The Quarterly Journal of Economics，2022年第四季刊

The Quarterly Journal of Economics，2022年第四季刊

 

 

1．Systemic Discrimination Among Large U.S. Employers

美国大型雇主之间的系统性歧视

Patrick Kline, Evan K Rose, Christopher R Walters

We study the results of a massive nationwide correspondence experiment sending more than 83,000 fictitious applications with randomized characteristics to geographically dispersed jobs posted by 108 of the largest U.S. employers. Distinctively Black names reduce the probability of employer contact by 2.1 percentage points relative to distinctively white names. The magnitude of this racial gap in contact rates differs substantially across firms, exhibiting a between-company standard deviation of 1.9 percentage points. Despite an insignificant average gap in contact rates between male and female applicants, we find a between-company standard deviation in gender contact gaps of 2.7 percentage points, revealing that some firms favor male applicants and others favor women. Company-specific racial contact gaps are temporally and spatially persistent, and negatively correlated with firm profitability, federal contractor status, and a measure of recruiting centralization. Discrimination exhibits little geographical dispersion, but two-digit industry explains roughly half of the cross-firm variation in both racial and gender contact gaps. Contact gaps are highly concentrated in particular companies, with firms in the top quintile of racial discrimination responsible for nearly half of lost contacts to Black applicants in the experiment. Controlling false discovery rates to the 5% level, 23 companies are found to discriminate against Black applicants. Our findings establish that discrimination against distinctively Black names is concentrated among a select set of large employers, many of which can be identified with high confidence using large-scale inference methods.

我们研究了一项大规模的全国性通信实验的结果，该实验将超过83，000份具有随机特征的虚构申请发送到108个美国最大雇主发布的地理上分散的工作。与独特的白人名字相比，独特的黑人名字将雇主接触的可能性降低了2.1个百分点。这种接触率的种族差距在公司之间差异很大，显示出1.9个百分点的公司间标准差。尽管男性和女性申请人之间的平均接触率差距微不足道，但我们发现性别接触差距的公司间标准差为2.7个百分点，这表明一些公司偏爱男性求职者，而另一些公司偏爱女性。公司特定的种族联系差距在时间和空间上是持久的，并且与公司盈利能力、联邦承包商地位和招聘集中化措施呈负相关。歧视在地理上几乎没有分散性，但两位数的行业解释了种族和性别接触差距的跨公司差异的大约一半。联系差距高度集中在特定的公司，在种族歧视方面排名前五分之一的公司占实验中与黑人申请人失去联系的近一半。将虚假发现率控制在5%的水平，发现23家公司歧视黑人申请人。我们的研究结果表明，对黑人名字的歧视集中在一组选定的大型雇主中，其中许多雇主可以使用大规模推理方法高置信度地识别。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac024

 

2．Valuing the Global Mortality Consequences of Climate Change Accounting for Adaptation Costs and Benefits  

评估气候变化对全球死亡率的影响 考虑适应成本和收益

Tamma Carleton, Amir Jina, Michael Delgado, Michael Greenstone, Trevor Houser, Solomon Hsiang, Andrew Hultgren, Robert E Kopp, Kelly E McCusker, Ishan Nath 

Using 40 countries’ subnational data, we estimate age-specific mortality-temperature relationships and extrapolate them to countries without data today and into a future with climate change. We uncover a U-shaped relationship where extreme cold and hot temperatures increase mortality rates, especially for the elderly. Critically, this relationship is flattened by higher incomes and adaptation to local climate. Using a revealed-preference approach to recover unobserved adaptation costs, we estimate that the mean global increase in mortality risk due to climate change, accounting for adaptation benefits and costs, is valued at roughly 3.2% of global GDP in 2100 under a high-emissions scenario. Notably, today’s cold locations are projected to benefit, while today’s poor and hot locations have large projected damages. Finally, our central estimates indicate that the release of an additional ton of CO2 today will cause mortality-related damages of $36.6 under a high-emissions scenario, with an interquartile range accounting for both econometric and climate uncertainty of [−$7.8, $73.0]. These empirically grounded estimates exceed the previous literature’s estimates by an order of magnitude.

