Publications

The European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA) is a major milestone in the history of platform regulation. Other governments are now asking themselves what the DSA’s passage means for them. This post will briefly discuss that question, with a focus on platforms like Facebook or YouTube and their smaller would-be rivals.

We use linked survey and administrative data to document and decompose the striking differences across demographic groups in both economic and health impacts of the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. The impacts of the pandemic on all-cause mortality and on employment were concentrated in the same racial, ethnic, and education groups, with non-White individuals and those without a college degree experiencing higher excess all-cause mortality as well as a greater employment loss. Observable differences in living arrangements and the nature of work – which likely affected exposure to the virus and to economic contractions – can explain 15 percent of the Hispanic-White difference in excess mortality, almost one-quarter of the non- Hispanic Black-White difference, and almost half of the difference between those with and without a Bachelor’s degree; they can also explain 35 to 40 percent of the differences in economic damages between these groups. These findings underscore the importance of non-medical factors in contributing to the disparate impacts of public health shocks.

We use linked administrative data that combines the universe of California birth records, hospitalizations, and death records with parental income from Internal Revenue Service tax records and the Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics file to provide novel evidence on economic inequality in infant and maternal health. We find that birth outcomes vary nonmonotonically with parental income, and that children of parents in the top ventile of the income distribution have higher rates of low birth weight and preterm birth than those in the bottom ventile. However, unlike birth outcomes, infant mortality varies monotonically with income, and infants of parents in the top ventile of the income distribution---who have the worst birth outcomes---have a death rate that is half that of infants of parents in the bottom ventile. When studying maternal health, we find a similar pattern of non-monotonicity between income and severe maternal morbidity, and a monotonic and decreasing relationship between income and maternal mortality. At the same time, these disparities by parental income are small when compared to racial disparities, and we observe virtually no convergence in health outcomes across racial and ethnic groups as income rises. Indeed, infant and maternal health in Black families at the top of the income distribution is markedly worse than that of white families at the bottom of the income distribution.Lastly, we benchmark the health gradients in California to those in Sweden, finding that infant and maternal health is worse in California than in Sweden for most outcomes throughout the entire income distribution.

Men living alone may have particular difficulty in managing chronic medical conditions. Anticoagulation control, a sensitive indicator of self-management, was significantly worse among men living alone.

Key policy takeaways from Michael McFaul on Russia after Putin, Francis Fukuyama on democracy in America, Daphne Keller on the global impact of the European Union's new digital policy, Marietje Schaake on Elon Musk's first days at Twitter, XXXXXX

A chapter in Routledge Handbook of the International Relations of South Asia

Islamist Movements, the Left, and Authoritarian Legacies in Egypt

Over the past two decades, the literature has shown a clear gradient between child health and wealth. The same health–wealth gradient is also observed among children in China, with a large gap in health between rural and urban children. However, there are still unanswered questions about the main causes of China’s rural–urban child health inequality. This paper aims to review the major factors that have led to the relatively poor levels of health among China’s rural children. In addition to the direct income effect on children’s health, children in rural areas face disadvantages compared with their urban counterparts from the beginning of life: Prenatal care and infant health outcomes are worse in rural areas; rural caregivers have poor health outcomes and lack knowledge and support to provide adequate nurturing care to young children; there are large disparities in access to quality health care between rural and urban areas; and rural families are more likely to lack access to clean water and sanitation. In order to inform policies that improve health outcomes for the poor, there is a critical need for research that identifies the causal drivers of health outcomes among children. Strengthening the pediatric training and workforce in rural areas is essential to delivering quality health care for rural children. Other potential interventions include addressing the health needs of mothers and grandparent caregivers, improving parenting knowledge and nurturing care, improving access to clean water and sanitation for remote families, and most importantly, targeting poverty itself.

An Asia Policy roundtable co-edited by Arzan Tarapore, including an essay by Oriana Skylar Mastro.

