Working in Progress
Papers Under Review
Tax Incentives and Local Business Ownership: Evidence from the Florida Enterprise Zone Program (with Jamie Pavlik and Juan Sayago) [WP Link]
The effect of place-based policies like enterprise zones has long been debated. Recent literature finds that even if the short-run effects of such policies are positive, the long-run effects tend to dissipate to zero. We focus on why this is the case. We argue that the lack of long-run effects is the failure to attract locally owned small businesses. We study the effects of enterprise zone designation on local business sorting in Florida. Utilizing a regression discontinuity design and establishment level NETS data, we find that enterprise zone designation reduces the likelihood of single-establishment local ownership but it attracts firm headquarters.
Sports Betting, Lotteries, and State Revenues in the Post-PASPA Era (with Joseph Nedved*, David Nason, Adam Hoffer, Brad Humphreys) [WP Link]
State lotteries are a staple of state revenue for the 45 states that run them and are an important part of state public finance. Following the repeal of the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA), 38 states, plus Washington, DC, began operating legal sports betting markets. It is unclear whether sports betting and lottery demand are substitutes, complements, or unrelated goods, but if the introduction of sports betting displaces expenditures from state lotteries to support sports gambling, state revenues could be severely impacted. Taking a cumulative revenue perspective, we combine monthly lottery revenue data for 18 states with sports betting data, and implement a difference-in-differences design, exploiting the staggered rollout of sports betting legalization following the repeal of PASPA. Our results show that sports betting does not impact overall monthly state lottery revenues and is robust across different specifications and sub-samples.
How do hurricanes affect local industry composition in Florida? (with John Shannon and Melanie Schmees)
This study examines how hurricanes affect industrial diversification in Florida counties over the short and long term. We use a wind field models to measure county-level hurricane exposure and employ a fixed effect model spanning 35 years across 67 counties. Results reveal distinct temporal patterns: non-major hurricanes drive gradual diversification 3-4 years post-impact, while major hurricanes trigger immediate restructuring within two years. We explore mechanisms including labor force composition, FEMA assistance, and agglomeration economies. Regions with larger prime-age populations better mitigate concentration effects following major hurricanes. Export-oriented regions experience attenuated diversification effects, while infrastructure spending promotes diversification but other FEMA assistance may inadvertently increase concentration. These findings inform disaster preparedness policies and community resilience strategies.
How Hot is too Hot? An Analysis of Housing Markets in the U.S. (with Andrea Santana* and Travis Jones)
This paper examines the shape of the housing price curve by examining the relationship between the monthly National Association of Realtors’ Market Hotness Index metric and real median listing prices for homes in 1612 counties in the U.S over the period 2017-2024. Economic theory suggests that there should be a correlation between market hotness and housing prices, but the shape of this relationship – linear or polynomial – is an empirical question. Our results illustrate that there is an N-shaped relationship between market hotness and median listing prices and that movements in the supply side (median days on market) are leading the changes in prices rather than movements on the demand side (viewers per property). We also document that this relationship is more prominent in urban homes and those in the second to fourth price quartiles.
A Tiered Framework for Classifying and Measuring Water-Dependent Economic Activity: Evidence from the Greater Everglades (with Johane Dikgang, John Shannon, and Paul Hindsley) [WP Link]
This study develops a reproducible, place-adaptable classification of industries dependent on water security and implements an input-output approach to measure their regional economic significance. We apply this framework to the Greater Everglades region in South Florida, a 16-county area where historic ecosystem alteration and ongoing restoration efforts make water management central to regional prosperity. Our classification combines literature-based and input-output data-driven to identify water-dependent industries, the Clean Water Economy. Results show the Clean Water Economy accounts for approximately 27% of total output, 26% of value added, and 20% of employee compensation in the region. This framework provides an economic baseline for tracking water-economy trends, recognizing stakeholders beyond traditional water users, and guiding investment decisions in regional water management.
Opportunistic Investment: The Political Economy Impacts of FEMA Hurricane Declarations (with Amanda Ross and Matt Fannin)
Do political incentives shape disaster aid allocation, and do such allocations generate electoral rewards? We examine these questions using FEMA disaster assistance following hurricanes in Florida, exploiting differences in administrative discretion and public visibility across programs. We find that counties represented by more Republican state legislators are more likely to receive discretionary Individual Assistance and experience more favorable funding and timing outcomes, whereas counties with greater Republican shares of legislative representation receive less aid. However, disaster aid does not generate uniform electoral returns. Public Assistance is generally associated with positive lagged effects on incumbent-party vote margins, whereas Individual Assistance produces substantially more heterogeneous electoral responses. These findings demonstrate that institutional design links distributive politics and democratic accountability: program characteristics shape both opportunities for political influence over the allocation of public resources and whether governments ultimately receive electoral credit for providing them.
Where Authority Belongs: Specifying Spatial Legitimacy in a Reconfiguring Field (with Kimberly Merriman, Oscar Aliaga*, and Michael Obal)
Authority in organizational fields is typically understood as attached to actors, practices, and organizational forms. This paper shifts attention to how authority also becomes anchored in place by developing an abductively grounded model of spatial legitimacy, the taken-for-granted belief that credible and consequential participation in a field properly belongs in particular geographic locations. Against the backdrop of geographic reconfiguration in U.S. finance across New York, Miami, and Dallas, we conduct a multi-method study of how spatial legitimacy becomes salient, contested, and translated. Geographic reconfiguration exposes this otherwise hidden evaluative infrastructure, revealing that physical clustering is necessary but insufficient for spatial legitimacy. Across field-level discourse, organizational artifacts, and lived professional accounts, we find that financial activity is distinguished from financial authority. While New York operates as a sedimented legitimacy anchor within our focal field, Miami and Dallas elicit distinct forms of legitimacy work rather than a simple hierarchy. Our cross-level synthesis identifies three higher-order mechanisms through which place-based symbolic authority persists and transforms: cognitive anchoring, evaluative defense, and legitimacy translation. Together, this work extends organizational scholarship beyond where work happens to where authority is recognized, identifying place as a gatekeeping mechanism for credible participation even as work becomes more geographically mobile.
Differential Effects of Enrollment in Online Classes on Graduation Rates (with James Higgins* and Clarisse Halpern*)
This study examines the impact of online enrollment on undergraduate graduation rates across various demographic groups. Utilizing data from the Integrated Post-secondary Education Data System (IPEDS) and U.S. Census Bureau from 2012 to 2018, we document the heterogeneous effects of online enrollment on graduation rates in the United States. Our results show that graduation rates are not affected by the simple offering of classes but by the intake amount. In particular, our results suggest that women, White and Asian student population benefit the most from this modality. The results underscore the need for higher education institutions to consider the diverse impacts of online learning modalities on different student demographics.