My current research on labor economics focuses on the consequences of cognitive and noncognitive ability for labor market outcomes.

My second main field of inquiry is service contracting in the public sector. In particular, I have studied the consequences of contracting out residential youth care to private providers.

Political economics is another area of interest, where I have studied how political polarization affects economic outcomes, and how people’s identity choices interacts with preferences for redistribution.

I have also contributed to a number of papers based on historical Swedish data on the causes and consequences of childbirth.

Publications

 "Is There an Adverse Effect of Sons on Maternal Longevity?" (with David Cesarini and Björn Wallace), Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 2009; 276(1664): 2081-2084.

 "Does Parental Age Difference Affect Offspring Count in Humans? Comment on Fieder and Huber" (with David Cesarini and Björn Wallace), Biology Letters, 2008; 4(1): 78-79.

 "Maternal Longevity and the Sex of Offspring in Pre-Industrial Sweden" (with David Cesarini and Björn Wallace), Annals of Human Biology, 2007; 34(5): 535-546.

 Essays on Privatization, Identity and Political Polarization, Ph.D. Dissertation, Stockholm School of Economics, 2007. 
 

Working Papers 

 "The Labor Market Returns to Cognitive and Noncognitive Ability: Evidence from the Swedish Enlistment" (with Roine Vestman), IFN Working Paper No. 794.

 "Privatization of Credence Goods: Theory and an Application to Residential Youth Care", IFN Working Paper No. 750. Won a Young Economist Award at the European Economic Association annual meeting 2008.

 "Political Polarization and the Size of Government" (with Robert Östling), IFN Working Paper No. 749.

 "Will Privatization Reduce Costs?", IFN Working Paper No. 736. 

 "Identity and Redistribution" (with Robert Östling), IFN Working Paper No. 735.