Economics Amplified: Building Policy Beyond Best Intentions

UChicago Economics Events and Conversations

Amanda Agan is interested in the ways that laws and regulations play out in the real world, often yielding unintended consequences. She visited the institute this spring and spoke about her recent work to evaluate policies that eliminate questions about previous criminal convictions from job applications Advocates of these “Ban the Box” policies have argued that these laws could increase employment for minorities, but some economic theories imply that they could have negative consequences for minorities without records. Agan and her coauthors designed a field experiment to see if the policy performs as intended.