Job Market Paper
On the Design of Paid Sick Leave: A Structural Approach
What is the optimal paid sick leave system? To answer this question, I combine individual-level data on paid sick leave claims with a model of sick pay insurance provision. I start by providing evidence that workers respond to the monetary incentives induced by the benefit scheme-- i.e., workers engage in moral hazard behavior. I also document that workers respond to non-monetary shifts in the temptation for shirking behavior induced by the day of the week a worker falls sick. I use these patterns to inform a model of sick pay insurance. In the model, risk-averse workers face a health risk and decide how many days to be on leave. Workers are insured by a risk-neutral social planner who chooses the optimal contract to maximize social welfare, considering workers' behavioral responses. Social welfare is a function of workers' utility and the potential production losses induced by sick pay provision. The main empirical challenge to estimating the model is to disentangle the underlying distribution of health from workers' preferences. To overcome this challenge, I combine the individual-level data on sick pay utilization with detailed medical assessments of recovery times associated with each health condition. This strategy allows me to construct the underlying distribution of health without imposing parametric assumptions on this distribution. To estimate workers' preferences parameters, I exploit the days of the week a sick leave claim is filed as quasi-exogenous shifters of the temptation for shirking behavior as the main source of variation. Finally, I use the estimated model to derive the optimal sick pay contract and estimate the welfare gains of its implementation. I find that the optimal system would provide more insurance for short term sickness and less insurance, i.e., lower replacement rates, for longer sickness spells relative to the current system. I estimate that workers are willing to give up 1.53% of their earnings to be insured under the optimal policy.
Awards: Best Proseminar Presentation in Applied Microeconomics (2022, 2020)
Presented at: Wagner School of Public Service; WEAI Graduate Student Workshop; ASHEcon; Young Economist Symposium (YES); EGSC at Washington University in St. Louis; APPAM*
Working Papers
A Manufactured Tragedy: The Origins and Deep Ripples of the Opioid Epidemic with Carolina Arteaga
This paper sheds new light on the origins and effects of the opioid crisis, emphasizing the critical role played by the pharmaceutical industry. Drawing on unsealed records from litigation against Purdue Pharma, we uncover rich geographic quasi-exogenous variation from the marketing of OxyContin, to causally connect supply-side factors to the origin of the opioid crisis. Our results indicate a strong causal link between Purdue Pharma's promotional targeting and future increases in the level of prescription opioids. We then use this variation to quantify the epidemic's effects. We estimate that the rise in the access to potent prescription opioids is responsible for a dramatic increase in opioid mortality as well as far-reaching declines in the quality of life, measured by populations on SNAP and disability. Further, it triggered inter-generational effects through its impact on fertility and birth outcomes.
Mentions in media: Vox
Presented at: NBER SI (Health Care), Cowles Labor Conference, Women in Empirical Microeconomics Conference Becker Friedman Institute, BSE Summer Forum, Electronic Health Economics Colloquium (EHEC)
Tobacco Consumption Habits in Argentina: Causal Evidence from a New Regulation
Reject and Resubmit at Journal of Health Economics -- New draft coming soon!!
This paper assesses the effectiveness of indoor smoking bans and graphic tobacco warnings in the context of low- and middle-income countries, where 80% of smokers worldwide live. I study Argentina's 2011 anti-smoking law. I exploit differences in previous state-level legislation to estimate the causal effect of the non-price policy on smoking prevalence, alcohol consumption, and health outcomes. I find that the probability of being a current smoker decreased by 6.17 percentage points. Nonetheless, when looking at heterogeneous effects, my results suggest that the policy disproportionately benefited more educated and richer individuals.
Presented at: Tobacco Online Policy Seminar (TOPS)
On the Design of Paid Sick Leave: A Structural Approach
What is the optimal paid sick leave system? To answer this question, I combine individual-level data on paid sick leave claims with a model of sick pay insurance provision. I start by providing evidence that workers respond to the monetary incentives induced by the benefit scheme-- i.e., workers engage in moral hazard behavior. I also document that workers respond to non-monetary shifts in the temptation for shirking behavior induced by the day of the week a worker falls sick. I use these patterns to inform a model of sick pay insurance. In the model, risk-averse workers face a health risk and decide how many days to be on leave. Workers are insured by a risk-neutral social planner who chooses the optimal contract to maximize social welfare, considering workers' behavioral responses. Social welfare is a function of workers' utility and the potential production losses induced by sick pay provision. The main empirical challenge to estimating the model is to disentangle the underlying distribution of health from workers' preferences. To overcome this challenge, I combine the individual-level data on sick pay utilization with detailed medical assessments of recovery times associated with each health condition. This strategy allows me to construct the underlying distribution of health without imposing parametric assumptions on this distribution. To estimate workers' preferences parameters, I exploit the days of the week a sick leave claim is filed as quasi-exogenous shifters of the temptation for shirking behavior as the main source of variation. Finally, I use the estimated model to derive the optimal sick pay contract and estimate the welfare gains of its implementation. I find that the optimal system would provide more insurance for short term sickness and less insurance, i.e., lower replacement rates, for longer sickness spells relative to the current system. I estimate that workers are willing to give up 1.53% of their earnings to be insured under the optimal policy.
Awards: Best Proseminar Presentation in Applied Microeconomics (2022, 2020)
Presented at: Wagner School of Public Service; WEAI Graduate Student Workshop; ASHEcon; Young Economist Symposium (YES); EGSC at Washington University in St. Louis; APPAM*
Working Papers
A Manufactured Tragedy: The Origins and Deep Ripples of the Opioid Epidemic with Carolina Arteaga
This paper sheds new light on the origins and effects of the opioid crisis, emphasizing the critical role played by the pharmaceutical industry. Drawing on unsealed records from litigation against Purdue Pharma, we uncover rich geographic quasi-exogenous variation from the marketing of OxyContin, to causally connect supply-side factors to the origin of the opioid crisis. Our results indicate a strong causal link between Purdue Pharma's promotional targeting and future increases in the level of prescription opioids. We then use this variation to quantify the epidemic's effects. We estimate that the rise in the access to potent prescription opioids is responsible for a dramatic increase in opioid mortality as well as far-reaching declines in the quality of life, measured by populations on SNAP and disability. Further, it triggered inter-generational effects through its impact on fertility and birth outcomes.
Mentions in media: Vox
Presented at: NBER SI (Health Care), Cowles Labor Conference, Women in Empirical Microeconomics Conference Becker Friedman Institute, BSE Summer Forum, Electronic Health Economics Colloquium (EHEC)
Tobacco Consumption Habits in Argentina: Causal Evidence from a New Regulation
Reject and Resubmit at Journal of Health Economics -- New draft coming soon!!
This paper assesses the effectiveness of indoor smoking bans and graphic tobacco warnings in the context of low- and middle-income countries, where 80% of smokers worldwide live. I study Argentina's 2011 anti-smoking law. I exploit differences in previous state-level legislation to estimate the causal effect of the non-price policy on smoking prevalence, alcohol consumption, and health outcomes. I find that the probability of being a current smoker decreased by 6.17 percentage points. Nonetheless, when looking at heterogeneous effects, my results suggest that the policy disproportionately benefited more educated and richer individuals.
Presented at: Tobacco Online Policy Seminar (TOPS)
CHAPTERS IN BOOKS
What Counts for Skill Development? with Julián Cristia and Santiago Cueto.
In Learning Better: Public Policy for Skills Development . Matías Busso, Julián Cristia, Diana Hincapié, Julián Messina y Laura Ripani (editors), Washington, DC: IDB, 2017.
