He is also a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research. His recent research examines how household consumption reacts to the timing of and/or changes in income including the response to Social Security check receipt, paycheck receipt, job loss, the repayment of vehicle loans, and retirement. In addition, he has examined a number of household responses to job loss, the impact of taxes on the intra-household allocation of assets, and the relationship between abortion legalization and adolescent drug use. After receiving his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Michigan, Professor Stephens was a National Institute on Aging Post-Doctoral Research Fellow. Prior to returning to Michigan he was an Assistant Professor at Carnegie Mellon University.