我们使用40个国家的次国家级数据，估计了特定年龄的死亡率与温度之间的关系，并将其外推到今天没有数据的国家以及气候变化的未来。我们发现了一种U型关系，其中极端寒冷和酷热的温度会增加死亡率，尤其是对老年人而言。至关重要的是，这种关系因收入增加和对当地气候的适应而变得扁平化。使用揭示偏好方法来恢复未观察到的适应成本，我们估计，在高排放情景下，气候变化造成的全球死亡风险平均增加（包括适应效益和成本）在2100年约占全球GDP的3.2%。值得注意的是，今天的寒冷地区预计将受益，而今天的贫困和炎热地区预计将受到较大的损害。最后，我们的中心估计表明，在高排放情景下，今天额外释放一吨二氧化碳将导致36.6美元的死亡相关损害，计量经济学和气候不确定性的四分位间距为[-7.8美元，73.0美元]。这些基于经验的估计比以前的文献估计高出一个数量级。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac020

 

3．Reshaping Global Trade: The Immediate and Long-Run Effects of Bank Failures

重塑全球贸易：银行倒闭的直接和长期影响

Chenzi Xu

I show that a disruption to the financial sector can reshape the patterns of global trade for decades. I study the first modern global banking crisis originating in London in 1866 and collect archival loan records that link multinational banks headquartered there to their lending abroad. Countries exposed to bank failures in London immediately exported significantly less and did not recover their lost growth relative to unexposed places. Their market shares within each destination also remained significantly lower for four decades. Decomposing the persistent market-share losses shows that they primarily stem from lack of extensive-margin growth, as the financing shock caused importers to source more from new trade partnerships. Exporters producing more substitutable goods, those with little access to alternative forms of credit, and those trading with more distant partners experienced more persistent losses, consistent with the existence of sunk costs and the importance of finance for intermediating trade.

本文表明，金融部门的中断可以重塑数十年的全球贸易模式。我研究了1866年起源于伦敦的第一次现代全球银行业危机，并收集了档案贷款记录，将总部设在伦敦的跨国银行与其海外贷款联系起来。伦敦银行倒闭的国家立即出口大幅减少，并且没有恢复相对于未暴露地区失去的增长。四十年来，它们在每个目的地的市场份额也一直明显较低。分解持续的市场份额损失表明，它们主要源于缺乏广泛的利润率增长，因为融资冲击导致进口商从新的贸易伙伴关系中获取更多。生产更多可替代商品的出口商、难以获得替代信贷形式的出口商以及与较远伙伴进行贸易的出口商经历了更持久的损失，这与沉没成本的存在和融资对中间贸易的重要性相一致。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac016

4．Sexual Harassment and Gender Inequality in the Labor Market 

劳动力市场中的性骚扰和性别不平等

Olle Folke, Johanna Rickne

We describe how sexual harassment contributes to sex segregation and pay inequality in the labor market. Combining nationally representative survey data and administrative data, we show that both harassment and wages vary strongly and systematically across workplaces. Women self-report more harassment from colleagues and managers in male-dominated workplaces where wages are relatively high, and men self-report more harassment in female-dominated workplaces where wages are low. These patterns imply two ways that harassment may contribute to gender inequality. First, harassment deters women and men from applying for jobs in workplaces where they are the gender minority. A survey experiment with hypothetical job choices supports this mechanism. Respondents are highly averse to accepting jobs in workplaces with a higher harassment risk for their own gender, but less averse when people of the opposite sex are at higher risk. A second way that harassment contributes to inequality is by making workplace gender minorities leave their workplaces for new jobs. An analysis of workplace transitions supports this mechanism. Women who self-report harassment are more likely to switch to new workplaces with more female colleagues and lower pay.

我们描述了性骚扰如何导致劳动力市场中的性别隔离和薪酬不平等。结合具有全国代表性的调查数据和行政数据，我们发现骚扰和工资在工作场所之间差异很大且系统。在工资相对较高的男性占主导地位的工作场所，女性自我报告受到同事和经理的骚扰更多，而在工资低的女性占主导地位的工作场所，男性自我报告受到的骚扰更多。这些模式意味着骚扰可能导致性别不平等的两种方式。首先，骚扰使女性和男性无法申请他们属于性别少数群体的工作场所的工作。一项假设工作选择的调查实验支持这一机制。受访者非常反感接受自己性别骚扰风险较高的工作场所的工作，但当异性面临较高风险时，受访者则不那么反感。骚扰加剧不平等的第二种方式是让工作场所的性别少数群体离开工作场所去找新工作。对工作场所过渡的分析支持这一机制。自我报告性骚扰的女性更有可能转向女性同事更多、工资更低的新工作场所。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac018

 

 

5．The Quality and Efficiency of Public and Private Firms: Evidence from Ambulance Services

公共和私营公司的质量和效率：来自救护车服务的证据

Daniel Knutsson, Björn Tyrefors

Economic theory predicts that outsourcing public services to private firms reduces costs, but the effect on quality is ambiguous. We explore quality differences between publicly and privately owned ambulances in Stockholm County, Sweden, a setting where patients are as good as randomly assigned to ambulances with different ownership status. We find that private ambulances reduce costs and perform better on contracted measures such as response time, but perform worse on noncontracted measures such as mortality. In fact, a patient has a 1.4% higher risk of death within three years if a private ambulance is dispatched (in aggregate, 420 more deaths each year). We also present evidence of the mechanism at work, suggesting that private firms cut costs at the expense of ambulance staff quality.

