Economics of LGBTQ+ Individuals Virtual Seminar Series
The seminar includes a 35-minute presentation by the author and 15 minutes for questions and discussion. For Spring 2025, please contact Kitt Carpenter at christopher.s.carpenter@vanderbilt.edu with any questions or feedback.
Please sign up to receive the link to the Zoom meeting each week.
Click here for a list of previous seminars: 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024
Winter/Spring 2025
All Seminars on Tuesdays at 12:05-12:55pm
Researchers of All Ranks
January 7
Nonbinary Gender Identities and Earnings: Evidence from a National Census
Donn Feir (dfeir@uvic.edu)
Abstract: The social and legal recognition of nonbinary people---those who do not exclusively identify with traditionally male or female genders---is growing. Yet, we know little about their economic realities. We offer the first nationally representative evidence on the earnings of nonbinary people using restricted-access 2021 Canadian Census data linked to tax records. We find that, although nonbinary individuals tend to be more educated than their peers, they have significantly lower earnings, especially at the bottom of the income distribution, even after adjusting for various demographic and socioeconomic factors.
January 14
Combating LGBTphobia in Schools: Evidence from a Field Experiment in France
Pedro Vergara Merino, CREST (pedro.vergaramerino@ensae.fr)
Abstract: LGBTphobia in schools is a worldwide problem, with harassment having significant detrimental effects on victims and social cohesion. Several countries have introduced school-based interventions to address this issue but have not assessed their effectiveness. Their impact on student knowledge, attitudes, and behavior is largely unknown. This paper presents the first rigorous evaluation of school-based interventions aimed at reducing LGBTphobia. We focus on a classroom intervention that addresses the issue of LGBT harassment through perspective-taking and narrative exchange. Using a field experiment in France with more than 10,000 middle and high school students, we find robust evidence of strong positive effects, with variations across gender, age, and socio-economic status. We argue that the shift in perceptions of group norms is a key channel driving these effects. Our results suggest that school-based interventions can be a promising means of combating LGBTphobia in schools and improving students' outcomes.
January 21
Exclusionary Government Rhetoric and Migration Intentions
Jan Gromadzki, Vienna University (jan.gromadzki@wu.ac.at)
Abstract: In 2019, almost 100 local governments in Poland voted to declare their localities "free from LGBT ideology." We study the effects of these declarations on migration intentions using unique data on domestic and international job search from a large global job site. Comparing counties with anti-LGBTQ resolutions to neighboring counties in a difference-in-differences design, we find that the resolutions increased domestic out-of-county job search by 12 percent and international job search by 15 percent, driven by European destination countries with high standards of LGBTQ rights.
January 28
Economic Outcomes of Gender Diverse People: Evidence from Linked Administrative Data in New Zealand
Maxine Lee, San Francisco State University (mclee@sfsu.edu)
Abstract: We provide new evidence on the economic outcomes of transgender and gender diverse people in New Zealand (NZ) using confidential linked administrative data from driver license records – which identify gender diverse people since 2021 – linked to NZ birth and tax records. We document that gender diverse people are younger than both transgender and cisgender people but are more highly educated than transgender people. Relative to otherwise similar cisgender men, we find large employment and earnings penalties for transgender and gender diverse people. Earnings gaps for gender diverse individuals are especially large.
February 4
Gay Varsity: Subject Choices, Grades, and Early Careers for UK LGB University Students
Jeff Frank, Royal Holloway University of London (j.frank@rhul.ac.uk)
Abstract: Using data on UK students in higher education from 2012 – 2018, we look at how LGB students differ from their heterosexual counterparts. LGB men and women both have large shifts towards Humanities subjects, and away from LEM (law, economics, management) and STEM. Gay and bisexual men do well in degree outcomes in the Humanities, and about the same as heterosexual men in other subjects. Lesbian and bisexual women do about the same as heterosexual women in the Humanities and poorly in other subjects. Male and female LGB students suffer in salaries in their early career.
Previous Seminars
2020
April 15, 2020
Ian Burn, University of Liverpool (with Mike Martell)
"Gender Typicality and Sexual Orientation Earnings Differentials"
April 22, 2020
Shuai Chen, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (with Jan van Ours)
"Mental Health Effects of Same-Sex Marriage Legalization"
April 29, 2020
David Schwegman, American University (with Mattie Mackenzie-Liu and Leonard Lopoo)
"Do Foster Care Agencies Discriminate Against Gay Couples? Evidence from a Correspondence Study"
May 6, 2020
Kitt Carpenter, Vanderbilt University (with Gilbert Gonzales Jr. Tara McKay and Dario Sansone)
"Effects of the Affordable Care Act Dependent Coverage Mandate on Health Insurance Coverage for Individuals in Same-Sex Couples"
May 13, 2020
Charlie Whittington (she/her), Human Rights Campaign Foundation (with Dan Stewart (he/him))
"The Moderating Role of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in the Relationship Between Income and Complications During COVID-19 Infection"
May 20, 2020
Ian Chadd, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (with Billur Aksoy)
"Queer Preferences for Competition"
May 27, 2020
Travis Campbell, University of Massachusetts - Amherst (with Lee Badgett and Everest Brennan)
"Beyond the Gender Binary: Transgender Labor Force Status in the United States 2014-2017"
June 3, 2020
