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I am an economist specializing in the study of education and social policy relating to children, often in historical perspective. My research has frequently drawn inspiration from major policy and demographic shifts in 20th century America, including the spread of publicly funded early education, passage of landmark federal civil rights and education legislation, and rising immigration. My recent work has focused on childcare and early education and on understanding how policy design, economic conditions, and political voice affect educational attainment and economic mobility.
Does Universal Preschool Hit the Target? Program Access and Preschool Impacts. Journal of Human Resources, Journal of Human Resources 58(1), 1-42, January 2023. Revised version (August 2020). [Coverage in The New York Times (June 2018, Apr. 2020, Nov. 2020, Nov. 2021), The Hechinger Report, Forbes, Quartz, The Economist, VOX]
Who Needs a Fracking Education? The Educational Response to Low-Skill Biased Technological Change (with Ayushi Narayan `14). ILR Review, 75(1), 56-89, January 2022. [Revised version, May 2020.] [Coverage in The Economist, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Salon, Business Insider]
Early Childhood Education in the United States: What, When, Where, Who, How, and Why. Chapter 2 in Routledge Handbook of the Economics of Education, ed. Brian McCall. London and New York: Routledge, 30-72, December 2021. [NBER Working Paper 28722, April 2021.] [Coverage in VOX.]
A Century of the American Woman Voter: Sex Gaps in Political Participation, Preferences, and Partisanship Since Women's Suffrage (with Na'ama Shenhav). Journal of Economic Perspectives, 34(2), 24-48, Spring 2020. [NBER Working Paper 26709, January 2020.] [Ungated version, January 2020.] [Coverage in The Atlantic, FiveThirtyEight, AEA Research Highlights Podcast]
Legal Activism, State Policy, and Racial Inequality in Teacher Salaries and Educational Attainment in the Mid-Century American South (with Ethan Lewis). NBER Working Paper 30631, November 2022. Under review. [Summary in The NBER Digest]
Opening the Door: Immigrant Legalization and Family Reunification in the United States (with Ethan Lewis). NBER Working Paper 27874, October 2020, revised August 2021. [Updated version, August 2022]. Revise and resubmit, Journal of Labor Economics.
Knowledge, Tests, and Fadeout in Educational Interventions (with Doug Staiger). NBER Working Paper 18038, May 2012.
COVID-19, Early Care and Education, and Child Development. Societal Experts Action Network (SEAN) White Paper, October 2021.
Why Early Childhood Education Matters and Why We Should Pay for It. Milken Institute Review: A Journal of Economic Policy 23(3): 13-23, Third Quarter 2018.
Public Investments in Child Care. In The 51%: Driving Growth Through Women's Economic Participation, eds. Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach and Ryan Nunn. Washington, D.C.: The Hamilton Project, 123-142, October 2017. [Featured in this Oct. 2019 Hamilton Project Strategy Paper.]
The Effectiveness of Policies that Promote Labor Force Participation of Women with Children: A Collection of National Studies (with Steven J. Haider and Helena Skyt Nielsen). Labour Economics, 36: 64-71, October 2015. IZA Discussion Paper 9297
The Promises and Pitfalls of Universal Early Education. IZA World of Labor 2015: 116, January 2015. [Coverage in The Guardian, Brookings]