Research

Working papers

Environmental Externalities of Urban Growth: Evidence from the California Wildfires

Does residential development at the urban edge increase the probability and cost of wildfires in California? I use geospatial data to show that the probability of wildfires increases as previously undeveloped land becomes developed, but decreases at higher levels of development until the probability of wildfire reaches zero. At very low housing densities, an additional housing unit increases the probability of wildfire by .01-.02 percentage points over a baseline probability of 1.53. This translates into an increase the probability of wildfire from 1.53 to 4.34 percent when housing density increases from 30 to 130 units per km2. I then calculate costs for a set of wildfires under counterfactual patterns of housing development. Due to the nonmonotonic relationship between development and wildfire probability, restricting some but not all development in fire-prone areas can have a larger impact on wildfire probability. I discuss how land use restrictions in safe areas relate to higher expected costs of wildfires.

Work in Progress

Right-to-Counsel in Eviction Court and Rental Housing Markets: Quasi-Experimental Evidence from New York
(with Rob Collinson, John Eric Humphries, Scott Nelson, Winnie van Dijk, and Daniel Waldinger)

Time to Approve and Uncertainty in Real Estate Development

Impact of Subnational Responses to a National Crisis: Evidence from Brazil
(with Juan Pablo Chauvin and Edward Glaeser)

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Other writings

Who's Talking about their COVID-19 Research? Gender and Research During a Pandemic
(with Alex Albright, Kristen McCormack, and Isabel Harbaugh Macdonald), June 2020