Publications
Does school socio-economic status influence university outcomes?
This study explores the role of schools’ socioeconomic status in determining academic performance at university. Data for first year domestic undergraduates at an Australian university in 2011 to 2013 are linked to schools’ data to examine the role of student-... Read article
Does School Type Affect Cognitive and Non-Cognitive Development in Children?
This paper investigates the effects of primary school choices on cognitive and non-cognitive development in children using data from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC). We militate against the measurement problems that are associated with individual unobserved heterogeneity by... Read article
Housing equity withdrawal in Australia: prevalence, patterns and motivations in mid-to-late life
In an era of population ageing, the primary home is increasingly viewed as a personal resource that can perform a pension role in retirement. This article assesses the extent to which Australians aged 45 years and over withdraw housing equity... Read article
Exchange rate fluctuations and immigrants’ labour market outcomes
In this paper, we exploit exogenous changes in exchange rates across home countries over time and panel data to identify the casual impact of exchange rate fluctuations on Australian immigrants’ labour market outcomes. We present new and robust evidence that,... Read article
Macroeconomic Fluctuations in Home Countries and Immigrants’ Wellbeing
In this paper we provide the first solid empirical evidence that improvements in home countries’ macroeconomic conditions, as measured by a higher GDP per capita and lower price levels, increase immigrants’ subjective well-being. We demonstrate this using 12 years of... Read article
Promoting low socio-economic participation in higher education
As with other countries, Australia has been grappling with the identification, measurement and impact of disadvantage in higher education. In particular, the measurement of socio-economic status (SES) has been of central concern. The immediate solution in Australia has been the... Read article
Macroeconomic Fluctuations in Home Countries and Immigrant’s Well-being
Abstract In this paper we provide the first solid empirical evidence that improvements in home countries’ macroeconomic conditions, as measured by a higher GDP per capita and lower price levels, increase immigrants’ subjective well-being. We demonstrate this using 12 years... Read article
Pharmaceutical Drug Misuse, Industry of Employment and Occupation
Abstract We contribute to the existing literature on drug consumption by analysing the misuse of pharmaceutical drugs, which has attracted scant attention in the economics literature. Specifically, using individual level data, we explore the determinants of pharmaceutical drug misuse and... Read article
Asset poverty, precarious housing and ontological security in older age: an Australian case study
Over two-thirds of Australians are owner-occupiers and a majority of the population holds most of their wealth in housing. Australian taxation privileges homeowners and retirement income policy is built around the assumption that state pensions can be kept low because... Read article
Bridging the gap between housing stress and financial stress
In recent decades, housing affordability has been increasingly linked to household financial outcomes where high housing costs relative to income are perceived to negatively affect financial well-being. However, the traditional measure of housing affordability in Australia is housing stress, which... Read article
Revisiting the impact of consumption growth and inequality on poverty in Indonesia during decentralisation
This article analyses the consumption growth elasticity and inequality elasticity of poverty in Indonesia, with a particular focus on the decentralisation period. Using provincial panel data, we show that the effectiveness of growth in alleviating poverty across provinces was greater... Read article
The Mining Boom and Indigenous Labour Market Outcomes
Much of Western Australia’s economic development and prosperity is derived from mining activity which takes place in remote areas in which Indigenous peoples disproportionately reside, and on country over which Indigenous Australians are now legally recognised as the custodians. It... Read article