Digital Commons Network^™

Temperature Effects On Prevalence Of Sexually Transmitted Infections Among At-Risk Female Sex Workers In India, Rajshri Suresh

Master's Theses

Vulnerability to climate change varies depending on the baseline climate, sensitivity to given exposure, and the presence of social, political, cultural, and institutional inequalities that influence access to essential resources of livelihood, particularly among informal labor market participants. Within the risky informal labor market, the transient nature of sex work implies that sex workers suffer disproportional losses in health, income, protection, and other aspects of general well-being as a result of the effects of climate anomalies. In this paper, I investigate the effect of temperature on the prevalence of sexually transmitted infections in a high-risk population of female sex workers …

Rationalizing Self-Defeating Behaviors: Theory And Evidence, Lars J. Lefgren, Olga B. Stoddard

Faculty Publications

Why do individuals engage in self-defeating behaviors like self-harm, addiction, and risky sexual behaviors? Why do they experience the apathy of depression or inaction when trapped by multiple competing problems? We propose a framework for explaining these and other related behaviors based on the insight that individuals can only experience a limited number of latent stimuli to which they are exposed. We conduct an experiment to test this model and find that more than two thirds of the subjects behave consistent with our theoretical framework.

Identifying Consumer Preferences From User-Generated Content On Amazon.Com By Leveraging Machine Learning, Jikhan Jeong

Economics Faculty Research & Creative Works

Inexperienced consumers may have high uncertainty about experience goods that require technical knowledge and skills to operate effectively; therefore, experienced consumers' prior reviews can be useful for inexperienced consumers. However, one-sided review systems (e.g., Amazon) only provide the opportunity for consumers to write a review as a buyer and contain no feedback from the seller's side, so the information displayed about individual buyers is limited. Therefore, this study analyzes consumers' digital footprints (DFs) for programmable thermostats to identify and predict unobserved consumer preferences, using a dataset of 141 million Amazon reviews. This paper proposes novel approaches (1) to identify unobserved …

Increasing Workplace Diversity: Evidence From A Recruiting Experiment At A Fortune 500 Company, Jeffrey A. Flory, Andreas Leibbrandt, Christina Rott, Olga B. Stoddard

Faculty Publications

While many firms have set ambitious goals to increase diversity in their ranks, there is a dearth of empirical evidence on effective ways to reach them. We use a natural field experiment to test several hypotheses on effective means to attract minority candidates for top professional careers. By randomly varying the content in recruiting materials of a major financial services corporation with more than 10,000 employees, we find that signaling explicit interest in employee diversity more than doubles the interest in openings among racial minority candidates, as well as the likelihood that they apply and are selected. Impacts on gender …

The Impact Of Microfinance On Women Empowerment In The Case Of Vietnam, Long Bui Thanh

Doctoral

In recent years, most microfinance programs have focused on gender issues with significant support given to poor female clients with the goal of facilitating their access to capital. An interesting fact to be considered is that women are regarded as wonderful clients, as they appear to engage in a more efficient manner in the saving process and the repayment of microloans when compared to men. Based on existing studies, researchers suggest that women are also more responsible regarding the management of finances in the context of poor families (Aggarwal et al., 2015; D'Espallier et al., 2011; Mayoux, 2005).

The Impact Of Place-Based Policy: Evidence From A Multiple Synthetic Control Analysis Of The Northeastern Revitalization Program In China, Justin T. Callais, Linan Peng

School of Business and Leadership Working Papers

We examine the effect of a well-known place-based policy in China, the Northeastern Revitalization Program. In 2003, the State Council of the People’s Republic of China initiated the program in northeastern China by removing an agricultural tax, enhancing the urban social security system, facilitating foreign investments, and restructuring state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in the region. Using a budding case-study approach (the synthetic control method), we find that the program had no significant effect on GDP per capita in all three regions. Liaoning had slightly worse GDP per capita post-treatment, as well as Heilongjiang (albeit to a less extent). While the multiple …

Part 7: Securing Release: Cash Bail In Hampton Roads, Dragas Center For Economic Analysis & Policy

State of the Region Reports: Hampton Roads

On any given day in 2019, on average, there were more pretrial inmates per 100,000 residents in Hampton Roads than in Virginia or the United States. To secure their release from jail, many inmates must provide collateral in the form of a secured bond. Now, with momentum building for reducing or eliminating cash bail in the Commonwealth, we estimate the costs and benefits of cash bail reform for cities and counties in Hampton Roads.

