- Speaker
- Date
- Monday 6 Nov 2023, 11:30 - 12:30
- Type
- Seminar
- Room
- 3-18
- Building
- Polak Building
Over the last several decades, there has been a large increase in asset valuations across many asset classes. While these rising valuations had important effects on the distribution of wealth, little is known regarding their effect on the distribution of welfare.
To make progress on this question, we develop a sufficient statistic for the money-metric welfare effect of deviations in asset valuations (i.e., changes in asset prices keeping cash flows fixed). This welfare effect depends on the present value of an individual’s net asset sales rather than asset holdings: higher asset valuations benefit prospective sellers and harm prospective buyers. We estimate this quantity using panel microdata covering the universe of financial transactions in Norway from 1994 to 2019. We find that the rise in asset valuations had large redistributive effects: it redistributed from the young towards the old and from the poor towards the wealthy.
About Benjamin
My work seeks to advance two core research agendas. The first addresses one of the longest-standing questions in economics: “Why are some countries so much poorer than others?” The second is to understand how the enormous heterogeneity observed at the micro level, and in particular, the vast disparities in income and wealth, impact the macroeconomy and macroeconomic policy. My work approaches these questions with a mix of theory and empirics.
Link to paper
Registration for bilateral, lunch or dinner
If you would like to meet the guest speaker for a bilateral or join for lunch. Ben has to leave on Monday afternoon so there will be no dinner on that day and bilaterals will also be scheduled before the seminar.
Please register by filling in the registration form.
