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Vita
EmailMelissa Kearney
Associate Professor of Economics
Biography
Melissa S. Kearney is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at the University of Maryland, where she has been on the faculty since 2006. She is a Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution for the 2013-14 academic year. She is a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and a Faculty Affiliate of the Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO). Professor Kearney received her PhD in Economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2002 and her BA from Princeton University in 1996. She studied on a National Science Graduate Research Fellowship and a Harry S Truman Scholarship. Past positions include Fellow at Brookings Institution and Assistant Professor at Wellesley College. Kearney's research focuses on issues of social policy, poverty, and inequality. She is particularly interested in the effect of government programs and economic conditions on the behaviors and outcomes of economically disadvantaged populations. She also has research interests in household decision-making with regard to risk and uncertainty, saving, and gambling. She teaches Public Economics at both the undergraduate and PhD level at the University of Maryland.
Areas of Interest:
poverty, inequality, government expenditure programs, children and families, economics of fertility, teen childbearing, individual decision-making with regard to risk, gambling, and savings behavior
Published Papers
| Date | Title |
|---|---|
| January 3, 2013 | Income Inequality and Early, Non-Marital Childbearing: An Economic Exploration of the "Culture of Despair" coauthored with Phil Levine (forthcoming, Journal of Human Resources) |
| March 3, 2012 | Why are teen birth rates so high in the U.S. and why does it matter? with Phil Levine Journal of Economic Perspectives 26(2), Spring 2012: 141-63. (Previously released as NBER working paper 17965, March 2012) |
| October 15, 2011 | Making Savers Winners: An Overview of Prize-Linked Savings Products Published in "Financial Literacy: Implications for Retirement Security and the Financial Marketplace," ed Olivia S. Mitchell and Annamaria Lusardi, Oxford University Press: 2011. |
| August 1, 2010 | Is Lottery Gambling Addictive? with Guryan, Jonathan American Economic Journal - Economic Policy, August 2010, 2(3). |
| March 1, 2010 | Product Recalls, Imperfect Information, and Spillover Effects: Lessons from the Consumer Response to the 2007 Toy Recalls with Seth Freedman; Mara Lederman Review of Economics and Statistics May 2012, Vol. 94, No. 2: 499–516. |
| November 1, 2009 | Reducing Unplanned Pregnancies through Medicaid Family Planning Services |
| October 1, 2009 | Subsidized Contraception, Fertility, and Sexual Behavior with Levine, Phil Review of Economics and Statistics, 2009 October 1: 91(1): 137. |
| September 1, 2008 | Teen Pregnancy Prevention as an Anti-Poverty Intervention: A Review of the Evidence Prepared for NBER conference volume “Targeting Investments in Children: Fighting Poverty when Resources Are Limited,” editors Phillip Levine and David Zimmerman |
| July 1, 2008 | Parental Education and Parental Time with Children with Hurst, Erik; Guryan, Jonathan Journal of Economic Perspectives 22(3), Summer 2008, 23-46 |
| May 1, 2008 | Trends in U.S. Wage Inequality: Re-Assessing the Revisionists with Autor, David; Katz, Larry Review of Economics and Statistics 90(2), May 2008, 300-323 |
| March 1, 2008 | Gambling at Lucky Stores: Evidence from State Lottery Sales with Guryan, Jonathan American Economic Review 98 (1), March 2008, 458-73 |
| January 1, 2008 | Socioeconomic Disadvantage and Early Childbearing with Levine, Phil An Economics Perspective on the Problems of Disadvantaged Youth, NBER conference volume, 2008 |
| September 1, 2007 | The Impact of Child SSI Enrollment on Household Outcomes: Evidence from the SIPP with Duggan, Mark Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, Fall, 2007, 861-886. |
| September 1, 2006 | Intergenerational Mobility for Women and Minorities in the United States Future of Children, Fall 2006 |
| May 1, 2006 | The Polarization of the U.S. Labor Market with Autor, David; Katz, Lawrence American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings, May 2006, 96(2). |
| June 1, 2005 | The Economic Winners and Losers of Legalized Gambling National Tax Journal, June 2005, 58: 281-302. |
| January 1, 2005 | State Lotteries and Consumer Behavior Journal of Public Economics, 2005, 89: 2269-2299. |
| January 1, 2004 | Is There an Effect of Incremental Welfare Benefits on Fertility Behavior? A Look at the Family Cap Journal of Human Resources, 2004, 39(2): 295-325. |
Working Papers
| Date | Title |
|---|---|
| June 6, 2013 | Do Lottery Payments Induce Savings Behavior? Evidence from the Lab joint with Emel Filiz-Ozbay, Kyle Hyndman, Jonathan Guryan, and Erkut Ozbay. under academic review |
| March 3, 2012 | Investigating Recent Trends in the U.S. Teen Birth Rate earlier version released as NBER working paper 17964 (coauthored with Phil Levine) |
| September 28, 2011 | House Prices and Birth Rates: The Impact of the Real Estate Market on the Decision to Have a Baby coauthored with Lisa Dettling (Revise and resubmit, Journal of Public Economics) |
| September 1, 2008 | Rising Wage Inequality: The Role of Composition and Prices with Autor, David; Katz, Larry NBER working paper 11628 |
| -- | Estimating Preferences Under Risk: The Case of State Lottery Bettors Ph.D. thesis, MIT Department of Economics |
Teaching - Spring 2013
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 454: Public Finance and Public Policy |  |
|
| ECON 752: Graduate Public Economics II | |
Teaching - Fall 2012
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 454: Public Finance and Public Policy | |
Teaching - Spring 2012
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 397: Honors Thesis |
Teaching - Fall 2011
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 396: Independent Honors Study | |
Teaching - Spring 2011
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 454: Public Finance and Public Policy | |
|
| ECON 752: Graduate Public Economics II | |
Teaching - Spring 2010
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 454: Public Finance and Public Policy | |
Teaching - Fall 2009
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 326: Intermediate Microeconomic Analysis | ||
| ECON 878: Workshop in Labor Economics |
Teaching - Spring 2009
| Course | Syllabus | WWW |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 752: Graduate Public Economics II | |
3115L Tydings Hall
Department of Economics
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742
Phone: 301-405-6202
Office Hours:
Thursday
10:30 am-12:30 pm