Hector Blanco
@hectorblanco.bsky.social
970 followers 660 following 13 posts
Assistant Professor of Economics at Rutgers U. Research: Public, Urban, Housing. https://hector-blanco.github.io/
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hectorblanco.bsky.social
🚨 Excited to share that my work w/ @loreneri.bsky.social, “Knocking it Down and Mixing it Up: The Impact of Public Housing Regenerations” found a home at @restatjournal.bsky.social.

We study the impact of converting distressed public housing into mixed-income housing on local housing markets. 🧵👇1/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
A caveat of our results is that we focus on **highly localized** effects, where demand effects dominate, while regenerations may still contribute (albeit modestly) to city-wide affordability through broader supply effects. 9/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
Implications:
1️⃣ Conversion to mixed-income housing while preserving the public housing stock can mitigate the negative effects of traditional public housing on neighborhoods
2️⃣ By improving amenities, it can also make housing less affordable in the **very local** vicinity.
8/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
Interestingly, we find that regenerations that add more market-rate housing actually see larger local price increases. This suggests that (in our context) demand effects from incoming higher-income HHs outweigh local supply effects from additional market-rate units. 7/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
Mechanisms:
- Eyesore removal: half of price effects occur within 50m of walking distance.
- Socioeconomic shifts: higher-income HHs move in, no evidence of decrease in low-income HHs
- Crime: drops up to 8% near regenerations, can explain at most 1/3 of price increase
6/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
By comparing housing units near the regenerations to units located farther away, we show that:
- Prices (+14%) & rents (8%) go up substantially within 100m of regenerated estates
- Effects fade with distance and disappear beyond 300m.
5/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
Theory is ambiguous:
- Supply effect: more market-rate housing could lower nearby prices.
- Demand effect: removing an eyesore, attracting higher-income households, and reducing crime could raise them by improving amenities.
4/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
These regenerations on average roughly preserved the number of public housing units but added a similar number of market-rate units on-site (⬆️housing supply).

*Did this approach improve neighborhoods, and what happens to nearby house prices and rents?* 3/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
Like in the US, large public housing "estates" in the UK had been associated with poor conditions, high crime rates, and low housing values.

In response, London started a wave of estate "regenerations” in the 2000s, replacing old estates with new mixed-income developments. 2/9
hectorblanco.bsky.social
🚨 Excited to share that my work w/ @loreneri.bsky.social, “Knocking it Down and Mixing it Up: The Impact of Public Housing Regenerations” found a home at @restatjournal.bsky.social.

We study the impact of converting distressed public housing into mixed-income housing on local housing markets. 🧵👇1/9
Reposted by Hector Blanco
cesifo.org
CESifo @cesifo.org · May 21
🎓 Say hello to our newest network member, @hectorblanco.bsky.social from Rutgers University!

📈Learn more about his work in Public Economics and Urban Economics: hector-blanco.github.io
📑More Details: www.ifo.de/en/cesifo/ne...
Reposted by Hector Blanco
reddingecon.bsky.social
Call for papers for NBER-Sloan conference on Transport Networks and the Spatial Distribution of Economic Activity: www.princeton.edu/~reddings/Ca... Deadline: June 30, 2025. Organized with Myrto Kalouptsidi. @nber.org @treballen.bsky.social @jintlecon.bsky.social @indorgsociety.bsky.social
www.princeton.edu
hectorblanco.bsky.social
Next week, I will be in Munich visiting @cesifo.org (thank you for the opportunity!). If you are around and want to hang out, let me know!
Reposted by Hector Blanco
instrumenthull.bsky.social
📢New WP w/ @borusyak.bsky.social

We derive the most powerful recentered IVs for formula treatments & propose an algorithm for approximating them

This approach yields *huge* power gains, relative to conventional simulated IV, when estimating Medicaid crowdout effects

Check it out! t.co/UPg2XQBefN
Reposted by Hector Blanco
kylefbutts.bsky.social
Working on a new R package. Looking for applications that do two things:

1. DID with y to show an effect
2. DID with X to show a possible “mechanism” of why treatment changed y

This could be a published paper or a paper you're working on (that I might help make "fancier" / cooler !!)
Reposted by Hector Blanco
Reposted by Hector Blanco
ahlfeldt.bsky.social
🧑‍🎄time! Our @cepr_org @LSEGeography @CEP_LSE
DP #PrimeLocations is forthcoming at AER: Insights.🍾 Our🎁4u: PL shapefiles and employment by sector at micro-geographic grid-level for 381 MSAs and 125 global cities. All free to download from primelocations.ahlfeldt.com Use it wisely!😀
Reposted by Hector Blanco
jeffgortmaker.com
Happy to share that my and @cconlon.bsky.social's micro BLP paper was just accepted at the Journal of Econometrics! jeffgortmaker.com/files/Incorp...

It's our 2nd tied to our PyBLP software, so here's a thread on surprising (to me) benefits of combining methods research with open source work. 1/6
Reposted by Hector Blanco
jeffrlin.bsky.social
I’m recruiting a research assistant to work on projects spanning neighborhood change, housing investment, highways, and innovation. Starting Summer 2025 or earlier. GIS+coding experience preferred. Please mention in your cover letter if you’re specifically interested in working with me. Job posting:
Research Assistant/Sr. Research Assistant (Hybrid)
Company Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia Job Description Summary Research assistants (RAs) at the Philadelphia Fed play a key role in the Economic Research Department. Whether they are helping eco...
rb.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com
Reposted by Hector Blanco
henryoverman.bsky.social
Just under two weeks till the submission deadline for our @urbaneconomics.bsky.social Berlin conference. Please submit your papers or session proposals. Details here: urbaneconomics.org/meetings/emu... #EconConf
UEA 2025 Berlin
urbaneconomics.org
Reposted by Hector Blanco
paulgp.com
Man I cannot endorse this abstract more
Reposted by Hector Blanco
eldiario.es
Falta de vivienda pública en España: los inmuebles de las entidades públicas son solo el 1%: 257.000

Más de 1.152 organismos públicos tienen más de 10 viviendas

Pero solo una tiene más del 20%: ni Vivienda ni Hacienda han podido aclarar qué organismo posee 50.000 www.eldiario.es/economia/100...
Reposted by Hector Blanco
cbgoodman.co
If you want to download the 1990-2023 county-level Census Building Permits data...

(I'll probably have a blog post about this at some point)

h/t @kjhealy.co for the `rvest` code
R code to import all years of county-level building permit data and lightly clean
R code to import all years of county-level building permit data and lightly clean - permits-import.r
gist.github.com
hectorblanco.bsky.social
#SEA2024
hectorblanco.bsky.social
On my way to SEA. I am excited to present some joint work with Jaehee Song on discrimination in online rental markets. Lucky to be on a panel with such amazing researchers in this space. If you’re around, let’s catch up!
hectorblanco.bsky.social
On my way to SEA. I am excited to present some joint work with Jaehee Song on discrimination in online rental markets. Lucky to be on a panel with such amazing researchers in this space. If you’re around, let’s catch up!