Hello! I’m Michael. I am currently a Research Project Manager at UPenn, working with Professors Anna Stansbury and R. Jisung Park on labor economics research into workplace safety. I will be starting my economics PhD at UC Berkeley in August 2025. Before moving into academic research, I worked in British civil society on economic policy reform across a range of research, organizing, and strategic roles. I hold a BA in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from the University of Oxford, and an MPP from Yale University.

My research interests lie in labor economics and political economy. My CV can be found here Opens in new window, and you can contact me at michael.davies@berkeley.edu.

Working Papers

Minimum Wages and Workplace Injuries Opens in new window (with Anna Stansbury and R. Jisung Park)

  • Media coverage: NPR, Marginal Revolution
  • Abstract: Do minimum wage changes affect workplace health and safety? Using the universe of workers' compensation claims in California over 2000-2019, we estimate whether minimum wage shocks affect the rate of workplace injuries. Our identification strategy exploits both geographic variation in state-and city-level minimum wages and local occupation-level variation in exposure to minimum wage changes. We find that a 10% increase in the minimum wage increases the injury rate by 11% in an occupation-metro area labor market which is fully exposed to the minimum wage increase. Our results imply an elasticity of the workplace injury rate to minimum-wage-induced wage changes of 1.4. We find particularly large effects on injuries relating to cumulative physical strain, suggesting that employers respond to minimum wage increases by intensifying the pace of work, which in turn increases injury risk.

Teaching Experience

ECON 117: Introduction to Data Analysis & Econometrics
Teaching Fellow for Joseph Altonji, Spring 2023, Yale College.

ENV 840/LAW 21754: Climate Change Policy and Perspectives
Teaching Fellow for Robert Klee, Fall 2022, Yale School of the Environment.

MGT 582: The Future of Global Finance
Teaching Fellow for Jeffrey Garten, Fall 2022, Yale School of Management.

Presentations

AEA Paper Session (Presenter), ASSA Annual Meeting (San Francisco, Jan 2025)
Roundtable Session (Presenter), People and Organizations (Wharton, Sep 2024).