Economics Commons^™

Feasibility Study For Lithium Mining In South Dakota, Neha Karna

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The increasing demand for lithium in the battery manufacturing industry, boosted by the growth of electric vehicles and smartphones, has led to concern over its sustainable supply chain in the United States. Historically, South Dakota has played a significant role in U.S. lithium production. The recent surge of interest in lithium exploration in South Dakota, specifically Black Hills, underscores the importance of evaluating the feasibility of lithium mining in Black Hills. This research aims to study the economic feasibility of a lithium mining operation in Black Hills, South Dakota. Our specific objective is to estimate cut-off grade using Lane’s model …

Towards Energy Access For All: Developing The Lived Energy Experience Index (Leei), Kentina Annie Ishimwe

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Energy is the fuel that powers the engine of civilization. Energy access metrics ensure that nations continuously work towards providing access for all. However, the prevalent binary indicator fails to consider that energy needs to be usable, accessible, affordable, and reliable. As a result, numerous tiered and multidimensional metrics, such as the Multi-Tier Framework, came about to bridge the gap but proved to be complex and complicated to implement. This study presents the existing literature review, assesses the limitations of current energy access measurement frameworks, and compares household energy needs with reported access statistics. Based on the findings, the Lived …

Dataset Supporting The Manuscript Promoting Awareness And Adoption Of Biochar As A Soil Amendment: Effect Of Message Framing, Tong Wang, David Wiltse, Filip Viskupic, Akinsola Oyebanji

South Dakota Farm Survey

A farmer survey was conducted from February 22nd to March 9th, 2025 to test the impact of message framing on farmers’ learning and adoption decisions of biochar. The survey targeted operators of farms in Eastern South Dakota where the production of corn requires chemical fertilizer is intensively used as a crucial input. Biochar as a soil amendment has the potential to serve as a partial substitute for chemical fertilizer in our studied region. A sample of 10,000 South Dakota farming operations east of the Missouri River (where climate favors row crop production) was randomly drawn from those who participated in …

A Research Project On The Feasibility Of The State Of California’S Mandate To Sell Only Zero-Emission (Electric) Vehicles By The Year 2035 For California And South Dakota, Sandeep Pudasaini

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research evaluates the feasibility of California's mandate to transition entirely to zero emission vehicles (ZEVs) by 2035 and explores the prospects of South Dakota adopting a similar policy. The study analyzes key factors such as infrastructure readiness, renewable energy capacity, material requirements for electric vehicle (EV) batteries, and socioeconomic variables that influence ZEV adoption. Feasibility studies like this are critical because large-scale policy mandates have far reached implications for energy systems, environmental outcomes, and economic planning. Understanding whether a state is equipped to meet such a goal allows policymakers to anticipate challenges, identify infrastructure gaps, and allocate resources more …

Impact Of Parental Involvement On Children’S Mental Health, Syeda Tasnime Kabir

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study estimates the causal effect of parental involvement on the mental health of primary school children in Bangladesh. Using an instrumental variables strategy that leverages local parental involvement norms, I find that increased parental involvement significantly reduces cognitive and emotional difficulties. Notably, I find that the protective effect of parental involvement varies by socio-economic context, showing weaker effects for children of mothers who married at an older age and those whose fathers live outside the household, but stronger effects in joint families. Furthermore, I identify two key mechanisms underlying these effects: accommodating parenting style and improved household hygiene practices. …

Simplified Regional-National Dsge Models For U.S. State-Level Analysis, Michael Telkamp

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis develops a series of simplified Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) model variants to analyze macroeconomic dynamics at the U.S. state level. Using South Dakota as a case study, I extend the Smets and Wouters (2007) mediumscale framework by implementing state-specific output, labor, consumption, investment, and wages into a dual-economy structure, where the state is modeled as a closed economy influenced by national-level shocks. The models are estimated using Bayesian techniques on quarterly data from 2007 - 2020. Model performance is evaluated through impulse response functions and variance decompositions. A key result is that South Dakota exhibits firm habit …

An Investigation Of Bidder Behaviour In Wic Infant Formula Rebate Auctions, Ashma Pandey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research investigated the competitive bidding dynamics for infant formula rebate contracts within the Special Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). I begin by focusing on the differences between winning and losing bids. The study employs multiple regression to predict rebate bids submitted by major manufacturers when they win a contract. I next conduct a paired t-test for each manufacturer – revealing statistically significant differences between predicted bids (based on the parameters from the winning model) and actual bids when a manufacturer did not win. This suggests that each manufacturer bids significantly lower rebates (higher net …

