Digital Commons Network^™

A Postmortem Analysis Of Covid-19 Ensemble Forecasts: Forward Or Sticky Information?, Jinman Pang

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This study conducts a postmortem analysis to evaluate the overall forecasting performance of a large number of pandemic transmission models for COVID-19 mortality. For a comprehensive accuracy analysis, we selected thirty-nine prolific forecasting models, which reported continuously national-level weekly incident death forecasts at least fifty times at four weekly horizons between June 8, 2020, and May 28, 2022. We found that the forecasting performance of individual models varies over target weeks and horizons, even after adjusting for time-varying forecast difficulty. Most individual models predicted the turning points with a lag, and very few models excelled at predicting the troughs and …

The Cost Of Public Mistrust: The Indirect Impact Of Mass Shootings On Home Values, Austin Dey

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines how mass shootings indirectly impact residential home values across the United States. I hand-collected data on internet search interests around 15 mass shooting events from 2012 to 2019 to measure public concern over mass shootings. Using an event study, I estimate the causal effects of shootings on home values in outlying areas over three years. The results indicate a significant negative relationship between mass shootings and home values two years after an event. This thesis demonstrates that the consequences of mass shootings are not confined to affected areas but have lasting nationwide impacts that reduce economic outcomes …

The Past, Present, And Future Of The Latino Paradox, Sheila Flores

University Honors Theses

The Latino/Hispanic paradox has left scholars and researchers puzzled as to how Latinos, despite facing socioeconomic challenges, show better health outcomes when compared to other racial/ethnic groups. The emergence of this phenomenon can be traced back to the 1980s/1990s when researchers first noticed Latinos in the United States having characteristics of lower mortality rates and improved health compared with non-Hispanic whites despite having a better socioeconomic status. Performing a literature review of scholars analyzing the past, present, and future of the Latino Paradox will thus allow for an understanding of its origin, current state, and the possible potential trajectories that …

The Economic Effects Of Covid-19 On Smallholder Farmers In Kenya, Sarah Hope Brasche

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Like many Sub-Saharan African countries, the Kenyan economy heavily relies on agriculture. Agriculture in Kenya accounted for 50% of the total workforce in 2019 and 70% of the rural workforce. Though reliant on agriculture for employment and subsistence, Kenya has been historically impoverished and malnourished. Kenya has been experiencing an economic recession since 2018, which was exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Relatively speaking to other African countries, Kenya managed to escape the worst health effects of the pandemic, but the economic effects were substantial. This study analyzes survey responses from 1,059 Kenyan smallholder agricultural producers on the economic impacts they …

The Effect Of Covid-19 Uncertainty On Corporate Default Risk: International Evidence, Md Ismail Haidar, Md Showaib Rahman Sarker, André Varella Mollick

School of Economics and Finance Faculty Publications

This paper investigates the effect of COVID-19 uncertainty on corporate default risk using an international sample of firms from 71 countries. We document that corporate default risk increases with higher COVID-19 uncertainty, even after controlling for a wide range of firmlevel and country-level characteristics. The effect is weaker for firms in highly religious adherence countries, stronger for firms in developed countries, and for firms geographically closer to China and Italy. Further, the effect is weaker for highly innovative firms and less financially constrained firms. Our findings are robust to propensity score matching and entropy balancing methods to address selection bias, …

Assessing Determinants Of Participation In Conservation Programs In The U. S., Manita Ale

Department of Agricultural Economics: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has implemented conservation programs through Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and Farm Service Agency (FSA). Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), and Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) are some of them. These programs provide financial and technical assistance to farmers and ranchers to adopt land management practices that generate environmental benefits. In this study, we explore the determinants of participation in conservation programs (CRP, CSP, EQIP) in Iowa, Kansas, and Nebraska. For this, we use a unique survey-based data set comprising observations from row crop farmers in these states. We are …

Valuing Ecosystem Services From Restoring Ancient Irrigation Systems: An Application Comparing Labor Vs. Monetary Payments For Choice Experiments, Sahan Dissanayake, Shamen Vidanage

Economics Faculty Publications and Presentations

The use of stated preference methods in developing countries is growing with the increasing concern about the environment as economies develop. At the same time using monetary payment vehicles and estimating a Willingnessto Pay (WTP) can be problematic in rural or low incomes areas in developing countries. Many respondents in these areas regularly engage in barter and paying with labor and do not use monetary payments for all transactions. This distinction from urban areas with a monetary economy and with most settings in developed countries can impact results from valuation studies as the WTP elicited from rural and low-income areas …

