Yifan Gong

Assistant Professor of Economics Economics University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Address: HLH 523
Lincoln, NE 68588-0489
Phone: 402-472-2319 On-campus 2-2319
Email: ygong5@unl.edu
Website: Personal Website
Website: Google Scholar
Social Media

Yifan Gong is an assistant professor of economics at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Western Ontario in 2020 and his B.A. in economics from the University of Science and Technology of China in 2011.

Gong is a labor economist and applied econometrician. Most of his research studies issues related to the interaction between individuals' decisions and their beliefs about unknown decision-influencing factors with a focus on the context of higher education. He also works on the analysis of the U.S. housing market in general equilibrium settings, using both macroeconomic and urban economic models.

Education

Ph.D. in Economics, University of Western Ontario, Canada, 2020.
M.Sc. in Applied Economics, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 2012.
B.A. in Economics, University of Science and Technology of China, China, 2011.

Areas of Expertise

Labor Economics
Economics of Education
Applied Econometrics
Urban and Housing Economics

Appointments

Assistant Professor, 2021

Vita

Read Vita

Scholarship

Publications/Articles

"Fertility Beliefs and Outcomes: The Role of Relationship Status and Attractiveness" (with Tyler Skura, Ralph Stinebrickner, and Todd Stinebrickner), Economic Journal, 135(668), 1410-1431, 2025.
"The Role of Nonpecuniary Considerations: Location Decisions of College Graduates from Low-Income Backgrounds" (with Todd Stinebrickner, Ralph Stinebrickner, and Yuxi Yao), International Economic Review, 66(2), 903-931, 2025.
"Examining Income Expectations in the College and Early Post-college Periods: New Distributional Tests of Rational Expectations" (with Thomas Crossley, Todd Stinebrickner, and Ralph Stinebrickner), Journal of the European Economic Association, 22(6), 2700–2747, 2024.
"Does Space Matter? The Case of a Cap on the Housing Expenditure Share" (with Charles Ka Yui Leung), Regional Science and Urban Economics, 104, 103974, 2024.
"Marriage, Children, and Labor Supply: Beliefs and Outcomes" (with Todd Stinebrickner, and Ralph Stinebrickner), Journal of Econometrics, 231(1), 148-164, 2022.
"Demographic Changes and the Housing Market" (with Yuxi Yao), Regional Science and Urban Economics, 95, 103734, 2022.
"The Ex Post Accuracy of Subjective Beliefs: A New Measure and Decomposition" (with Thomas Crossley, Todd Stinebrickner, and Ralph Stinebrickner), Economics Letters, 210, 110160, 2022.
"Perceived and Actual Option Values of College Enrollment" (with Todd Stinebrickner, and Ralph Stinebrickner), Journal of Applied Econometrics, 35(7), 940-959, 2020.
"When Education Policy and Housing Policy Interact: Can They Correct for the Externalities?" (with Charles Ka Yui Leung), Journal of Housing Economics, 50, 101732, 2020.
"Uncertainty about Future Income: Initial Beliefs and Resolution during College" (with Todd Stinebrickner, and Ralph Stinebrickner), Quantitative Economics, 10(2), 607-641, 2019.

Working Papers

"The Consumption Value of College" (with Lance Lochner, Todd Stinebrickner, and Ralph Stinebrickner).
"Signal-based Learning Models without the Rational Expectations Assumption: Identification and Counterfactuals".
"Identifying Reference-Dependent Preferences in Input Choice Models: Do (Some) Students Have Grade Targets?" (with Ralph Stinebrickner and Todd Stinebrickner), 2025.

Courses

Graduate Courses

ECON-815 - Math review for PhD students in fields including economics, agricultural economics, and business.

ECON-918 - Second course in the graduate econometrics sequence. Covers IV estimation, GMM, MLE, error component models, NLLS, and multinomial choice models.

Undergraduate Courses

ECON-215 - Basic statistics and applications in business and economics.