Digital Commons Network^™

Fafsa Completion: Considerations For An Extension-Led Statewide Nudge Campaign, Portia L. Johnson, Kacee Ross, Emily Hines

Journal of Extension

Eight U.S. states have enacted legislation that mandates high school seniors to act on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) before graduation. At least 10 other states are considering implementing similar FAFSA requirements. While proponents of the law believe it will affect postsecondary education and the workforce positively, dissenters argue that the policy is an unfunded mandate that taxes students and parents without offering adequate resources. This article synthesizes existing literature related to policy-related nudge campaigns to provide an Extension-led, cost-effective strategy to achieve the FAFSA mandate’s goal and improve citizens’ FAFSA completion behavior.

The Economic Impact Of West Virginia University Institute Of Technology, Eric Bowen, John Deskins

Bureau of Business & Economic Research

In this report, we estimate the economic contribution of West Virginia University Institute of Technology's operational and student spending to the state and Raleigh County economies. Between the operations of the campus and spending from its student population, WVU-IT has a broad economic footprint in West Virginia and its local region.

Determinants Of Demand Response Program Participation, Janie M. Chermak, Jesse Ian Kaczmarski, Benjamin A. Jones

SMART Grid Center (NM EPSCoR RII V)

Survey instrument and codebook for the analysis reported in:

Kaczmarski, Jesse, Benjamin Jones, and Janie Chermak. 2022. "Determinants of Demand Response Program Participation: Contingent Valuation Evidence from a Smart Thermostat Program" Energies 15, no. 2: 590. https://doi.org/10.3390/en15020590

The survey instrument can be accessed via the "Download" link.

Accompanying files include a README. Information from the README file is also included below.

Per the consent language in the included survey instrument, raw data from the reported study are not publicly available.

GENERAL INFORMATION

Title of Dataset: Determinants of Demand Response Program Participation

Principal Investigator Information Name: Janie Chermak, ORCID: N/A, Institution: …

Market Concentration And Political Outcomes, Xueyan Cao

Economics Honors Projects

U.S. industries have become more consolidated over the past decades. This trend has raised concerns regarding its impact on society. This paper delves into the connection between market concentration and political outcomes. By integrating lobbying data from the Center for Responsive Politics with industry-wide economic data from 2003 to 2019, I utilize several multivariate models to investigate the link between concentration and lobbying expenditures at the aggregate U.S. industry level. I also conduct three representative industry case studies: commercial banks, airlines, and general merchandise stores. The results are mixed. While there is a negative association between market concentration and lobbying …

The Giannis Effect: How Celebrities Impact Prejudice In Their Communities, Mason Bosley

Economics Honors Projects

This paper examines the effect Giannis Antetokounmpo, a Greek-Nigerian NBA player for the Milwaukee Bucks, has had on bias towards immigrants and Black people in Milwaukee and in Wisconsin as a whole. This work is based on the breakthrough 2021 study from Alrababa’h et al., which found that Liverpool FC’s signing of star Muslim footballer Mohamed Salah dramatically reduced public instances of islamophobia in Liverpool. Using Synthetic Control (SC) and Synthetic Difference in Difference (SDID) frameworks, I implement two methods of analysis to examine Giannis’s influence: an examination of Anti-Black and Anti-Immigrant hate crimes in the US, and analysis of …

Declining Unionization And The Despair Of The Working Class, Kelly Chen, Samia Islam

Economics Faculty Publications and Presentations

While the effects of labor unions on objective conditions have been extensively studied, little is known about their role in individuals' perceptions of economic circumstances. We investigate whether union density affects the subjective well-being of area residents by exploiting the staggered adoption of right to work laws in the United States through a border-county design. We find that unionization promotes happiness for those of low socioeconomic status, including non-college-educated residents and current or former blue-collar job holders, but has no discernible impact on their high-status counterparts. Of affected residents, workers stand to reap the most benefit. We also find that …

An Economic And Regulatory Analysis Of Breast Cancer Drugs Approved By The Us Food And Drug Administration, Abdullah Althomali

Pharmaceutical Sciences (MS) Theses

Introduction

Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women and the leading cause of cancer death among women worldwide. The pharmacological options for breast cancer include chemotherapy, hormone therapy, targeted therapy, and immunotherapy, which are used for the prevention or treatment of breast cancer. This study assessed trends in FDA approvals and prices at the market entry of new drugs indicated for breast cancer in the period 1980-2022. The study also evaluated the factors associated with the price of the new breast cancer drugs at market entry.

