Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Cross-Border Shopping: Implications For State Fiscal Competition In Multiple Tax Instruments, Kusum Singh

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation investigates whether consumers’ cross-border shopping due to interstate commodity tax differentials influence counties’ economic activity and states’ strategic competition in multiple tax policies.

First, I examine how own and the nearest neighboring states’ commodity tax rates affect counties’ retail activity. Particularly, in contrast to many previous studies, I examine whether the distance to the state border influences the responsiveness of counties’ retail activity to sales and excise taxes of own and the nearest neighboring states. Since the costs of avoiding state commodity taxes are presumably lower along borders, the impacts of state commodity taxes on retail activity may …

Firm Bidding Behavior In Highway Procurement Auctions: An Analysis Of Single-Bid Contracts, Tacit Collusion, And The Financial Impact On Kentucky, David R. Barrus

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Recently, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) indicated lack of competition and single-bid contracts in asphalt paving as a major issue facing state transportation departments. Single-bid contracts indicate a lack of competition which increases costs to state and local governments. During the period from 2005-2007 in Kentucky, 42 percent of all bids were awarded with only one firm bidding on the project. Of the asphalt paving jobs, 63 percent of those jobs were awarded to a single bidder.

The analysis of this dissertation focuses on detecting tacit collusion in asphalt paving jobs in Kentucky. A focal …

Analysis Of Two-Year Colleges: Transfer, Retention And Graduation, Darshak P. Patel

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Investment in higher education is typically considered as a static discrete-choice problem where students make post-secondary education choices usually right after high school (Heckman et al., 2006). This is largely aligned with Becker’s human capital theory. As Becker’s theory holds, students’ decisions can alter with the arrival of new information (Weisbrod, 1964). By relaxing the assumption certainty in the human capital model, student education decisions can be modeled using Weisbrod’s option value theory. According to this theory, students reevaluate their lifetime-utility maximizing decisions based on new information acquired in a sequential nature. Students face large uncertainties due to unexpected positive …

Mississippi Period Occupational And Political History Of The Middle Savannah River Valley, Keith Stephenson

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Research focusing on the political economy of Mississippian mound centers in the middle Savannah River valley has prompted a reevaluation of current interpretations regarding societal complexity. I conclude the clearest expression of classic Mississippian riverine-adaptation is evident at centers immediately below the Fall Line with their political ties to chiefdom centers in the Piedmont, and especially Etowah. By contrast, those centers on the interior Coastal Plain were politically autonomous with minimal signatures in social ranking. The scale of appropriated labor and resulting level of surplus production, necessitated by upland settlement on the Aiken Plateau, fostered social contradictions making communally-oriented and …

Essays On Income Volatility And Individual Well-Being, Bradley L. Hardy

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

My dissertation consists of three essays in which I document trends in earnings and income volatility, estimate potential causal mechanisms for changing volatility, and examine the long-term consequences of parental income volatility for children. In essay 2 I document trends in earnings and income volatility of individuals and families using matched data in the March Current Population survey from 1973 to 2009. Essay 3 advances the literature on volatility, using matched data from the CPS to identify demographic and labor market correlates of earnings volatility within education-birth year cohorts. This study collapses the cross-sectional CPS into a pseudo-panel and then …

The Public Sector, Migration, And Heterogeneity, Carlos J. Lopes

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Questions on the optimal size of government always provoke intense political debate. At the center of this is the public goods problem, where certain goods and services are “under-provided” by the market due to problems with rivalry and excludability. These goods are usually provided by the public sector and financed through taxes. Questions emerge over the optimal level of provision, as different individuals value these goods differently. This dissertation consists of two studies which address preferences for the size of government from different perspectives.

The first study provides a method that can be used to estimate demand for changes in …

The Effects Of Minimum Salaries On Firm Tenure, Career Length, And The Experience Distribution: Evidence From The National Football League, Johnny C. Ducking

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

I use data from the National Football League (NFL) to analyze the impact of minimum salaries on an employee’s firm tenure, an employee’s career length, and an employer’s distribution of employee experience. The NFL has a salary structure in which the minimum salary a player can receive increases with the player’s years of experience. Salary schedules similar to the NFL’s exist in public education, Secret Service, Internal Revenue Service, other federal government agencies, the Episcopalian church, and unionized industries. Even though the magnitude of the salaries in the NFL differs from other industries, this study provides insight to the impact …