Part 4: All In: Casinos, Online Betting And The Future Of Gambling In Hampton Roads, Dragas Center For Economic Analysis And Policy

State of the Region Reports: Hampton Roads

In 1987, Virginia voters approved the state lottery, bringing legalized gambling to the Commonwealth. Fast forward to 2021: Virginians can now buy lottery tickets online, place sports bets on their phones and wager in historical horse racing parlors. Now, with casinos opening soon in Norfolk and Portsmouth, as well as Bristol, Danville and, likely, Richmond, we discuss the benefits and costs of casinos in Hampton Roads

Public Health Insurance And Pharmaceutical Innovation: Evidence From China, Xuan Zhang, Huihua Nie

Research Collection School Of Economics

Developing countries are characterized by low levels of pharmaceutical innovation. A likely reason is their small market size, which is not because of the population size but because of low levels of income and lack of health insurance coverage. This study exploits a natural experiment from the implementation of a public health insurance program for rural residents in China (New Cooperative Medical Scheme [NCMS]) to examine whether the pharmaceutical industry increases innovation regarding diseases covered by the NCMS that are prevalent in rural areas. We examine the 1993–2009 patent data to gauge pharmaceutical innovation in China. Diseases with a 10% …

Generalized Jump Regressions For Local Moments, Tim Bollerslev, Jia Li, Leonardo Salim Saker Chaves

Research Collection School Of Economics

We develop new high-frequency-based inference procedures for analyzing the relationship between jumps in instantaneous moments of stochastic processes. The estimation consists of two steps: the nonparametric determination of the jumps as differences in local averages, followed by a minimum-distance type estimation of the parameters of interest under general loss functions that include both least-square and more robust quantile regressions as special cases. The resulting asymptotic distribution of the estimator, derived under an infill asymptotic setting, is highly nonstandard and generally not mixed normal. In addition, we establish the validity of a novel bootstrap algorithm for making feasible inference including bias-correction. …

Retirement Preparedness In Singapore, Junxing Chay, Seonghoon Kim

Research Collection School Of Economics

This chapter presents empirical evidence on a variety of measures to assess the social and economic well-being of near-retirees and retirees in Singapore based on rich data from the Singapore Life Panel, a nationally representative monthly panel survey of 50- to 70-year-old adults in Singapore. Large differences in retirement behaviour and household financial conditions related to retirement preparedness across education and wealth groups are documented. This suggests the importance of a retirement-related policy that focuses on the low-skilled and low-wealth groups. In addition, we discuss and evaluate current public policy designed to increase the employment of older workers and propose …

Development Of Sustainable Port Supply Chain Integration In Egypt, Khaled Nasraldin Mohamed Hussein

World Maritime University Ph.D. Dissertations

Advances in transportation and communication technology have led to acceleration of globalisation. The introduction of containerisation and multimodalism has triggered the cheaper, faster and safer shipping. Industries became encouraged to offshore their business to best utilise cheap labour and natural resources. Consequently, adoption of new strategies for global sourcing and outsourcing, such as supply management, became inevitable. These globalisation phenomena triggered the need for integrated logistics services and thus more integrated maritime logistics into global supply chains. Port integration into supply chains became a legitimate evolution for development taking place in the global maritime logistics industry. Empirical evidence refers to …

Evaluating College Students' Attitudes And Understanding Of Recycling, Taylor Shipley

Honors Program Theses

Individuals have different habits, beliefs, and knowledge regarding recycling. These can be due to a variety of reasons such as peers, upbringing, accessibility of recycling, or prior knowledge of what can be recycled. A school setting, in particular, can be influential to a student’s motivation to recycle; schools can provide an environment for students to learn about the importance of recycling and other various sustainability initiatives. Like most campuses, students’ recycling behaviors on the University of Northern Iowa’s (UNI) campus are likely to be affected to some degree by the reasons listed above as well as other life experiences.

Recycling …

[Introduction To] Paradoxes Of Care: Children And Global Medical Aid In Egypt., Rania Kassab Sweis

Bookshelf

Each year, billions of dollars are spent on global humanitarian health initiatives. These efforts are intended to care for suffering bodies, especially those of distressed children living in poverty. But as global medical aid can often overlook the local economic and political systems that cause bodily suffering, it can also unintentionally prolong the very conditions that hurt children and undermine local aid givers. Investigating medical humanitarian encounters in Egypt, Paradoxes of Care illustrates how child aid recipients and local aid experts grapple with global aid's shortcomings and its paradoxical outcomes.

