Economics Commons^™

Continuity Of Fdi: Determinants And Effects On Growth, Loredana Popescu

Honors Theses

The literature on foreign direct investment (FDI) provides evidence on the relation from FDI to growth in the presence of some absorptive qualities such as existing level of development, financial market depth, trade policies and human capital thresholds. The analysis of FDI inflows in the literature so far does not include an investigation of discontinuity, or of lack of steady positive flows. Discontinuities are expected to depend on development levels and risk factors in the host country as they proxy for attractiveness of the target to the foreign investor. This paper investigates the continuity of FDI with its determinants and …

Impact Of Various Insurance Types On Level And Appropriateness Of Health Care Consumption, Allison Mary Janda

Honors Theses

The goal of this study was to examine the extent to which insurance type, or method of care management, impact the appropriate delivery of health care. Previous studies indicate a relationship between insurance type and patterns of consumption but do not directly link the incentives or disincentives inherent in each plan with trends inconsumption of health care. This study explores how different types of health insurance coverage affect the location, the degree, and the frequency of health care consumption in order to gain insight into which plans promote appropriate delivery and consumption ofcare.

The Impact Of Social Pressures On Referee's Sanctions In Professional Soccer : A Case Study Of Penalty Kicks In The Mls, Mariano Harari

Honors Theses

This paper examines referee bias in the Major League Soccer (MLS), particularly looking at referees’ decisions regarding penalty kicks. After analyzing the 520 penalty kicks sanctioned since the inception of the MLS, this study ascertains that referees’ display a considerable bias favoring the home team when awarding the initial penalty kick of a game. Additionally, this study demonstrates that in matches with more than one penalty kick, the penalties are disproportionately awarded to each team, suggesting that referees are compensating or atoning for their initial calls. Moreover, when sanctioning a second penalty kick, there is a bias effect of 5.4% …

Can Scouts And Nfl General Managers Predict Future Quarterback Performance At The Time Of The Nfl Draft?, Cain Montgomery

Honors Theses

Every year the National Football League has a draft selection process to recruit new talent. Despite the overwhelming amount of analysis performed on players, bad draft picks happen every year. Little research has previously been done to determine whether player performance is predictable at the time of the NFL Draft. Rafferty and Johnson chartered new territory in 2008 with their study entitled Is the NFL Draft a Crap Shoot? The Case of Wide Receivers. The purpose of this paper is to help fill the void of literature on performance prediction by extending the study by Rafferty and Johnson to …

Measuring The Effect Of Family Income On Undergraduate Behavior, Lindsey Brewer

Honors Theses

Educational equality has been an important and relevant issue in recent years, especially as tuition increases at colleges and universities make it increasingly difficult for low and middle-income families to afford education for their children. There are even more issues of educational equality that come into play once a student matriculates at a chosen school. This paper focuses on this area, expanding on existing literature that details family income’s impact on undergraduate behavior. Academic pursuits have been a topic for prior research in this area, but this paper also models extracurricular behavior as a function of family income. Results show …

Forecasting Utility Of Uk Consumer Sentiment Indexes In Real Time : Do Consumer Sentiment Surveys Improve Consumption Forecasts In Real Time?, Bradford M. Smith

Honors Theses

This paper builds on recent research utilizing real time datasets in order to assess the forecasting utility of consumer sentiment indexes in the United Kingdom. Academic researchers have consistently found that consumer confidence indexes accurately predict consumer spending in the near term. Few of these examinations, however, have utilized out of sample forecasting and only one has incorporated real time data. In an effort to recreate the exact dataset that is available to economic forecasters in real time, this paper utilizes the recently published Gross Domestic Product Real-Time Database from the Bank of England in order to produce forecasts of …

The Effects Of Market Sentiment On Crude Oil Futures Markets, Nathan Somayaji

Honors Theses

This paper uses a behavioral finance approach to examine the effect of psychological factors on pricing in futures markets. Specifically, I assess the impact of the contemporaneous market sentiment on price discovery in crude oil futures markets. A considerable amount of previous research has shown that futures prices in crude oil markets lead spot prices, as futures act as a mechanism for determining spot prices. My analysis addresses whether the lead-lag relationship between futures and spot varies with differing market sentiment. I hypothesize that futures pricing will lead in times of increased uncertainty due to lower transactions costs and greater …