Global Energy Consumption: An Analysis Of Variables That Shape Per Capita Usage, Or How Pump Price, Urbanization, And Fossil Fuels Imports Impact Fossil Fuels Consumption Per Capita Across Oecd Countries, Mila Demchyk Savage

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

Among reasons explaining the importance of studying fossil fuel consumption are: crude oil is a subject of the international commodities market, thus, any fluctuation related to its' availability or price would impact the rest of the World; natural resources like oil, gas, and coal are limited; the extensive use of fossil fuels harms our surroundings, creating many environmental concerns; every human (on average) has been using more energy since 1971 and the trend is expected to continue. The upward trend is not consistent among individual countries. Therefore, the core question of my research is, `Why do some countries consume less …

Borderplex Business Barometer, Volume 7, Number 8, Thomas M. Fullerton Jr., Steven L. Fullerton

Border Region Modeling Project

No abstract provided.

Is Neo-Fascism Inevitable? Looking At The Economic Surplus, The Baran Ratio, And Long Wave Cycles, Thomas E. Lambert

Faculty and Staff Scholarship

This paper briefly outlines the idea and development of the economic surplus concept at the macroeconomic level as opposed to the one in microeconomics often labeled as a Marshallian surplus. The notion of a residual amount of output or income over and above what is necessary for a society’s consumption (education, housing, food, clothing, health care, transportation, and other necessities of life) that can be used either for further consumption by an elite class, used for reinvestment in productive activities, and/or wasted on unproductive efforts is one that has been and continues to be taught and used in heterodox and …

Experiences With Environmental Gentrification: Evidence From Chicago, Tania Schusler, Amy Krings, Richard T. Melstrom

School of Environmental Sustainability: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Environmental contamination and limited access to green spaces disproportionately burden communities of color with negative impacts on residents’ health. Yet, cleaning up contamination and creating green spaces has in some cases been associated with displacing long-term residents as the neighborhood becomes desirable to more affluent, often Whiter, populations through environmental gentrification. We used mixed methods to investigate environmental gentrification in the city of Chicago, IL, USA. We examined quantitatively the relationship between green areas, brownfield cleanups, and indicators of gentrification, including race and ethnicity, income, households without children, and home ownership. We explored through qualitative interviews how key informants perceive …

Parental And Individual Correlates Of Work Ethic In Young People In Albania, Eljona Elmazi

All Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate the work ethic strength, dimensions, and correlates in young people in Albania. The review of the available research concluded that, regardless of the attention that youth-related topics have received in the last decade, there was a considerable gap in the understanding of the state and correlates of the work ethic in this group. Using the Multidimensional Work Ethic Profile – Short Form, the work ethic strength and dimensions were explored in an Albanian sample of (N = 501) 18 to 24 years old, otherwise known as Generation Z. Data were collected via …

Does Fertility Matter For Middle Aged And Older Adults’ Risk Attitudes?, Christine Ho, Bussarawan Teerawichitchainan, Joanne Tan, Eugene Rui Le Tan

Research Collection School Of Economics

Given that risk attitudes influence many decisions, it is important to understand the factors that shape such attitudes in late adulthood, when individuals face important risky decisions. While research finds that parenthood tends to correlate with lower risk tolerance in western countries, there is a lacuna on whether such associations persist in late adulthood, and are applicable to the Asian context, where children are conventionally considered a linchpin of old age support. Data for middle aged and older individuals come from the nationwide Singapore Life Panel (N = 6,740). Multivariate statistical analyses are employed to estimate the associations between willingness …

Two Essays On Retail Trading, Qiqi Liang

Theses and Dissertations in Business Administration

Essay 1: Retail investors from the discount broker Robinhood swarm into stocks with pending earnings announcements and stay away from them immediately after the announcements. We study four competing explanations for this phenomenon: liquidity provision, informed trading, lottery preference, and attention-induced herding by noise traders. We find strong evidence that, immediately around earnings announcements, Robinhood investors’ behavior is primarily driven by attention-induced noise trading. Our results offer new insights into retail traders’ motivation for trading when they face heightened uncertainty from earnings announcements. Our study also goes beyond Barber et al.’s (2022) limited focus on the top 0.5% of the …

Beef And Dairy Substitution Effects Associated With Carbon Labeling And An Information Intervention, Sara Gardner Hedgecock