经济理论预测，将公共服务外包给私营企业可以降低成本，但对质量的影响是模糊的。我们探讨了瑞典斯德哥尔摩县公有和私营救护车之间的质量差异，在这种情况下，患者就像随机分配到具有不同所有权状态的救护车一样好。我们发现，私人救护车降低了成本，在响应时间等合同措施上表现更好，但在死亡率等非合同措施上表现更差。事实上，如果派遣私人救护车，患者在三年内的死亡风险要高出 1.4%（每年总共有 420 人死亡）。我们还提出了该机制发挥作用的证据，表明私营公司以牺牲救护车人员的质量为代价来削减成本。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac014

 

6．Does Welfare Prevent Crime? the Criminal Justice Outcomes of Youth Removed from Ssi

福利能预防犯罪吗？从SSI中移除的青少年的刑事司法结果

Manasi Deshpande, Michael Mueller-Smith

We estimate the effect of losing Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits at age 18 on criminal justice and employment outcomes over the next two decades. To estimate this effect, we use a regression discontinuity design in the likelihood of being reviewed for SSI eligibility at age 18 created by the 1996 welfare reform law. We evaluate this natural experiment with Social Security Administration data linked to records from the Criminal Justice Administrative Records System. We find that SSI removal increases the number of criminal charges by a statistically significant 20% over the next two decades. The increase in charges is concentrated in offenses for which income generation is a primary motivation (60% increase), especially theft, burglary, fraud/forgery, and prostitution. The effect of SSI removal on criminal justice involvement persists more than two decades later, even as the effect of removal on contemporaneous SSI receipt diminishes. In response to SSI removal, youth are twice as likely to be charged with an illicit income-generating offense than they are to maintain steady employment at $$15,000/year in the labor market. As a result of these charges, the annual likelihood of incarceration increases by a statistically significant 60% in the two decades following SSI removal. The costs to taxpayers of enforcement and incarceration from SSI removal are so high that they nearly eliminate the savings to taxpayers from reduced SSI benefits.

我们估计了在未来二十年中，18岁时失去补充保障收入（SSI）福利对刑事司法和就业结果的影响。为了估计这种影响，我们使用回归不连续设计来评估1996年福利改革法在18岁时被审查SSI资格的可能性。我们使用与刑事司法行政记录系统记录相关联的社会保障管理局数据来评估这一自然实验。我们发现，在未来二十年中，SSI的移除使刑事指控的数量增加了20%，具有统计学意义。指控的增加集中在以创收为主要动机的犯罪上（增加60%），特别是盗窃、入室盗窃、欺诈/伪造和卖淫。二十多年后，SSI移除对刑事司法参与的影响仍然存在，即使移除对同时期收到SSI的影响减弱。作为对SSI取消的回应，年轻人被指控犯有非法创收罪的可能性是他们在劳动力市场上保持稳定就业的两倍，每年15，000美元。由于这些指控，在SSI移除后的二十年中，每年监禁的可能性增加了60%，具有统计学意义。纳税人因SSI移除而执行和监禁的成本如此之高，以至于它们几乎消除了纳税人因减少SSI福利而节省的费用。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac017

 

7．Labor Market Returns and the Evolution of Cognitive Skills: Theory and Evidence

劳动力市场回报与认知技能的演变：理论与证据

Santiago Hermo, Miika Päällysaho, David Seim, Jesse M Shapiro

A large literature in cognitive science studies the puzzling “Flynn effect” of rising fluid intelligence (reasoning skill) in rich countries. We develop an economic model in which a cohort’s mix of skills is determined by different skills’ relative returns in the labor market and by the technology for producing skills. We estimate the model using administrative data from Sweden. Combining data from exams taken at military enlistment with earnings records from the tax register, we document an increase in the relative labor market return to logical reasoning skill as compared to vocabulary knowledge. The estimated model implies that changes in labor market returns explain 37% of the measured increase in reasoning skill, and can also explain the decline in knowledge. An original survey of parents, an analysis of trends in school curricula, and an analysis of occupational characteristics show evidence of increasing emphasis on reasoning as compared to knowledge.

