KECD 2300 - Topics in Public, Law, and Organizational Economics

In this course, we will present recent research in law and economics, in public economics, and in labor economics. The objective of the class is to guide students in the development of their own research questions by presenting several open questions in these fields.

The class is divided into three blocks, organized as follows:

.Block 1: Topics in Law, Economics and Institutions (Roberto Galbiati)

This block will be organized around three topics. In each session we will introduce the topic and discuss some recent research. Our aim is not to provide an in-depth and exhaustive review of each topic, instead we will try to discuss some ideas to stimulate students’ own research.

1 Introduction to the economics of crime and justice: labor markets and crime; law enforcement)

• Becker, Gary S. 1968. “Crime and Punishment: An Economic Approach.” Journal of Political Economy, 76 (March/April): 169–217.
• Britto, D., Pinotti, P., Sampaio, B. (2022). The Effect of Job Loss and Unemployment Insurance on Crime in Brazil. Econometrica
• Fougere, D., F. Kramarz and J. Pouget (2009). Youth unemployment and crime in France, Journal of the European Economic Association, 7(5), 909–38.
• Caroli, E., Bignon, V. and Galbiati, R. Stealing to Survive: Crime in XIXth Century France. Economic Journal 127(559), pp. 19-49 2017 Drago, F. Galbiati, R. and Vertova P “The Deterrent Effects of Prison Evidence from a Natural Experiment”. Journal of Political Economy, 117(2), pp. 257-280
• Drago, F., Galbiati, R. and Vertova P. (2009) The Deterrent Effect of Prison. Journal of Political Economy

2 Introduction to the economics of crime and justice: Judicial behavior

• D. Abrams, R. Galbiati, E. Henry and A. Philippe When in Rome... On Local Norms and Sentencing Decisions . CEPR WP
• Shamena Anwar & Patrick Bayer & Randi Hjalmarsson, 2012. "The Impact of Jury Race in Criminal Trials," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 127(2), pages 1017-1055

3 Introduction to the economics of crime and justice: Are we all equal before the law?

• Becker, Gary S., The Economics of Discrimination, University of Chicago Press, 1957
• Amanda Agan, Sonja Starr, Ban the Box, Criminal Records, and Racial Discrimination: A Field Experiment, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 133, Issue 1, February 2018, Pages 191–235,
• Persico, Nicola, “Racial Profiling? Detecting Bias Using Statistical Evidence”, Annual Review of Economics

4 Inequality and political institutions

• Scheve, Kenneth F. and Stasavage, David, Wealth Inequality and Democracy (May 2017). Annual Review of Political Science, Vol. 20, pp. 451-468, 2017,
• Diego Puga and Daniel Trefler, International Trade and Institutional Change: Medieval Venice’s Response to Globalization, The Quarterly Journal of Economics 129 (2) (2014), 753–821
• Belloc, M. Drago, F., Fochesato, M. and Galbiati, R. Wealth Accumulation and Institutional Capture: the Rise of the Medici and the Fall of the Florentine Republic. CEPR DP (July 2022)

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Block 2: Topics in Public Economics (Antoine Ferey)

This class aims to provide a broad overview of recent topics and methods in public economics, drawing on empirical and theoretical research. After a short introduction, the first class analyzes recent empirical results on tax incidence and uses this topic to introduce the use of sufficient statistics (a theoretical tool with applications outside of public economics). The second class covers recent works in unemployment insurance to showcase research on social insurance programs. The third class focuses on social transfers and discusses a sufficient statistic metric to compare different policies across domains. The fourth class covers wealth taxation and tax evasion. Important readings are marked with ***.

5 Introduction and tax incidence

• Jensen, A. (2022). Employment structure and the rise of the modern tax system. American Economic Review.
• *** Benzarti, Y (2024). Tax incidence anomalies. Annual Review of Economics.
• Chetty, R. (2009). Sufficient statistics for welfare analysis: A bridge between structural and reduced-form methods. Annual Review of Economics.