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Understanding consumer perceptions of carbon emissions in agriculture is a critical step to help increase the sustainability of food consumption. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 14.5 percent of all global anthropogenic GHG emissions are estimated to be represented by livestock (FAO), and cattle, raised for beef and milk, are the largest animal species responsible for emissions, comprising over 60 percent of the livestock sector’s emissions. This motivates this study’s analysis of beef and dairy milk products and alternatives. To better understand how consumers may substitute meat and milk products when provided with information about …

Taxing The Gender Gap: Labor Market Effects Of A Payroll Tax Cut For Women In Italy, Enrico Rubolino

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

This paper studies the labor market effects of a large payroll tax cut for female hires in Italy. Starting in January 2013, the payroll tax rate paid by the employer for female hires was reduced by 50 percent for a period of 12 months for temporary jobs and 18 months for permanent jobs. Eligibility for the tax cut depends on the time elapsed in nonemployment status and varies discontinuously by the worker’s municipality of residence, age, and occupation. Combining social security data on the universe of Italian private-sector workers with several empirical approaches, I find that the tax cut increases …

Can A Payroll Tax Cut For Women Narrow The Gender Gap?, Enrico Rubolino

Upjohn Institute Policy and Research Briefs

No abstract provided.

An Analysis Of Capital Flow To Construct An Economic Typology In A Comparative Case Study Of Three Ancient Cities: Third Kingdom Of Ur, New Kingdom Of Thebes, And Classical Athens, Darrell Gremillion

Dissertations

This dissertation adds to the literature on Economic Development through the development of a Typology of Economy applicable to the earliest cities. Understanding the evolution of these early economies is a crucial step in understanding the past to assist in the establishment of policies for the future. This is especially important in the light of the environmental and sustainability challenges facing the globe today.

The cities in the comparative case study include the Third Dynasty of Ur in Mesopotamia, the New Kingdom of Thebes in Egypt, and Classical Athens in Greece. These cities are chosen for the case study for …

Nebraska Extension: Supporting The Well-Being Of Farmers And Ranchers, Jessica Groskopf

Cornhusker Economics

Nebraska Extension is a proud member of the North Central Farm and Ranch Stress Assistance Center. A regional center funded by USDA NIFA, it delivers farm and ranch stress and mental health resources and services in 12 states, including Nebraska.

Since 2021, several programs delivered by Nebraska Extension and its partners have been supported with these funds. This article will review the key programs supported in Nebraska.

The Impact Of Geopolitical Risks On Price Variation And Political Trust In France: Analyzing The Ukraine-Russia Conflict, Olivier Sempiga

The Journal of International Relations, Peace Studies, and Development

Geopolitical risks (GPRs) have varied consequences over countries and over time. COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine are some of the recent GPRs. The conflict in Ukraine has had far-reaching economic consequences, not only for the countries directly involved in it but also for their trading partners and allies, and on the global economy in general. France, as one of Ukraine and Russia's major trading partners, has also felt the impact of the conflict on its economy. Using data from the French National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE), the paper investigates the impact of GPRs caused by the …

Current Developmental Challenges In Nepal: How Can The Diaspora Help?, Ambika P. Adhikari

Himalayan Research Papers Archive

Nepal now enjoys a unique opportunity to positively transform the country’s economy and society. The economic activities fueled by remittance, supported by foreign aid, and aided by domestic economic activities such as tourism, trade, and services, including start-ups, are helping increase individual incomes. However, the earnings from remittances, which measure to about 25% of Nepal’s GDP, are spent on consumer goods and not on investments that can generate employment and raise the standards of living. The foreign aid is often donor driven and also not always well managed and wisely spent on national priorities. Further, it is frequently marred by …

Geographic Market Definition In Commercial Health Insurer Matters: A Unified Approach For Merger Review, Monopolization Claims, And Monopsonization Claims, Deborah Haas-Wilson, Kristof Zetenyi, Brian Gorin

Economics: Faculty Publications

We provide a methodology for geographic market definition when the product(s) being purchased or sold has an intrinsic geographic component, such as (1) the sale of commercial health plans and (2) the purchase of health care providers’ services by commercial health plans. In these situations, we show that a straightforward application of the Horizontal Merger Guidelines issued by the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission (hereafter, Guidelines) that uses the customer or supplier location to define the geographic market is not sufficient and can result in markets that are unintuitively small. This is often addressed by applying …

Testimony To U.S. House Education & Workforce Committee’S Workforce Protections Subcommittee, Aaron Sojourner

Testimonies

No abstract provided.