Emily Nix, University of Southern California (with Martin Eckhoff Andresen)
"What Causes the Child Penalty and How Can it be Reduced? Evidence from Same-Sex Couples and Policy Reforms"
June 10, 2020
Matthew Shannon, University College, Dublin
"The Labour Market Outcomes of Transgender Individuals"
June 17, 2020
Connor Redpath, University of California, San Diego
"Access to Marriage Affects Couples’ Assortativeness: Evidence from Same-Sex Marriage Legalization"
June 24, 2020
Michael Martell, Bard College
"Tolerance and the Labor Supply of Gays and Lesbians"
July 1, 2020
Joanne Hadaad, University of Ottawa (with Abel Brodeur)
"Institutions, Attitudes and LGBT: Evidence from the Gold Rush"
July 15, 2020
Ralph Dehaas, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, CEPR, and Tilburg University (with Victoria Baranov and Pauline Grosjean)
"Men. Roots and Consequences of Masculinity Norms"
August 26, 2020
Raquel Fernandez, New York University (with Sahar Parsa and Martina Viarengo)
"Coming Out in America"
September 16, 2020
Roberto Ivo da Rocha Lima Filho, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro
"Decision Neuroscience Applied to a Trading Environment: An EEG Approach"
September 23, 2020
Nir Eilam, University of Texas, Austin (with Scott Delhommer)
"PrEP and Moral Hazard"
October 7, 2020
Luca Fumarco and Eva Dils, Tulane University (with Patrick Button, Benjamin Harrell, and David J. Schwegman)
"Gender Identity, Race, and Ethnicity Discrimination in Access to Mental Health Care: Evidence from an Audit Field Experiment"
October 14, 2020
William Delgado, University of Chicago
"Teachers’ Comparative Advantage, School Segregation, and Educational Mobility in Chicago Public Schools"
October 21, 2020
Hyunmin Park, University of Chicago
"Specific Human Capital and Employment Dynamics"
October 28, 2020
Hani Mansour, University of Colorado, Denver
"Voting and Political Participation in the Aftermath of the HIV/AIDS Epidemic"
November 18, 2020
Ylva Moberg, Swedish Institute for Social Research (SOFI) (with Marie Evertsson and Maaike van der Vleuten)
"The child penalty in same-sex and different-sex couples in Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland"
December 2, 2020
Raquel Fernandez, New York University (with Sahar Parsa and Martina Viarengo)
"Coming Out in America"
December 9, 2020
Lucas Tilley will present "The Labor Market and Health Effects of Gender Dysphoria: Evidence from Sweden" (with Ian Burn, Ylva Moberg and Emma von Essen)
December 16, 2020
Sheheryar Banuri (University of East Anglia) "On the process of discrimination in healthcare: A field experiment with Pakistan’s Transgender community" (with Husnain F. Ahmad and Farasat Bokhari)
2021
February 2, 2021
Samuel Mann, Swanswea University
"Sexual Orientation, Political Trust, and Same-Sex Relationship Recognition Policies: Evidence from Europe"
samuel.mann@swansea.ac.uk
February 16, 2021
Marcus Dillender, University of Illinois at Chicago
"Does Place-Based Federal Health Funding Work? Evidence and Lessons from the Fight against HIV/AIDS"
modillen@uic.edu
March 2, 2021
Bridget Hiedemann and Lisa Brodoff, Seattle University
"Marriage Equality and Activity Limitations among Older Adults in Same-Sex Relationships"
bgh@seattleu.edu
March 16, 2021
Travis Campbell, University of Massachusetts at Amherst
"Health insurance coverage and health outcomes among transgender adults in the U.S."
tbcampbell@umass.edu
March 30, 2021
Silvia Palmaccio, KU Leuven
"Early Labor Market Outcomes of Children in Same-Sex Families: Evidence from Population Data"
silvia.palmaccio@kuleuven.be
April 13, 2021
Joshua Martin, West Virginia University
"The Effect of Same-Sex Partnership Laws on Adoptions and Family Formation in the US"
jcm0067@mix.wvu.edu
April 20, 2021
Max Lee, San Francisco State University
"Schooling and Coming Out: Education as a Coping Mechanism"
mclee@sfsu.edu
May 4, 2021
Billur Aksoy, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
"Hidden Identity and Social Preferences: Evidence From Sexual Minorities"
billuraksoy@gmail.com
May 18, 2021
Raquel Fernandez, New York University (with Sahar Parsa and Martina Viarengo)
"Coming Out in America"
raquel.fernandez@nyu.edu
July 20, 2021
Mike Martell, Bard College
“Labor market differentials estimated with researcher-inferred and self-identified sexual orientation”
August 31, 2021
Billur Aksoy, Christopher “Kitt” Carpenter, and Dario Sansone
"Survey Experiments on LGBTQ Individuals: A Preliminary Design"
September 14th at 12:00 ET:
Moving for Love? Migration in Same-Sex and Opposite-Sex Relationships
Etienne Makdissi (etienne.masson.makdissi@mail.utoronto.ca)
September 21 at 12:00 ET:
Heated Tobacco Products (HTP) Taxation and Tobacco Use in Japan and Korea
Shaoying Ma (shaoyingma13@gmail.com), Ce Shang, Kai-Wen Cheng, Hye Myung Lee, Hong Gwan Seo, Sungkyu Lee, Sujin Lim, Sung-il Cho, Shannon Gravely, Steve Xu, Anne C. K. Quah and Geoffrey T. Fong
September 28th at 12:00 ET:
How Does the Earned Income Tax Credit Affect Household Expenditures for Single Female Heads of Households?
Arian Seifoddini (seifoddini@ucdavis.edu)
October 5th at 12:00 ET:
Duration Dependence: Learning from Advance Notice
Div Bhagia (bhagia@bc.edu)
October 12th at 12:00 ET:
Gender Differences in the Cost of Corrections in Group Work
Yuki Takahashi (yuki.takahashi2@unibo.it)
October 19th at 12:00 ET:
Estimating the nature of corruption: evidence from a policy experiment in Brazil
Murilo Ramos (murilo@berkeley.edu)
October 26th at 12:00 ET:
From Taxation to Fighting for the Nation: Historical Fiscal Capacity and Military Draft Evasion during WWI
Luca Bagnato (lucabgn@gmail.com)
November 2nd at 12:00 ET:
Same-Sex Couples and Parental Earnings Dynamics
Rachel Nesbit (rachel.nesbit@census.gov) (with Barbara Downs, Lucia Foster, and Danielle Sandler)
November 9th at 12:00 ET:
The effects of anti-LGBTQ+ curriculums: Evidence from Utah's 'no promo homo' repeal
Santiago Deambrosi (santiagodeambrosi@gmail.com)
November 16th at 12:00 ET:
Do gender-nonconforming peers influence their classmates' life outcomes?
