How did David Card use natural experiments?
I employed natural experiments to isolate causal effects. For instance, when studying the minimum wage, we looked at a situation where New Jersey raised its minimum wage, but neighboring Pennsylvania did not. This created a natural comparison group. By meticulously collecting data on fast-food restaurants in both states before and after the policy change, we could more reliably attribute any observed differences in employment to the minimum wage increase itself, rather than other confounding factors.
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