Brian Melzer's Home Page
Brian Melzer's Home Page
 | Brian Melzer PhD Candidate in Economics (Expected graduation June 2008) University of Chicago, Graduate School of Business bmelzer@chicagogsb.edu |
| Fields of Research and Teaching Interest: |
| Financial Institutions, applied microeconomics, corporate finance, household finance, urban economics |
| Job Market Paper: |
| "The Real Costs of Credit Access: Evidence from the Payday Lending Market" |
| ABSTRACT: I estimate the real effects of credit access among low-income households by exploiting geographic and temporal variation in the availability of payday loans. The empirical design isolates variation in loan access that is uninfluenced by store location decisions and state regulatory decisions, two factors that might otherwise correlate with economic hardship measures. I find no evidence that payday loans alleviate hardship. On the contrary, I find that loan access leads to increased incidence of difficulty paying mortgage, rent and utilities bills; moving out of one's home due to financial troubles; and delaying needed medical care, dental care and prescription drug purchases. Through further analysis of differences in loan access - over time and across income groups - I rule out a number of alternative explanations for the estimated effects. |
Dissertation Committee: Marianne Bertrand (co-chair), Toby Moskowitz (co-chair), Erik Hurst, Amir Sufi and Luigi Zingales