National Bureau of Economic Research

While low socioeconomic status is well known to be associated with heightened mortality risk, little is known about the mortality rate of the most disadvantaged segment of the US population, people experiencing homelessness. In Life and Death at the Margins of Society: The Mortality of the US Homeless Population (NBER Working Paper 31843), Bruce D. Meyer, Angela Wyse, and Ilina Logani illustrate the stark health disparities associated with homelessness.

The researchers follow 140,000 people recorded as sheltered and unsheltered homeless during the 2010 Census through 2022, tracking all-cause mortality using administrative data from the Social Security Administration (SSA). They compare homeless individuals’ mortality risk to that of a representative...

Over the past 25 years, labor force participation at older ages has increased dramatically. In the 12 countries that are part of the NBER’s International Social Security (ISS) project, participation among those aged 60 to 64 has risen by an average of over 20 percentage points for men and over 25 percentage points for women.

In The Effects of Reforms on Retirement Behavior: Introduction and Summary (NBER Working Paper 31979), authors Axel Börsch-Supan and Courtney Coile report on the most recent work of the ISS project. The current analysis builds on previous project phases which showed that changes in health and education could…

Segregation based on race and income is a defining feature of cities and schools across the United States. While Black Americans make up less than 14 percent of the overall population, the typical Black child lives in a neighborhood where Black families make up the majority of residents and attends a school where at least half their peers are also Black. These neighborhoods and schools also tend to have relatively high rates of poverty.

Theory posits that segregation in terms of neighborhoods and schools plays important roles in understanding poverty for disadvantaged Black communities. This segregation may also shape the development of White residents’ attitudes, behaviors, and outcomes...

Access to a high-speed internet connection provides patients with a low-cost means of collecting information related to medical decisions and the quality of medical care providers. In Broadband Internet Access and Health Outcomes: Patient and Provider Responses in Medicare (NBER Working Paper 31579), Jessica Van Parys and Zach Y. Brown link information on broadband availability by ZIP code from the Federal Communications Commission to Medicare claims data from 1999 to 2008. They analyze the effect of high-speed internet access on health outcomes and provider choices for Medicare beneficiaries who are undergoing common procedures.

Private equity (PE) firms’ business model is to acquire privately held companies, to change their strategy and operations with the goal of improving profitability and growth, and ultimately to sell the companies for a profit. The senior management team is replaced at a majority of private equity acquisitions. More than 40 percent of PE firms report that this is a key way to improve their acquisitions’ success.

In The Market for CEOs: Evidence from Private Equity (NBER Working Paper 30899), Paul Gompers, Steven Kaplan, and Vladimir Mukharlyamov compare the characteristics of CEOs installed by PE firms to the characteristics of those who become...