About Me

Email: pbutton AT tulane DOT edu

patrickbutton.youcanbook.me

Twitter: @ProfPButton

LinkedIn Google Scholar

RePEc ORCiD

Publons

ResearchGate (ungated papers)

NBER Working Papers

IZA Working Papers

I am an Associate Professor of Economics at Tulane University and the Executive Director

of The Connolly Alexander Institute for Data Science (formerly called The Data Hub: Tulane Center for Data Literacy.)

I am also a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a Research Affiliate at the IZA Institute of Labor Economics, and an invited researcher with

J-PAL North America.

I primarily research discrimination, focusing especially on age and disability, but also sexual orientation, gender identity, race, and ethnicity. I research discrimination two ways:

(1) I quantify discrimination using audit field experiments.

I previously studied hiring discrimination against older workers using resume experiments, where we applied for jobs as younger and older workers to study age discrimination in hiring. I am currently researching sexual orientation and race discrimination in access to mortgages, and gender identity, race, ethnicity, and health insurance status discrimination in access to mental healthcare appointments.

(2) I determine the effects of discrimination laws.

I use variation in time and across states in employment discrimination laws to see if these laws improve employment and hiring, primarily for older workers and individuals with disabilities. I also study how these discrimination laws affect Social Security Disability Insurance application.

In other research, I quantified the (lack of) economic impacts of tax incentives for the film industry, by comparing filming location choice, employment, and business growth in the film industry and related industries after states adopted these aggressive subsidies.

My research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Aging, the Sloan Foundation, the Social Security Administration, the Haynes Foundation, and the Borchard Center for Law and Aging, among others.

Home: About Me

Home: Research

Research

Topics: Research In Progress

Effects of Recessions and COVID-19 on Older Workers

Age Discrimination in Employment

Effects of Disability Employment Discrimination Laws

Other Research on Discrimination

Tax Incentives for the Film Industry

Notes: * = Student / post-doc co-author

Selected research presented below. For everything, please see my CV.

The links in paper titles go to the published work, which is often gated (requires payment or a subscription).

I provide links underneath each publication for free, ungated/pre-publication versions.

You can find all my ungated papers on ResearchGate as well. Email me if you can't find something.

In Progress

Fumarco, Luca,* Benjamin Harrell,* Patrick Button, David Schwegman, and E Dils*. 2023 “Gender Identity, Race, and Ethnicity Discrimination

in Access to Mental Healthcare: Evidence from an Audit Correspondence Field Experiment.” Revise and resubmit at the American Journal of Health Economics.

Button, Patrick, Barb Lundebjerg*, Yu Liu*, Luca Fumarco, Benjamin Harrell, and David Schwegman. “Discrimination in Access to Mental

Health Care: Evidence from an Audit Correspondence Field Experiment.” (Tentative title. This is a follow up to the above experiment.

We are putting the experiment into the field in June 2023.)

Button, Patrick, David Schwegman, Javiera Selman,* Tran Nguyen-Phuong*, and Cathy Balfe*. “Sexual Orientation and Racial Discrimination in

Mortgage Lending: An Audit Correspondence Field Experiment." (Experiment in the field May 2023. See Balfe et al., 2022 for the pilot study.)

Effects of Recessions and COVID-19 on Older Workers

Bui, Truc T. M.*, Patrick Button, and Elyce G. Picciotti*. 2020. "Early Evidence on the Impacts of COVID-19 and the Recession on Older

Workers." Public Policy & Aging Report, 30(4): 154-159. (Open Access)

Related: NBER Working Paper No. 27448.

Neumark, David and Patrick Button. 2014. “Did Age Discrimination Protections Help Older Workers Weather the Great Recession?” Journal

of Policy Analysis and Management, 33(3): 566-601.

Age Discrimination in Employment

Burn, Ian, Patrick Button, Luis Munguia Corella,* and David Neumark. 2022. "Older Workers Need Not Apply? Ageist Language in Job Ads

and Age Discrimination in Hiring." Journal of Labor Economics, 40(3): 613-67.

Button, Patrick, Mashfiqur Khan,* and Mary Penn*. 2022. "Do Stronger Employment Discrimination Protections Decrease Reliance on Social

Security Disability Insurance? Evidence from the Social Security Reforms." Journal of the Economics of Ageing, 22: 100370.

Burn, Ian, Patrick Button, Ted Figinski, and Joanne Song McLaughlin. 2020. "Why Retirement, Social Security, and Age Discrimination Policies

Need to Consider the Intersectional Experiences of Older Women." Public Policy & Aging Report, 30(3): 101-106. (Open Access)

Related: NBER Working Paper

Button, Patrick. 2020. “Population Aging, Age Discrimination, and Age Discrimination Protections at the 50th Anniversary of the Age

Discrimination in Employment Act.” In Czaja, Sara J., Joseph Sharit, and Jacquelyn James (Eds.). Current and Emerging Trends in Aging and Work. Springer: New York.

