A large literature exploits geographic variation in the concentration of immigrants to identify their impact on a variety of outcomes. To address the endogeneity of immigrants' location choices, the most commonly-used instrument interacts national inflows by country of origin with immigrants' past geographic distribution. We present evidence that estimates based...

We reassess recent and widely reported evidence that the MTV program 16 and Pregnant played a major role in reducing teen birth rates in the U.S. since it began broadcasting in 2009 (Kearney and Levine, American Economic Review 2015). We find Kearney and Levine's identification strategy to be problematic. Through...

This paper describes the theoretical underpinnings and provides empirical evidence for a model that predicts a positive impact of immigration on entrepreneurial activity. Immigrants, we hypothesize, facilitate innovation and entrepreneurship by being willing and able to invest in new skills. At the heart of this theoretical prediction is the observation...

Strikes by unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, have been the primary weapon used by the United States to combat the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan. This paper examines the dynamics of violence involving drone strikes and the Taliban/Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan from January 2007 to December 2010....

While it is well known that some areas of the United States receive more immigrants than others, less is understood about the extent to which the character of immigration varies as well. There is much broader geographic variation in the skill and demographic composition of immigrants than natives, with important...

We provide a comparison of return to schooling estimates based on an influential study by Angrist and Krueger (1991) using two stage least squares (TSLS), limited information maximum likelihood (LIML), jackknife (JIVE), and split sample instrumental variables (SSIV) estimation. We find that the estimated return to education is quite sensitive...

This paper examines how violence in the Second Intifada influences Palestinian public opinion. Using micro data from a series of opinion polls linked to data on fatalities, we find that Israeli violence against Palestinians leads them to support more radical factions and more radical attitudes towards the conflict. This effect...

Using recently-available data from the New Immigrant Survey, we find that previous self-employment experience in an immigrant’s country of origin is an important determinant of their self-employment status in the U.S., increasing the probability of being self-employed by about 7 percent. Our results improve on the previous literature by measuring...

In this paper we assess the effectiveness of suicide attacks and targeted killings in the Second Intifada. We find evidence that the targeted killings of Palestinian leaders by Israel reduce realized Palestinian violence. We find, however, that intended Palestinian violence is increasing at low levels of targeted killings, but decreasing...

Geographic mobility is important for the functioning of labor markets because it brings labor resources to where they can be most efficiently used. It has long been hypothesized that individuals' migration propensities depend on their attitudes towards risk, but the empirical evidence, to the extent that it exists, has been...