Regresi Ambang Untuk Mendalami Pengaruh Nonlinier Kekuatan Pasar Terhadap Pinjaman Bank Di Asean-5, Mahjus Ekananda

Jurnal Ekonomi dan Pembangunan Indonesia

Credit distribution has developed rapidly in the ASEAN region and it is largely dominated by the banking sector compared to other financial institutions. This study explores the effects of various changes to the GDP growth regime, firm size, and monetary policy. The objects of this research are commercial banks in ASEAN-5 from year 2010 to 2019. This study utilises the threshold regression method and a single proxy to measure market power. Results of this study found that monetary policy and market forces affect productive credit. Changes in impact that occur are mostly due to different behavior between banks in response …

Essays On The Child Health And Education Benefits Of Government Programs, Abhradeep Karmakar

Economics ETDs

This work comprises five chapters. Chapter 1 presents an outline of three separate research papers, highlighting their objectives, main findings, and contributions to existing literature. Chapter 2 evaluates the impact of the Right to Education Act on children’s health and cognition in Andhra Pradesh, using the Young Lives data. We exploit the timing of the survey rounds and variations in children’s age in each round for studying the relationship. Chapter 3 studies the impact of the Clean India Mission sanitation program on children’s math and reading test-scores. Using data from the ASER surveys and from the Govt. of India, we …

How The Manufacturing Extension Partnership Can Anchor U.S. Workforce Development, Matthew D. Wilson, Nichola Lowe, Greg Schrock, Rumana Rabbani, Allison Forbes

Upjohn Institute Policy and Research Briefs

No abstract provided.

Effects Of Technological Progress And Productivity On Economic Growth In Uganda: A Generalized Least Squares Approach, Jimmy Alani, Bruno Yawe, John Mutenyo

Arab Economic and Business Journal

The paper makes use of the generalized least squares method to examine the effects of technological progress and productivity on economic growth in Uganda during the 1970 to 2020 period. Data employed in conducting empirical analyses were collected from the United Nations data bank. The paper is based on the neoclassical growth model and Cobb–Douglas production function with decreasing returns to scale because production often takes place within the feasible region of production. Therefore, we focus on the range of diminishing (but non–negative) productivity of the factors of production. We also examine the effects of some determinants of technology (e.g., …

Housing Fever In Australia 2020-2023: Insights From An Econometric Thermometer, Shuping Shi, Peter C. B. Phillips

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

Australian housing markets experienced widespread and, in some cases, extraordi-nary growth in prices between 2020 and 2023. Using recently developed methodology that accounts for fundamental economic drivers, we assess the existence and degree of speculative behaviour as well as the timing of exuberance and downturns in these markets. Our findings indicate that speculative behaviour was indeed present in six of the eight capital cities at some time over the period studied. The sequence of events in this nation-wide housing bubble began in the Brisbane market and concluded in Melbourne, Canberra, and Hobart following the interest rate hike implemented by the …

Policy Evaluation With Nonlinear Trended Outcomes: Covid-19 Vaccination Rates In The Us, Lynn Bergeland Morgan, Peter C. B. Phillips, Donggyu Sul

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

This paper points out some pitfalls in the use of two-way fixed effects (TWFE) regressions when outcome variables contain nonlinear or stochastic trend components. When a policy change shifts trend paths of outcome variables conventional TWFE estimation can distort results and invalidate inference. A robust solution is proposed by identifying determinants of dynamic club membership based on the idea of relative convergence, which can be assessed empirically by the so-called ‘logt’ test (Phillips & Sul, 2007a). Club membership in each time period is estimated by recursive regression, transforming outcome variables to statistically stable, stationary status. Time varying club membership can …

Study On The Effectiveness Of Environmental Regulations And Its Spatial Spillover In China’S High-Quality Human Habitat Cities, Chuansheng Wu, Weixuan Fan, Lingling Qi, Levent Kutlu

School of Economics and Finance Faculty Publications

High-quality human habitat cities in developing countries are facing new urban environmental problems as a result of the significant resource footprints of wealthy urban populations in the process of rapid urbanization. These areas are desperate for solutions to the coexistence of old and new pollutants, as well as inorganic and organic compounds. The authors of this study propose a comprehensive framework and methods for evaluating the effectiveness of environmental regulation in high-quality human habitat cities for a state-of-the-art path of improving environmental governance and optimizing environmental policies in these regions. This paper aims to analyze the effectiveness of environmental regulation …