This paper examines how divorce laws affect couples' intertemporal choices and well-being. Exploiting panel variation in US laws, I estimate the parameters of a model of household decision-making. Household survey data indicate that the introduction of unilateral divorce in states that imposed an equal division of property is associated with higher household savings and lower female employment, implying a distortion in household assets accumulation and a transfer toward wives whose share in household resources is smaller than the one of their husband. When spouses share consumption equally, separate property or prenuptial agreements can reduce distortions and increase equity.

Compulsory licensing allows firms in developing countries to produce foreign-owned inventions without the consent of foreign patent owners. This paper uses an exogenous event of compulsory licensing after World War I under the Trading with the Enemy Act to examine the effects of compulsory licensing on domestic invention. Difference-in-differences analyses of nearly 130,000 chemical inventions suggest that compulsory licensing increased domestic invention by 20 percent.

Historical accounts suggest that Jewish migrs from Nazi Germany revolutionized U.S. science. To analyze the migrs' effects on chemical innovation in the U.S. we compare changes in patenting by U.S. inventors in research fields of migrs with fields of other German chemists. Patenting by U.S. inventors increased by 31 percent in migr fields. Regressions that instrument for migr fields with pre-1933 fields of dismissed German chemists confirm a substantial increase in U.S. invention. Inventorlevel data indicate that migrs encouraged innovation by attracting new researchers to their fields, rather than by increasing the productivity of incumbent inventors.

Maternal mortality remains very high in many parts of the developing world, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. While maternal deaths are observable, it may not be straightforward for individuals to learn about risk factors. This paper utilizes novel data on male and female perceptions of maternal risk in Zambia to document that superstitions about causes of maternal mortality are pervasive and to uncover evidence that such beliefs impede learning about maternal health risk levels and correlates. In our data, people who hold traditional beliefs disregard past birth complications completely in assessing future risk, unlike those who hold modern beliefs.