Essays in Urban Economics

Abstract

The papers in this dissertation use large-scale administrative US Census Bureau data to understand the consequences of urban sorting for spatial inequality, housing affordability, and the welfare of low-income households. The first chapter (co-authored with Ashvin Gandhi and Valentine Gilbert) presents evidence suggesting gentrification primarily affects low-income renters by changing the characteristics of other neighborhoods in their choice sets. This finding has important policy implications: it suggests that policies promoting citywide affordability (e.g., zoning deregulation) may increase welfare for low-income renters more than policies like rent control which prioritize incumbent renters’ welfare in the short-run. The second chapter (co-authored with Valentine Gilbert) compares the characteristics of residential vacancy chains created by new suburban single-family homes to those created by new urban multifamily housing. Our current results imply that new suburban housing supply has little effect on urban housing affordability or on the welfare of low-income urban households. The third chapter develops and estimates a quantitative spatial equilibrium model to demonstrate how optimal urban economic policy varies based on three sets of parameters that are subject to contentious debate, both popular and academic: parents’ preferences, the technology governing children’s upward economic mobility, and social preferences over children and their parents.