Home Equity Lending and Retail Spending: Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Texas
利用1997年德克萨斯州放宽房屋净值贷款限制的自然实验，研究发现该政策显著提升了县级和州级零售销售额，支持了信贷约束假说。
We estimate how spending in Texas responded to a 1997 constitutional amendment that relaxed severe restrictions on home equity lending. We use this event as a natural experiment to estimate the importance of credit constraints. If households are credit-constrained, such an increase in credit availability will increase their spending. We find that Texas retail sales at the county and state levels increased significantly after the amendment, lending support to the credit-constraint hypothesis. We confirm these findings and refine our interpretation of the estimated aggregate-level responses using household-level data on home equity loans.