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Articles 1 - 13 of 13
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Credit Cards, Credit Utilization, And Consumption, Scott Fulford, Scott Schuh
Credit Cards, Credit Utilization, And Consumption, Scott Fulford, Scott Schuh
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Credit bureau data show remarkably stable consumer utilization of unsecured debt over the business cycle, life cycle, and individually quarter-to-quarter, despite massive variation in available credit. To explain these new findings, we propose a life-cycle consumption model with heterogeneous preferences, endogenous payment choice, and the option to revolve debt for consumption smoothing. Using diary data to identify payment use, the estimated model matches consumption and credit use at every frequency and suggests that around half the population has an endogenously high marginal propensity to consume. The results suggest understanding credit availability and heterogeneous use may lead to richer counter-cyclical policies.
Revolving Versus Convenience Use Of Credit Cards: Evidence From U.S. Credit Bureau Data, Scott Fulford, Scott Schuh
Revolving Versus Convenience Use Of Credit Cards: Evidence From U.S. Credit Bureau Data, Scott Fulford, Scott Schuh
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Credit card payments and revolving debt are important for consumer theory but a key data source — credit bureau records — does not distinguish between current charges and revolving debt from the previous month. We develop a theory-based econometric methodology informed by survey evidence to estimate the likelihood a consumer is revolving each quarter. We validate our approach using a new survey linked to credit bureau data. For likely revolvers: (1) 100 percent of an increase in credit becomes an increase in debt eventually; (2) credit limit changes are half as salient as debt changes; and (3) revolving status is …
Professional Sporting Events Increase Seasonal Influenza Mortality In Us Cities, Alexander Cardazzi, Brad Humphreys, Jane E. Ruseski, Brian P. Soebbing, Nicholas Watanabe
Professional Sporting Events Increase Seasonal Influenza Mortality In Us Cities, Alexander Cardazzi, Brad Humphreys, Jane E. Ruseski, Brian P. Soebbing, Nicholas Watanabe
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
The COVID-19 pandemic shut down sporting events worldwide. Local policy makers and league officials face important decisions about restarting play, especially in professional leagues that draw large numbers of spectators to games. We analyze the impact of professional sporting events on local seasonal influenza mortality to develop evidence that will help inform sports league reopening policy decisions. Results from a difference-in-differences model applied to data from a sample of US cities that gained new professional sports teams over the period 1962-2016 show that the presence of games in these cities increased local influenza mortality by between 4% and 24%, depending …
Disamenity Or A Signal Of Competence? The Empirical Political Economy Of Local Road Maintenance, Benjamin Blemings, Margaret Bock
Disamenity Or A Signal Of Competence? The Empirical Political Economy Of Local Road Maintenance, Benjamin Blemings, Margaret Bock
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Empirical results find different conclusions than theoretical evidence of how electorates perceive road work. This paper uses a geographically smaller unit of analysis than prior work, political alignment, local election cycles, and difference-in-differences. It finds political distortions in invasive road maintenance timing and rules out maintenance seasonality. Spatial discontinuity plots leveraging ward boundary cutoffs confirm the shift. Results identify new public distortions to road maintenance, local election cycles, which are widespread and frequent. The estimates are used to calculate financial costs of local elections on road maintenance. Local elections have cost medium-large U.S. cities over $185.5 million from 1960- 2020.
Economic Activity, International Intervention, And Transitional Governance: A Comparative Case Study Of Somalia, Daniel Bonneau, Joshua C. Hall
Economic Activity, International Intervention, And Transitional Governance: A Comparative Case Study Of Somalia, Daniel Bonneau, Joshua C. Hall
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
This paper investigates the impact of international state-building efforts in Somalia on economic development. We use satellite data on night lights to measure economic activity to deal with nonexistent or poor-quality national income accounts. Using the synthetic control method, we find that the establishment of the Transitional Federal Government in 2004 was associated with economic stagnation relative to the years under statelessness. Using nighttime light emissions, we find economic stagnation regardless of whether we use the total lights emitted from the country or the spread of lights across the country. Our empirical findings are consistent with the idea that the …
Academia In Anarchy: 50 Years On, Joshua C. Hall
Academia In Anarchy: 50 Years On, Joshua C. Hall
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
In 1970, James Buchanan and Nicos Devletoglou published Academia in Anarchy: An Economic Diagnosis. Even though the book focuses on the industry Buchanan worked in for nearly 70 years, it is the only one of his non-autobiographical, non-textbook, books not included in his collected works. I evaluate the arguments of Buchanan and Devletoglou in light of the past 50 years of scholarship on the economics of higher education.
