About
I am a Ph.D. candidate in Economics at Northeastern University, working in development, labor, and public economics. I study how access to finance and the design of public programs shape health, work, and effort.
My job market paper shows that the expansion of mobile money in Kenya reduced infant mortality, as easier access to funds let mothers deliver in health facilities and begin antenatal care earlier. My other work examines how the implicit tax built into public housing rent rules affects employment, and how pension reforms change the on-the-job performance of police officers.
Before my Ph.D., I was an instructor of record at Baze University in Abuja, Nigeria, teaching undergraduate courses in statistics, macroeconomics, and mathematics for economists, supported by a Returning Experts Grant from the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ). I hold an M.Sc. in Economics from the University of Hamburg and a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from the University of Ghana.
- Development Economics
- Labor Economics
- Public Economics
Research
Job Market Paper
Digital Financial Inclusion and Infant Health: Evidence from Mobile Money Expansion in Kenya
Expanding mobile money agent density by the average within-county increase lowers infant mortality by 0.43 percentage points, or 11 percent of the sample mean.
Can digital financial services improve infant health where households face severe liquidity constraints? I study the rapid expansion of mobile money agents in Kenya. Combining administrative data on agent locations with retrospective birth histories, I compare siblings born to the same mother under different levels of local mobile money access, and complement this with an instrumental-variables strategy based on proximity to early adoption hubs. Greater mobile money access substantially reduces infant mortality, with the largest effects where initial access is low. The mechanism is better maternal care: mothers shift from home to institutional delivery and begin antenatal care earlier, while free inputs such as vaccinations and maternal labor supply are unchanged. Digital financial inclusion can improve early-life health by relaxing short-run financial barriers to health care.
Working Paper
Implicit Taxation and Labor Supply: Evidence from Public Housing Rent Reforms
Public housing rent is set at 30 percent of household income, a 30 percent tax on additional earnings. The Quality Housing and Work Responsibility Act of 1998 let residents pay a flat rent instead, removing this tax for those earning enough to switch. Using the 1996 Survey of Income and Program Participation linked to HUD Fair Market Rents, I study whether this option increased employment. I first show that the reform's reach was narrow: based on household income, 18.8 percent of residents could gain from flat rent, almost all in households with a second earner. I then estimate employment effects using two designs: a comparison of high earners in low-rent and high-rent metropolitan areas, and a continuous measure of each household's potential saving from flat rent. The results inform the design of work incentives in means-tested housing assistance.
Working Paper
Deferred Compensation and On-the-Job Performance: Evidence from Police Productivity
How do pension reforms affect on-the-job productivity in the public sector? I exploit staggered changes in state pension rules in the United States and measure police productivity using arrest data from the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports. Using a stacked difference-in-differences design, I find little change in overall arrest activity in the short run, but meaningful differences across enforcement margins: violent crime arrests remain largely unchanged, while drug and property crime arrests and arrests per capita decline. Pension reforms appear to reduce policing intensity and shift effort away from more discretionary enforcement, while leaving core public safety functions intact. Changes in deferred compensation can shape not only labor supply but also on-the-job performance where effort is hard to monitor.