Rania Kassab Sweis examines how some of the world's largest …

Waqf As A Medium For Community Development: A Review On Literature From 2010 To 2020, Ahmad Fahme Mohd Ali, Wan Ahmad Amirzal Wan Ahmad, Nurasyikin Ghazali, Ruzanifah Kosnin, Naiziatul Aziah Mohd Radzi, Azwan Abdullah, Nurhanan Abdul Rahman

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Nowadays, the application of Waqf in community has become more widespread as a source of community development. The objective of this article is to analyse and examine the related literatures on Waqf towards community development from 2010 to 2020. Descriptive research is employed as the methodology of this article based on a number of literatures on Waqf and community development within a ten-year duration. Exactly 100 articles were gathered from on World of Science (WoS), Scopus, Google Scholar, and Mendeley software using specific keywords, namely “Waqf and Community Development,” “Waqf and Economic Development,” and “Waqf + Community …

Framing Inclusion: The Media Treatment Of Irregular Immigrants' Right To Health Care In Spain, Alisa Petroff, Anahí Viladrich, Sònia Parella

Publications and Research

With the passing of Royal Decree-Law 16/2012, Spain’s national health system switched from a model defined by universal and free health care principles, to a private insurance system that excluded large population groups. Based on a qualitative research design, this paper examines the media treatment of undocumented immigrants’ prerogatives to public health care in Spain (2012–2018). The analysis of 234 articles, drawn from three major Spanish newspapers, reveals three frames that underscore the media’s "rhetorics of inclusion," which argue for the extension of free medical services to irregular immigrants a topic traditionally underestimated by the literature. The moralist frame, supported …

Zoning Out: Urban Agriculture, Sustainability, And Development In Portland, Oregon, Brian Elliott

Philosophy Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper examines the recent history of urban planning policy in and around Portland, Oregon with respect to efforts to enhance local agriculture. Despite recent and ongoing efforts to promote distribution and direct sale of local food products in the city, I argue that the dominant effect of the Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) in place since the 1970s has been to push agricultural production further from the most populous areas of the city. Whereas the UGB at present cannot include areas zoned specifically for agricultural use, I argue that it must reformed to allow for "agricultural reserves" within the boundary. …

Non-Monetary Economies: A Study On Different Governing Principles, Richard Perry Vest Ii

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This thesis examines a new economic system with a focus on non-monetary (primarily automation) aspects. Currency has been used in exchange for goods and services and this exchange has often resulted in benefits gained by any given individual. What if that wasn’t the case? How might society function if it was not influenced by currency? This thesis explores this hypothetical concept of an economy without currency with a focus given to automation. Using utility and production functions, discussion is given on how supply and demand functions behave in a non-monetary economy, how governing policy could be handled, and how society …

Three Essays In Applied Urban Economics, Alexander Cardazzi

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The first chapter examines the effect of policing strategies on housing prices. Crime has been shown to negatively affect housing values. However, there is not much empirical evidence documenting the amenity value of how people are policed. Stop & Frisk was a particularly salient policing tactic employed in New York City until a judge ruled it to be unconstitutional. This chapter uses exogenous variation in Stop & Frisk behavior resulting from landmark events in a federal class action lawsuit as well as exposure to Operation Impact, a high intensity policing strategy, to explain variation in property sales. Results indicate a …

Pulling Back The Curtain: A Student Collaborative Case Study Of Equity Issues In Colorado’S School Finance System, Amy Jo Schwartz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

After the Great Recession, a seven percent decrease in funding ended decades of academic growth and further widened the achievement gap between White and Black students (Jackson et al., 2020). Colorado’s school-finance system is particularly distorted and inequitable because of a series of tax-limiting policies which, combined, have led Colorado to become one of the lowest-funded per pupil states in the country (Resnick et al., 2015). The purpose of this study is to describe the policymaking context, as it relates to equity within Colorado’s school-finance system and explore policy alternatives to improve equity within the system. The study was designed …

Three Essays On “Energy , Environment, And Developmental Economics”, Bolarinwa Ajanaku

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This dissertation examines topics related to renewable energy development and investment planning, energy markets, environment degradation and economic development. The substantial ecological costs of deforestation are well known and considered globally important due to biodiversity loss, land degradation, soil erosion, and contributions to climate change. The first essay focuses upon understanding the tradeoff between development and deforestation in Africa. In the second essay, spatial analysis and Geographic Information System (GIS) are applied to determine potential locations for wind farms development in the state of West Virginia. Lastly, the third essay examines the role of wind power penetration on wholesale electricity …

Property Rights, Consequences Of Electrical Blackouts, And Measures Of Institutional Quality, Kerianne Nicole Lawson

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This dissertation is comprised of three essays. Chapter 1 is about a house titling program, called Khaya Lam, in South Africa. Despite it being legal in South Africa to acquire a title deed to a government-issued home, roughly 20 million South Africans do not hold title to their property. Millions of homes are eligible to have ownership transferred from the government to the individuals living in them, but legal costs and lack of awareness keep these renters from going through the steps to secure title deeds. Though they may occupy the property for years, without a title deed South Africans …

Three Essays In Applied Econometrics: Agricultural And Energy Economics, Kuan-Ming Huang

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This dissertation examines three empirical issues in energy and agricultural economics using econometrics models whose titles are: 1) Do Natural Hazards in the Gulf Coast Still Matter for State-Level Natural Gas Prices in the US? Evidence After the Shale Gas Boom; 2) Do Exploitations of Marcellus and Utica Shale Formations Improve Regional Economy in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia? A Synthetic Control Analysis; and 3) How Did Covid-19 Impact US Household Food Spending? An Analysis Six Months In.