Blaming The Ref: Understanding The Effect Of Unexpected Emotional Cues On Family Violence, Alexander J. Cardazzi, Brad R. Humphreys, Bryan Mccannon, Zachary Rodriguez
Blaming The Ref: Understanding The Effect Of Unexpected Emotional Cues On Family Violence, Alexander J. Cardazzi, Brad R. Humphreys, Bryan Mccannon, Zachary Rodriguez
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Domestic violence generates long-term effects on offenders, victims, and other household members. Insight into triggers of family violence can inform policy and improve services aimed at reducing abusive behavior. We investigate potential domestic violence triggers by analyzing unexpected losses in National Basketball Association games. The literature identifies increasing in-home violence after unexpected losses in the National Football League. Combining information on referee accuracy and fatigue, we develop a unique identification strategy to explore the impact of human error on family violence following unexpected losses. Results indicate that as referees are more accurate (more rested) in unexpected losses, family violence decreases, …
Localization Economies And Firm Productivity: Evidence From Football Teams In Sao Paulo, Brazil, Brad Humphreys, Amir B. Neto
Localization Economies And Firm Productivity: Evidence From Football Teams In Sao Paulo, Brazil, Brad Humphreys, Amir B. Neto
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Agglomeration economies affect urban economic outcomes. We analyze variation in sports team productivity and localization of teams across divisions and cities in Campeonato Paulista an annual football competition in São Paulo state, Brazil, exploiting plausibly exogenous variation in localization generated by a promotion and relegation system in this league. Results show that both urbanization, proxied by population, and localization affects short and long run team productivity. These results provide new evidence on the importance of localization economies in the urban economy in developing countries and shed light on why sports teams in larger cities enjoy more success than those in …
The Effect Of Transparency, Independence And Accountability Of Central Banks On Disinflation Costs, Golnaz B. Motie, Joshua C. Hall
The Effect Of Transparency, Independence And Accountability Of Central Banks On Disinflation Costs, Golnaz B. Motie, Joshua C. Hall
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Policymakers often want to achieve low inflation to avoid the low economic growth associated with high inflation. Reducing inflation through monetary policy (disinflation) is not costless as it can coincide with higher unemployment rates and reduced output. In this paper we use sacrifice ratios to calculate the cost of disinflation during the 1990s for 40 countries. We then study whether transparency and democratic accountability of monetary institutions reduces disinflation costs. Our empirical results suggest that more transparent central banks seem to face higher disinflation costs. This result could be because more transparent central banks have lower initial inflation rates during …
Legalized Sports Betting, Vlt Gambling, And State Gambling Revenues: Evidence From West Virginia, Brad Humphreys
Legalized Sports Betting, Vlt Gambling, And State Gambling Revenues: Evidence From West Virginia, Brad Humphreys
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
A Supreme Court decision legalizing sports betting in the US led states to legalize sports betting in order to generate new tax revenues from wagering on sports events. Most states already permit other forms of gambling and receive tax revenues from these sources. The literature analyzing consumer substitution in gambling spending contains some evidence on the impact of expansions in many types of gambling, but no evidence on the impact of expanded sports betting. This paper exploits the legalization of sports betting and timing of sports book openings in West Virginia to analyze the impact of expanded sports betting on …
This Is ``What's In Your Wallet'' ... And Here's How You Use It, Tamás Briglevics, Scott Schuh
This Is ``What's In Your Wallet'' ... And Here's How You Use It, Tamás Briglevics, Scott Schuh
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Consumer wallets have more means of payment yet cash still is used most. We develop a dynamic structural model blending cash inventory management and payment instrument choice. For each expenditure, consumers endogenously pay with cash, debit card, or credit card with an option to withdraw cash beforehand. The model is estimated with transaction- level data from a daily consumer payment diary and reveals that utility from payment services exceed cash management costs. For payment card owners, optimal cash holdings are about $50 and jointly determined with the share of cash payments. Eliminating either cash or payment cards reduces consumer welfare …
Inventor Mobility, Human Capital, And The Propensity To Patent, David Youngberg, Joshua Hall
Inventor Mobility, Human Capital, And The Propensity To Patent, David Youngberg, Joshua Hall
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
Using 1975-1992 patent data this article untangles two opposing effects of knowledge spillovers: increasing productivity of invention (encouraging higher-quality patents) and increasing trade secret leakage to competitors (encouraging lower-quality patents). Using geographic labor mobility to predict the former and industry labor mobility in the latter, we find that doubling the rate of industry level labor mobility of scientists and engineers decreases patent quality. Results from doubling the rate of regional level mobility are mixed, but suggest an increase in patent quality.
State Exit Exams And Graduation Rates: A Hierarchical Slx Modelling Approach, Joshua Hall, Donald Lacombe, Shree B. Pokharel
State Exit Exams And Graduation Rates: A Hierarchical Slx Modelling Approach, Joshua Hall, Donald Lacombe, Shree B. Pokharel
Economics Faculty Working Papers Series
The literature on high school exit exams has found both positive and negative effects of these high stake exams on high school graduation rates. To this point the literature has not taken into account the embedded nature of school districts within state education systems. We employ a Bayesian Hierarchical SLX model to account for the hierachical nature of education data in the United States. Our approach also allows us to account for spatial spillovers that influence graduation rates across districts and states. Using school district and state-level data for 45 states and 8194 school districts in the United States in …