University of Toronto
Research
Job Market Paper
Public Transit, Residential Sorting and Labor Supply: Evidence and Theory from Lahore’s Bus Rapid Transit System.
Public transit can transform how people live and work, yet its distributional effects remain unclear, particularly in developing cities where most households rely on low-quality transit. This paper studies the establishment of the Lahore Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system to examine how mass transit reshapes residential sorting and household labor supply. Using a novel geo-spatial dataset,and exploiting the staggered roll-out of the planned BRT lines, I show that younger, nuclear, non-college-educated households relocate closer to BRT corridors, with greater labor force participation of men in these households. Women’s labor market participation, however, remains largely unchanged—consistent with tied-mover dynamics. To interpret these patterns, I build a spatial model that incorporates gender specific constraints, age-based mobility, and endogenous amenities and provides a framework for evaluating the distributional welfare consequences of transit infrastructure in developing-country contexts.
Working Papers
Cash Transfers, Social Norms and Married Women’s Labor Supply: Evidence from the Benazir Income Support Program
Abstract: This paper uses the introduction of the Benazir Income Support Program in Pakistan to study the impact of unconditional cash transfers on married women's labor supply. Using a fuzzy regression discontinuity design, the paper provides evidence of a positive, significant impact of the transfer on the labor supply of married women without children, but no significant impact on the labor supply of married women with children. These findings are at odds with standard household labor supply models that predict a negative impact of unearned income on labor supply. Instead, I argue, that they are in keeping with models in which gender norms restrict women's ability to enter the workforce. Cash transfers can increase female bargaining power and help them overcome restrictive norms. The paper finds evidence for this: the transfer significantly increases women's control over household funds and their mobility outside the home. Further, dividing households into more or less constrained in terms of the gap between male and female attitudes towards female labor force participation, it finds an increase in labor supply for more constrained households and no impact for less constrained households. These findings, however, are only evident five years into the program. Data concerns makes it difficult to determine whether this is a dynamic effect or an issue of selection. The paper deals extensively with this concern, providing suggestive evidence for the former.
Brides or Breadwinners? Labor versus Marriage Market Returns to Female Education: Evidence from Pakistan
Abstract:This paper studies the long-run impacts of a large-scale female education stipend program in Pakistan on women’s labor market and marriage outcomes. Using variation in exposure across birth cohorts and districts in a cohort-based difference-in-differences framework, I find that the program significantly increases female educational attainment but does not lead to higher labor force participation or wages. Instead, education reduces unpaid family work and slightly increases self-employment. In contrast, the effects on the marriage market are substantial: exposed women are more likely to be married, match with more educated spouses, and experience improved fertility outcomes, including fewer children and greater birth spacing. The decline in labor supply is concentrated among married women, with no effects among unmarried women, suggesting that the returns to education are realized primarily through improved marital matches rather than direct labor market engagement. These findings highlight how, in settings with low female labor force participation and binding social constraints, investments in education may operate through household formation and intra-household dynamics rather than increasing women’s participation in the workforce.