Digital Commons Network^™

Demographics, Macroeconomy, Or Monetary Policy: What Drives Japan’S Short Run Economic Movements Since 1991?, James Ac Raymond Ii

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis examines how Japan’s post-1991 macroeconomy behaves by analyzing quarterly inflation, money growth, and equity returns, with a focus on whether demographic change, macroeconomic indicators, or monetary policy better explains short run movements. Using Newey West regressions, the results show that demographics exert almost no influence at short horizons, while major Bank of Japan policy regimes such as QQE, NIRP, and YCC strongly shape liquidity conditions and dominate both money growth and equity performance. The findings suggest that demographic change matters primarily as a long run force that creates a low-rate environment, while short run dynamics are driven almost …

Determinants Of The U.S. Experience Economy: A Macroeconomic, Demographic, And Technological Analysis, 1984–2023, Chloe Ross

CMC Senior Theses

Pine and Gilmore et al. 1999 examine American consumers’ preferences for experiences over durable goods. Since then, there has been a multitude of research on the psychology behind this shift in consumption preferences, and there has been an abundance of media coverage of the new “experience economy.” This thesis goes beyond psychology and examines the macroeconomic, demographic, and technological determinants of experiential spending in the United States from 1984 to 2023. I use annual data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Consumer Expenditure Survey (CES) and variables from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA), Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED), US …

Medical And Recreational Cannabis In Colorado: Evidence From County-Level Sales And Medical Cards, Ethan Sattley

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis examines how Colorado’s cannabis market transitioned after recreational legalization by analyzing county-level medical card registrations and the medical share of cannabis sales from 2010–2020. Using an event-study design, I find that medical participation remained stable for several years after recreational sales began in 2014, but then declined sharply, by roughly 50–60 cards per 10,000 residents, about ten quarters after legalization. Using annual sales data, I show that the medical share of total cannabis revenue collapsed much more quickly, falling by more than half between 2014 and 2015 and converging near zero in most counties by the late 2010s. …

Macroeconomic Resilience And Sentiment Dynamics In The Global Luxury Fashion Industry, Mehr Gupta

CMC Senior Theses

The global luxury fashion industry is often viewed as a sector where broad economic conditions intersect with individual spending behavior. Yet despite this common assumption, it remains unclear whether macroeconomic fluctuations meaningfully shape luxury firms’ financial performance. This thesis examines the relationship between four key macroeconomic indicators - consumer sentiment, disposable income, unemployment, and exchange rates - and firm-level quarterly revenue for twelve publicly listed luxury companies from the early 2000s through 2024. Firm financial data from S&P Capital IQ are matched with macroeconomic measures from the Federal Reserve (FRED), and the analysis employs a two-way fixed-effects framework with firm …

Factors Correlated With State-Level Variation In Grocery Consumption Changes During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Sun Young Byun

CMC Senior Theses

In this paper, I employ a two-part empirical strategy to explore the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on grocery consumption across U.S. states. First, I use the United States Department of Agriculture's Weekly Retail Food Sales data from 2018-2023 to estimate a time-series panel model. I use the results to test three hypotheses regarding state-level variation in consumption changes and impacts in the initial pandemic period, the remaining pandemic period, and the post-pandemic period. Second, I use the estimated state-level effects as dependent variables in cross-sectional regressions to test three hypotheses linking variation in state-level consumption patterns to economic, demographic, …

Keeping America Ahead: The Global Chip Conundrum, Ethan Chen

CMC Senior Theses

Semiconductors underpin nearly every aspect of modern economic, military, and technological power. Yet while the United States pioneered chip innovation and design, it now heavily depends on foreign manufacturing, particularly Taiwan and the Taiwanese Semiconductor Manufacturing Company who produce more than 90% of the world’s leading edge chips. This thesis investigates how the U.S. lost its fabrication leadership, what risks its current dependence creates, and what strategies can most effectively restore domestic capacity and resilience in both the short term and long term. By going through historical analysis of industrial development, recent policy evaluation such as export controls and the …