Do Agricultural Commodity Price Spikes Always Stem From News?, Zhouxin Li

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study delves into the occurrence and differentiation of significant price jumps in agricultural commodity markets, challenging the conventional belief that such movements are solely driven by exogenous factors. Existing literature has primarily focused on the impact of news on agricultural commodity prices, neglecting the distinction between endogenous and exogenous price spikes. I aim to identify and categorize both types of price spikes in corn, soybean, and wheat futures markets. I propose a comprehensive methodology involving the collection of agricultural news, non-parametric price jump detection, and differentiation between exogenous (newsdriven) and endogenous (non-news related) price spikes. By utilizing intraday price …

Access To Banking : A South Asian Perspective, Aditi Poudel

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines the driving factors behind gender disparities in access to banking services in South Asia (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka) with a focus on legal indicators (assets, marriage, mobility, parenthood, pay, pension, workplace) and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. The choice of South Asia is not just due to the sheer number of women affected by financial exclusion but also because of its economic significance and the opportunity for substantial impact through legal and economic reforms in the world economy. Employing logistic regression models, I examine the critical legal and economic determinants influencing …

Session 7: Would Ai Stocks Estimate Be As Surprised To Usda Stock Reports As Private Market Analysts?, Asif Mahmud Chowdhury, Matthew Elliott

SDSU Data Science Symposium

Would AI Stocks Estimate Be as Surprised to USDA Stock Reports as Private Market Analysts?

Keywords: Machine Learning, Random Forest, Agricultural Commodities Market, Informational Impact, Efficient Market Hypothesis.

The USDA survey-based Quarterly Grain Stocks reports are the primary source of information regarding the relative supply of U.S. corn, soybeans, and wheat for the last fifty years. Previous research has examined the accuracy of the USDA stock reports and their relevancy to the market, given alternative sources of estimates (e.g., Isengildina-Massa et al., 2021). For example, private industry analysts also estimate expected quarterly grain stock reports before USDA releases their reports. …

2023 South Dakota Rancher Survey Descriptive Results, Tong Wang, Sujan Ghimire, Stephan Cheye

Midwestern Farm and Producer Surveys and Policy Briefs

Researchers at South Dakota State University surveyed South Dakotan ranchers between January and March 2023 to better understand their beliefs and perspectives on various grazing techniques, which will allow programs to be tailored to better serve their needs in the future. A sample of 3,500 ranchers were purchased from DTN that contains 3,500 records from South Dakota with 50+ livestock and 100+ acres of pasture.

The Role Of Carbon Credits On Farmers’ Adoption Of Climate-Smart Practices In South Dakota, Stephen Cheye

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Net-zero pledges and carbon credit systems have gained momentum due to the growing urgency to address climate change and limit global warming to below 2°C above preindustrial levels. Agricultural carbon credits can be a potentially win-win mechanism by providing extra income for farmers while helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Nevertheless, there is a paucity of understanding about farmers’ willingness to accept carbon credit incentives and adopt climate-smart practices that sequester carbon. To address this, we analyzed 309 responses from a South Dakota producer survey conducted in 2021. We estimated probit and interval regression models to ascertain the level of …

Adaptive Learning Gain In Asset Pricing, Sedealy Juste Lokossou

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This paper delves into the complexities of asset pricing, emphasizing the need to go beyond prevailing paradigms and constant learning gain assumptions. We examine the influence of personal experiences, adaptive learning processes, and subjective return expectations on asset pricing. By incorporating the concept of time-varying learning gain, we provide a more realistic portrayal of asset pricing. Empirical analysis reveals a consistent negative correlation between experienced real payout growth and subsequent returns, indicating counter-cyclical behavior. Our findings also support the mean-reversion hypothesis in stock returns, although caution is needed due to some scenarios lacking statistical significance. Theoretical exploration uncovers that higher …

U.S. Consumers’ Willingness To Pay For Raised Carbon-Friendly Beef: Moderation Effect Of Information And Consumer Characteristics, Mariam Ishaq

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Impact Of Covid-19 Relief Packages On U.S. Household Food Security And Food Expenditure, Bridget Yeboah Bafowaa

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The COVID-19 pandemic led to changes in consumer shopping habits, including food expenditures. The pandemic induced changes in food expenditure patterns, food accessibility, and declining household income contributed to increased food insecurity during the pandemic. The objective of this study is to examine the impact of COVID-19- related relief packages on food security and food expenditures. The effect of Economic Impact Payments, P-EBT, SNAP, and free food will be considered. Using data from the Household Pulse Survey (HPS), a total sample of 1,899,929 households were analyzed in this study. The HPS is a nationally representative survey structured to produce data …

