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Working Paper
Modeling the Revolving Revolution: The Debt Collection Channel
We investigate the role of information technology (IT) in the collection of delinquent consumer debt. We argue that the widespread adoption of IT by the debt collection industry in the 1990s contributed to the observed expansion of unsecured risky lending such as credit cards. Our model stresses the importance of delinquency and private information about borrower solvency. The prevalence of delinquency implies that the costs of debt collection must be borne by lenders to sustain incentives to repay debt. IT mitigates informational asymmetries, allowing lenders to concentrate collection ...
Working Paper
The Effect of Minimum Wages on Consumer Bankruptcy
We use cross-state differences in minimum wage (MW) levels and county-level consumer bankruptcy rates from 1991-2017 to estimate the effect of changes in minimum wages on consumer bankruptcy by exploiting policy discontinuities at state borders. We find that Chapter 7 bankruptcy rates are significantly lower in counties belonging to states with higher MW compared to neighboring counties in the lower MW state: a 10 percent increase in MW decreases the bankruptcy rate by around 4 percent. Before the 2005 bankruptcy reform, this effect was almost twice as large as for the entire sample. ...