Maternity Leave And Women’S Leadership In A Changing Work Environment: Global Evidence, Josefine Byström

CMC Senior Theses

Family leave policies play a central role in shaping women’s participation and advancement in the labor market. This study investigates whether the relationship between maternity leave duration and women’s labor outcomes has changed before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Using a cross-country panel spanning multiple years with fixed effects, this study examines two related outcomes: women’s labor force participation and representation in leadership. Prior to 2011, maternity leave duration displayed opposite non-linear patterns across these outcomes: an inverted U-shape for labor force participation, peaking at moderate leave lengths, and a U-shape for women’s leadership, which improved only at longer durations …

The Tcja And Shareholder Payouts, Carson T. Bloom

CMC Senior Theses

Abstract

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) provided corporations an estimated $233 billion in tax savings, yet relatively little is known about how firms allocated this cash windfall. This study examines whether growth and mature firms differed in whether they used these tax savings to distribute dividends and repurchase shares. Using panel data on publicly traded North American firms from 2016–2019, I classify firms as either growth or mature based on their cash-flow patterns and estimate the effects of the TCJA on their behavior using a difference-in-differences design.

The results indicate that mature firms increased shareholder payouts significantly more …

Esg And Misvaluation In U.S. Equity Markets, Rohaan Bhojwani

CMC Senior Theses

Existing research has produced conflicting conclusions on whether environmental, social, and governance (ESG) characteristics are efficiently priced in equity markets. While some studies argue that ESG performance improves firm value through lower risk and stronger fundamentals, others suggest that investor demand has inflated valuations in the past beyond intrinsic worth. This thesis examines whether ESG-driven valuation gaps represent justified pricing through firm fundamentals or systematic mispricing using Bartram and Grinblatt’s Agnostic Fundamental Analysis Framework (2018).

For this paper, I analyze the top 1000 U.S public firms by market value. I regress the market value on 19 accounting fundamentals for these …

The Future Of U.S. Higher Education: Equity Implications Of Shifting Immigration Policies, Research Institute For Social Equity Rise

Research Institute for Social Equity

This report examines the impact of U.S. immigration policies on higher education and international students from 2000 to 2025. It traces five major policy eras, from the post- 9/11 security overhaul and Obama-era expansion to the restrictive turns of 2017–2020 and 2025, and analyzes how shifting regulations have influenced enrollment patterns, economic contributions, and student well-being. Despite hosting more than 1.1 million international students in 2023–2024, the U.S. share of the global student market has fallen from 20% to 16%, underscoring how policy volatility and restrictive measures weaken national competitiveness. Drawing on federal data, scholarly research, and institutional reports, this …

Employment Preferences Of Favela Residents, Mayara Felix, Beatriz Marcoje, Ieda Matavelli, Maria Clara Rodrigues

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

We document employment preferences of workers at the margin of informality using open-ended questions and discrete choice experiments in Brazil’s largest favela complex. Stated preferences emphasize pay and tangible job benefits rather than meaning or purpose, while primary complaints center on poor management, customers, and inflexible schedules. Workers exhibit high valuations for all formal sector amenities on average—unemployment insurance, parental leave, and termination notice—as well as for learning opportunities, but lower for non-formal sector amenities such as shorter commutes. Valuations vary systematically by employment sector in ways consistent with sorting: formal workers value formal amenities most, the self-employed value them …

Three Essays In Health Economics, Caroline Andressa Welter

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Health outcomes and access to care are shaped by the interaction between public institutions, administrative rules, and responses to health risk. This dissertation investigates how barriers to access, changes in perceived risk, and policy design influence participation in public programs, preventive health behavior, and  treatment continuation. Across three essays in health economics, I examine how individuals respond to disruptions in service delivery, epidemic exposure, and administrative burden, with a focus on vulnerable populations that depend on public systems of care.
The first essay analyzes the impact of Social Security Administration field office closures on participation in federal disability programs during …

Three Essays On Urban Transportation, Daniel Amorim Souza Centuriao

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Urban environments are shaped by dynamic interactions between infrastructure development, policy interventions, and episodic demand shocks, all of which can generate unintended externalities in the form of motor vehicle collisions, injuries, and fatalities. This dissertation investigates the determinants of traffic safety in dense urban settings, with a particular focus on how different sources of urban activity affect collision risk and severity. Using New York City as a case study and leveraging high-resolution spatial and temporal data, I examine three distinct but interconnected mechanisms: construction activity, traffic safety policies, and large-scale events.

