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Essays On Institutions And Development, Andrew Jonelis

Theses and Dissertations--Economics

The essays in this dissertation examine how political institutions affect economic development. In the first essay, I examine how executive control of the legislature shapes the time horizon of governing politicians and its effect on economic growth. The second essay examines how border changes over the past two centuries have provided different areas within modern countries with different institutional histories and how this affects the geographic concentration of economic activity. For the final essay, I examine whether elections have an effect on macroeconomic volatility when controlling for the democratic nature of the regime.