Digital Commons Network^™

The Rise Of Hollywood East: Regional Film Offices As Intermediaries In Film And Television Production Clusters, Pacey Foster, Stephan Manning, David Terkla

Management and Marketing Faculty Publication Series

Prior research on project-based organizing in creative industries has emphasized the importance of regionally embedded institutions, creative networks and intermediaries in the development of regional project ecologies. Recently, film and television production in the United States has expanded beyond traditional clusters in Hollywood and New York to new locations in the United States, Canada and overseas, raising important questions about the dynamics of increasingly mobile creative project networks. Using data on the Massachusetts film and television industry between 1998 and 2010, it is argued that regional film offices play an increasingly important role as network intermediaries in connecting mobile creative …

Investing In The Arts As A Regional Economic Development Tool: A Case Study Of Suny Buffalo State College Arts Students, Dinash Lal Mpa

Public Administration Master’s Projects

The intent of this study was to determine the financial needs of the art students attending Buffalo State College when considering producing their art. In order to establish this need, this case study required the opinions of arts students on their current and future potential financial circumstances including, prospective income supplementation to produce their art work, ability to produce art work given their current and future financial outlooks, the importance of their financial circumstances in relation to the production of their art, the degree to which they currently or foresee the use of financial products and services to produce their …

The Political Economy Of Environmental Justice: A Comparative Study Of New Delhi And Los Angeles, Ratik Asokan

CMC Senior Theses

Though mainstream environmentalism, both in the U.S. and India, was initially rooted in social justice, it has, over time, moved away from this focus. The Environmental Justice Movement consequently arose to reunite social and environmental activism. In this thesis, I trace the historical relationship between the mainstream environmentalism, the Environmental Justice Movement, and marginalized communities. After providing this general overview, I examine two case studies – in Los Angeles and New Delhi respectively – where marginalized communities have been involved in Environmental Justice activities. My analysis reveals that marginalized communities often act in an ‘environmentalist’ or ‘environmentally friendly’ manner, without …

Feasibility Analysis And Strategic Measures For Promoting Viable New Urban Development, Elizabeth J. Farr

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis demonstrates that New Urbanism is both an advisable and feasible method for reducing carbon emissions to mitigate global climate change. New Urban areas commonly generate lower carbon emissions compared to conventional suburban development due to lower car use and higher levels of walking and use of other forms of transportation. Economic and political feasibility of New Urban development is determined by analyzing case studies, housing price premia, financing, and fiscal impact. The many contexts and perspectives involved in the planning process are analyzed to determine if New Urbanism is advisable in the larger setting in which developers, advocates, …

Global Governance And The Reduction Of Poverty And Inequality In The Post-Mdg Era: How Can The Asean-Japan Partnership Contribute?, Fernando T. Aldaba, Rafaelita M. Aldaba

Economics Department Faculty Publications

In 2000, the ASEAN member countries signed the UN Millennium Declaration to eradicate extreme poverty in the world by 2015 through the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs represented the global vision of reducing poverty in its various dimensions, and they were mainstreamed in the process of building the ASEAN Socio-cultural Community, which had a similar target date of 2015.1 The new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) framework approved in 2015 goes beyond the MDG agenda, which focused solely on poverty, to also include inequality. In recent years, inequality has been worsening amidst rapid economic growth and falling …

Decentralization In Violent Conflict Zones: Views From The Periphery, Emmi Bevensee

Capstone Collection

This thesis looks at the question of, “How can nations on the periphery of global capitalism sustainably negotiate with nations in the center of global capitalist power in the process of governance decentralization in violent conflict zones?” Decentralization here describes the process of power transfer of fiscal, political, and administrative duties from higher and more centralized entities to lower and more localized divisions. The process of decentralization is employed to cultivate participatory democratization, minority advocacy, peacebuilding, and development. Because of the nature of these needs decentralization is often accompanied by international intervention that uses the justification of “failed statehood.” This …

Firm Characteristics And Organizational Change: The Effects Of Electronic Commerce In The United States Manufacturing Industry, Candice Y. Wallace

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This dissertation seeks to provide insight to how e-commerce adoption and utilization change the condition of U.S. Manufacturing establishments, by answering two interrelated questions: (1) What are the characteristics of manufacturing establishments that were early adopters of e-commerce activities?; (2) Once e-commerce is adopted, how has adoption affected employment within manufacturing establishments? The U.S. manufacturing industry was selected for analysis as manufacturing has been and continues to be an important sector for employment and the overall U.S. economy and has been the primary sector responsible for the majority of Business-to-Business e-commerce activity.

