Economics Commons^™

Entrepreneurs And Entrepreneurial Development In State-Owned Enterprises Reform In China: Problems And Corruption, Baiwei Fu

Masters Culminating Experiences (1993-2011)

The report focuses on microeconomic reform in China, especially on entrepreneur problems and corruption in State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs). China has about 145,000 SOEs employing 113 million people. State enterprises account for 70 percent of fixed assets but only 34 percent of industrial output. The total state enterprise debt is greater than China’s bank deposit base. In some cases, SOEs are unable to afford to pay worker salaries or make pension payments. Reforms caused large-scale lay-offs and plant closures in recent years.

Entrepreneurs’ corruption contributes negative effects to SOE reform. Corruption is one way of getting around political control and poor …

Skill-Biased Technological Change: Evidence From A Firm-Level Survey, Donald S. Siegel

Upjohn Press

Siegel provides evidence that technology adoption is associated with downsizing, skill upgrading, greater employee empowerment, and a widening wage gap. Unlike previous studies that use industry-level data, Siegel collected firm-level data on technology usage and labor composition which enable him to link the magnitude of labor market outcomes for six classes of workers to the types of technologies implemented.

Economic Conditions And Welfare Reform, Sheldon Danziger Editor

Upjohn Press

The relationship between welfare caseloads and the economy is one of the key issues addressed in this book. Using the most current data available, a group of the nation's leading researchers examines the effects of welfare reform prior to and after enactment of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA).

Who's Not Working And Why: Employment, Cognitive Skills, Wages, And The Changing U.S. Labor Market, Frederic L. Pryor, D. L. Schaffer

Economics Faculty Works

Over the Last Quarter-Century, the U.S. labor market has experienced some disturbing trends. Despite apparent economic prosperity, joblessness among less-educated prime-age males is rising and, in addition, an increasing number of university graduates are taking "high-school jobs." Moreover, except for a thin layer of university-educated workers, most in the labor force are experiencing stagnating or falling real wages. Simultaneously, the inequality of wages is increasing within most groups. Using an entirely new approach that takes account of the cognitive skills of U.S. workers and the detailed occupational structure of the labor force, Frederic L. Pryor and David L. Schaffer explore …

The Impact Of Foreign Trade On The Employment Of Unskilled U.S. Workers: Some New Evidence, Frederic L. Pryor

Economics Faculty Works

This paper explores four empirical relationships reflecting the impact of foreign trade on the employment of unskilled workers: (i) the direct relationship between net exports and embodied education of the corresponding goods; (ii) the changes in domestic prices accompanying changes in net exports; (iii) the relationship between real or potential import competition and defensive measures such as more investment or increasing the skill level of the labor force; and (iv) the relationship between foreign trade and domestic prices. None of these exercises suggests that foreign trade has much impact on the employment of less skilled U.S. workers.

Single-Equation Estimation Of The Equilibrium Real Exchange Rate, J. Baffes, Stephen A. O'Connell, I. Elbadawi

Economics Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Change, Consolidation, And Competition In Health Care Markets, Martin Gaynor, Deborah Haas-Wilson

Economics: Faculty Publications

The health care industry is being transformed. Large firms are merging and acquiring other firms. Alliances and contractual relations between players in this market are shifting rapidly. Within the next few years, many markets are predicted to be dominated by a few large firms. Antitrust enforcement authorities like the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission, as well as courts and legislators at both the federal and state levels, are struggling with the implications of these changes for the nature and consequences of competition in health care markets. In this paper we summarize the nature of the changes in …

Economic Currents: The State Of The State Economy, Alan Clayton-Matthews

Public Policy and Public Affairs Faculty Publication Series

The state and national economies are now feeling the brunt of the global economic crisis. So far, the pattern of events in the Commonwealth has mirrored that of the nation. This is not surprising, since the source of the problem — the global slowdown and financial uncertainty — is an external shock that affects all the nation’s regions through international trade and financial markets.

Relative Cohort Size: Source Of A Unifying Theory Of Global Fertility Transition, Diane J. Macunovich

Center for Policy Research

Using United Nations estimates of age structure and vital rates for nearly 200 nations at five-year intervals from 1950 through 1995, this paper demonstrates how changes in relative cohort size appear to have affected patterns of fertility across nations since 1950--not just in developed countries, but perhaps even more importantly in countries as they pass through the demographic transition. The increase in relative cohort size (defined as the proportion of the population aged 15 to 24 relative to that aged 25 to 59) which occurs as a result of declining mortality rates among children and young adults during the demographic …

The Baby Boom As It Ages: How Has It Affected Patterns Of Consumptions And Savings In The United States?, Diane J. Macunovich

Center for Policy Research

Using detailed estimates of personal consumption expenditures at the state level for 1900, 1929, 1970, and 1982 developed by Stanley Lebergott, this paper demonstrates that the passage of the Baby Boom from childhood through the teen years and into family formation would have caused market swings in patterns of aggregate consumption and savings in the United States during the past 50 years. The effect of age structure on personal consumption expenditures is estimated using population by single year of age from 0 to 85, revealing the expected pattern of life cycle consumption and savings in the adult years. In addition, …

Geography, Industrial Organization, And Agglomeration, Stuart S. Rosenthal, William C. Strange