6 Unemployment insurance

• *** Chetty, R., & Finkelstein, A. (2013). Social insurance: Connecting theory to data. Handbook of public economics (Vol. 5).
• Schmieder, J. F., & Von Wachter, T. (2016). The effects of unemployment insurance benefits: New evidence and interpretation. Annual Review of Economics.
• Hendren, N. (2017). Knowledge of future job loss and implications for unemployment insurance. American Economic Review.
• Landais, C., & Spinnewijn, J. (2021). The value of unemployment insurance. The Review of Economic Studies.

7 Social transfers

• Currie, J., & Gahvari, F. (2008). Transfers in cash and in-kind: Theory meets the data. Journal of Economic Literature.
• Piketty, T., & Saez, E. (2013). Optimal labor income taxation. Handbook of public economics (Vol. 5).
• Finkelstein, A., & Notowidigdo, M. J. (2019). Take-up and targeting: Experimental evidence from SNAP. The Quarterly Journal of Economics.
• *** Hendren, N., & Sprung-Keyser, B. (2020). A unified welfare analysis of government policies. The Quarterly Journal of Economics.

8 Wealth taxation and tax evasion

• *** Saez, E., & Zucman, G. (2020). The rise of income and wealth inequality in America: Evidence from distributional macroeconomic accounts. Journal of Economic Perspectives.
• *** Scheuer, F., & Slemrod, J. (2021). Taxing our wealth. Journal of Economic Perspectives.
• Alstadsæter, A., Johannesen, N., & Zucman, G. (2019). Tax evasion and inequality. American Economic Review.
• Alstadsæter, A., Johannesen, N., & Zucman, G. (2018). Who owns the wealth in tax havens? Macro evidence and implications for global inequality. Journal of Public Economics.

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Block 3: Topics in Labor Economics (Claire Montialoux)

This block is organized around four topics covering recent research on labor market institutions and inequality. Important readings are marked with ***.

9 Minimum wage policies

• Cengiz, D., Dube, A., Lindner, A., and Zipperer B. (2019), “The Effect of Minimum Wages on Low Wage Jobs”, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 134, Issue 3.
• ***Dube, A., and Lindner, A. (2024), “Minimum Wages in the 21st Century”, Handbook of Labor Economics, vol. 5, pp. 261-383.
• Derenoncourt, E. and Montialoux C. (2021), “Minimum Wages and Racial Inequality”, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 136(1):169-228.
• Derenoncourt, E., Gérard F., Lagos L. and Montialoux C. (2025), “Minimum Wages and Informality”, NBER Working Paper#34445.

10 Unions

• Derenoncourt, E., Gérard F., Lagos L. and Montialoux C. (2025), “What Do (Thousands of) Unions Do? Union-Specific Pay Premia and Inequality”, NBER Working Paper#34139.
• Farber, H., Herbst, D., Naidu S. and Kuziemko I., (2021) “Unions and Inequality in the 20th Century: New Evidence From Survey Data”, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 136, Issue 3, Pages 1325–1385.
• ***Jäger, S., Naidu S., and Schoefer B., (2025), “Collective Bargaining, Unions, and the Wage Structure: An International Perspective”, Hanbook of Labor Econmics

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11 Workweek regulations

• Carry, P., Montialoux C., Nimier-David, E., Roussille N., and Roulet A., “The Unequal Effects of Shorter Workweeks: Evidence from France’s 35-Hour Reform”, Working Paper.
• ***Gethin A. and Saez, E. “Global Working Hours” (2026), forthcoming Quarterly Journal of Economics.

12 Human capital development

• Gethin, A. (2025), “Distributional Growth Accounting: Education and the Reduction of Global Poverty, 1980-2019”, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 140(4), 2571–2618.
• Montialoux, C., Otero S., and Rocha R. (2026), “Equalizing the Great Equalizer: The Long-Run Consequences of School Funding Reforms”, Working Paper.

Evaluation :

.Students will be evaluated on the basis of three homework assignments.

• Evaluation: You will write a referee report on a research paper for each part of the class. This means that you must summarize and critically assess the contributions of a paper (that we will assign), analyzing its methodology and results. Each referee report cannot exceed 2000 words and counts for 1/3 of the final grade.
• Deadline: Each referee report is due within two weeks after ending a teacher’s block