认知科学的大量文献研究了富裕国家流体智力（逻辑推理技能）上升的令人费解的“弗林效应”。我们开发了一种经济模型，在该模型中，群体的技能组合由不同技能在劳动力市场上的相对回报和生产技能的技术决定。我们使用瑞典的行政数据估计模型。将入伍时参加的考试数据与税务登记处的收入记录相结合，我们记录了与词汇知识相比，相对劳动力市场对逻辑推理技能的回报有所增加。估计模型意味着劳动力市场回报的变化可以解释推理技能增长的37%，也可以解释知识的下降。对家长的原始调查、对学校课程趋势的分析以及对职业特征的分析表明，与知识相比，推理越来越受到重视。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac022

 

8．Army Service in the All-Volunteer Era

全志愿军时代的军队服役

Kyle Greenberg, Matthew Gudgeon, Adam Isen, Corbin Miller, Richard Patterson

Since the beginning of the all-volunteer era, millions of young Americans have chosen to enlist in the military. These volunteers disproportionately come from disadvantaged backgrounds, and while some aspects of military service are likely to be beneficial, exposure to violence and other elements of service could worsen outcomes. This article links the universe of army applicants between 1990 and 2011 to their federal tax records and other administrative data and uses two eligibility thresholds in the Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) in a regression discontinuity design to estimate the effects of army enlistment on earnings and related outcomes. In the 19 years following application, army service increases average annual earnings by over $$4,000 at both cutoffs. However, whether service increases long-run earnings varies significantly by race. Black servicemembers experience annual gains of $$5,500 to $$15,000 11–19 years after applying while white servicemembers do not experience significant changes. By providing Black servicemembers a stable and well-paying army job and by opening doors to higher-paid postservice employment, the army significantly closes the Black-white earnings gap in our sample.

自全志愿时代开始以来，数百万美国年轻人选择参军。这些志愿者不成比例地来自弱势背景，虽然服兵役的某些方面可能是有益的，但暴露于暴力和其他服务要素可能会使结果恶化。本文将 1990 年至 2011 年间的军队申请者范围与其联邦税务记录和其他行政数据联系起来，并在回归不连续性设计中使用武装部队资格测试 （AFQT） 中的两个资格阈值来估计军队入伍对收入和相关结果的影响。在申请后的19年中，服兵役在两个截止时间都会使平均年收入增加4，000美元以上。然而，服务是否增加长期收入因种族而异。黑人军人在申请 11-19 年后的年收益为 5，500 至 15，000 美元，而白人军人没有显着变化。通过为黑人军人提供稳定且高薪的军队工作，并为高薪的退役后就业敞开大门，军队显着缩小了我们样本中的黑人与白人的收入差距。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac026

 

 

9．Competing Models

竞争模型

José Luis Montiel Olea, Pietro Ortoleva, Mallesh M Pai, Andrea Prat

Different agents need to make a prediction. They observe identical data, but have different models: they predict using different explanatory variables. We study which agent believes they have the best predictive ability—as measured by the smallest subjective posterior mean squared prediction error—and show how it depends on the sample size. With small samples, we present results suggesting it is an agent using a low-dimensional model. With large samples, it is generally an agent with a high-dimensional model, possibly including irrelevant variables, but never excluding relevant ones. We apply our results to characterize the winning model in an auction of productive assets, to argue that entrepreneurs and investors with simple models will be overrepresented in new sectors, and to understand the proliferation of “factors” that explain the cross-sectional variation of expected stock returns in the asset-pricing literature.

不同的代理需要做出预测。他们观察相同的数据，但具有不同的模型：他们使用不同的解释变量进行预测。我们研究哪个智能体认为他们具有最好的预测能力 - 通过最小的主观后验均方预测误差来衡量 - 并显示它如何取决于样本量。对于小样本，我们呈现的结果表明它是使用低维模型的代理。对于大样本，它通常是具有高维模型的代理，可能包含不相关的变量，但从不排除相关变量。我们应用我们的结果来描述生产性资产拍卖中的获胜模型，论证具有简单模型的企业家和投资者在新行业中的代表性过高，并了解解释资产定价文献中预期股票回报横断面变化的“因素”的扩散。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac015

 

10．Improving Management Through Worker Evaluations: Evidence from Auto Manufacturing

通过工人评估改善管理——来自汽车制造业的证据

Using a randomized experiment with an automobile manufacturing firm in China, we measure the effects of letting workers evaluate their managers on worker and firm outcomes. In the treatment teams, workers evaluate their managers monthly. We find that providing feedback leads to significant reductions in worker turnover and increases in team-level productivity. In addition, workers report higher levels of happiness and well-being. The evidence suggests that these results are driven by learning by managers, leading to changes in their behavior and an overall better relationship between managers and workers.

