Research

For decades, population research has been interested in the complex relationship between child mortality and fertility, with a key focus on identifying hoarding behavior (i.e., fertility response to expected aggregate child mortality). Using unique data from the Malawi Longitudinal Study of Families and Health, we investigate the impact of individual-specific subjective expectations about infant mortality on fertility behavior. We instrument the potentially endogenous infant mortality expectations with the average of parents' ratings of children's health to address the potential for omitted variable bias, such as parental preference for health. Consistent with the hoarding mechanism, we find that a 10-percentage-point increase in community-level child mortality expectations leads to a 14-percentage-point increase in the propensity to have a child in the next two years from a baseline propensity of 39%.

In sequential auctions for identical goods, theory predicts that prices follow a martingale. Using over 12 million transactions spanning 27 years of Dutch auctions at the Sydney Fish Market, we document two findings. First, prices follow an inverted-U pattern: they rise in the first three rounds and then decline. Second, this pattern is driven by the experience of the first bidder. When an experienced bidder wins the first crate, subsequent prices rise, as other bidders treat the experienced bidder's price as a credible signal of lot value. When an inexperienced bidder wins first, prices fall immediately. We present a simple model of asymmetric information that rationalizes both facts: in equilibrium, an expert's bid reveals information about lot value, inducing uninformed bidders to bid higher in subsequent rounds.

Research on perceptions of inequality shows that beliefs about unequal economic outcomes depend on the social position of the belief-holder. We study perceptions of a different object: the attitudes behind an unequal outcome. When a group's labor-force participation is low, insiders and outsiders both hold beliefs about the attitudes surrounding that outcome. To measure this, we develop a relational framework that holds the attitude fixed and varies who is guessing about whom. A belief about one's own reference group is a perceived norm; a belief about a group outside one's network is a stereotype; a belief about what outsiders think of one's own group is an anticipated stereotype. We apply the framework to the labor-market expectations of Australian-born Muslim female university students, using original surveys of Muslim students, working professionals, and general students. Inside the community, the attitude that matters is maternal employment: Muslim women's expected labor supply with a preschool-aged child tracks their own views and perceived in-group norms on this margin. Outside the community, audiences substantially underestimate Muslim men's support for women's freedom to work. Muslim women anticipate this underestimation. These anticipated stereotypes remain associated with expected labor supply after conditioning on the corresponding in-group belief. Perceptions of the attitudes associated with the same inequality thus differ across social positions not only in accuracy but in content: group members are guided by one norm inside their community while expecting to be seen through another outside it.

We provide the first comprehensive analysis of Australia's Baby Bonus, a large universal cash transfer introduced in 2004, using linked administrative data that follow mothers' fertility through 2022. The 17-year horizon allows us to distinguish between timing shifts (tempo effects) and genuine increases in completed fertility (quantum effects), overcoming a key limitation in the literature. Using interrupted time series analysis, we find that the Baby Bonus increased monthly births by approximately 7 percent. Birth responses were concentrated among lower-income mothers and women aged 35–39, with minimal effects among high-income or university-educated mothers. Importantly, we find no evidence of birth spacing adjustments; instead, mothers exposed to the policy had 7 percent more children in total by 2022, indicating permanent increases in completed fertility. A parity-transition framework confirms this directly: the policy's effect on family size grows rather than fades as the observation horizon extends to 20 years. These results show that direct cash transfers can raise completed fertility, with implications for policy responses to declining birth rates and ageing populations.

Do laws that impose a norm from outside change the practices they target, or harden them? We study Nigeria's Child Rights Act (CRA) of 2003, which set a single minimum age of marriage of 18 regardless of local culture and which opponents denounced as a Western imposition. A century earlier, Christian missions had tried to replace local marriage norms with Western ones. Exploiting the staggered adoption of the CRA across states and birth cohorts, we find that exposure raised the share of women married before 18 by 3.6 percentage points and lowered the age at first marriage by 0.65 years. The CRA's effect is concentrated near the mission stations of 1924. There, the CRA raised marriage before 18 by about a fifth, and it raised first births before 18 and polygyny as well. Far from the stations, the CRA did not raise child marriage. Across Africa, places near these stations marry more like the West but view outside powers less favourably. In Nigeria, adoption led people to place their ethnic group before the nation and lowered tolerance of other groups. A law that imposed a Western norm on marriage backfired where an earlier attempt to do so had left its mark.

This study investigates the spillover effects of unexpected severe health shocks within households, focusing on the impacts on labour market outcomes, physical and mental health, and overall quality of life both the affected individual and other household members. Using data from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey and employing an event study approach with a staggered difference-in-differences model and individual fixed effects, we find that severe health shocks lead to persistent labour market consequences for the affected individuals. For other household members, these shocks significantly increase the likelihood of taking on caregiving roles, lead to an initial increase in working hours, increase financial stress and negatively affect life satisfaction, as well as physical and mental health.

The Coronavirus Supplement, introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic, was a temporary policy aimed at mitigating financial hardship for Australian households. However, its effect on employment behaviour has been the subject of debate. This research examines whether the Supplement reduced incentives to work by comparing labour market responses of Australians to New Zealanders residing in Australia, who were excluded from the policy. Using propensity score matching and a difference-in-differences framework, we identify a 19% decline in job-finding rates and a 64% increase in job separations attributable to the Supplement. These findings underscore the balance policymakers must strike between financial support and labour market incentives, particularly during crises. We also explore implications for optimal unemployment benefits, highlighting the need for careful calibration to address both social insurance and incentive effects.

Australia's 2004 Baby Bonus disproportionately raised fertility among lower-income, lower-education mothers. This raises the question of whether the additional children induced by the policy go on to have worse outcomes in early adulthood. Using a date-of-birth regression discontinuity design around the February 2005 conception-response cutoff in linked administrative data, we compare children whose births were induced by the policy with those who would have been born regardless. We find no evidence that these marginal children experienced worse early-adult trajectories across high-school completion, education and employment engagement, income-support receipt, and disability-support participation. The results suggest that a universal cash transfer at birth can shift the composition of births toward more disadvantaged families without generating worse early-adult outcomes for the induced cohort.