The first chapter analyzes the impact of urban development, …

A Practitioner’S Guide To Panel Data Quantile Regression, Antonio F. Galvao, Carlos Lamarche

Economics Faculty Publications

Quantile regression for panel data has become a common model of interest for econometricians and statisticians. The theoretical literature has addressed important questions, including identification, estimation, and statistical inference. Although recent advances have enabled practitioners to estimate flexible models under a wide range of assumptions, practical issues have not been fully addressed. In this paper, we offer a guide to empirical practice intended to help applied researchers navigate the challenges of estimation and inference for panel quantile models. We also present a series of practical recommendations and illustrations, emphasizing both “why” and the “how” to help researchers with the implementation …

Wedges: A Microeconomic Perspective On Misallocation, Lauren Falcao Bergquist, Danial Lashkari, Eric Verhoogen

Discussion Papers

This chapter takes stock of what has been learned from the recent micro-development literature about wedges—mechanisms generating dispersion in marginal revenue products of factors across firms, which are commonly interpreted as indicators of misallocation. We present a general theoretical framework that allows us to consider several different types of wedges simultaneously. We argue that it is important to distinguish between between technological wedges, which are present even in the efficient allocation that would be chosen by the social planner, and distortionary wedges, which are present in market equilibrium but not the social planner's allocation. Not all wedges, as we have …

Economic Development And The Environment, Kelsey Jack, Nicholas Ryan

Discussion Papers

Economic development relies on and transforms the environment. The transformation is evident in the poor environmental quality in many developing countries. For example, air quality in Southeast Asia is three times worse than in the United States, in sub-Saharan Africa four times worse and in South Asia more than six times worse. We model how environmental quality affects health, productivity and well-being and how individuals privately adapt to environmental hazards. We also model how collective action and formal regulation contribute to environmental quality. We draw three main findings from a review of empirical research on these mechanisms. First, individual adaptation …

Skipping The Factory: Service-Led Growth And Structural Transformation In The Developing World, Michael Peters, Youdon Zhang, Fabrizio Zilibotti

Discussion Papers

In today’s developing world, many economies appear to bypass industrialization and transition directly from agriculture to services. The largest rise in service employment has occurred in non-tradable consumer services, such as retail and hospitality, especially in urban areas, where many cities resemble consumer hubs built around local demand. These patterns of growth raise fundamental questions: Can service-led growth sustain improvements in living standards over time? Is service-led growth inherently biased toward affluent urban consumers? What role should policy play? To address these questions, we propose a parsimonious general equilibrium framework that incorporates non-homothetic preferences and locally non-tradable consumer services in …

An Examination Of Remittance Inflow Variation In Net-Emigration Countries, Andrew Rizko

CMC Senior Theses

This paper examines the structural and institutional determinants of remittance inflows in a panel of 40 net-emigration countries from 2000 to 2024. By restricting the sample to countries with negative average net migration, the analysis holds migration pressure constant and isolates the role of domestic conditions in explaining cross-country variation in remittance dependence. Using fixed effects and correlated random effects (Mundlak) estimators, I find that labor force participation is the most robust within-country determinant: a one percentage point increase is associated with approximately a 2.3 percent decline in remittance inflows, consistent with remittances functioning as a structural need in contexts …

International Cocoa Trading Arrangements Between Industrialised And Developing Countries 1951–1999: A Structural Gravity Analysis, John Brown, Xenia Matschke, Juan René Rojas Rodríguez