Abigail R. Banan (abanan@purdue.edu)
November 23rd at 12:00 ET:
N/A
December 7th at 12:00 ET:
Employer Sponsored Health Insurance and Labor Market Outcomes for Gay Men: Evidence from the Advent of Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis
Conor Lennon (conor.lennon@louisville.edu)
December 14th at 12:00 ET:
The introduction of Prep and HIV: Incidence, Mortality and Heterogeneity
Sebastian Tello-Trillo (dst2c@virginia.edu)
2022
February 1, 2022
“Economic Outcomes for Transgender People in the United States: First Estimates from a Nationally Representative Sample”
Christopher S. Carpenter (christopher.s.carpenter@vanderbilt.edu) with Maxine J. Lee and Laura Nettuno
February 15, 2022
“Elite Endorsement of Emergent Issues in Weak States: Survey Experimental Evidence on Same-sex Marriage in Nepal”
Siddhartha Baral (sbaral@ucsd.edu) with Sarah Rich-Zendel
February 22, 2022
“Identifying Effective Strategies to Improve Livelihoods of LGBTI People” and a panel on Research Opportunities related to Development.
Lee Badgett (lbadgett@econs.umass.edu) with James Heintz
March 1, 2022
“The LGBTQ+ Gap: Recent Estimates for Young Adults in the United States”
Marc Folch (mfolch@uchicago.edu)
March 8, 2022
“The Impact of Sodomy Law Repeals on Crime”
Riccardo Ciacci (riccardo.ciacci@gmail.com) and Dario Sansone
March 15, 2022
“Gender and LGB Pay Gaps in the National Health Service: The Puzzle of Observability and Disclosure”
Karen Mumford (karen.mumford@york.ac.uk)
March 29, 2022
“Do Same-Sex Couples Induce Gentrification?”
Daniel J. Henderson (djhender@cba.ua.edu) with Mia Goodnature and Amanda Ross
April 5, 2022
“Gender Affirming Care and Transgender Health: Evidence fromMedicaid Coverage”
Samuel Mann (samuel.j.mann@vanderbilt.edu) with Travis Campbell and Duc Hien Nguyen
April 12, 2022
“Effects of Legal Same-Sex Marriage on Employer Offers of Domestic Partner Health Benefits”
Ben Harrell (benjamin.harrell@vanderbilt.edu) with Christopher S. Carpenter and Thomas Hegland
April 19, 2022
“Public Health Insurance Expansions and The Spread of Infectious Disease”
Shyam Raman (sr2297@cornell.edu) with Katherine Wen, Ben Harrell, Sam Mann, and Alex Hollingsworth
April 26, 2022
“Intergenerational Mobility of LGBTQ+ Individuals”
Santiago Deambrosi (santiagodeambrosi@gmail.com)
June 14, 2022
Matching on Gender and Sexual Orientation
Edoardo Ciscato and Marion Goussé (marion.gousse@gmail.com)
July 12, 2022
Commuting to work and gender-conforming social norms: evidence from same-sex couples
Sonia Oreffice (s.oreffice@exeter.ac.uk ) and Dario Sansone
August 16, 2022
Do LGBTQ-related Events Drive Individual Online Disclosure Decisions?
Jason Jones (jason.j.jones@stonybrook.edu)
September 6: Conversion Therapy Bans, Suicidality, and Mental Health
Benjamin Harrell (benjamin.harrell@vanderbilt.edu)
September 13: Anti-Discrimination Laws and Mental Health: Evidence from Sexual Minorities
Samuel Mann (Samuel.j.mann@vanderbilt.edu)
September 20: Power to the teens: collective labor supply model with parents and teenager
José Alfonso (jalfonso.munoza@tse-fr.eu)
September 27: Local Income, Race, and Mortality
EK Green (ekgreen42@email.arizona.edu)
October 4: The Effect of Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy (HAART) on Suicide Rates
Hasan Shahid (hshahid1@gsu.edu).
October 11: Mechanisms of Misinformation Diffusion
Jimmy Narang (jimmy.narang@berkeley.edu)
October 18: The Effects of Post-Release Supervision on Crime and Recidivism
By Abigail R. Banan (abanan@purdue.edu)
October 25: Bikesharing, Metro Stations, and House Prices: Evidence from Washington’s Capital Bikeshare System
Xinxin Cao (xinxin_cao@gwu.edu)
November 1: Criminal Activity Nuisance Ordinances and Drug Mortality
Ashley Bradford (asbrad@iu.edu)
November 8: #IamLGBT: Social networks and coming out in a hostile environment
Jan Gromadzki (jangromadzkiecon@gmail.com), Przemyslaw Siemaszko
November 15: Do LGBTQ-related Events Drive Individual Online Disclosure Decisions?
Jason J. Jones (jason.j.jones@stonybrook.edu)
November 29: If You (Re)Build It, Will They Come? Evidence from California Hospitals
Zach Levin (levin611@umn.edu)
December 6
Inclusive Law and Democrats Votes - Evidence from Law of Same-Sex Marriage in the U.S.
