The NBER Reporter 2011 Number 1: Program and Working Group Meetings

The NBER's Program on Economic Fluctuations and Growth met at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on February 4, 2011. NBER Research Associates Russell Cooper of European University Institute and Mark Gertler of New York University organized the meeting. These papers were discussed:

Robert Shimer, University of Chicago and NBER, "Wage Rigidities and Jobless Recoveries"

Alan B. Krueger, Princeton University, and Andreas Meuller, Stockholm University, "Job Search and Job Finding in a Period of Mass Unemployment: Evidence from High-Frequency Longitudinal Data"

Virgiliu Midrigan and Daniel Xu, New York University and NBER, "Finance and Misallocation: Evidence from Plant-level Data" (NBER Working Paper No. 15647)

Craig Burnside, Duke University and NBER, and Martin S. Eichenbaum and Sergio Rebelo, Northwestern University and NBER, "Understanding Booms and Busts in Housing Markets" (NBER Working Paper No. 16734)

Andrew Glover, University of Minnesota; Jonathan Heathcote, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis; Dirk Krueger, University of Pennsylvania and NBER; and Jose-Victor Rios-Rull, University of Minnesota and NBER, "Inter-generational Redistribution in the Great Recession"

Vasco M. Carvalho, CREI, and Xavier Gabaix, New York University and NBER, "The Great Diversification and Its Undoing" (NBER Working Paper No. 16424)

Summaries of these papers may be found here.

The NBER's Program on Industrial Organization, directed by Nancy Rose of MIT, met in Stanford, CA on February 25 and 26, 2011. John Asker, NBER and New York University, and Tom Hubbard, NBER and Northwestern University, organized the meeting. These papers were discussed:

Alessandro Gavazza, New York University, "An Empirical Equilibrium Model of a Decentralized Asset Market"

Joseph A. Cullen, Harvard University, "Dynamic Response to Environmental Regulation in the Electricity Industry"

Ryan C. McDevitt, University of Rochester, "'A' Business by Any Other Name: Firm Name Choice as a Signal of Firm Quality"

Allan Collard-Wexler, New York University and NBER, "Mergers and Sunk Costs: An Application to the Ready-Mix Concrete Industry"

Mark R. Cullen and Liran Einav, Stanford University and NBER; Amy Finkelstein and Stephen P. Ryan, MIT and NBER; and Paul Schrimpf, MIT, "Selection on Moral Hazard in Health Insurance"

Brett R. Gordon, Columbia University; and Wesley R. Hartmann, Stanford University, "Advertising Effects in Presidential Elections"

Summaries of these papers may be found here.

The NBER's Program on International Finance and Macroeconomics met in Cambridge on March 4, 2011. NBER Research Associates Roberto Chang, Rutgers University, and Kristin Forbes, MIT, organized the meeting. These papers were discussed:

Gianluca Benigno, London School of Economics; Huigang Chen, JD Power; Christopher Otrok, University of Virginia; Alessandro Rebucci, Inter-American Development Bank; and Eric Young, University of Virginia, "Financial Crises and Macro-Prudential Policies"

Olivier Jeanne, Johns Hopkins University and NBER, and Anton Korinek, University of Maryland, "Managing Credit Booms and Busts: A Pigouvian Taxation Approach"

Barry Eichengreen, University of California, Berkeley and NBER, and Hui Tong, International Monetary Fund, "The Impact of Chinese Exchange Rate Policy on the Rest of the World: Evidence from Firm-Level Data"

Daniel Paravisini and Daniel Wolfenzon, Columbia University and NBER; Veronica Rappoport, Columbia University; and Philipp Schnabl, New York University, "Dissecting the Effect of Credit Supply on Trade: Evidence from Matched Credit-Export Data"

Charles Engel, University of Wisconsin, Madison and NBER, "The Real Exchange Rate, Real Interest Rates, and the Risk Premium"

Michael Kumhof, International Monetary Fund, "International Currency Portfolios"

Andrew K. Rose, University of California, Berkeley and NBER, and Tomasz Wieladek, Bank of England, "Financial Protectionism: the First Tests"

Stephanie E. Curcuru and Charles P. Thomas, Federal Reserve Board, and Francis E. Warnock, University of Virginia and NBER, "On Returns Differentials"

Summaries may be found here.

The NBER's Program on Labor Studies, directed by David Card of the University of California, Berkeley, met in San Francisco on March 4, 2011. These papers were discussed:

Douglas Miller, Marianne E. Page, and Ann Huff Stevens, University of California, Davis and NBER, and Mateusz Filipski, University of California, Davis, "The Best of Times, the Worst of Times: Understanding Pro-cyclical Mortality"

Philippe Belley, Kansas State University; Marc Frenette, Social Research & Demonstration Corporation; and Lance Lochner, University of Western Ontario and NBER, "Post-Secondary Attendance by Parental Income in the U.S. and Canada: What Role for Financial Aid Policy?"

Nicholas J. Sanders, Stanford University, "What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Weaker: Prenatal Pollution Exposure and Educational Outcomes"

Florian Hoffman, University of British Columbia, "An Empirical Model of Life-Cycle Earnings and Mobility Dynamics"

Camille Landais, Stanford University; Henrik Kleven, London School of Economics; and Emmanuel Saez, University of California, Berkeley and NBER, "Taxation and International Migration of Superstars: Evidence from the European Football Market" (NBER Working Paper No. 16545)

Peter J. Kuhn, University of California, Santa Barbara and NBER, and Kailing Shen, Xiamen University, "Gender Discrimination in Job Ads: Theory and Evidence"

Summaries of these papers may be found here.

