Targeting In-Kind Transfers through Market Design: A Revealed Preference Analysis of Public Housing Allocation
利用马萨诸塞州剑桥市的等待名单数据，估计公共住房偏好模型，发现取消选择权虽能改善定向分配，但会使租户福利下降超过30%，仅当社会有强烈再分配偏好时才合理。
Public housing benefits are rationed through wait lists. Theoretical work on public housing allocation has debated how much choice applicants should have over units, identifying a possible trade-off between efficiency and redistribution. This paper empirically establishes the existence and economic importance of this trade-off using wait list data from Cambridge, Massachusetts. I estimate a model of public housing preferences in a setting where heterogeneous apartments are rationed through waiting time. Eliminating choice would improve targeting but reduce tenant welfare by more than 30 percent. Such a change is only justified on targeting grounds by a strong social preference for redistribution.