January 2019 "Effects of Immigration on Investment." [Job Market Paper]
This paper documents how corporate investment reacts to immigration. I use an interaction of the ex-ante cluster of migrants and a change in immigration policy in the UK to provide evidence that investment increases in anticipation of immigration flows. The time variation in immigration policy allows me to control for local economic shocks, reducing endogeneity concerns. Part of the increase in investment occurs through a transitory increase in fixed assets. The major change occurs in the extensive margin, through an increase in firm creation. The increase is larger for the knowledge and the service sector, suggesting that human capital is an important driver of the effect. The results suggest that firms react fast to an immigration-induced labor supply shock.
February 2019 "The Impact of the Mexican Drug War on Trade." with Jose Morales and Bernardo Ricca.
This paper studies the unintended economic consequences of increases in violence following the Mexican Drug War. We study the effects on exports in municipalities with different levels of exposure to violence after the policy. A focus on exports allows us to control for demand shocks by comparing exports of the same product to the same country of destination. Building on the close elections identification strategy proposed by Dell (2015), we show that municipalities that are exogenously exposed to the Drug War experience a 40\% decrease in export growth on the intensive margin. Large exporters suffer larger effects, along with exports of more complex, capital intensive, and skill intensive products. Finally, using firm level data, we provide evidence consistent with violence increasing marginal exporting costs.
November 2017 "A Managerial Explanation for Agency Costs of Free Cash Flow: Evidence from European Football."
[Preliminary version available upon request]
Are inexperienced managers more likely to invest additional cash sub-optimally? To answer this question, this paper uses a new hand-constructed database on odds of football matches, football managers, and player trades of teams that participate in the European Champions League from 2000 until 2014. I provide evidence that wins in matches with close odds ex-ante are as good as randomly assigned, and, in particular, uncorrelated with the experience or age of managers. I then show that teams with inexperienced managers significantly spend the cash obtained in close matches to acquire new players; while experienced managers do not engage in this behavior. Teams do not perform better after the new acquisitions, suggesting inexperienced managers may not spend cash to benefit the team.
Working Papers