The Impact Of Cluster Strength On Wages: An Empirical Analysis, Devan Schaefer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this thesis, I examine the relationship between clusters (i.e., the grouping of competitive, interconnected industries within a geographical area) and wages, building upon the work of Marshall (1890) and Porter (2003) on the importance of clusters for regional economic development. I seek to answer two research questions. First, after accounting for robustness tests, do clusters continue to affect wages positively? Second, is labor force productivity the only channel through which this relationship occurs? In my analysis, I employ ordinary least squares, two-stage least squares, and fixed effects regression analyses using panel data from 2009 to 2014 for every U.S. …

Would Ai Stocks Estimate Be As Surprised To Usda Stocks Reports As Private Market Analysts?, Asif Mahmud Chowdhury

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The USDA survey-based Quarterly Agriculture Stocks (QAS) reports are the primary source of information regarding the relative supply of U.S. corn, soybeans, and wheat for the last fifty years. Research has examined USDA stock reports and their relevancy to the market (e.g., Isengildina-Massa et al., 2021). In addition, private industry analysts estimate expected quarterly grain stock reports before USDA releases them. Market information firms such as Bloomberg and Reuters publish a subset of these estimates a few days before the USDA reports. Previous research has found that when industry analysts have significant differences in stock expectations compared to what the …

Firm-Level Political Risk And Corporate R&D Investment, Emmanuel Boah

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

I examine how firms make R&D investment decisions during periods of political uncertainty. To minimize stickiness and overly generalized assumptions, I employ quarterly data. I find that firms invest more in R&D when facing high levels of political risk. The results suggest that this positive relationship between political risk and R&D investment is more pronounced for competitive and politically sensitive firms. Additionally, the positive association is evident among firms with higher growth opportunities and more liquid assets. The results are robust to the test for correlation, addressing endogeneity, and alternative proxies adopted for the variables of interest. Overall, the findings …

Simulating The Impact Of Emissions Control On Economic Productivity Using Particle Systems And Puff Dispersion Model, Najam Khan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A simulation platform is developed for quantifying the change in productivity of an economy under passive and active emission control mechanisms. The program uses object-oriented programming to code a collection of objects resembling typical stakeholders in an economy. These objects include firms, markets, transportation hubs, and boids which are distributed over a 2D surface. Firms are connected using a modified Prim’s Minimum spanning tree algorithm, followed by implementation of an all-pair shortest path Floyd Warshall algorithm for navigation purposes. Firms use a non-linear production function for transformation of land, labor, and capital inputs to finished product. A GA-Vehicle Routing Problem …

2022 Survey For Midwestern Producers Descriptive Results, Tong Wang, Stephen Cheye

Midwestern Farm and Producer Surveys and Policy Briefs

From July to September 2021, researchers at South Dakota State University carried out a survey of producers in the Midwest to understand producers’ views and use of conservation farming and precision technology. To further understand how the input market supply volatilities has affected Midwest farmers' decisions and their potential adjustments to the current market situation, we carried out a re-survey in 2022 with the 1,119 respondents to the 2021 Midwestern survey. The participants of the survey were contacted in four separate rounds in line with the modified Tailored Design Method.

Effects Of Conservation Management Practices On Soil Health And Crop Yields In Eastern South Dakota, Alex Mclain

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Conservation management practice adoption on agricultural land has increased in recent years due to increasing public and private investment. The anticipated impact of increasing conservation management practice adoption are reduced greenhouse gas emissions and improved soil, water, and air quality. Understanding how these conservation management practices affect agricultural producers economically is vital to properly incentivize these practices. The existing literature on how conservation management practices affect soil health and crop yields is mixed and generally has been conducted on experimental research stations. These studies may not fully account for the on-farm effects of conservation management practices. The objectives of this …

Technology-Intensive Exports, R&D, Human Capital, And Economic Growth In The Twenty-First Century, Pierce Plucker

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates twenty-first century economic growth through a distanceto- frontier (technology-gap) lens where growth in a country’s knowledge stock is determined by knowledge creation and knowledge imitation. The creation term is assumed to be a function of research and development, technology-intensive export performance, and human capital, while the imitation term is a function of the technology gap, technology-intensive export performance, and human capital. Over the period 1997-2018, two samples of countries are analyzed in a panel setting, and two growth models are estimated in total—one for each sample. While research and development has been extensively analyzed in the economic …

Ceo Types And Firm Efficiency, Lok Chi Lam

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This paper investigates the connection between CEO types and firm efficiency. I utilize the general ability index (GAI) as a proxy to examine and separate CEO types: generalist CEOs and specialist CEOs. Initially, I applied the pooled ordinary least square (OLS) and fixed effect regression on 26,830 firm-year observations to explore the GAI effect on firm efficiency. The finding shows that GAI has a negative impact on firm efficiency. It indicates that CEOs with lower GAI are better at improving firm efficiency; for instance, specialist CEOs are preferable to generalist CEOs. Further analysis of CEO types using the quadrant method …

