideration the unique cultural norms, behaviors and healthcare barriers encountered by specific immigrant communities.

The recent growth in cycling in the United States has paralleled a growth in the diversity of cyclists, but what encourages people to bicycle is not the same across all demographic groups. This study uses intercept survey data from predominately Latino-immigrant neighborhoods to understand how social ecological motivations for cycling differ for immigrants and U.S.-born residents. Both perceptions of cycling and social relationships with cyclists are strong predictors of cycling, and more strongly so for immigrants. Planning that supports both social and physical infrastructure may help meet the needs of diverse cyclists and promote equity.

I study the effect of having dual public health insurance coverage on healthcare utilization among US patients. Specifically, I focus on Medicare beneficiaries who gain additional Medicaid coverage, which eliminates out-of-pocket costs for healthcare services. While the lower cost may increase patients' demand for healthcare, I identify a countervailing force: providers are less willing to treat Medicaid patients due to lower reimbursement rates and higher administrative burdens. Using administrative Medi-care claims data and variation from a substantial expansion in dual-Medicaid eligibility in the state of Connecticut, I find that dual enrollment increases patients' total health care utilization by 51 percent, and that much of this increase is driven by a higher use of the emergency department (83 percent increase at the sample mean). At the same time, dual enrollment leads to a 24 percent decline in the number of outpatient physician visits, especially for preventive care. I demonstrate that the decline in outpatient care is concentrated among providers with a low share of Medicaid patients. My findings thus demonstrate the unintended consequences of policies that increase enrollment in dual-Medicaid among patients without changing provider side constraints regarding their willingness to treat Medicaid patients. More broadly, my results speak to the role of the interaction between Medicare and Medicaid-the two primary public health insurance programs in the US-in driving access to care and healthcare spending.