The NBER's Monetary Economics Program met in Chicago on March 4, 2011. NBER Research Associate Valerie A. Ramey of the University of California, San Diego and Jon Steinsson of Columbia University, organized this program:

Harrison Hong, Princeton University and NBER, and David Sraer, Princeton University, "Quiet Bubbles"

Judith Chevalier, Yale University and NBER, and Anil K Kashyap, University of Chicago and NBER, "Best Prices"

Douglas Davis and Oleg Korenok, Virginia Commonwealth University, "Nominal Price Shocks in Monopolistically Competitive Markets: An Experimental Analysis"

James D. Hamilton, University of California, San Diego and NBER, and Jing Wu, University of California, San Diego, "The Effectiveness of Alternative Monetary Policy Tools in a Zero Lower Bound Environment"

Karel O. Mertens, Cornell University, and Morten Ravn, University College London, "Fiscal Policy in an Expectations Driven Liquidity Trap"

Isabel Correia, Universidade Catolica Portuguesa; Emmanuel Farhi, Harvard University and NBER; Juan Pablo Nicolini, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis; and Pedro Teles, Universidad di Tella, "Unconventional Fiscal Policy at the Zero Bound"

Summaries of these papers may be found here.

Richard C. Sutch, University of California, Riverside and NBER, "Hard Work, Nonemployment, and the Wealth-Age Profile: Evidence of a Life-Cycle Strategy in the United States During the Nineteenth Century"

Daniel K. Fetter, Wellesley College and NBER, "How Do Mortgage Subsidies Affect Home Ownership? VA Home Loans and the Mid-20th Century Transformation in U.S. Housing Markets"

Leah Platt Boustan, University of California, Los Angeles and NBER, and Robert A. Margo, Boston University and NBER, "White Suburbanization and African-American Home Ownership, 1940-1980" (NBER Working Paper No. 16702)

Karen Clay, Carnegie Mellon University and NBER; Jeff Lingwall, Carnegie Mellon University; and Melvin Stephens, University of Michigan and NBER, "Compulsory Attendance Laws and Nineteenth Century Schooling"

Erik Heitfield, Federal Reserve Board of Governors; Gary Richardson, University of California, Irvine and NBER; and Shirley Wang, Cornell University, "Contagion During the Initial Banking Panic of the Great Depression"

Douglas A. Irwin, Dartmouth College and NBER, "Did France Cause the Great Depression?"(NBER Working Paper No. 16350)

Summaries of these papers may be found here.

The NBER's Program on Technological Progress and Productivity Measurement, directed by NBER Research Associates Nick Bloom of Stanford University and Josh Lerner of the Harvard Business School, met in Cambridge on March 11, 2011. These papers were discussed:

Oriana Bandiera and Andrea Prat, London School of Economics; Luigi Guiso, European University Institute; and Raffaella Sadun, Harvard University and NBER, "What Do CEOs Do?"

Yi Qian, Northwestern University and NBER, "Counterfeiters: Foes or Friends"(NBER Working Paper No. 16785)

Nicola Lacetera, University of Toronto, and Justin Sydnor, Case Western Reserve University, "Is High-Quality Production Location-Specific? Evidence from the Automobile Industry"

Leonardo Iacovone, The World Bank; Wolfgang Keller, Princeton University and NBER; and Ferdinand Rauch, London School of Economics, "Innovation Responses to Import Competition"

Iwan Barankay, University of Pennsylvania, "Rank Incentives: Evidence from Field Experiments"

Summaries of these papers may be found here.

The NBER's Program on International Trade and Investment met in Cambridge on March 25 and 26, 2011. Program Director Robert C. Feenstra of the University of California, Davis organized the meeting. These papers were discussed:

Matthieu Bussiere and Giulia Sestieri, Banque de France; Giovanni Callegari, IMF; Fabio Ghironi, Boston College and NBER; and Norihiko Yamano, OECD, "Estimating Trade Elasticities: Demand Composition and the Trade Collapse of 2008-9"

Daniel Paravisini and Daniel Wolfenzon, Columbia University and NBER; Veronica Rappoport, Columbia University; and Philipp Schnabl, New York University, "Dissecting the Effect of Credit Supply on Trade: Evidence from Matched Credit-Export Data"

Arnaud Costinot, MIT and NBER; Jonathan Vogel, Columbia University and NBER; and Su Wang, MIT, "An Elementary Theory of Global Supply Chains"

Richard Baldwin, Graduate Institute, Geneva and NBER, and Anthony Venables, University of Oxford, "Relocating the Value Chain: Offshoring and Agglomeration in the Global Economy" (NBER Working Paper No. 16611)

Beatriz de Blas, Universidad Autonoma de Madrid, and Katheryn Russ, University of California, Davis and NBER, "Teams of Rivals: Endogenous Markups in a Ricardian World" (NBER Working Paper No. 16587)

David H. Autor, MIT and NBER; David Dorn, CEMFI and IZA; and Gordon H. Hanson, University of California, San Diego and NBER, "The China Syndrome: Local Labor Market Effects of Import Competition in the U.S."

John McLaren, University of Virginia and NBER, and Shushanik Hakobyan, University of Virginia, "Looking for Local Labor-Market Effects of the NAFTA" (NBER Working Paper No. 16535)

Kyle Handley, University of Maryland, and Nuno Limao, University of Maryland and NBER, "Trade and Investment under Policy Uncertainty: Theory and Firm Evidence"

Summaries of these papers may be found here.