Zach Freitas-Groff

Welcome! I am a PhD candidate in Economics at Stanford University.

My fields are public economics, political economy, and behavioral/experimental economics. I use a mix of applied, experimental, and historical methods. My primary current research interest is the impact of policies on future generations, and I have an additional interest in the economics of animal welfare. These interests have led me to work on long-term political dynamics and social preferences.

zgroff@stanford.edu | 579 Serra Mall, Stanford, CA 94305-6072

DISSERTATION COMMITTEE

Prof. B. Douglas Bernheim (Primary)
Economics Department, Stanford University
650-725-8732
‍bernheim@stanford.edu

Prof. Matthew Gentzkow
Economics Department, Stanford University
650-721-8375
‍gentzkow@stanford.edu

Prof. Caroline Hoxby
Economics Department, Stanford University
650-723-7075
‍choxby@stanford.edu

Prof. Ran Abramitzky
Economics Department, Stanford University
650-723-9276
‍ranabr@stanford.edu

Working Papers

[Job Market Paper] Persistence in Policy: Evidence from Close Votes

+/- Abstract

PDF

Policy choices sometimes appear stubbornly persistent, even when they become politically unpopular or economically damaging. This paper offers the first systematic empirical investigation of how persistent policy choices are, defined as whether an electorate’s or legislature’s decisions affect whether a policy is in place decades later. I create a new dataset that tracks the historical record of more than 800 policies that were the subjects of close U.S. state referendums since 1900. In a regression discontinuity design, I estimate that passing a referendum increases the chance a corresponding policy is operative 20, 40, or even 100 years later by over 40 percentage points. I collect additional data on U.S. Congressional legislation and international referendums and use existing data on state legislation to document similar policy persistence for a range of institutional environments, cultures, and topics. I develop a theoretical model to distinguish between possible causes of persistence, and I present evidence that persistence arises because policies' salience systematically declines over time. Calibrating my model suggests that many policies remain in place—or not—regardless of popular support.

Paying It Forward (and Back): An Experiment on Sequential Giving
with Ben Grodeck, Oliver Hauser, and Johannes Lohse
+/- Abstract
|
PDF
Within both families and states, important policies involve pay-it-forward schemes where one cohort invests in the next cohort (e.g., via education), sometimes with an expectation of a future reward (e.g., retirement support). We study whether altruism, reciprocity, social information, or self-interested equilibriums can sustain forward transfers in an experimental setting. A sequence of players choose whether to allocate some of an endowment to be multiplied and given to a future, prior, or contemporary player. By varying the option set and the information set, we can separate possible mechanisms for sustaining investment in the future.We find that the ability to give back increases the willingness to give forward, but a social preference for reciprocity rather than individual rationality drives the result.

The Effects of Large Group Meetings on the Spread of COVID-19: The Case of Trump Rallies
with B. Douglas Bernheim, Nina Buchmann, Sebastián Otero
+/- Abstract
|
PDF
We investigate the effects of large group meetings on the spread of COVID-19 by studying the impact of eighteen Trump campaign rallies. To capture the effects of subsequent contagion within the pertinent communities, our analysis encompasses up to ten post-rally weeks for each event. Our method is based on a collection of regression models, one for each event, that capture the relationships between post-event outcomes and pre-event characteristics, including demographics and the trajectory of COVID-19 cases, in similar counties. We explore a total of 24 procedures for identifying sets of matched counties. For the vast majority of these variants, our estimate of the average treatment effect across the eighteen events implies that they increased subsequent confirmed cases of COVID-19 by more than 250 per 100,000 residents. Extrapolating this figure to the entire sample, we conclude that these eighteen rallies ultimately resulted in more than 30,000 incremental confirmed cases of COVID-19. Applying county-specific post-event death rates, we conclude that the rallies likely led to more than 700 deaths (not necessarily among attendees).

Work in Progress

Positive Time Preference and Intergenerational Equity
+/- Abstract
|
Slides
In an incentivized survey experiment, respondents allocate resources over time for other people in different age cohorts. In incentivized scenarios, respondents choose how many meals to the homeless and how much clean water gets donated now or in twenty years. I use these choices to estimate a social discount rate consistent with respondents' choices, which is modestly negative and indicates little preference for earlier compared to later generations. To better understand the shape of respondents' intergenerational equity views, I present respondents with a series of choices about how to allocate consumption across two time periods for themselves, another person or for two different people, one early and one late. Respondents' decisions indicate indifference between giving a dollar to an early person and a dollar for a later person but strongly prefer a dollar earlier for themselves or another person. Additional decisions show that people systematically ignore certain efficiency considerations when thinking about intergenerational equity, behaving in a manner inconsistent with conventional approaches to intertemporal social welfare.
Interventionist Preferences and the Welfare State: The Case of In-Kind Nutrition Assistance
with Sandro Ambuehl, B. Douglas Bernheim, and Tony Fan
+/- Abstract
|
Slides
Poverty assistance is often administered in-kind even though cash transfers might raise recipients’ welfare more effectively. We characterize the political economy constraint that paternalistic motives impose on the welfare system. In our experiment, a representative sample of U.S. citizens reveal their motives by deciding whether to constrain real U.S. food stamp recipients’ choices between in-kind donations and cash equivalents we disburse. The modal respondent (40%) imposes the strictest possible constraints, while 30% impose no constraints. Hence the majority’s behavior is consistent with deontological motives rather than trade-off thinking. Yet, because of biased beliefs about recipient preferences, respondents underestimate the restrictiveness of their interventions, suggesting that they are partly misguided. When respondents decide between restricting recipients whom they believed should be restricted and giving choice to those whom they believe should have choice, they place substantially more weight on the former motive, which, too, tends to increase the severity of restrictions. Overall, respondents’ goal is not to ensure sufficient healthy nutrition, but to prevent consumption of items deemed inappropriate. While respondents reveal racial and gender stereotypes in various survey questions, neither donor nor recipient demographics have substantial effects on restriction decisions, though restrictions increase with respondents’ political conservatism. In-experiment behavior correlates strongly with views about government policy.
The Inelasticity of Meat Consumption?
with Carl Meyer
+/- Abstract
|
Slides
The past decades have seen a number of new policies and food technology businesses concerned with alleviating animal welfare or environmental impacts of animal agriculture. We study whether there is evident that social changes are driving a change in consumer behavior by examining real grocery purchases matched with machine-scanned label data. We find that meat consumption has been at its highest in recent years, consistent with prior observations, but we offer the first observational evidence that a growing share of the population is purchasing fewer or no meat and other animal products. As partial evidence that meat consumption may be less deep-seated than some argue, we examine people who move to show that consumption of animal products quickly shifts toward behavior typical of the destination region, even after controlling for price. We finally examine potential causes of this change and show that while more consumers are buying newly available substitutes, this is too small a share of the population to account for the bulk of the recent change in behavior.

Working Papers

Work in Progress

Publications