Economics

Using a state-of-the-art structural gravity model, we investigate the impact of various (post-)colonial cocoa trading arrangements on the cocoa trade between developing cocoa producer countries and rich industrial cocoa consumer nations in the time period 1951–1999. We find that in particular the trading arrangements of the European (Economic) Community (EEC/EC), such as the Association, Yaoundé and Lomé Agreements, as well as the UNCTAD International Cocoa Agreement, had a measurable positive impact on cocoa trade flows, in contrast to the British Commonwealth partnership or the GATT Generalised System of Preferences. In particular, the Yaoundé Agreement not only increased the trade between …

The Low Human Rights Advantage And The Failure Of Globalization: The Challenge Of China Inc., Shaomin Li

Management Faculty Publications

Purpose

We develop a framework of the low human rights advantage – labor repression, state discretionary expropriation and total control – that reduces factor costs and enables coordinated resource mobilization. These mechanisms generate economic advantage only when combined with access to global markets, which provide demand, capital and technology. By leveraging this low human rights advantage, the Chinese state has transformed China into a giant corporation that combines the agility of a firm with the resources of a nation, thereby reshaping global competition. Economic integration without corresponding political integration is a major contributor to the failure of the current wave …

Unlocking Organizational Support Through Psychological Empowerment: Identification And Test Of Transformational Leadership As A Catalyst Of Perceived Organizational Support, Ryan L. Klinger, Nathapon Siangchokyoo, Tipat Sottiwan

Management Faculty Publications

Organizational support theory (OST) explains how employees develop and respond to beliefs about their organization, with perceived organizational support (POS) representing a central construct within this framework. Integrating psychological empowerment theory, we examine an intrinsic motivational pathway through which POS relates to employee in-role performance and identify transformational leadership as a contextual catalyst that may strengthen this process. We test a multilevel moderated mediation model using multisource and multi-time data from 217 employees and 41 supervisors. Results indicate that POS is positively related to in-role performance through the psychological empowerment dimensions of competence and self-determination. Moreover, transformational leadership strengthens the …

Human Capital And Development, Philippe Aghion, Ingvild Almås, Costas Meghir

Discussion Papers

Human capital is central to efforts to promote growth, convergence, and the elimination of poverty. Drawing on the seminal macroeconomic frameworks by Nelson-Phelps, Lucas and subsequent developments, alongside macro and microeconomic evidence, we examine the role of human capital in driving innovation and growth. We highlight how different types of human capital, characterized by education level, matter in different stages of development. Despite documented increases in years of schooling, the world’s poorest regions still see stagnating outcomes in learning and education quality, potentially creating poverty traps where investments in neither physical nor human capital materialize. We discuss obstacles to human …

Multivariate Quantile Autoregression-Mixed Data Sampling (Mvqar-Midas) Modeling Of Cost Of Living And Supply Chain Dynamics In Canada., Patrick Gbolonyo

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In recent years, the rising cost of living as a result of persistent inflationary pressures, disruptions in the global supply chains, and changes in the macroeconomic landscape has become a critical topic of discussion. To address this, we move beyond a mean-based framework and employ a quantile regression approach. This allows the persistence of each series and the transmis- sion of shocks between the Consumer Price Index (CPI) (the total CPI which is a percentage change over the past 12 months), the Interest Rate (IR)(the target for the overnight rate), the New Housing Price Index (NHPI), and high-frequency supply chain …

Mechanisms Driving Disparities In Income Mobility Across The Income Distribution, Joe Larkins

Honors Theses

This study examines intergenerational income persistence across the income distribution, testing whether mechanisms driving inequality differ between families in the top and bottom halves of the income distribution. Using data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88), a nationally representative longitudinal survey of 8th grade students and their parents, this research estimates an interaction model comparing parental income effects for children in advantaged versus disadvantaged economic circumstances. The analysis reveals that a $1,000 increase in parental income yields eight times greater income gains for children in the bottom half of the distribution compared to those in the top …

Esg Risk And Agricultural Commodity Integration, Alper Gormus, Yoav Wachsman, Elif Gormus