Using two econometric models, seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) …

Issues And Challenges In The Establishment Of Continuous Improvement In Vietnam, Phoung Anh Nguyen

School of Economics and Business Administration Faculty Works

A better understanding of Vietnamese management is important for both practitioners and academics because of the huge and continuing growth of business activity in Vietnam. In particular, information about the Vietnamese use of continuous improvement (CI) practices is valuable because these have underpinned the success of both western and Asian companies in recent decades. Using the case-study method based on over 60 in-depth interviews with executives, managers, supervisors, and employees of nine leading companies in Vietnam and information gathered from discussions with 440 business and non-business leaders, practitioners, and academics, this paper shows that Vietnamese organizations face numerous challenges when …

It's The Economy, Stupid: Economic Voting And Gender Bias In U.S. Congressional Elections, Grace Lutz

Scripps Senior Theses

This study examines the relationship between the state of the U.S. economy and the outcome of general elections for incumbents in the U.S. House of Representatives. The analysis uses a unique data set compiled from a sample of U.S. Congressional Elections and state and economic indicators between the years 1999 and 2014. We find that economic indicators are consistently related to election outcomes, but have a larger and more significant effect when the time period examined is closer to a major economic event, such as the Great Recession. We also find that female incumbent candidates are more negatively affected by …

Toward Consistent Cross-Hauling Estimation For Input-Output Regionalization, Christa D. Court, Randall Jackson

Regional Research Institute Working Papers

Although the literature has provided steps in the right direction, conceptual shortcomings still exist in the cross-hauling adjustment methods that are currently being applied in the literature. This paper represents an attempt to 1) characterize the cross-hauling adjustment methods that exist in the literature; 2) identify the shortcomings that exist with the most widely applied method, CHARM; 3) provide an empirical analysis to tackle the notion of just how ubiquitous crosshauling is and the potential impact it has on input-output multiplier estimates; and 4) suggest directions for future conceptual and theoretical development that will lead to consistent cross-hauling measures for …

Analisis Spasial Kriminalitas Harta Benda Di Wilayah Jadetabek, Aditya Harin Nugroho, Sonny Harry B. Harmadi

Jurnal Ekonomi dan Pembangunan Indonesia

This study aims to identify the existence of spatial dependence of property crime at sub-district level in the case of Jakarta, Tangerang, Depok, and Bekasi (Jadetabek), the major metropolitan area in Indonesia over 2010 period. Empirical results by using spatial autoregressive suggest the existence of positive spatial autocorrelation of property crime in Jadetabek. We also find the determinants of property crime is related to per capita household expenditure, number of youth unemployment, number of young population, number of drags abuse case, and percentage of case solved.

Determinants Of Fdi And Economic Integration In Sub-Saharan Africa, Lachlan Davis

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper examines the effects of economic integration, FDI and increased trade liberalization in Sub-Saharan Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa is a region notorious for low human development indexes, slow economic grown and high levels of corruption. Ever since the inception of western aid and corporate interests, the region has no developed at we should expect. This paper will look to find the effects of increased “globalization” in the region and attempt to suggest reasons for the developmental challenges rampant in this region of the world. I expect to find that even though development has increased in some areas (for variables such …

The Economic Impacts Of Forest Pathogens In Washington State: A Hedonic Approach, Logan Blair

All Master's Theses

An increase in the incidence of forest pathogens in the Western US has created new resource management issues. In this research I employ a dataset of 170,141 housing transactions in twelve Western Washington counties to quantify the impacts of parasitic forest damage on the proxy real estate market. Specifically, I estimate a set of hedonic fixed effects models to control for omitted variable bias and spatial autocorrelation. Results show statistically significant impacts on property values in the presence of species specific and aggregate defoliation, suggesting new information for forestry management and policy.

Who Profits From Trade Facilitation Initiatives? Implications For African Countries☆, Bernard Hoekman, Ben Shepherd

Journal of African Trade

Extensive research has demonstrated the existence of large potential welfare gains from measures to facilitate trade — reduce trade costs — for African countries in particular. However, concerns have been expressed by policymakers regarding the distribution of the benefits and costs of trade facilitation. We use firm-level data for a large number of developing countries, in Africa and the rest of the world, to assess the claims that it will be mostly large firms that benefit from trade facilitation and that trade facilitation may result in a deterioration of the trade balance. We find no evidence for either argument. Our …

Human Capital In Mexico: Estimating Externalities With The Constant-Composition Approach, Lorin D. Dawson

Honors Theses

Understanding a country's human capital externalities is an important part of understanding economic phenomena and implementing national economic policy. However, externalities are difficult to estimate. Measurement error can cause a misinterpretation of economic models and result in misguided policies. The two methods of calculating human capital externalities are the Mincer Equation and Constant-Composition approach. The author estimates human capital externalities in Mexico with the Constant-Composition approach because the Mincer approach often finds externalities where none are present. Using the Constant-Composition method, the author finds no indication of human capital externalities in Mexico.