通过对中国一家汽车制造公司的随机实验，我们衡量了让员工评估经理对工人和公司结果的影响。在治疗团队中，工人每月评估他们的经理。我们发现，提供反馈可以显著降低员工流动率并提高团队层面的生产力。此外，工人报告的幸福感和幸福感更高。有证据表明，这些结果是由管理者的学习驱动的，导致他们的行为改变，以及管理者和工人之间整体更好的关系。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac019

 

11. Price Discrimination by Negotiation: a Field Experiment in Retail Electricity

谈判价格歧视：零售电力的实地实验

David P Byrne, Leslie A Martin, Jia Sheen Nah

We use a field experiment to study price discrimination in a market with price posting and negotiation. Motivated by concerns that low-income consumers do poorly in markets with privately negotiated prices, we built a call center staffed with actors armed with bargaining scripts to reveal negotiated prices and their determinants. Our actors implement sequential bargaining games under incomplete information in the field. By experimentally manipulating how information is revealed, we generate sequences of price offers that allow us to identify price discrimination in negotiations based on retailer perceptions of consumers’ search and switching costs. We also document differences in price distributions between entrants and incumbents, reflecting differences in captivity of their respective consumer bases. Finally, we show that higher prices paid by lower-income subsidy recipients in our market is not due to discriminatory targeting; they can be explained by variation in consumer willingness and ability to search and bargain.

我们使用实地实验来研究市场上的价格歧视，包括价格发布和谈判。出于对低收入消费者在私下协商价格的市场中表现不佳的担忧，我们建立了一个呼叫中心，配备了手持讨价还价脚本的参与者，以揭示协商价格及其决定因素。我们的参与者在现场信息不完整的情况下实施顺序讨价还价游戏。通过实验操纵信息的披露方式，我们生成了一系列价格报价，使我们能够根据零售商对消费者搜索和转换成本的看法来识别谈判中的价格歧视。我们还记录了进入者和现有者之间的价格分布差异，反映了他们各自消费者群的囚禁差异。最后，我们表明，我们市场上低收入补贴接受者支付的较高价格不是由于歧视性目标;它们可以通过消费者意愿以及搜索和讨价还价能力的变化来解释。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac021

 

12．Investing in Infants: the Lasting Effects of Cash Transfers to New Families

投资于婴儿：现金转移支付对新家庭的持久影响

Andrew Barr, Jonathan Eggleston, Alexander A Smith

We provide new evidence that cash transfers following the birth of a first child can have large and long-lasting effects on that child’s outcomes. We take advantage of the January 1 birthdate cutoff for U.S. child-related tax benefits, which results in families of otherwise similar children receiving substantially different refunds during the first year of life. For the average low-income single-child family in our sample, this difference amounts to roughly $$1,300, or 10% of income. Using the universe of administrative federal tax data in selected years, we show that this transfer in infancy increases young adult earnings by at least 1%–2%, with larger effects for males. These effects show up at earlier ages in terms of improved math and reading test scores and a higher likelihood of high-school graduation. The observed effects on shorter-run parental outcomes suggest that additional liquidity during the critical window following the birth of a first child leads to persistent increases in family income that likely contribute to the downstream effects on children’s outcomes. The longer-term effects on child earnings alone are large enough that the transfer pays for itself through subsequent increases in federal income tax revenue.

我们提供了新的证据，证明第一个孩子出生后的现金转移可以对该孩子的结果产生巨大而持久的影响。我们利用 1 月 1 日美国儿童相关税收优惠的出生日期截止日期，这导致其他类似孩子的家庭在出生后的第一年获得截然不同的退税。对于我们样本中的平均低收入独生子女家庭来说，这种差异约为1300美元，占收入的10%。使用选定年份的行政联邦税收数据，我们发现婴儿期的这种转移使年轻人的收入至少增加了1%-2%，对男性的影响更大。这些影响在较早的年龄表现为数学和阅读考试成绩的提高以及高中毕业的可能性更高。观察到的对短期父母结果的影响表明，在第一个孩子出生后的关键窗口期，额外的流动性导致家庭收入持续增加，这可能有助于对儿童结果的下游影响。仅对儿童收入的长期影响就足够大，以至于转移支付通过随后增加联邦所得税收入来收回成本。

https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjac023