research

"... it is distressing how often one can guess the answer given to an economic question merely by knowing who asked it." - George J. Stigler, 1946

publications

  1. (2024) Braun, Christine, Finn Kydland, Peter Rupert. "Quality Hours: Measuring Labour Input," Labour Economics, vol. 88, June 2024.
    2. [Downlaod][Link]

  2. (2024) Braun, Christine. "Measuring the Total Number of US Job Seekers" The Economic Journal , Vol 134, Issue 664, Pages 3173–3201, November 2024.
    3. [Download][Link]

  3. (2021) Braun, Christine, E. Charlie Nusbaum, and Peter Rupert. " Labor Market Dynamics and the Migration Behavior of Married Couples" Review of Economic Dynamics
    4. [Downlaod] [Link]

  4. (2020) Braun, Christine, Ben Griffy, Bryan Engelhardt, and Peter Rupert. "Testing the Independence of Job Arrival Rates and Wage Offers," Labour Economics, vol. 63, April 2020, 101804.
    5. [Downlaod] [Link]

  5. (2019) Braun, Christine. "Crime and the minimum wage," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 32, pages 122-152, April 2019.
    6. [Downlaod] [Link]


working papers

  • Measuring the Productivity of Working from Home, with Travis Cyronek and Peter Rupert [draft] Reject & Resubmit at Review of Economics and Statistics

    Abstract: We document a doubling of hours worked at home in the US from 2003 to 2019. We propose a model where workers choose optimally where (at home or at the office) and how much to work, in which their choices depend on their preferences across locations and the relative productivity of working from home. We estimate the model allowing for both preference and productivity to change over time and decompose the rise in hours worked. We show that changes in preferences and the demographic composition of the workforce played little role in the rise of working from home. Instead, increases in the relative productivity of working from home and employment shifts toward occupations with higher relative productivity can account for the entire observed increase in hours worked at home.

  • Labor Market Beliefs and the Gender Wage Gap, with Ana Figueiredo [draft]

    Abstract: We study the role of labor market beliefs in the gender pay gap. We find that, on average, women expect to receive lower salaries than men and also expect to receive fewer offers when employed. Gender differences in expectations explain a sizable fraction of the residual gap in reservation wages. We estimate a partial equilibrium job search model that incorporates worker heterogeneity in beliefs about the wage offer distribution, arrival rates, and separation rate. Counterfactual exercises show that labor market beliefs play an important role in the gender wage gap, but matter little for the gender differences in welfare. Eliminating gender differences in the actual offer distribution, by contrast, decreases the gender gap in pay and welfare.