The first essay assesses the impact of natural hazards on state-level natural gas prices and evaluates the effects of the shale gas …

Causal Determinants Of College Success, Benjamin Blemings

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The first essay focuses on alcohol access in college, which is an impediment to many students' success. Alcohol sales to general seating at college football games has been broadly adopted despite results suggesting greater alcohol availability increases crime and college alcohol abuse. Using differences-in-differences, this paper estimates how allowing alcohol sales in college football general seating sections affects crime. Reductions in crime are found after sales are allowed. After sales begin, those under the age of 21 are still not legally permitted to purchase in-stadium alcohol, but are still affected by changes in other stadium policies or law enforcement strategies. …

The Gendered Impact Of Droughts On Household Decision Making: Evidence From Uganda, Fiona Onyango, Andrew Hobbs

Master's Theses

Do female headed households lose/ sell more of their livestock in the event of a drought as compared to households headed by males? We address this question through an analysis of the combination of Living Standards Measurement study Integrated surveys on Agriculture dataset on Uganda using data from the period 2011-2016 and NDVI & Weather data. We carry out both OLS and fixed effects estimations. Our OLS Results are consistent with the theory of Consumption smoothing while we do not find evidence of any gendered effects from both the OLS and IV estimations.

Theorizing Beyond "The Code Of Capital": A Reply, Katharina Pistor

Faculty Scholarship

In this reply, I respond to and elaborate on the critique of my book “The Code of Capital” published in this special issue. The common thread of the critiques is the call for more theorizing of the themes the book addresses, especially the conception of state power, of resources, social relations and questions of knowledge and access to knowledge about the law, or epistemology. This reply is only a first response to issues that do require further analysis and I am hoping to follow suit on at least some of them in the near future.

Part 5: Whither Old Dominion University?, Dragas Center For Economic Analysis And Policy

State of the Region Reports: Hampton Roads

The University of Virginia, Virginia Tech and College of William & Mary historically have played important roles in the Commonwealth. They have set impressive records in admitting and graduating talented students who (predictably) do well after they leave these campuses. Nevertheless, the future viability and cohesion of the Commonwealth in this century will more likely be determined on campuses like Old Dominion University, for it is there that the critical social mobility challenge is being addressed in a meaningful way. We explore what the future may hold for ODU.

The Impact Of Disparity In Infrastructure Development On Aceh's Economic Performance: An Inter-Provincial Analysis, Mutiara Fahmi

Economics and Finance in Indonesia

This study provides empirical findings on regional disparity in infrastructural facilities in 23 districts/municipalities of Aceh Province and the impact of the disparity on the economic performance of Aceh Province, specifically on those of economic growth, poverty, and unemployment. The unit of analysis is the district level and the Infrastructure Development Index (IDI) is used as the variable computed by using the multivariate method. Regional disparity is measured by the Coefficient of Variation and the impact of IDI on the provinces economy is analyzed using the econometric model. The analysis shows that infrastructure development disparity exists and that IDI generally …

Public Health Spending, Governance Quality And Poverty Alleviation, Mohamad Komarudin

Economics and Finance in Indonesia

Poverty alleviation has become the main priority program in most developing countries. This research empirically studies the correlation between public health spending, governance quality, and poverty alleviation in developing countries. The panel data were estimated via a random-effects (RE) model and robustness check using instrumental variables (IV) (two-stage least-squares [2SLS]) and first-difference generalized method of moments (GMM) because of the endogeneity problem. The results suggest that public health spending has a significant effect on reducing the poverty rate, and that countries with better governance tend to reduce poverty than countries with poor governance. Increasing public health spending by one percentage …

A Decomposition Analysis Of Fertility: Evidence From Dki Jakarta And East Nusa Tenggara, Farma Mangunsong

Economics and Finance in Indonesia

Fertility control has been one of the priorities of development in Indonesia. However, the 2000 and 2010 population censuses showed an increase in fertility indicators. To identify the sources of increased fertility in developed and less developed areas, DKI Jakarta and East Nusa Tenggara Provinces were selected for comparison. Using 2000 and 2010 census data, the decomposition analysis shows that the increase in Total Fertility Rate (TFR) of DKI Jakarta was dominated by the increase in nuptiality rate, while the increase in TFR of East Nusa Tenggara was mainly caused by the increase in Marital Fertility Rate (MFR). The highest …