Luyang Chen (luyang.chen@bristol.ac.uk)
December 13
Understanding Labor Market Discrimination Against Transgender People: Evidence from a Double List Experiment and a Survey
Billur Aksoy (billuraksoy@gmail.com) (with Christopher S. Carpenter and Dario Sansone)
December 20
Gender, Sexual Identity, and Competitiveness
Ian Chadd (chaddi@rpi.edu) (with Billur Aksoy)
2023
January 31, 2023
Book Club Hosted by Bitsy Perlman (elisabeth.perlman@census.gov)
February 7, 2023
Settling in the Shadow of Sexual Orientation: Bias and Marital Asset Division
Jennifer Bennett Shinall with John Roberts (jennifer.shinall@vanderbilt.edu)
February 21, 2023
Local Income, Race, and Mortality
EK Green (ekgreen42@email.arizona.edu)
March 7, 2023
Taste-Based Discrimination against Sexual Minorities: Evidence from Information Provision Experiment
Gayane Baghumyan (baghumyangayane@gmail.com)
March 21, 2023
Your place or mine? Private spaces of interaction among people in same-sex relationships and their friends
Mirjam Fischer (mail@mirjamfischer.com)
April 4, 2023
Sexual orientation and entrepreneurship: evidence from Sweden
Erwan Dujeancourt (erwan.dujeancourt@ju.se)
April 18, 2023
Conversion Therapy, Suicidality, and Running Away: An Analysis of Transgender Youth in the U.S.
Travis Campbell (Campbelt1@sou.edu) and Yana van der Meulen Rodgers
May 2, 2023
Does publicly-provided health insurance mitigate the health-at-birth effects of prenatal air pollution?
Anderson Ospino (aospino@ucdavis.edu)
May 16, 2023
Intra-Household Inequality and Tax Planning of Same-Sex Couples
Johannes Köckeis (johannes.koeckeis@fit.fraunhofer.de)
SEPTEMBER 5
The Role of Legal Gender Change on Labor Market Outcomes: A Sibling-Based Comparison of Transgender Individuals
Erwan Dujeancourt (erwan.dujeancourt@ju.se)
September 12
The effects of deferred action for childhood arrivals on labor market outcomes
Nhan Tran (ntran7@binghamton.edu)
September 19
Is Slacktivism Harmless? Unintended Consequences of Social Media Activism
Amanda Bonheur (abonheur@ucsd.edu)
September 26
Government Responses to Scandal: Child Protection Responses and Outcomes After High-Profile Deaths
Alice Heath (alice_heath@hks.harvard.edu)
October 3
Labor Demand and the Supply of College Courses
Jacob Light (jdlight@stanford.edu)
October 10
Neighborhoods and Racial Differences in Policing: Evidence from Stop-and-Frisk
Gerard Domènech-Arumí (gerard.domenech.arumi@ulb.be)
October 17
Persistence of Policy Choices: The Case of Close Referendums
Zach Freitas-Groff (zgroff@stanford.edu)
October 24
Perceived discrimination at work
Hannah Ruebeck (hruebeck@mit.edu)
October 31, 2023
Legalized Same-Sex Marriage and Coming Out: Evidence from Catholic Seminaries
Rohit Ticku (rohit.ticku@eui.eu)
November 14
Gender-based Discrimination in Personal Care Services: Experimental Evidence
Duc Hien Nguyen (duchiennguye@umass.edu)
November 28
The Gender Minority Gaps in Confidence and Self-Evaluations
Billur Aksoy (billuraksoy@gmail.com)
December 5
Impact of Abolishing the Sterilization Requirement for Legal Gender Change on the Trans-population
Rinni Norlinder (rinni.sharma@nek.uu.se)
December 12
Australia’s LGBTIQ Data Landscape and emerging research on LGBTIQ health disparities
Karinna Saxby (karinna.saxby@monash.edu)
February 6, 2024
“Gender Identity and Access to Higher Education”
I. Maupin and Bryan McCannon (bryan.c.mccannon@gmail.com)
Abstract: Our research examines the potential gender identity discrimination within higher education. An audit study was conducted by sending emails to admission counselors, where the messages varied in the inclusion of gender pronouns in the signature line. The results indicate a higher response rate for emails which included preferred pronouns, with a response rate increase of approximately four percentage points, regardless of the type of pronoun used. This suggests a preference for students that are more progressive in their thinking. We engage in text analysis and show that responses to inquiries with pronouns received more friendly responses receiving more use of exclamation marks, emojis/emoticons, and from a topic modeling algorithm were less likely to be strictly replies explaining the admission process. Finally, we apply machine learning to identify key institution attributes that are useful in predicting heterogeneous responses, and to identify the attributes of institutions where negative discrimination is likely to occur.
February 13, 2024
“Dynamics in Employment and Income Before and After Transgender Transitioning: Evidence from Dutch Administrative Data”
Elisa de Weerd (deweerd@ese.eur.nl) with John Cawley and Hans van Kippersluis
Transgender individuals on average have lower socioeconomic and health outcomes. This paper estimates the changes in labor market and health outcomes before and after legal gender transitioning. Using individual-level administrative panel data from the Netherlands over the period 2014-2022, we identify nearly 6,500 legal gender transitions, defined as the change of gender marker on one's birth certificate. Data on employment and health care utilization are drawn from administrative records. Using an event study approach with a sample of the general population serving as controls, we find changes in economic outcomes after transitioning, and important differences between those transitioning female-to-male (FTM) versus male-to-female (MTF). For both groups, employment and earned income decrease in the years preceding their legal gender transition. They differ, however, in dynamics after transitioning. For those transitioning FTM, there are increases in employment and income 5 or more years after transitioning; in contrast, for those transitioning MTF, employment and income remain significantly lower 3-4 years after transitioning, and are not significantly higher 5 or more years post-transition. The results provide information about dynamics in economic outcomes around legal gender transitions, and demonstrate that there can be meaningful differences for those transitioning FTM versus MTF.