Can Parallel Exchange Rates Forecast Commodity Prices?, John F. Roberts

Honors Theses

Commodity price uncertainty imposes large costs on society. On the macro level, it results in sudden and unexpected shifts in current account imbalances and real GDP volatility, while on the micro level, it leads to allocation inefficiencies. Accurate price forecasts have the potential to remove some of this uncertainty and allow for a more efficient distribution of resources, and thus, an increase in social welfare. Despite the obvious gains to be had from accurate commodity price forecasts, few models have been able to deliver these results. Chen, Rogoff and Rossi (2008) were the first to find a promising link between …

Cyclicality Of State Budgeting: A Political-Economy Analysis., Ian W. Cummins

Honors Theses

This paper disentangles the effect of political ideology and budget rules on fiscal cyclicality across the U.S. states. Using panel data from 1963 to 2006, liberal states are found to be significantly less procyclical than conservative ones. The impact of balanced budget constraints is contingent on the ideological orientation of the state in which they are imposed. Tight balanced budget rules are not binding on conservative states, but are binding on liberal ones. Where they are binding, budget rules mediate the link between voter preferences and policy outcomes skewing them toward greater procyclicality.

The Evolution Of Campaign Finance And Its Reform: An Expoloration And Economic Analysis, Meghan Milloy

Honors Theses

From the blunders of Theodore Roosevelt that initiated much of the debate on campaign finance reform to Bill Bradley's ideas on voting reform as a means to reform campaign finance, this is a topic that has inspired much debate and controversy. My hope is that throughout the following pages, through the history, opinions, and empirical evidence, the reader may formulate his or her own opinions on the good, evil, and necessity — or lack thereof — of reforming the system. History teaches where we have gone wrong. Econometric evidence tells us where we should go next. And opinions for future …

Market Efficiency : Testing Price Discovery In The Bond And Credit Derivative Markets, Justin M. Polselli

Honors Theses

Recent developments in credit markets over the past few months have seen credit spreads widen dramatically for a range of debt products. Almost overnight, credit spreads for both investment grade and high yield bonds jumped as news continued to worsen about credit quality. The speed with which credit spreads increased this past summer led many investors to ask if markets were efficient in conveying material information, and to see if there were any indications prior to the credit crunch that the market for credit was going to tighten. New products such as credit derivatives have increased the number of indicators …

An Analysis Of Tuition And Enrollment In Higher Education : Measuring Price Elasticity, Adam C. Wright

Honors Theses

The hierarchical nature of higher education, in which schools compete in small enclaves for the best students, and competition for higher rankings among private, non-profit liberal arts colleges has prompted some schools to drastically increase their tuition in order to correspond with the price changes of rival institutions. Since top liberal arts schools operate with sizable excess demand for enrollment spots, significant tuition alterations generally do not affect the quantity of enrolled students at these schools. However, the extent to which increases in tuition affect the quality of enrolled students has not been thoroughly examined. This study directly analyzes the …

Forest Fires In Southern Europe : An Econometric Investigation Of The Existence Of Economic Incentives For Fire Arson, Radoslava Dogandjieva

Honors Theses

Devastating forest fires during the summer of 2007 resulted in an unprecedented level of destruction in the Mediterranean forests, prompting widespread speculation about profit-motivated arson as one of the principal causes of the fires. Forest protection laws essentially create a scarcity of land, making arson potentially profitable in several ways: the clearing of land for development and construction, expansion of farm size, and salvage logging (Economist 2007). This study seeks to evaluate the validity of these accusations by examining the relationship between land, wheat, and timber prices and incidence of forest fires in four countries: Spain, Greece, Italy, and Bulgaria. …

Nuclear Vs. Coal In Bulgaria, Peter B. Manchev

Honors Theses

In early 2005 the government of Bulgaria commissioned the construction of a new nuclear power plant (NPP) near the town of Belene on the Danube border with Romania. The € 4 billion project will be executed by a consortium appointed in October 2006 by the National Electric Company led by the Russian Atomstroyexport. The work will be overseen by the architect-engineer of the plant, the American company WorleyParsons. The endeavor received a “green light” in December 2006 when the Nuclear Regulatory Agency of Bulgaria approved the Belene site for the construction of a new nuclear power plant.

