Benjamin Faber

June 2025, with Dennis Egger (Oxford), Ming Li (CUHK Shenzhen) and Wei Lin (CUHK Shenzhen)

Research question: Do reductions in barriers to rural-urban migration affect flows of trade and investment, and what is their incidence in spatial equilibrium?

July 2024, with Marco Badilla (UC Berkeley), Antoine Levy (UC Berkeley) and Mathilde Muñoz (UC Berkeley)

Research question: Can lagging regions foster economic development by attracting mobile seniors? Do migration flows after retirement reduce or reinforce the concentration of economic activity in space?

March 2025, with Alonso Alfaro-Urena (Banco Central de Costa Rica), Cecile Gaubert (UC Berkeley), Isabela Manelici (LSE) and Jose Pablo Vasquez (LSE)

Revise and resubmit at American Economic Review

Links to: Recording (Nov 2022), NBER Working Paper, CEPR Discussion Paper, Article at VoxDev.org, Article at VoxEU.org, Featured in WTO World Trade Report 2024

Research question: What are the average and distributional implications of "Responsible Sourcing" policies by multinationals in host countries?

April 2025, with Lauren Bergquist (Yale), Thibault Fally (UC Berkeley), Matthias Hoelzlein (Notre Dame), Ted Miguel (UC Berkeley) and Andres Rodriguez-Clare (UC Berkeley)

Revise and resubmit at Econometrica

Links to: NBER Working Paper, CEPR Discussion Paper, Article at VoxEU.org, Article at VoxDev.org

Research question: We develop and quantify a rich but tractable GE model to explore the average and distributional implications of scaling up local policy interventions in agriculture.

The Gains from Online Integration, with Victor Couture (UBC), Cecile Gaubert (UC Berkeley), Yizhen Gu (Peking University), Ming Li (CUHK) and Wei Lin (CUHK)

Research question: What are the local and aggregate effects of the spread of broadband and mobile internet in China over the past decades?

The Data Revolution in International Trade, with David Atkin (MIT)

In preparation for the Journal of Economic Literature

July 2023, with David Atkin (MIT), Thibault Fally (UC Berkeley) and Marco Gonzalez-Navarro (UC Berkeley)

Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2024, Vol. 139(1), pp. 419-475

Links to: Coding toolkit, NBER Working Paper, CEPR Discussion Paper

Research question: Measuring changes in household welfare requires a combination of detailed microdata that are seldomly available. We propose and implement a new approach using widely available expenditure survey microdata that is grounded in theory.

May 2021, with Thibault Fally (UC Berkeley)

Review of Economic Studies, 2022, Vol. 89(3), pp. 1420-1459

Links to: NBER Working Paper, CEPR Discussion Paper

Research question: A growing literature has documented the role of firm heterogeneity for income inequality. This paper explores the implications for household price indices.

July 2020, with Victor Couture (UBC), Yizhen Gu (Peking University) and Lizhi Liu (Georgetown)

American Economic Review: Insights, 2021, Vol. 3(1), pp. 35-50

Links to: NBER Working Paper, CEPR Discussion Paper, Article at VoxDev.org, Article at VoxChina.org, Featured in World Development Report 2020, Featured in AEA Research Highlights

Research question: To what extent and how does access to e-commerce trading reduce the rural-urban economic divide in developing countries?

May 2018, with Cecile Gaubert (UC Berkeley)

American Economic Review, 2019, Vol. 109(6), pp. 2245-93

Links to: NBER Working Paper, CEPR Discussion Paper, Article at VoxEU.org, Article at VoxDev.org, Article in Houston Chronicle, Featured in AEA Research Highlights

Research question: What are the long-term economic consequences of tourism in developing countries?

May 2016, with David Atkin (MIT) and Marco Gonzalez-Navarro (UC Berkeley)

Journal of Political Economy, 2018, Vol. 126(1), pp. 1-73 (Lead Article)

Links to: Recording (April 2015), NBER Working Paper, CEGA Working Paper, Article at VoxEU.org, IGC Blog, CEGA Research Brief, CATO Research Brief, Article at MicroeconomicInsights.org, Article at VoxDev.org, Featured in 2019 World Bank Global Investment Report

Research question: What are the implications of foreign retail entry for household welfare in developing countries?

February 2014, Online Appendix, Earlier version with counterfactual analysis

Review of Economic Studies, 2014, Vol. 81(3), pp. 1046-70

Links to: Article in The Economist

Research question: Are falling trade costs a force for the diffusion of production to peripheral regions or do they reinforce the concentration of production in space?

September 2024

Links to: Conference website, Session recording

Keynote at World Bank conference in DC.

May 2024, with Alonso Alfaro-Urena (Banco Central de Costa Rica), Cecile Gaubert (UC Berkeley), Isabela Manelici (LSE) and Jose Pablo Vasquez (LSE)

Links to: World Trade Report 2024

Research summary for the 2024 WTO World Trade Report: "Trade and inclusiveness: How to make trade work for all".

May 2017, with Benjamin Krause (UC Berkeley) and Raul Sanchez de la Sierra (Chicago Harris)

Links to: French version

Analysis of the context and trade-offs for Responsible Sourcing practices in the Copperbelt of the DR Congo.

July 2014

Research question: What is the effect of developing country trade liberalization on the price of quality, and household cost of living across the income distribution?

September 2016, with Rosa Sanchis-Guarner (Imperial College) and Felix Weinhardt (Humboldt University Berlin)

Links to: NBER Working Paper

Research question: To what extent and how do ICT upgrades affect educational attainment?

Econ 140 Econometrics, undergraduate course, UC Berkeley, Spring 2023-ongoing

Effective Altruism, student-led undergraduate course, UC Berkeley, Fall 2019 (faculty sponsor)

Development Economics, graduate course, MIT, Fall 2017

Economic Development, undergraduate course, UC Berkeley, Spring 2016-2022

Macro Development, graduate course, UC Berkeley, Spring 2014-ongoing

International Trade, graduate course, UC Berkeley, Fall 2013-ongoing

NBER East Asia Seminar on Economics (EASE) (2024-ongoing)

Links to: EASE 2024 in Hong Kong, EASE 2025 in Sydney, EASE 2026 in Beijing (upcoming)

Berkeley International Econ Seminar (Spring 2020-ongoing)

Links to: Schedule

Berkeley Development Seminar (Spring 2014-ongoing)

Links to: Schedule

Trade Work in Progress Seminar (Fall 2014-ongoing)

Berkeley Econ Summer Work in Progress Seminar (Summer 2014-2017)

West Coast Trade Workshop (Spring 2016)

Links to: Program

BREAD 27th Junior Pre-Conference (Summer 2014)

Links to: Program