Direct radiation lasts less than a second, but its lethal level can extend over a mile in all directions from the detonation point of a modern-day nuclear weapon with an explosive yield equal to the effect of several hundred kilotons of TNT.

The self-esteem of students may be significantly associated with their academic performance. However, past research in developing contexts on this issue is limited, particularly among early adolescents. Using a sample of 3101 students from rural primary and junior high schools in China, this study measured their self-esteem by the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) and explored its association with academic performance. Our findings indicate that students in rural China had both significantly lower self-esteem and a higher prevalence of low self-esteem when compared to past studies of similarly aged students both from urban China and internationally. Furthermore, there was a strong positive correlation between a student’s self-esteem and academic performance. A one-SD increase in RSES score (indicating better self-esteem) was associated with an increase of 0.12 SD in standardized math scores (p < 0.001), and students with low self-esteem (RSES score < 25) scored lower on math tests by 0.14 SD (p < 0.001), which were robust and consistent when employing the propensity score matching method. Our study expands the growing body of empirical evidence on the link between self-esteem and academic performance among rural youth in developing countries and emphasizes the need to improve their self-esteem with the aim of helping them achieve academically.

Putin's menacing rhetoric has alarmed the West, but lessons learned 60 years ago in the Cuban Missile Crisis provide some reassurance

Chapter in Struggles for Political Change in the Arab World, edited by Lisa Blaydes, Amr Hamzawy, and Hesham Sallam.

Regimes, Oppositions, and External Actors after the Spring

Seven and a half months after it began, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine has not gone as the Kremlin had hoped.

As part of its effort to balance economic development with environmental objectives, China has established a new national park system, with the first five locations formally established in 2021. However, as the new parks all host or are proximate to human populations, aligning the socioeconomic needs and aspirations of local communities with conservation aims is critical for the long-term success of the parks. In this narrative review, the authors identify the ecological priorities and socioeconomic stakeholders of each of the five national parks; explore the tensions and synergies between these priorities and stakeholders; and synthesize the policy recommendations most frequently cited in the literature. A total of 119 studies were reviewed. Aligning traditional livelihoods with conservation, limiting road construction, promoting education and environmental awareness, and supporting the development of a sustainable tourism industry are identified as important steps to balance conservation with economic development in the new national parks.

Subtitle Test

Nuclear threats are no trivial matter, but Ukraine and the world should not be intimidated. The West should respond with political and military signals of its own.

One out of every three children under age 5 in developing countries lives in conditions that impede human capital development. In this study, we survey the literature on parenting training programs implemented before age 5, with the aim to increase parental investment in human capital accumulation in developing countries. Our review focuses on the implementation and effectiveness of parenting training programs (i.e., training in child psychosocial stimulation and/or training about nutrition). We emphasize the mechanisms that drive treatment-induced change in human capital outcomes and identify the demand- and supply-side behaviors that affect efficacy and effectiveness. Although the literature includes evidence on program features that are associated with successful interventions, further evidence on the dynamics of human capital formation, documentation of medium- to long-term persistence of treatment impacts, and research on the implementation and evaluation of programs at scale are needed to delineate a scalable and inclusive program that provides long-term treatment impacts.

Abstract

Professions play a key role in determining the division of labor and the returns to skilled work. This paper studies the productivity difference between physicians and nurse practitioners (NPs), two health care professions performing overlapping tasks but with stark differences in background, training, and pay. Using data from the Veterans Health Administration and quasi-experimental variation in the patient probability of being treated by physicians versus NPs in the emergency department, we find that, compared to physicians, NPs significantly increase resource utilization but achieve worse patient outcomes. We find evidence suggesting mechanisms relating to lower human capital among NPs relative to physicians and worker-task assignment responding to the lower skill of NPs. Counterfactual analysis suggests a net increase in medical costs with NPs, even when accounting for NPs’ wages that are half as much as physicians’. Despite large productivity differences between professions, we find even larger productivity differences within professions and substantial productivity overlap between professions. Yet there is little overlap in wages between NPs and physicians and, within professions, no significant correlation between productivity and wages.