Aapo Stenhammar

Assistant Professor · University of Bonn · aapo.stenhammar [at] uni-bonn.de

I am an assistant professor at the Institute for Applied Microeconomics, Department of Economics, at the University of Bonn.

I am also a research fellow at the at Labour Institute for Economic Research LABORE in Helsinki, Finland.

I received my PhD in Economics at the Aalto University and Helsinki GSE. During my PhD I also visited UC Berkeley and the IIES at the Stockholm University.

My research focuses on the interaction of labor markets, public policy, and political responses. In my work, I also use machine learning methods to digitize archived documents and to use text and images in econometric analysis.

You can download my cv here.

Fields: Labor Economics, Economic History, Political Economy

Research

Working Papers

Tensions of Structural Change: Evidence from Finland's Field Reservation Policy

Abstract (click to expand)

While structural transformation is vital for economic development, it often counters resistance. To shed light on the tension between the political and economic effects of structural change, I study the field reservation policy that paid farmers to not farm in 1970s Finland. Using over 290,000 newly digitized Agricultural Census forms linked to rich register data, I find that the policy led to farm closures but did not affect farmers' income or geographical mobility. However, it had an important intergenerational effect. Children of the most affected farmers had 2.7\% higher earnings and were more likely to work in office and managerial positions. Surprisingly, the positive effects on income are predominantly driven by children with lower cognitive skills. Despite the economic benefits, the policy faced a political backlash contributing to the rise of a populist rural party. I provide evidence for two separate explanations for this political reaction: identity-based backlash by offended farmers and negative externalities arising from field reservation.

New Evidence on the Effect of Technology on Employment and Skill Demand

with Joonas Tuhkuri (Stockholm U) and Johannes Hirvonen (Northwestern).

Reject and Resubmit from the Quarterly Journal of Economics.

Abstract (click to expand)

We present novel evidence on the effects of advanced technologies on employment, skill demand, and firm performance. The main finding is that advanced technologies led to increases in employment and no change in skill composition. Our main research design focuses on a technology subsidy program in Finland that induced sharp increases in technology investment in manufacturing firms. Our data directly measure multiple technologies and skills and track firms and workers over time. We demonstrate novel text analysis and machine learning methods to perform matching and to measure specific technological changes. To understand our findings, we outline a theoretical framework that contrasts two types of technological change: process versus product. We document that the firms used new technologies to produce new types of output rather than replace workers with technologies within the same type of production. The results contrast with the ideas that technologies necessarily replace workers or are skill biased.

Online Appendix

Work in Progress

Opening Borders: Self-Selection and Economic Outcomes of Migration During the EU Enlargement

with Matti Sarvimäki and Jaan Masso

Publications in Finnish

Yksilöllistettyä opetusta ennustavat tekijät ja suhteellisen iän vaikutus erityisopetuksessa (paper)

with Markku Jahnukainen and Mika Kortelainen