Neumark, David, Ian Burn, Patrick Button, and Nanneh Chehras. 2019. “Do State Laws Protecting Older Workers from Discrimination Reduce

Age Discrimination in Hiring? Evidence from a Field Experiment.” Journal of Law and Economics, 62(2): 373-402.

Neumark, David, Ian Burn, and Patrick Button. 2019. “Is it Harder for Older Workers to Find Jobs? New and Improved Evidence from a Field

Experiment.” Journal of Political Economy, 127(2): 922-970.

Neumark, David, Joanne Song, and Patrick Button. 2017. “Does Protecting Older Workers from Discrimination Make It Harder to Get Hired?

Evidence from Disability Discrimination Laws.” Research on Aging, 39(1): 29-63.

Neumark, David and Patrick Button. 2014. “Did Age Discrimination Protections Help Older Workers Weather the Great Recession?” Journal

of Policy Analysis and Management, 33(3): 566-601.

Effects of Disability Employment Discrimination Laws

Button, Patrick, Mashfiqur Khan,* and Mary Penn*. 2022. "Do Stronger Employment Discrimination Protections Decrease Reliance on Social

Security Disability Insurance? Evidence from the Social Security Reforms." Journal of the Economics of Ageing, 22: 100370.

Neumark, David, Ian Burn, Patrick Button, and Nanneh Chehras. 2019. “Do State Laws Protecting Older Workers from Discrimination Reduce

Age Discrimination in Hiring? Evidence from a Field Experiment.” Journal of Law and Economics, 62(2): 373-402.

Button, Patrick. 2018. “Expanding Employment Discrimination Protections for Individuals with Disabilities: Evidence from California.”

ILR Review, 71(2): 365-93.

Armour, Philip, Patrick Button, and Simon Hollands*. 2018. “Disability Saliency and Discrimination in Hiring.” AEA Papers and Proceedings,

108: 262-66.

Related: Pre-Publication Version

Neumark, David, Joanne Song, and Patrick Button. 2017. “Does Protecting Older Workers from Discrimination Make It Harder to Get Hired?

Evidence from Disability Discrimination Laws.” Research on Aging, 39(1): 29-63.

Other Research on Discrimination

Balfe, Cathy*, Patrick Button, Mary Penn*, and David Schwegman. 2022 “Infrequent Identity Signals and Detection Risks in Audit

Correspondence Studies.” Field Methods, 35(1): 3-17.

Button, Patrick, and Brigham Walker. 2020. “Employment Discrimination Against Indigenous Peoples in the United States: Evidence from a

Field Experiment.” Labour Economics 65(4): 101851.

Tax Incentives for the Film Industry

Button, Patrick. 2021. “Can Tax Incentives Create a Local Film Industry? Evidence from Louisiana and New Mexico.” Journal of Urban

Affairs, 43(5): 658-84.

Related: Pre-Publication Version

Button, Patrick. 2019. “Do Tax Incentives Affect Business Location and Economic Development? Evidence from State Film Incentives.”

Regional Science and Urban Economics, 77: 315-339.

In Progress

Recessions

Age Discrimination

Disability Discrimination

Other Discrimination

Film

Teaching

Urban Economics (ECON 3320)

Labor Economics (ECON 3810)

PhD Econometrics III (ECON 7175)

Economics of Discrimination
(ECON 4970/6970)

Urban economics studies how economics applies to geography, such as issues at regional or local levels. Topics covered include finding and using geographical data, crime, agglomeration, policing, racial bias, economic development incentives, housing, and neighborhood effects. Students will also learn the intuition behind how economists analyze policies or programs using statistical analysis. Syllabus

Labor economics studies labor markets. Topics covered include finding and using population and labor force data, labor supply, labor demand, economic models of the labor market, employment discrimination, and labor market policies (e.g., EITC, minimum wage). The course will also include a short introduction to using STATA to conduct research in labor economics. Students will also learn the intuition behind how economists analyze policies or programs using statistical analysis. Syllabus

Spring 2024

The course covers methodologies that would be in any empirical microeconomist's “toolbox”. These include regression control, instrumental variables, experiments, panel methods, difference-in-differences, and regression discontinuity design. The course will cover the basic theory, applications, and best practices. Students will put this into practice with actual data sets and applications, using STATA. Syllabus

This course provides an overview of how economists, and other social scientists, quantify discrimination in various markets or interactions (e.g., employment, housing, healthcare). The course focus on mentored data analysis assignments and a research project. Students may also have the opportunity to do paid work in my lab. Syllabus

Home: Teaching

Contact

6823 St. Charles Avenue, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118

pbutton AT tulane DOT edu

Home: Contact