The need for …

An Incumbent's Guide To Reelection: The States And Economic Voting In U.S. Presidential Elections, Kyle Smith

Honors Theses

This study has two chapters. The first uses Ray Fair 's national economic voting model of U.S. presidential elections to pose and answer specific questions about how voting theory works in practice. The results suggest that economic activity in the year of an election is the primary determinant of voters' perceptions of presidential performance on the economy, while earlier years in the administration's term are not important. Also, voters hold the incumbent party responsible for economic conditions whether or not that party controls Congress. Finally, the results suggest that economic voting generally operates symmetrically -a fall in growth affects the …

Demographic Differences In Household Expenditure For Low-Income Families: Evidence From The United States, Joerose Tharakan

Honors Theses

Despite being one of the world’s most prosperous countries, the United States of America was home to roughly 7.7 million households living in poverty in 2006. Of this figure, 53% percent of households were headed by a single mother. What is more disturbing is that a significant majority of these households were those of full time workers, unable to meet the basic needs of their families at federally mandated minimum wage rates. Researchers and activists from a multitude of disciplines have repeatedly called for an overhaul of the current method of estimating poverty in the United States` and further proposed …

Stock Markets And Household Wealth: Can A Stock Market Crash Cause A Recession In The U.S. Economy?, Ishan Singh

Honors Theses

Stock market wealth effects on the level of consumption in the United States economy have been constantly debated; there is evidence for arguments for and against its prominence and its symmetry. This paper seeks to investigate the strength of its negative effect by creating models to analyze unexpected shocks to the Standard and Poor's 500 index. First, a transmission mechanism between the stock market and GDP is established through the use of second-order vector autoregressive models. Following which, theory from the life cycle model and adaptations of previous researchers' models are used to create a structural model. This paper finds …

The Impact Of The Common Agricultural Policy On Agricultural Productivity, Flemming Schneider Rhode

Honors Theses

In 2004 10 new countries, primarily Eastern European countries, joined the European Union (EU) with much media speculation concerning how this would affect their economies. This paper will look at how the Common Agricultural Program (CAP) affects agricultural productivity by measuring four independent variables and by using the 2004 entry as a natural experiment. The paper will estimate how the CAP affects the average farm size, fallow land area, proportion of farming dedicated to organic farming, and GOP growth. This is expected to impact agricultural productivity through increasing returns to scale, input availability, efficiency of land use and the Environmental …

Textbook Bundling : Is It Really Worth The Sum Of Its Parts, Kati Simmons

Honors Theses

Studies have been conducted examining the impact of commodity bundling on company profits and the premium prices charged for these bundles. With recent news of the skyrocketing costs of higher education, it is critical to highlight the specific effects of commodity bundling on the prices of textbooks. A study performed by the Government Accountability Office in 2005 cited that a main cause of increasing textbook prices is the recent inclusion of textbook supplements such as software and workbooks. This paper investigates the impact that different types of supplements have on the overall price paid for the bundle. Aggregate sales data …

Divergent Effect Of Social Cohesion On Economic Growth In East Asia And Latin America, Horacio Diaz Adda

Honors Theses

In this paper I explore the link between social cohesion and economic growth in Latin America and East Asia. Unlike previous studies, I allow for different slope parameters for the different regions. Using ethno linguistic fractionalization as a proxy, I find that social cohesion has not played an important role in determining growth outcomes in Latin America. While social cohesion has not had a direct effect on growth nor institutions in Latin America, it helps explain a large degree of the growth differentials among Asian countries. Social cohesion mostly impacts growth through its effect on institutional quality. However, these results …

Voices Of The Poor: Poverty And Growth In Albania, Magda Tsaneva

Honors Theses

This paper uses three waves of panel surveys at the household level to study growth and poverty in Albania over the period 2002-2004. It attempts to answer two main questions. The first question is directed at finding the micro determinants of growth and aims to expose the obstacles households face to improve their economic situation. The main focus of the analysis is to investigate the importance of health, education, and infrastructure indicators for income growth. The second question asks whether growth in Albania during the period 20022004 has been pro-poor. I find that there is some evidence for a convergence …

Two Essays In The Indiana Family Cap Provision, Aimee Williams

Honors Theses

The first federal welfare program in the United States was established under the 1935 Social Security Act. The child welfare component of this bill was entitled Aid to Dependent Children (ADC). While only children were eligible to receive benefits, this program was partially intended to keep women out of the labor force during the depression so they would not take jobs that would otherwise go to men. In the 1950's and 1960's. this program was expanded to allow states to claim federal reimbursement for aid to unemployed parents and the spouse of an unemployed or incapacitated parent, becoming Aid to …

Deficit Reduction In The U.S. Senate : The Search For Moral Leadership In The Budget Process, David Kendall Roberts

