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Academic Programs

“The Effect of ID Provision on Previously Incarcerated Individuals” – Jing Wu

 

“The rise of residential sorting with remote work ” – Richard Thorpe

Abstract: This paper examines whether remote work, by increasing locational flexibility, has led to greater Tiebout sorting—the residential sorting of workers based on preferences for local government services, taxation, and amenities. Previous literature argues that residential sorting is constrained by commuting costs, but the rise of remote work since the COVID-19 pandemic allows workers to choose residences based on preferences for public goods, services, and amenities. We treat the COVID-19 pandemic as a shock that drastically reduced commuting costs by accelerating the adoption of remote and hybrid work. Using industry concentrations from LEHD LODES and measures of remote work potential by sector, we estimate the share of residents in each Commuting Zone who could potentially work remotely based on their sectors of employment in 2019. We quantify Tiebout sorting through measuring neighborhood concentration of demographic proxies for public goods preferences, including age, nativity, number of children, and school enrollment. Through an event study, we will analyze how the concentration of these demographic proxies changes in tracts located in CZs more exposed to the work-from-home shock compared to those in less exposed CZs. Finally, we will evaluate whether variation in public goods demand and provision between municipalities has increased since the pandemic and the rise of remote work. We approach this by first calculating dispersion across municipalities in demographic proxies for demand and then examining direct measures of public goods provision, such as per capita taxation, general spending, education spending, and protection spending.