Material and Methods

Regulatory data were collected from the FDA website, and …

Perceptions Of Student Loan Debt: A Phenomenological Study Exploring Black Undergraduate Students' Experiences., Pilar Prather

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The rising cost of higher education concerns many families in the United States, especially those from historically underrepresented backgrounds. The purpose of this study is to explore the phenomenon of Black students' perception of their student loan debt and how their financial knowledge influences their decisions at a public institution. This qualitative research provides space to empower individuals to share their stories through semi-structured interviews to get an account of their experiences. Grounded in Yosso's (2005) Community Cultural Wealth Theory, the study seeks to capture the unique ways Black students make financial decisions. The dissertation is divided into five chapters: …

Designing For Mass Customization Housing Through Generative Design, Tania Salgueiro

Architecture Undergraduate Honors Theses

This research proposal aims to investigate computational design strategies for sustainable, affordable, and more equitable housing. The study will focus on the use of generative design tools, such as parametric modeling, rule-based modeling, and optimization, to aid architects and designers in creating custom housing complexes for single families in small and medium urban lots. The goal is to develop a computational method that considers sustainability, affordability, and long-term usage parameters to create housing designs that meet the desired spatial qualities. The research question asks how generative design tools can support designers in approaching affordable housing given the increasing demand for …

The Role Of Conditional Cash Transfer Programs In Improving Access To Professional Attendance At Birth In Indonesia, Kaitlin Murray

Economics Undergraduate Honors Theses

This paper examines the impact of an Indonesian conditional cash transfer program, named Program Keluarga Harapan (PKH), on households’ use of institutional delivery facilities at childbirth. Difference-in-differences and fixed effects regressions were conducted to examine the relationship between receipt of PKH cash transfers, use of institutional delivery facilities, and accessibility to institutional and traditional delivery facilities. The accessibility to institutional and traditional delivery facilities was demonstrated through a longer one-way trip time to these facilities. This paper had three significant findings: (1) that receipt of PKH cash transfers reduced the use of institutional delivery facilities, (2) that receipt of PKH …

An Economic Perspective On Self-Reported Happiness In Taiwan, Shih Yu Sung

All Theses

Happiness research has become a topic of interest in recent years. The OECD's "Better Life Index," the U.N.'s "World Happiness Report," and Taiwan's "National Happiness Indicator" are examples of initiatives to understand better and evaluate the well-being of people. After the well-known "Easterlin Paradox" was proposed, more and more economists started researching the economics of happiness. Economists studied the relationship between reported happiness and income and the relationship between reported happiness and socioeconomic factors and demographic factors. In this study, I use data from the Taiwan Social Change Survey of 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, and 2015 to analyze potential factors …

Paying For What Kind Of Performance? Performance Pay, Multitasking, And Sorting In Mission-Oriented Jobs, Daniel B. Jones, Mirco Tonin, Michael Vlassopoulos, K. Pun Winichakul

Economics: Faculty Publications

How does pay-for-performance (P4P) impact productivity and the composition of workers in mission-oriented jobs when output has multiple dimensions? This is a central issue in the public sector, particularly in areas such as education and healthcare. We conduct an experiment, manipulating compensation and mission, to answer these questions. We find that P4P has significantly smaller positive effects on productivity on the incentivized (quantity) dimension in the mission-oriented setting relative to the non-mission-oriented setting. On the other hand, P4P generates no loss in performance on the non-incentivized (quality) dimension of effort in the mission-oriented setting, whereas it does so in the …

Stringency In Occupational Licensing Requirements: Explanations And Effects, Nicholas Hall

Honors Scholar Theses

In this paper, I explore explanations for and effects of variation in stringency in occupational licensing requirements across states. Focusing on data on cosmetology, I first analyze the effect of characteristics of the professional licensing board, including its membership composition and department within the state government, on the regulations the board implements. I find evidence that the department of a board impacts its licensing fees, with health-based departments requiring lower fees than commerce- and general licensing-based departments. I then examine the effects of stringency on wages and the number of practitioners in an area. I find evidence that the number …

Does Family Size Moderate The Relation Between Resource Transfers And Intimate Partner Violence Rates?, Paul Gramling

Psychological Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

Intimate partner violence (IPV) refers to physical, sexual, or psychological abuse within an intimate relationship. It is a global issue, particularly for women in developing countries where data show higher rates of IPV for these women than in developed countries. IPV can lead to physical harm, chronic health problems, and even death. It also has negative effects on mental health, economic stability, and the overall well-being of the woman and their children. Family size has been shown to be a predictor of IPV risk; women from larger families face a higher risk. Cash transfer programs in developing countries have been …