South Dakota Farmers’ Usage Of Conservation Tillage, Tong Wang, Jim Ristau

South Dakota Farm Survey

Researchers at South Dakota State University (SDSU) conducted producer surveys in the eastern part of South Dakota in both 2018 and 2021. Producers could take the survey online or via mail and were asked questions about their farm, farming practices including usage of soil and water conservation practices, and their values. Using publicly available addresses from the Farm Service Agency, a random sample of 3,000 producers were sent the survey in 2018. 650 were ineligible, and 708 responded to the survey for a response rate of 30%. In 2021, the same producers who took the survey in 2018 were asked …

South Dakota Farmers’ Perceived Extreme Weather Frequency And Adaptation Measures, Tong Wang, Jim Ristau

South Dakota Farm Survey

Researchers at South Dakota State University (SDSU) conducted surveys of eastern South Dakota (SD) commodity crop producers with the support of the South Dakota Corn Utilization Council. Using publicly available addresses of government program participants, a random sample of 3,000 producers were sent the survey in 2018. 650 were ineligible and 708 responded to the survey for a response rate of 30%. In 2021, the same producers who took the survey in 2018 were asked to take a follow up survey. 94 were ineligible, and 350 responded for a 59% response rate. Producers could take the survey online or via …

South Dakota Farmer Survey Chemical Use On Cropland, Tong Wang, Jim Ristau

South Dakota Farm Survey

Researchers at South Dakota State University (SDSU) conducted surveys with South Dakota (SD) commodity crop producers in the eastern part of the state in both 2018 and 2021. Producers could take the survey online or via mail and were asked questions about their farm, farming practices including usage of soil and water conservation practices, challenges, and benefits to using conservation practices, and their attitudes about the environment. Using publicly available addresses from the Farm Service Agency of government program participants, a random sample of 3,000 producers were sent the survey in 2018. 650 were ineligible, and 708 responded to the …

South Dakota Farmers’ Usage Of Integrated Crop & Livestock Management, Tong Wang, Jim Ristau

South Dakota Farm Survey

Researchers at South Dakota State University (SDSU) conducted producer surveys in the eastern part of South Dakota in both 2018 and 2021. Producers could take the survey online or via mail and were asked questions about their farm, farming practices including usage of soil and water conservation practices, and their values. Using publicly available addresses from the Farm Service Agency, a random sample of 3,000 producers were sent the survey in 2018. 650 were ineligible, and 708 responded to the survey for a response rate of 30%. In 2021, the same producers who took the survey in 2018 were asked …

South Dakota Farmers’ Perceived Value Of Carbon Credits, Tong Wang, Jim Ristau

South Dakota Farm Survey

Researchers at South Dakota State University (SDSU) conducted surveys with South Dakota commodity crop producers in the eastern part of the state in both 2018 and 2021. Producers could take the survey online or via mail and were asked questions about their farm, farming practices including usage of soil and water conservation practices, challenges and benefits to using conservation practices, and their attitudes about the environment. Using publicly available addresses from the Farm Service Agency of government program participants, a random sample of 3,000 producers were sent the survey in 2018. 650 were ineligible, and 708 responded to the survey …

South Dakota Farmers’ Usage Of Cover Crops, Tong Wang, Jim Ristau

South Dakota Farm Survey

Researchers at South Dakota State University (SDSU) conducted producer surveys in the eastern part of South Dakota in both 2018 and 2021. Producers could take the survey online or via mail and were asked questions about their farm, farming practices including usage of soil and water conservation practices, and their values. Using publicly available addresses from the Farm Service Agency, a random sample of 3,000 producers were sent the survey in 2018. 650 were ineligible, and 708 responded to the survey for a response rate of 30%. In 2021, the same producers who took the survey in 2018 were asked …

South Dakota Farmers’ Usage Of Diversified Crop Rotations, Tong Wang, Jim Ristau

South Dakota Farm Survey

Researchers at South Dakota State University (SDSU) conducted producer surveys in the eastern part of South Dakota in both 2018 and 2021. Producers could take the survey online or via mail and were asked questions about their farm, soil and water conservation practices, and their values. Using publicly available addresses from the Farm Service Agency, a random sample of 3,000 producers were sent the survey in 2018. 650 were ineligible, and 708 responded to the survey for a response rate of 30%. In 2021, the same producers who took the survey in 2018 were asked to take a follow up …