Finance and Economics

This study investigates how major agricultural commodities interact with diversified U.S. equity funds, sorted by their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) risk exposure. Using daily Morningstar data on 880 U.S. equity mutual funds, we construct portfolios representing high- and low-ESG-risk equities and examine their linkages with prices for eight agricultural commodities. Applying Fourier-augmented Toda–Yamamoto VAR and LM-GARCH models that accommodate both abrupt and gradual structural breaks, we document clear heterogeneity across ESG risk segments. Low-ESG-risk portfolios exhibit minimal price and volatility spillovers from agricultural commodities, whereas high-ESG-risk portfolios display strong and often bidirectional transmissions—particularly for coffee, corn, cotton, livestock, and …

Essays On Public Policy, Labor Markets, And Regional Economics, Toby Heaney

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This dissertation consists of three empirical essays examining how economic and political outcomes respond to changes in public policy, information, and local economic conditions. Across the three studies, the dissertation applies empirical methods to questions in political economy, economic forecasting, and regional economics, with particular attention to how the effects of economic shocks and policy changes vary across individuals, markets, and geographic areas.

The first essay examines the role of policy salience in electoral outcomes. Building on rational-choice and median-voter models, it argues that voters may respond disproportionately to policies that impose concentrated and highly visible costs, even when those …

The Origins And Expansion Of The Soviet Union’S Military-Industrial Complex, Noah B. Heminger

All Master's Theses

This thesis explores the way in which the “Soviet Military-Industrial Complex” that dominated the Soviet Union’s economy in the latter half of its existence came into existence and what forces caused its expansion. The first force was the ideological and strategic beliefs and assumptions of the leadership and military planners which held that the USSR would always be in existential danger. The second was Stalin’s “Revolution from Above” which broke down the barriers economically and politically that resisted the militarization of politics, economics, and society. And the final force was the stresses of World War II which caused the Soviet …

Examining The Results Of Revolutions In The Third World: A Case Study Of The Iranian, Libyan, And Nicaraguan Revolutions, Noah A. Mohammedelamien

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This thesis examines the post-revolutionary trajectories of Libya, Iran, and Nicaragua to explain why some Third World revolutionary projects preserve and use elements of their founding ideology while others fragment, personalize, or diffuse over time. Rather than focusing on the causes of revolution alone, it analyzes the durability of religious-socialist ideological continuity after revolutionary upheaval. Using a (MDSD) comparative historical and institutional approach grounded in primary and secondary sources, the study evaluates five key dimensions across the cases: religious-socialist ideological fusion, religious elite loyalty, popular religious mobilization, institutional embedding of ideology, and external pressure. The findings suggest ideological continuity is …

Barriers To Immunity: Understanding Covid-19 Vaccine Uptake In Africa, Emilia Blechschmidt

Honors Theses

This thesis examines the factors influencing COVID-19 vaccine uptake across African countries, with a focus on structural, informational, and behavioral barriers to immunization. Drawing on cross-country data, the study analyzes how access to transportation, reliable information, and healthcare resources shape vaccination rates, alongside the effect of demographics and institutional factors in shaping individual perceptions of risk and vaccine safety.

The findings emphasize that the broader strength and preparedness of national health systems strongly influence vaccine uptake. Countries that demonstrated higher coverage of routine childhood immunizations, such as polio and hepatitis B, also tended to perform better in COVID-19 uptake efficiency …

Interpreting Legal Standards Of Proof: An Experimental Study Of Probabilistic Decision-Making, Hayley Leopold

Honors Theses

Legal standards of proof play a central role in structuring decision-making under uncertainty, yet they are typically communicated using qualitative language rather than precise probabilities. This raises an important question: how do individuals interpret and apply these standards when making decisions based on probabilistic evidence? This study examines whether individuals apply legal standards of proof in a manner consistent with their commonly associated probabilistic thresholds, and whether quantification and incentives improve alignment with normative decision-making.

To address these questions, I conducted a controlled behavioral experiment in which participants made legal-style decisions under uncertainty. Participants were assigned roles in a simplified …