County Finance, House Prices, And Financial Decision-Making, Kyle Kopplin

College of Business: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This work is in three chapters. The first chapter investigates the extent to which county-level property tax changes are capitalized into house prices. The literature mainly focuses on specific tax events, but this chapter generalizes the context to large U.S. cities. The main findings suggest that county-level property tax capitalization occurs and varies along the distribution of house prices. The second chapter measures differences in county-aggregated self-assessed valuations of house prices and county- aggregated sale prices to determine whether there are trends in the level of misperceived house value. Factors like age, time of tenure in a house, and house …

Can Renewable Portfolio Standards Explain The U.S. States’ Advancement Of Wind Energy?, Elise Monson

Political Science Theses and Capstones

No abstract provided.

The Gender Investing Gap: A Global Viewpoint, Olivia Walker

Economics Undergraduate Honors Theses

The gender investing gap is a topic of increasing concern, referring to the disparities in investment participation and outcomes between men and women. This gap is prevalent in various financial instruments, including stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. Its consequences for women include reduced savings and accumulation of assets, decreased financial security, and lower savings for retirement. The economic costs of the gender investing gap are substantial, with an estimated $3.22 trillion more available for investment and $1.87 trillion more invested in socially and environmentally responsible companies if women invested at the same rate as men. This literature review examines the …

Income Inequality And Economic Growth: An Analysis, Nicholas Martin

Economics Undergraduate Honors Theses

Income inequality and its relationship with economic growth has been a subject of debate in academia for decades. This paper examines the relationship the Gini index of five selected countries and four macroeconomic variables (GDP growth, unemployment rate, lending interest rate, and savings rate) for each country with two developed nations being represented (United States and Italy) and three developing nations being represented (Peru, Belarus, and Indonesia). After reviewing the literature on the relationship between income inequality and economic growth, a multivariate regression analysis of each country is presented; first with GDP growth as the dependent variable, followed by a …

Urban Understandings: Exploring Potential Coercion In Lincoln Park’S Gentrification Process, Jacob Price

Honors Theses

While much research has been carried out on the topic of gentrification over the past several decades, little to no economic research has been conducted on the potential presence of coercion within the process. In this paper, we define coercion as any attempts by third parties, whether government or private entities, to artificially accelerate the natural housing cycle. In studying this, we examine Lincoln Park as a case study, a Chattanooga neighborhood that was once a bastion of culture and security for the Southern African American community, by employing a two-pronged approach. On the qualitative front, we interview community and …

The Influences Of The Public Health Care System And Education System On The Economic Growth Of Swaziland, Grace Greer

International and Global Studies Undergraduate Honors Theses

The Kingdom of Eswatini, also known as Swaziland, has one of the youngest populations in the world with over 70% of citizens being under the age of 18 years old. This creates a substantial opportunity for economic, social, and educational growth in a country previously plagued with diseases such as HIV/AIDS, poor health care infrastructure cutting off thousands from basic care, and an educational system with a very low attendance rate and an even lower graduation rate. By evaluating the root causes of such issues dating back to the colonial era there is an opportunity to reprioritize health care and …

Understanding Romania's Poverty: A Historical Overview Of Economics And Politics And Their Implications On Poverty Today, Benjamin Bucur

Senior Honors Theses

Romania is a country with a high-income economy that is experiencing considerable growth following its economic reforms of earlier decades. With growth, tendencies for an unequal society are prevalent. Therefore, appropriate economic policies that are specifically targeted toward bottlenecks are essential. This thesis seeks to outline the major types of poverty in Romania while also offering actionable entrepreneurial and educational insights that practically combat poverty at its roots.

Us Public School Demand For Locally Produced Meat And Poultry, Shara Akat

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

The objective of the USDA Farm-to-School program is to promote the understanding and use of local food in school education and meals. The hope is that by reconnecting students with how food is raised and purchasing the product from local producers it will increase nutrition and reduce food insecurity and obesity among students while simultaneously increasing economic activity for local producers. Most studies evaluating the federal program have focused on how the economic outcomes for local producers or student related health outcomes and primarily using fresh fruits and vegetables. Fundamental to either of these outcomes is understanding the schools’ demand …

The Role And Implications Of Negotiation In Fed Cattle Transactions, Taralee Hudson