Economic Welfare Of Firefighting Service In Detroit, Matthias H. Jung

Wayne State University Dissertations

Chapter 1 is concerned with the effect of public fire service quality on individual utility. I develop a theoretical model to account for fire risk as a function of socio-economic, housing, and spatial factors. I review relevant literature on certain inherent public fire service issues regarding technology and cost structure before I briefly discuss the importance of public fire service with regard to overall social welfare. Finally, I employ equity mapping in a case study to assess the effect of a budget cut on equity of fire service allocation in Detroit.

Chapter 2 examines whether socio-economic factors, various aspects of …

Industry Career Guide: Construction, Ma. Concepcion G. Latoja, Dickson A. Lim

Angelo King Institute for Economic and Business Studies (AKI)

This paper is a career guide on the Philippine construction industry. It provides a general overview into the nature and role of construction in the context of the general macroeconomy, highlights its employment-generating capacity and manpower development prospects, and gives jobseekers and other interested parties a peek into the industry’s likely direction in terms of performance and labor market interface within the next short run cycle.

A Critical Review Of Ontario’S Blue Box Program: Identifying And Testing Best Practices In Printed Paper And Packaging Recycling, Calvin Lakhan

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This dissertation undertook a critical review of four recycling policies used in Ontario which are designed to promote household waste diversion and reduce material management costs. These policies include:

1) Municipal funding should be directly tied to program performance relative to their peer group. 2) All municipalities should make investments in recycling promotion and education, and will be reimbursed $1 per household for all recycling promotion and education expenditures

3) Where possible, municipalities should implement pay as you throw schemes for household waste as a means to minimize the amount of material being disposed of in the waste stream.

4) …

"Microfinance As A Determinant Of Domestic Violence In Bangladesh: Who Is At Risk?", Alvin Christian

Dissertations and Theses

This paper examines the impact that microfinance participation has on reported domestic violence rates among women in Bangladesh. While microfinance programs are aimed at reducing poverty, they may have unintended consequence and contribute to domestic violence or Intimate Partner Violence (IPV). Using nationally representative data from the Urban Health Survey (2006), I study the association between microfinance participation and domestic violence among currently married women. The outcome variable is domestic violence, which is coded as a dummy variable, where a women either has experienced domestic violence episodes or she hasn’t. Predictor variables include microfinance participation, community attitudes, liberal views, labor …

Do Oil Economies In Sub-Sahara Africa, Rebecca Girma

Dissertations and Theses

The African continent provides majority of the world’s raw material for technology and fine jewelry. Countries dependent on their extractive industries lag behind on developmental goals. Their GDPs are high as well as their national poverty levels. This paper explores the factors in which a nation lacks development when it is financially wealthy to do so. There are similar patterns in nations where resource curse has occurred. What is the key to sustainable development in Sub-Saharan Africa? Is solving corruption and migrating away from a market dependent on primary exports the answer? Can they transition from the ancient patrimonial state …

Is The Trans-Pacific Partnership A ‘Natural’ Trade Bloc?, Matthew Ziegler

Dissertations and Theses

The Trans-Pacific Partnership began as a free trade agreement between Brunei Darussalam, Chile, New Zealand and Singapore which was enacted in 2004. Since that time, additional countries have entered into formal negotiations to expand the trade bloc, including the USA, Mexico, Peru, Australia, Malaysia, Canada, Vietnam and Japan. This paper seeks to determine whether these countries represent a ‘natural’ trade partnership by comparing and contrasting the trade complementarity index between each pair of countries within the partnership and those other countries counted in the APEC 21 countries plus India, which is a member of the RCEP trade bloc.
Previous studies …

World Bank, Agriculture And Policy: A Case Study In Ghana And Ethiopia, Steven Margel

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis tests the effectiveness of the World Bank’s agricultural-aid policy by examining case studies in Ghana and Ethiopia in the period of 2000-2010. Each study examines the policy context, project/program success, overall human development results, and threats to sustainability, of agricultural aid. The primary hypothesis of the paper is that participatory processes and inclusive institutions will prove to be decisive factors. Each case is tested against this political view of aid in addition to three additional images (Destructive, Ineffective, Effective Technical), in order to ensure a comprehensive review.