February 20, 2024
“Implications of the Decline in LGBT Rights for Population Mental Health: Evidence from Polish ‘LGBT-free zones’”
Chad Meyerhoefer (chm308@lehigh.edu), Bingjin Xue, and Anna Poznańska
We investigate the consequences of anti-LGBT laws in Poland for suicide attempts and fatalities by applying border-area difference-in-differences models to county-level data. We find that annual suicide attempts increased by 16%, or 5 attempts per 100k capita, after the enactment of anti-LGBT statutes. This rise in suicide attempts was concentrated among men, and was associated with 11 additional suicides per 100k individuals aged 30-49. We also find an increase in suicide attempts in areas that deliberated, but subsequently rejected anti-LGBT resolutions, providing evidence that stigmatization of minority groups leads to declines in population mental health.
February 27, 2024
“Transgender Stratification Economics: Empirical Evaluation of Intersectional Effects in the 2015 Transgender Survey”
Robert Haggar (robertdonaldhaggar@gmail.com)
Research on the economic status of transgender status has found that transgender people face pervasive discrimination from both state and non-state actors. This paper builds upon the growing labor-economics of transgender people (Carpenter, Eppink, and Gonzales 2020; Carpenter, Lee, and Nettuno 2022; Shannon 2022) but breaks with it by considering economic precarity more broadly. By incorporating insights from intersectional theory and Marxian Feminism, this paper seeks to argue that economic marginalization and social oppression reinforce and enable one another. Following the intersectional methods of stratification economics, this paper compares the economic marginality of transgender people to the US population across income distributions and labor force status using the 2015 United States Transgender Survey and the 2015 American Community Survey. Transgender individuals are clustered in precarious labor force statuses which are characterized by low income. This clustering is more pronounced for transgender women, nonbinary people, and racially marginalized people. These transgender individuals, alongside those with disabilities and those who have experienced workplace discrimination due to their gender identity, are far more likely to engage in low-income self-employment, sex work, and illegal employment. This is the first research, to the author’s knowledge, to provide quantitative analyses of the factors contributing to engagement in sex work for transgender individuals in the United States.
March 5, 2024
“Transition to College and Disparities among LGBTQ+ Students: Survey Evidence from the High School Class of 2023”
Christina Sun (ucsun@ucdavis.edu)
As college education becomes increasingly more important and offers a wide range of economic and social benefits (Chan, 2016), the transition from high school to college is an especially important milestone for many young adults. Existing research suggests that students from historically underserved groups are also the ones likely facing the most obstacles during their transition to college (Goldrick-Rab et al., 2007). One such group is Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ+) students, whose transition to college has not been well-studied in part due to a dearth of data. In this paper, we provide direct evidence on the experience of LGBTQ+ students prior to college matriculation, leveraging survey data collected from a large sample of graduating high school seniors with a special focus on documenting the supports, challenges, and disparities facing gender and sexual minority students. Preliminary results show that gender and sexual minority students report worse social experiences in high school, and have markedly different patterns of college major choices and concerns about college from their cisgender, heterosexual peers.
March 12, 2024
“Silence to Solidarity: Using Group Dynamics to Reduce Anti-Transgender Discrimination in India”
Duncan Webb (duncan.webb@psemail.eu)
Individual-level discrimination is often attributed to deep-seated prejudice that is difficult to change. But at the societal level, we sometimes observe rapid reductions in discriminatory preferences, suggesting that communication about a minority might drive such shifts. I examine whether discrimination can be reduced by two types of communication about a minority: (i) horizontal communication between majority-group members, or (ii) top-down communication from agents of authority (e.g., the legal system). I run a field experiment in urban India (N=3,397) that measures discrimination against a marginalized community of transgender people. Participants are highly discriminatory: in a control condition, they sacrifice 1.9x their daily food expenditure to avoid hiring a transgender worker to deliver groceries to their home. But horizontal communication between cisgender participants sharply reduces discrimination: participants who were earlier involved in a group discussion with two of their neighbors no longer discriminate on average, even when making private post-discussion choices. This effect is 1.7x larger than the effect of top-down communication, informing participants about the legal rights of transgender people. The discussion’s effects are not driven by virtue signalling or correcting a misperceived norm. Instead, participants appear to persuade each other to be more pro-trans, partly because pro-trans participants are the most vocal in discussions.
March 19, 2024
No Seminar – Spring Recess
March 26, 2024
“Labor Market Outcomes of Same-Sex Couples in Countries with Legalized Same-Sex Marriage”
Honorata Bogusz (h.bogusz@uw.edu.pl ) and Jan Gromadzki
We study the labor market outcomes of same-sex couples using data from large representative household surveys. We assess the quality of the data on same-sex couples in 18 high- and middle-income countries that have legalized same-sex marriage. In our detailed analysis, we use high-quality data representing more than two-thirds of the world’s population with access to same-sex marriage on three continents. Same-sex couples are characterized by higher labor force participation rates and more hours worked than different-sex couples, largely due to the differences in the probability of having a child. Men in same-sex couples have a much higher risk of unemployment than men in different-sex couples. These unemployment gaps cannot be explained by individual and household characteristics.
April 2, 2024
“The Gender Minority Gaps in Confidence and Self-Evaluations”
Billur Aksoy (billuraksoy@gmail.com)
A rich literature explores gender differences between men and women, but an increasing share of the population identifies their gender in some other way. We explore the confidence and self-evaluations of gender minorities. Using data from roughly 10,000 students and 1,500 adults, we compare gender minorities to those who identify as male or female and document “gender minority gaps.” On a math and science test, gender minorities are less confident and provide less favorable self-evaluations than equally performing males. Among students, similar gaps arise between gender minorities and females. Additional results reveal that gender minority gaps are domain specific.