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

Within the past three decades, a significant evolution has occurred in how fed cattle are bought and sold. Driven by changes in the quality of beef and consumer health preferences, the beef industry began to advocate for “value-based marketing,” resulting in the development of grid pricing and eventually formula transactions. Alternative marketing arrangements (AMAs) have become the predominant method used for the sale of fed cattle, ultimately resulting in fewer transactions in the negotiated cash market. Such market conditions have recently reignited concerns among industry stakeholders about potentially uncompetitive outcomes for beef producers, particularly after the occurrence of sequential Black …

An Exploration Of Influences On Consumers' Behaviors/Decisions In Relation To Animal Agriculture, Abigail Durheim

Department of Agricultural Leadership, Education, and Communication: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Animal agriculture provides many daily resources for consumers around the globe. While the average American is at least three generations removed from agriculture, they still hold power to influence the industry with the dollar and their vote. The purpose of this study was to identify influences on consumer behaviors/decisions in relation to animal agriculture. Seven hundred four complete and usable responses were collected via a researcher-developed online survey. Using branding concepts as a framework, the first study evaluated how visual stimuli influenced consumers' intention to purchase Nebraska beef products. Researchers found that visual stimuli did influence respondents to choose Nebraska …

Developing The Food Navigator Role At Everyone's Harvest, Chase Rodriguez

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

Everyone’s Harvest (EH) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit that operates farmers’ markets. In order to reduce hunger in Monterey County, Everyone's Harvest offers several food assistance programs for low-income people including the Market Match (MM) incentive program which matches CalFresh money, modern day food stamps, dollar for dollar. The problem is that in Monterey County 1 in 4 adults and 1 in 3 children are food insecure. The purpose of the Food Navigator (FN) at EH is to engage with the local community and connect low-income people with food assistance resources, primarily the MM program. This project was a role development …

Analyzing The Impact Of Automation On Employment In Different Us Regions: A Data-Driven Approach, Thejaas Balasubramanian

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Automation is transforming the US workforce with the increasing prevalence of technologies like robotics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. As a result, it is essential to understand how this shift will impact the labor market and prepare for its effects. This culminating experience project aimed to examine the influence of computerization on jobs in the United States and answer the following research questions: Q1. What factors affect how likely different jobs will be automated? Q2. What are the possible effects of automation on the US workforce across states and industries? Q3. What are the meaningful predictors of the likelihood of …

Economic Impact Assessment Of Nature-Based Coastal Resilience Solutions In Charleston. Estimating Local Economic Effects With Algorithm-Based Supporting Tool., Oksana Veselkova

All Theses

Coastal cities are at the forefront of the risks induced by climate change. Local communities are adversely affected, but the essential cultural assets and economies are also at risk of damage or destruction. In the efforts to limit hazard risk exposure, local governments are increasingly planning for long-term flood protection. One prospective flood risk mitigation measure is living shorelines or nature-based adaptation. The coastal ecosystems, such as beaches, wetlands, barrier islands, oyster reefs, and salt marshes, deliver multiple benefits to communities, including recreation, natural resources, freshwater, and carbon sequestration. Moreover, when combined with structural solutions, they can effectively reduce water …

Borderplex Business Barometer, Volume 7, Number 5, Thomas M. Fullerton Jr., Steven L. Fullerton

Border Region Modeling Project

No abstract provided.

Cbdc: Context, Challenges, And Conditions For A Successful Adoption, Charlie Nhuc Hiang Lay

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

Central bank digital currencies (CBDC) are the digital version of physical notes and coins. They are the latest milestone in the evolution of money over the centuries due to technological advancements. This digitalisation of physical money primarily serves as a medium of exchange that has a central bank anchor. There are two versions of CBDC, wholesale and retail. This thesis focuses on retail CBDC, which targets the general public and small daily transactions. It discusses the issues and the plausible implementation of a retail CBDC. A CBDC will preserve monetary sovereignty, foster financial stability, and counter private network effects, i.e., …

Zooming Out: A Retrospective Analysis Of Nontraditional Learning Modes' Effect On High School Graduation And Dropout During The 2020-2021 Covid-19 School Year, Jonah F. Klein-Collins

Economics Honors Projects

This paper examines the impact of nontraditional learning modes, such as online education, on high school graduation and dropout rates during the 2020-2021 Covid-19 school year. Using school-level data from the Illinois Report Card for 2012-2021, a difference-in-differences framework is used to estimate the average treatment effect of two groups: schools that used virtual learning modes for only part of the year and those that used it for nearly the entire year. The study reveals that virtual learning had a negligible effect on four-year graduation rates. However, schools that used virtual learning for only part of the year witnessed a …