Loren Brandt | Macro Paper Warehouse

Distortions, Producer Dynamics, and Aggregate Productivity: A General Equilibrium Analysis

Thu, 01 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

This paper asks how institutional distortions to factor markets affect not only the static allocation of inputs across farms but also the dynamic choices — crop selection and productivity-enhancing investment — that determine the long-run distribution of farm productivities and hence aggregate agricultural TFP. The question matters because prior work on misallocation has largely treated the productivity distribution as exogenous; this paper endogenizes it, showing that the dynamic channels can be quantitatively larger than the static factor-misallocation channel.

Serial Entrepreneurship in China

Thu, 01 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

This paper studies entrepreneurship and new firm creation in China through the lens of serial entrepreneurs (SEs) — individuals who establish more than one firm — contrasting them with non-serial entrepreneurs (Non-SEs). The central question is whether serial entrepreneurs are selected on persistent productive skill or on non-skill advantages such as preferential access to finance, because the two mechanisms have opposite implications for resource allocation: skill-driven serial entrepreneurship raises aggregate productivity, while favoritism-driven serial entrepreneurship generates misallocation.