April 9, 2024
“Socio-Economic Disparities in Latin America among Same-Sex and Different-Sex Couples”
Ercio Munoa (erciom@iadb.org)
This paper exploits full-count population censuses from several countries in Latin America that contain information that allows the identification of same-sex couples through the question about the sex of each household member and the relationship to the head. Once the population of interest is identified in the census data, we characterize them and document existing socioeconomic disparities using the information available in the questionnaire.
April 16, 2024
“Ageing queer bodies – and the drag of Austria’s recent history”
Karin Schoenpflug (karin.schoenpflug@univie.ac.at)
Based on qualitative interviews with LGBTIQ+ people aged 60 plus, this paper explores the expectations, foreseeable adversities, and desires for possible queer living arrangements in retirement and (very) old age. The study differentiates between the subgroups in the LGBTQI+ universe, and also employs an intersectional perspective, considering a diversity of situations based on race, class and family/social capital and networks. Next to the perspectives of the ageing queer community, the study also includes interviews with (queer) old age care personnel, social security providers, and community experts in Austria, Germany and Sweden talking about their perspectives on specific needs and public and private provisions for this segment of an ageing population. On a meta-level, the findings are linked to a time-line of significant events and periods for the different living cohorts of Austria’s queer community, showing how a rapidly changing historical background (ranging from the total ban of homosexuality until 1971, the AIDS-crisis of the 1980s, the “second” women’s movement, the first (trans-inclusive) pride march in 1996, gay marriage in 2019 and the ongoing genital mutilation of intersex children) leads to very different positions when it comes to imagining life as an old(er) queer person.
April 23, 2024
“Non-binary Gender Economics: The Preferences and Behaviors of Non-Binary Individuals”
Keith Marzilli Ericson (kericson@bu.edu) with Katherine Coffman, Lucas Copffman
Previous research has documented male-female gender differences in economically important contexts, including economic preferences (e.g. risk tolerance and altruism), workplace behaviors (e.g. competitiveness and task assignment), and beliefs (e.g. self-confidence). However, there is little work examining gender minorities in these domains. Using best practices for eliciting gender identity, we recruit and identify a large sample of non-binary individuals, men, and women from the US. Our survey instrument adapts many existing paradigms used to identify gender differences in economic preferences, workplace behaviors, beliefs, and experienced discrimination, expanding coverage of these key economic measures to a broader, more inclusive sample. In addition, we elicit beliefs about how men, women, and non-binary people compare on all of these measures, allowing us to measure stereotypes and (in)accuracy of beliefs.
April 30, 2024
“How do same-sex couples affect central cities? “
Jooyoung Kim (jkim266@syr.edu)
Abstract: In the United States, same-sex couples disproportionately live in central cities of metropolitan areas, and their presence has often been reported as an indicator of imminent gentrification. In this paper, I suggest two mechanisms that attract same-sex couples into central cities: income elasticity of housing demand and different preferences for downtown/suburban amenities including child-related amenities and cultural tolerance. Analysis based on American Community Survey data provides evidence for these mechanisms. Further analysis using a shift-share IV shows that metropolitan areas with a higher initial share of same-sex couples downtown experienced a larger increase in average individual income downtown between 2010 and 2017.
May 7, 2024
Labor Market Outcomes of Transgender People in the United States: Evidence from Linked Administrative Data
Max Lee (mclee@sfsu.edu) with Kitt Carpenter and Lucas Goodman
Abstract: TBA
Job Market Candidates
September 10
Behavioral Responses to Risk: Evidence from Gay Men’s Personal Ads.
Hasan Shahid (hasan.shahid@vanderbilt.edu)
Abstract: The early years of HIV/AIDS were characterized by inadequate reporting on the virus and its transmission, as well as inaction from the federal government. To better understand early behavioral responses to HIV/AIDS, this study leverages Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and machine learning to construct a unique rich dataset of over 170,000 men’s personal ads posted in the oldest and largest national LGBT publication in the United States, from 1975 to 1992. The vast majority of these personal ads represent men seeking other men for sexual or romantic relationships. This study documents significant changes in the content of personal ads that occurred well before any substantial efforts by the federal government to disseminate AIDS information. I show that the early years of the epidemic saw an increase in the number of personal ads with a greater emphasis on ‘safe-sex' practices. I then exploit variation in the timing of the first report of an AIDS case across U.S. cities and demonstrate that this trend is causally related to the rising costs of risky sexual behavior associated with the first reported AIDS case in each city. Additionally, I show that changes in the ads inform us about changes in behaviors by showing that areas with larger adoption of ‘safety' language in the content of personal ads also experienced the greatest declines in rates of syphilis among men.
September 17
Psychological Well-being, Impact Heterogeneity, and Spillovers in a Graduation Program in Paraguay
Marcos M. Sugastti, University of California, Davis (martinezsugastti@ucdavis.edu)
Michael R. Carter, University of California, Davis
José Molinas-Vega, Instituto Desarrollo
Multifaceted graduation programs modeled after BRAC’s seminal approach aim to reduce poverty by building up physical productive assets and intangible business and life skills. Participants receive a bundle that includes a large cash transfer for purchasing assets and intensive mentoring for up to two years. Research on these programs has shown that they generally result in positive average treatment effects across various economic variables, though these results obscure sizable heterogeneity. This paper studies the heterogeneous impacts of a graduation program and examines psychological well-being as both an outcome affected by the program and as a source of heterogeneity. We exploit a randomized controlled trial with a staggered rollout and a saturation design of a graduation program implemented by the government of Paraguay. Midline results reveal positive effects of the program on income, assets, and savings. Impacts vary widely across the distribution of participants, with about 25% of participants experiencing no effect on income and 10% of participants experiencing no effect on assets, according to conditional quantile treatment estimates. The baseline psychological state of beneficiaries may explain some of this heterogeneity, as participants who started the program with higher aspirations and lower self-efficacy benefited more from it. When considering psychological measures as outcomes, we find that the program leads to a worsening in the psychological state of beneficiaries by midline across different categories. Finally, the RCT’s saturation design, whereby different communities have different levels of program coverage at the time of the survey, reveals that among treated households, higher saturation rates result in better outcomes, while the opposite is true for non-treated households. The paper discusses what all these findings imply for designing and implementing graduation programs in a cost-effective manner.
