Papers

"Minority Status Impacts on Group Work" (In Progress)

“The Large Effects of a Small Win: How Past Rankings Shape the Behavior of Voters and Candidates”
with Vincent Pons and Clemence Tricaud
Candidates’ placements in polls or past elections can be powerful coordination devices for both parties and voters. Using a regression discontinuity design in French two-round elections, we show that candidates who place first by only a small margin in the first round are more likely to stay in the race, win, and win conditionally on staying in than those placed second. The impacts are even larger for ranking second instead of third, and also present for third instead of fourth. Rankings’ effects are largest when candidates have the same political orientation (making coordination more important), but remain strong when only two candidates qualify for the second round (and coordination is not needed). They stem from allied parties agreeing on which candidate should drop out, voters coordinating their choice, and the “bandwagon effect” of desiring to vote for the winner. We find similar results in two-round elections across 19 other countries.

“Using Online Psychotherapy to Improve Mental Health and Economic Resilience”
with Matthew Notowidigdo, Gautam Rao, Heather Sarsons, Frank Schilbach, and Jeffrey Yang (In Progress)
In this paper we test whether online-based psychotherapy tools can help improve the mental health of unemployed and low-income adults and, in turn, improve their labor-market outcomes. We conduct an RCT enrolling such individuals into groups which only receive information about such tools (control) or additionally receive price subsidies or incentives for use (treatments). We study whether our treatments increase use of such psychotherapy services, leading to reductions in depression, anxiety and stress. We then investigate whether improved mental health translates into improved economic outcomes, measured by efforts in job search and (re)training, and by increased employment and earnings.