CREAT: Census Research Exploration and Analysis Tool

Papers written by Author(s): 'Huiyu Li'

The following papers contain search terms that you selected. From the papers listed below, you can navigate to the PDF, the profile page for that working paper, or see all the working papers written by an author. You can also explore tags, keywords, and authors that occur frequently within these papers.
Click here to search again

Viewing papers 1 through 3 of 3


  • Working Paper

    Borrowing Constraints, Markups, and Misallocation

    December 2025

    Working Paper Number:

    CES-25-75

    We document new facts that link firms' markups to borrowing constraints: (1) less constrained firms within an industry have higher markups, especially in industries where assets are difficult to borrow against and firms rely more on earnings to borrow; (2) markup dispersion is also higher in industries where firms rely more on earnings to borrow. We explain these relationships using a standard Kimball demand model augmented with borrowing against assets and earnings. The key mechanism is a two-way feedback between markups and borrowing constraints. First, less constrained firms charge higher markups, as looser constraints allow them to attain larger market shares. Second, higher markups relax borrowing constraints when firms rely on earnings to borrow, as those with higher markups have higher earnings. This two-way feedback lowers TFP losses from markup dispersion, particularly when firms rely on earnings to borrow.
    View Full Paper PDF
  • Working Paper

    Entry Costs Rise with Growth

    October 2024

    Working Paper Number:

    CES-24-63

    Over time and across states in the U.S., the number of firms is more closely tied to overall employment than to output per worker. In many models of firm dynamics, trade, and growth with a free entry condition, these facts imply that the costs of creating a new firm increase sharply with productivity growth. This increase in entry costs can stem from the rising cost of labor used in entry and weak or negative knowledge spillovers from prior entry. Our findings suggest that productivity-enhancing policies will not induce firm entry, thereby limiting the total impact of such policies on welfare.
    View Full Paper PDF
  • Working Paper

    Missing Growth from Creative Destruction

    April 2018

    Working Paper Number:

    CES-18-18

    Statistical agencies typically impute inflation for disappearing products based on surviving products, which may result in overstated inflation and understated growth. Using U.S. Census data, we apply two ways of assessing the magnitude of 'missing growth' for private nonfarm businesses from 1983'2013. The first approach exploits information on the market share of surviving plants. The second approach applies indirect inference to firm-level data. We find: (i) missing growth from imputation is substantial ' at least 0.6 percentage points per year; and (ii) most of the missing growth is due to creative destruction (as opposed to new varieties).
    View Full Paper PDF