Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Who Is The Customer? Identifying The Initial Adopters Of Formal Savings. Field Evidence From Malawi, Karan Saggi

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis examines household characteristics as determinants of formal savings accounts in rural Malawi. The main questions answered in this paper include the effects of household characteristics on the probability of having formal savings, the amounts saved in these accounts, and the probability of adopting formal savings. The central discussion aims to identify the initial adopters of formal savings accounts, using a marketing approach previously unapplied to this area of research. This paper also contributes to the dialogue of the household composition by considering three untried variables: number of adults, number of children, and literacy of all household members. Results …

The Effect Of Natural Disasters On Volunteerism, Alexander P. Kalish

CMC Senior Theses

The power of natural disasters to significantly and drastically alter the lives of the people they touch is vast, and the response rate of the provided aid can be the difference between a successful recovery and not. This study examines the relationship between natural disasters and volunteerism. The analysis makes use of panel data measurements on volunteer rate and volunteer hours per resident as well as FEMA measurements of major natural disasters from 2005 – 2012. I find that states that experience a natural disaster in the current year experience a significant and positive increase in volunteer rate in the …

Africa Rising: Corruption & Foreign Direct Investment Inflows, Kunaal A. Chande

CMC Senior Theses

Using a panel data set spanning from 2005 to 2012 and drawn from 35 Sub-Saharan

African countries, this paper examines the relative impact of corruption on the

inflow of foreign direct investment. This study is motivated by the recent influx of

political and media attention on the African continent that is poised to receive

billions of dollars in investment over the coming years. It is argued in this paper that

there is no significant link between the two variables. There did appear to be a

negative skew meaning higher levels of perceived corruption resulted in less FDI

inflows, while few …