Honors Theses

Contemporary deficit reduction and fiscal responsibility are central to the economic wellbeing of future generations as well as their ability to freely decide their own policy priorities. Many scholarly publications and popular commentary on budget policy describe the obstacles to deficit reduction and political leaders' unwillingness to address the nation's long-term fiscal problems. However, current discussions of budget deficits and the national debt have not been informed by a comprehensive empirical analysis of attempts to reduce the deficit. This thesis examines all deficit-affecting floor amendments to budget legislation from 1975 to 2005 in order to assess whether the bleak account …

Role Of Home Equity In Retirement Saving: Building Your Nest (Egg), Caroline Theoharides

Honors Theses

This study examines the role of home equity in retirement saving. Using data from the 2001 and 2003 Panel Study of Income Dynamics, this study first updates the existing literature by regressing active saving on real housing capital gains using median regression techniques. Consistent with the literature, an increase in housing capital gains results in a decrease in active saving. While the active saving literature provides an initial analytical framework regarding saving behavior and home equity, the demographic shift in the U.S. due to the imminent retirement of the baby boomers indicates that the impact of changes in home equity …

Media Coverage And Disaster Relief: Is A Picture Worth A Thousand Words?, Jessica H. Minty

Honors Theses

This paper analyzes the effect of media coverage on donations made to relief agencies. Specifically, this empirical analysis examines the effect of the daily volume of domestic newspaper and television coverage devoted to the December 26, 2004 tsunami on daily web donations to U.S. relief agencies. Media coverage, as measured by daily newspaper word and picture counts and by daily total television minutes positively affects the amount of donations relief agencies receive. In addition, media coverage is found to have a greater effect on donations for some agencies than for others.

Liberalization Of Village Banking In Guatemala: Structural Differences In Village Banking Institutions, Erica L. Hill

Honors Theses

The International Year of Microcredit in 2005 facilitates public awareness campaigns of microfinance initiatives. Village banking allows microfinance services to reach a wider geographic region, with particular emphasis on rural regions and the poorest sector of society. It attends to those marginalized by a history of repression and conflict. In Guatemala, ethnic diversity and its accompanying social divisions have deep roots. Guatemala is an important case for village banking because of its economic reliance on village banking, the size of the country, and the large number (9) of VBIs in the country. Recent literature calls for an increase in flexibility …

Theoretical Mathematical Model Of Fishery Economics, Andre Garron

Honors Theses

The world population recently topped 6 billion people. Each person has the same need to eat, breathe, and drink. Unfortunately the world's limited resources imply a carrying capacity for the human race. As we approach this critical mass, the strain on our resources becomes increasingly severe. We have already begun to realize such disasters. Many of the world's fisheries have been destroyed, depleted to near nonexistence, or critically overfished. In some cases they only held on because the price of catching the final fish outweighed the potential revenue from catching it. This paper is an attempt to increase our understanding …

Wealth Effects On Consumer Spending In The Us Economy, Andriy Avramenko

Honors Theses

This paper investigates the effects of wealth on consumer spending in the United States. A traditional life-cycle model is estimated first. Although it does find a statistically significant wealth effect, its findings are unusable due to the presence of autocorrelation and non-stationarity. Variables in logarithmic forms are found to be cointegrated. Thus, a logarithmic model with the Stock-Watson adjustment and an AR(I) term is estimated instead. Three extensions to this model are offered. First, wealth is divided into stock market and non-stock market components, second into liquid and illiquid components. Finally, a new approach to the wealth division is introduced, …

Defining Microcredit Success In Bolivia, Kelly Miller

Honors Theses

The structure of this study is as follows: The first chapter describes the origin of microcredit and the three major lending models. This chapter also includes a description of the motivation of the study as well as the methodology used. The second chapter illustrates the changes of development strategies in Bolivia and identifies the motivation behind and significance of each development method. The third chapter discusses the informal sector, which is the targeted population of microcredit. This chapter presents several theories about the development of the informal sector and illustrates how politics shape the informal sector in Bolivia. The fourth …

Effect Of Competitive Balance On Single Game Attendance In Major League Baseball, Thomas V. Richardson

Honors Theses

Many studies have looked at competitive balance in sports. A majority of the competitive balance studies have looked at panel data sets covering multiple years, however. Many of these studies have looked at the distribution of winning percentages within a league over multiple seasons, looking to see if different teams have an ability to rise to the top of the league, or if the same teams always win (Balfour and Porter 1991; Butler 1995; Quirk and Fall 1997). Schmidt and Bern (2001) use the Gini coefficient to measure competitive balance for baseball seasons since 1900. This measure of competitive balance, …