NBER Publications by Geert Ridder

In this paper we nonparametrically analyze the effects of reallocating individuals across social groups in the presence of social spillovers. Individuals are either 'high' or 'low' types. Own outcomes may vary with the fraction of high types in one's social group. We characterize the average outcome and inequality effects of small increases in segregation by type. We also provide a measure of average spillover strength. We generalize the setup used by Benabou (1996) and others to study sorting in the presence of social spillovers by incorporating unobserved individual- and group-level heterogeneity. We relate our reallocation estimands to this theory. For each estimand we provide conditions for nonparametric identification, propose estimators, and characterize their large sample properties...

This paper presents methods for evaluating the effects of reallocating an indivisible input across production units, taking into account resource constraints by keeping the marginal distribution of the input fixed. When the production technology is nonseparable, such reallocations, although leaving the marginal distribution of the reallocated input unchanged by construction, may nonetheless alter average output. Examples include reallocations of teachers across classrooms composed of students of varying mean ability. We focus on the effects of reallocating one input, while holding the assignment of another, potentially complementary, input fixed. We introduce a class of such reallocations -- correlated matching rules -- that includes the status quo allocation, a random allocation, and bot...