Bounding the Labor Supply Responses to a Randomized Welfare Experiment: A Revealed Preference Approach

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Kline, Patrick; Tartari, Melissa
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Berkeley; University of Chicago
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0002-8282
• DOI: 10.1257/aer.20130824
• 发表日期: 2016
• 页码: 972-1014
• 关键词: Optimization frictions; indivisible labor; income; elasticities; MODEL; PARTICIPATION; consistent; micro; Heterogeneity; taxation

摘要

We study the short-term impact of Connecticut's Jobs First welfare reform experiment on women's labor supply and welfare participation decisions. A nonparametric optimizing model is shown to restrict the set of counterfactual choices compatible with each woman's actual choice. These revealed preference restrictions yield informative bounds on the frequency of several intensive and extensive margin responses to the experiment. We find that welfare reform induced many women to work but led some others to reduce their earnings in order to receive assistance. The bounds on this latter opt-in effect imply that intensive margin labor supply responses are nontrivial.