The Ghana case showed a lack of participation in forming the …

Economic And Traffic Impacts Following The Installation Of New Bicycle Facilities: A Denver Case Study, Stephen Antonio Rijo

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

America is currently experiencing a unique departure from the historical vehicle miles traveled (VMT) trend, often referred to as "peak travel." Decreasing VMT numbers suggest that the US is currently experiencing an unprecedented change in the way individuals utilize transportation systems. The following research calls on a need to understand the importance of improving alternative transportation infrastructure, namely cycling facilities, and how this impacts local businesses and their communities. This research informs the overarching question, "What are the economic and traffic impacts of cycling facilities?" A mixed methods analysis of retail sales tax, traffic count, and RTD transit access data …

Say What You Want, Get What You Need: The Effects Of Media Freedom On Fdi Inflows, Hjalmar Breit

Honors Theses

As the discussion concerning economic growth has become increasingly important, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and its determinants have become a hot topic. This thesis uses 2SLS to investigate the relationship between Media Freedom, Socio-political Stability, and FDI levels, using Corruption as a robustness check. It finds that there is a positive correlation for FDI levels for both Media Freedom and Corruption, providing a theoretical framework within which they operate.

The Political Economy Of The Essential Air Service Program, Joshua Hall, Amanda Ross, Christopher Yencha

Economics Faculty Working Papers Series

We find that congressional influences affect the amount of airport subsidies that a congressional district receives from the Essential Air Service (EAS) program. The EAS program was passed with the goal of helping to continue commercial air service to rural communities following the deregulation of the airline industry. Using subsidy data from 1998-2014, we find strong evidence that subsidies are higher in districts having congressional representation on the House Transportation Committee. Representation on the House Appropriations Committee is also associated with higher subsidies. Our empirical results, combined with news reports, are consistent with the EAS serving private as well as …

When Income Depends On Performance And Luck: The Effects Of Culture And Information On Giving, Pedro Rey-Biel, Roman M. Sheremeta, Neslihan Uler

ESI Working Papers

We study how giving depends on income and luck, and how culture and information about the determinants of others’ income affect this relationship. Our data come from an experiment conducted in two countries, the US and Spain, which have different beliefs about how income inequality arises. We find no cross-cultural differences in giving when individuals are informed about the determinants of income, but when uninformed, Americans give less than Spanish. Culture and information not only affect individual giving, but also the determinants of giving and the beliefs about how income inequality arises. Beliefs partially moderate cross-cultural differences in giving.

The Tale Of Two Economies: A Comparative Macroeconomic Analysis Of Palo Alto And East Palo Alto, Aditya Kotak, Safwan Siddiqi, Fred Foldvary

Faculty Publications

Cities in the USA have experienced diverse growth rates and levels of prosperity. Some cities flourish in prosperity, while others suffer economic recession. This study examines why cities have had different outcomes. We investigated three elements: 1) What are the factors that play a role in the shaping of a municipal’s economy? 2) What are the implications of these factors? 3) Which policies promote economic growth and prosperity? This essay aims to offer policy directions for cities that are not performing well. The paper applies a comparative analysis of two nearby cities, a flourishing economy contrasted with a troubled economy. …

Further Towards A Theory Of The Emergence Of Property, Bart J. Wilson

ESI Publications

This article explores the emergence of property as a moral convention. To understand this process I make use of several laboratory experiments on property in its nascence. These experiments illustrate how a rule of property arises from our knowledge of what is morally right, and not vice versa. I also argue that while the ultimate end of property is our interest in using things, the proximate end of property is not losing them, i.e., the end of a rule of property is to secure from morally unfounded harm.

Quantitative Study Of Housing Price Based On Huff Model And Hedonic Method, Yuan Li, Lang He, Junfeng Jiao, Guoqiang Shen

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Using Hedonic and Huff model, we conduct empirical study of the ordinary commercial housing price’s spatial pattern in Xiamen City, China. This paper mainly focus on the following three issues: (1) Exploring the 21 potential factors that influence spatial distribution of housing price; (2) The relationship between commercial size and housing price; (3) Quantitative analysis about the five primary factors’ mode of action and saliency characteristics. In the numerous variables, allocation of educational resources and the distance between housing and shopping malls and supermarkets based on Huff model have Significant impact on housing price.

Pushing The Limits: International Land Acquisitions In Comparative Perspective, Ariane Goetz

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The role of investor countries in large-scale land acquisitions is poorly understood in the contemporary “land grab” literature. Orthodox explanations largely build on deductive analyses that deviate from the emerging empirical evidence, and/or face analytical difficulties when trying to capture why large-scale land acquisitions happen. This thesis investigates the global phenomenon of “land grabbing” from the comparative perspective of two major investor countries: the UK and China. The regional focus is on Sub-Saharan Africa, a major target of land-consuming investments since 2000.

The dissertation advances three arguments: Firstly, the specific details of the home country’s industrial set-up, development challenges, ideological …