Labor Markets
Together with collaborators Dr. Leif Jensen and Dr. Danielle Rhubart we examined a variety of ways in which labor markets are delineated in the United States. Under contract with the Economic Research Service of the USDA we delineated commuting zones based on 2010 data. More significantly, we noted in our review of the literature that there are a range of meanings people attribute to the idea of labor markets and that these different meanings suggest different ways of delineating them. We conducted an analysis of the quality of different delineations and devised a series of simple metrics that can be used to judge the quality of a particular delineation for use with a specific theoretical understanding of what a labor market is. Our hope is that future work using labor markets as the unit of observation will be informed by our analysis so that the observations will more closely match the theoretical ideal. The two papers published in this area and all of the delineations and generated metrics are available at https://sites.psu.edu/psucz/
School Attendance Boundaries
With Dr. Erica Frankenberg and collaborators at the Center for Education and Civil Rights (CECR we have undertaken a multi-year project to collect school attendance zone boundary maps for the period 1990 to 2020. We know that schools are more segregated than neighborhoods in the United States and we know that judicial rulings have left adjustment of school attendance zones as one of the only tools available to school districts to change the racial composition of their student bodies. Surprisingly, there is virtually no way to track boundary changes over time. This major data collection and digitization effort is funded by the National Science Foundation and Penn State’s Social Science Research Institute under the auspices of the Longitudinal School Attendance Boundaries Study (LSABS).
Redistricting
With Dr. Linda Fowler current research examines the possibilities of increasing representation for the people of Pennsylvania by introducing multi-member districts with ranked choice voting in future redistricting for the State and Congressional election districts. Outreach efforts in this area include an op-ed in the Washington post, and testimony in front of the PA House Government Committee.
Uncertainty in Metrpolitan/Micropolitan/Nonmetropolitan and RUCA definitions
With John Cromartie at USDA ERS we examine the stability of federal delineations for counties and tracts used to assign places to metropolitan and rural status. The delineations are based, in part, on estimates of commuting flows from the ACS and those estimates can have very high margins of error. We explored the impact of this uncertainty on the delineations and found them to be mostly stable with some exceptions. We also provide code for replicating the metro and RUCA definitions which may prove useful as the new definitions are announced in June 2023. Full version of record is here , accepted manuscript is here, and the git repository with all code necessary for replication of our results is here.