September 24
Effects of Workplace Anti-Discrimination Policies on Families: Evidence from “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.
Laura Nettuno (laura.e.nettuno@vanderbilt.edu)
The repeal of “Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) in 2011 marked a significant shift in U.S. military policy, allowing lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals to serve openly without fear of employment discrimination. Using a difference-in-differences approach paired with data from the 2008-2019 American Community Survey, I leverage information on active-duty military employees and their families to study the effects of the repeal of DADT on the formation of same-sex partnerships and downstream economic outcomes for military families. I find that the repeal of DADT increased same-sex partnership for women in the military, the group with the largest share of LGBT-identifying service members. I also show that civilian women in same-sex partnerships with active-duty women are more likely to have military health insurance coverage following the repeal of DADT. In addition, I show that women in same-sex active duty-civilian couples make divisions of labor choices that are similar to civilian same-sex couples. This paper provides the first evidence of the effects of repealing DADT, shedding new light on the relationship between workplace discrimination and family formation and contributing to the broader literature on LGBTQ+ rights and policies.
October 1
The Global Allocative Efficiency of Deforestation
Prakash Mishra (mishrap@wharton.upenn.edu)
This study quantifies the impact of a global Pigouvian tax on carbon emissions from agricultural deforestation on the levels and spatial allocation of deforestation. Extending a classic trade model, I micro-found a measure for general equilibrium abatement costs. I estimate all key model elasticities, including the first global deforestation elasticity to agricultural rents at 0.42 (0.1, 1) In counterfactuals, a $51 Pigouvian tax would have abated 75% of realized deforestation damages between 1982-2016 as land reallocates away from agriculture. General equilibrium channels raise abatement costs by 50% relative to previous partial equilibrium estimates. Absent gains from trade, abatement costs would double. Finally, I decompose deforestation into an effect of trade and an effect of geography. Trade liberalization since 1980 has driven a 0.31% increase in deforested area, or 140,000 sq. km., lowering gains from trade by 13%.
October 8
Peer Health Shocks and Labor Supply
Joshua Martin (joshua.martin@vanderbilt.edu)
I provide novel evidence on how workers respond to peer health shocks within high-risk occupations by leveraging two natural experiments within professional hockey and gridiron football. First, I compare differences in labor supply between characteristically similar athletes who differ only in their exposure to a colleague who died of chronic traumatic encephalopathy -- a deadly neurological disease causally linked to continued workplace participation. Though the information about these deaths is widely publicized, I find that their occurrence differentially increases the probability for former teammates to retire. This effect is greater for those with longer periods spent as teammates and diminishes with time since they were last on the same team. Second, I leverage quasi-random differences in the monetary compensation that workers would forgo upon retiring at the time of this peer health shock. I show these retirements are highly responsive to opportunity costs -- estimating that teams would have to increase workers’ annual salaries by $3 million to prevent their exit. Remaining treated workers display a heightened sensitivity to health risks by exchanging salary for signing bonuses in their subsequent employment contracts. The finding that labor supply decisions are highly responsive to the health status of peers suggests that workers substantially underestimate utility loss from work-related health damages even in environments where such risks are highly publicized.
Researchers of All Ranks
October 15
N/A - Fall Break
October 22
The Cost of Coming Out
Enzo Brox Riccardo Di Francesco (difrancesco.riccardo96@gmail.com)
Abstract: The fear of social stigma and discrimination leads many individuals worldwide to hesitate in openly disclosing their sexual orientation. Due to the large costs of concealing identity, it is crucial to understand the extent of anti-LGB sentiments and reactions to coming out. However, disclosing one’s sexual orientation is a personal choice, complicating data access and introducing endogeneity issues. This paper tackles these challenges by using an innova- tive data source from a popular online video game together with a natural experiment. We exploit exogenous variation in the identity of a playable character to identify the effects of disclosure on players’ revealed preferences for that character. Leveraging detailed daily data, we monitor players’ preferences for the character across diverse regions globally and employ synthetic control methods to isolate the effect of the disclosure on players’ preferences. Our findings reveal a substantial and persistent negative impact of coming out. To strengthen the plausibility of social stigma as the primary explanation for the estimated effects, we systematically address and eliminate several alternative game-related channels.
October 29
Tobacco and Alcohol Use Patterns and the Impacts of Taxation Among Sexual and Gender Minoritized Adults in the United States
Shaoying Ma (shaoying.ma@osumc.edu)
Background: Disparities exist in smoking, vaping, and alcohol use between sexual and gender minoritized (SGM) adults in the U.S., and their heterosexual and cisgender counterparts. Excise taxes are one of the most effective tools to reduce smoking in the general population, and e-cigarette taxes have been increasingly used by state and local jurisdictions in the U.S. to curb the e-cigarette epidemic. However, there is limited evidence on how excise taxes impact cigarette, e-cigarette and alcohol use behaviors and use disparities among SGM adults.
Objectives: To investigate tobacco and alcohol use patterns among SGM adults and evaluate the impacts of excise taxes on their tobacco and alcohol consumption.
Methods: Two online volumetric choice experiments (VCEs) were conducted between 2020-2021, and in 2023, respectively. The first is a tobacco and alcohol co-use VCE with 181 current or recent adult smokers who reported past-30-day alcohol consumption and recent (re-)initiation of e-cigarette use. The second study is an e-cigarette use VCE with 808 adult vapers, including both exclusive e-cigarette users, and dual users of cigarettes and e-cigarettes. In each VCE, participants were asked about their intended consumption of tobacco (and alcohol in the first study) in hypothetical scenarios where prices were manipulated to reflect different tax levels.
Results: In the tobacco and alcohol co-use VCE, there were 37 sexual minoritized participants. If own prices increased through excise taxes by 10%, sexual minoritized adult smokers who vape and drink alcohol would reduce their consumption of beer, liquor/wine, cigarettes, and e-cigarettes by 0.04%, 0.77%, 0.31%, and 2.01%, respectively; and they were more price sensitive when smoking cigarettes and drinking liquor/wine, but less price sensitive when consuming beer, compared to their heterosexual counterparts. In the e-cigarette use VCE, there were 21 gender minoritized participants and 146 sexual minoritized participants. If own prices increased through excise taxes by 10%, gender minoritized adult vapers would reduce their consumption of pod e-cigarette devices, pod starter kits, packs of pod refills, and e-cigarette tank devices by 4.1%, 3.3%, 2.6%, and 1.3%, respectively; and sexual minoritized adult vapers would reduce their consumption of disposable e-cigarettes, pod devices, pod starter kits, packs of pod refills, tank devices, e-liquids, and cigarettes by 0.27%, 3.40%, 3.13%, 1.57%, 2.62%, 0.70%, and 0.10%, respectively. When using pod starter kits, sexual minoritized adult vapers were more price sensitive than their heterosexual counterparts.
Conclusion: Excise taxes on cigarettes and liquor/wine may be effective in reducing smoking and alcohol use disparities, respectively, among sexual minoritized adult smokers who drink alcohol and use e-cigarettes. Gender minoritized adult vapers’ consumption of pod devices, pod starter kits, packs of pod refills and tank devices will decline when taxation increases prices. Excise taxes on pod starter kits may be effective in reducing vaping disparities among sexual minoritized adults.
Funding statement: The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health (grant # R01CA235719, R21CA249757). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Ma was supported by the Pelotonia Fellowship from The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center.
November 5
No Seminar - Election Day
November 12
Queering Economics
Mike Martell (mmartell@bard.edu) and Leanne Roncolato (lroncola@fandm.edu)
Abstract TBD
November 19
N/A Safe travels to APPAM and SEAs
November 26
Sexual Orientation and Multiple Job Holding: Evidence from Swedish Administrative Data
Erwan Dujeancourt (erwan.dujeancourt@sofi.su.se)
We provide the first evidence on sexual orientation and multiple job holding. Few surveys ask directly about multiple job holding; we use Swedish administrative data from 2001-2021 which allow us to identify individuals with labor market earnings from multiple employers. Over this period, we identify over 19,000 employed individuals who ever entered a legal same-sex union – our proxy for sexual minority status. We compare their likelihood of multiple job holding with all employed individuals who were only ever in different-sex unions. We find that sexual minority individuals, especially sexual minority men, are significantly more likely than otherwise similar heterosexual individuals to hold multiple jobs, a difference on the order of 3-8 percentage points. We explore four potential underlying drivers of this higher incidence of multiple job holding: financial constraints, self-insurance, career mobility, and job heterogeneity. We find evidence in line with self-insurance mechanisms for sexual minority men. For women, we find that career mobility is a likely explanation. We provide new evidence on how the higher incidence of multiple job holding among sexual minority individuals associates with their longer run labor market outcomes and find evidence that for sexual minority women multiple job holding is associated with reduced unemployment and increased earnings growth.
December 3
LGBTQ Identity in Adolescence and the Peer Effects of Coming Out
Hannah Ruebeck (hruebeck@hamilton.edu)
LGBTQ students are more likely to be bullied, are less likely to graduate from high school, and have worse mental health. Because the formal support schools provide to these students is increasingly contentious and politicized, peer support or prejudice may play an increasingly important role. I use data from one of the largest school districts in the US from 2016-2020 to study how exposure to more LGBTQ-identifying peers affects students' own sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) and their victimization and attendance at school. To do so, I use within-school, cross-cohort variation in the share of classmates in a student's 9th grade class who identified as LGBTQ in 8th grade, conditional on both 9th-grade-school and 8th-grade-school fixed effects. My panel data also provides a unique opportunity to understand how SOGI identities form in adolescence. I have three main results. First, I find that snapshots understate the size of the adolescent population that is affected by school and state policies targeting LGBTQ students: over my four-year period, 14 percent of students ever identified as LGBTQ compared to the 6 percent who identified as LGBTQ in any given year. Second, exposure to more LGBTQ-identifying students increases the likelihood that previously-LGBTQ or uncertain students identify as LGBTQ. Third, having more LGBTQ-identifying peers substantially shrinks LGBTQ-Cis/Het gaps in bullying and in whether students leave the district in the following year.
December 10
Another Baby Boom? How Same-Sex Marriage and the Affordable Care Act Increased Births in the US
Maximilien Bielsa (mtbielsa@udel.edu)
Assistive Reproductive Treatment clinics use IVF and other procedures to help patients facing infertility, or same-sex couples, have children. Using CDC Data, I find that the Affordable Care Act led to an increase in frozen births, due to them being the cheaper alternative, in states with insurance mandates when compared to states without them. Additionally, same-sex marriage legalization boosted births through methods using donated materials, which are employed by same-sex couples. However, these effects diminish at the clinic level due to an increase in the number of clinics two years following policy changes, and an exhaustion of the increased demand.