Center for Policy Research

This paper makes two contributions to the empirical literature on agglomeration economies. First, the paper uses a unique and rich database in conjunction with mapping software to measure the geographic extent and nature of agglomerative externalities. Previous papers have been forced to assume that agglomeration economies are club goods that operate at a metropolitan scale. Second, the paper tests for the existence of organizational agglomeration economies of the kind studied qualitatively by Saxenian (1994). This is a potentially important source of increasing returns that previous empirical work has not considered. Results indicate that localization economies attenuate rapidly and that industrial …

Income Growth Across The U.S. States: An Empirical Analysis, Weixiong He

Masters Culminating Experiences (1993-2011)

The purpose of this study is to test the convergence hypothesis that prevails the neo-classical economic literature. In light of research on cross-country economic growth, the paper is adopting the same kind of methodology in studying income growth across U.S. states. The paper starts with a survey of literature in the study of growth of convergence. Then it tries to define the term of “convergence” in various economic implications, in particular the notion of “ð-Convergence” versus “ß-Convergence”, “conditional convergence” versus “absolute convergence”, and such popular notion as “club convergence”. The paper then goes into the quantitative analysis of U.S. per …

An Empirical Study Of The Relationship Between Democracy And Prosperity, Yujie Zhang

Masters Culminating Experiences (1993-2011)

Per capita wealth is far from evenly distributed in all countries of this world. For example, in 1992, real GDP per capita in Japan was about $15,105 (constant dollar using chain index). The corresponding measure for India was $1,282, or about 8.5% that of Japan. While the disparities are large in an absolute sense, they are small in comparison to the richest and poorest countries in the world. Are the rich countries and poor countries developing at the same rate? Have the poor countries shown any signs of catching up? What factors are correlated with the economic prosperity?

This paper …

Will The Real Adam Smith Please Stand Up?: Teaching Social Economics In The Principles Course, Jonathan B. Wight

Economics Faculty Publications

Part of the difficulty of introducing social economics into the principles course is the perception that social economics is anathema to mainstream economics. As noted by Warren Samuels, however, "neoclassical economics is already a form of social economics" despite its "pretensions of methodological individualism and value-neutrality". Heilbroner also makes the case that the " ... the preponderance of great economists were aware of economics as explanation systems of particular socio-economic formations." Like it or not, economists err in omitting from their models what McCloskey calls "S" variables--variables representing the "social embeddedness" of values which direct human choices.

Decomposable Choice Under Uncertainty, Simon Grant, Atsushi Kajii, Ben Polak

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

Savage motivated his Sure Thing Principle by arguing that, whenever an act would be preferred if an event obtains and preferred if that event did not obtain, then it should be preferred overall. The idea that it should be possible to decompose and recompose decision problems in this way has normative appeal. We show, however, that it does not require the full separability across events implicit in Savage’s axiom. We formulate a weaker axiom that suffices for decomposability, and show that this implies an implicit additive representation. Our decomposability property makes local necessary conditions for optimality, globally sufficient. Thus, it …

Trade Basics (Web-Based Course), Anwar Shaikh Phd, Steven M. Suranovic Phd

Archives of Anwar Shaikh

This collection includes:

• Suranovic, S. (1999). Foreign exchange markets and exchange rates: Introduction to purchasing power parity (PPP). Retrieved from http://internationalecon.com/v1.0/Finance/ch30/30c010.html

• Suranovic, S. (1999-07-10). PPP as a theory of exchange rate determination [Web page].

• Suranovic, S. (n.d.). The national income or product identity [Web page].

• Suranovic, S. (1998-05-21). The role of imports in the national income identity [Web page].

• Suranovic, S. (n.d.). The US national income statistics [Web page].

• Suranovic, S. (1998-08-20). The balance of payments accounts: Definitions [Web page].

• Suranovic, S. (1998-08-20). Recording transactions on the balance of payments [Web page].

• Suranovic, S. (1998-09-13). Some further complications [Web page]. …

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A Benchmarking Study Of The Lehigh Valley, Jason Faberman, Stephanie Laski

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

This study benchmarks the Lehigh Valley to nine other metropolitan areas within the United States. These areas represent a wide array of economic growth levels. Charlotte, Portland, Seattle, and Nashville represented high growth cities. Minneapolis and Lancaster represented moderate growth cities. Hartford, Flint, Rochester and the Lehigh Valley represented low growth cities. Three analyses attempted to identify reasons for economic growth. The study period included the years 1970 through 1995. All three analyses looked at regional growth relative to the nation. A study of each region’s industry mix compared the diversity of this mix to the overall employment growth of …

An Economic Analysis Of Child Care: Bias, Refinement, And Powerful Insight, Ben Fritz

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

This paper considers the various ways in which the child care market operates (and fails), both in reality and in terms of economic models. Economic theory shows that child care should have a significant impact on women's’ decision to enter the labor market, and I consider whether this is true in practice, as well as how the child care market operates compared to the demonstrated need. Economic analysis shows that child care has a significant impact on women’s participation in the labor force, both in theory and in practice.

The Effects On Labor Of Post-Industrial Globalization: A Comparison Of Marxist And Non-Marxist Paradigms, Louis Hyman

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

In this paper I will be examining the changes in labor conditions that have occurred during the last ten years, how they are intimately linked to new notions of information technology and the rise of a global economic perspective. I will compare the [Marxist and non-Marxist] trains of thought as well, and attempt to provide a notion of where I believe them to be sufficient and lacking. If these new notions of globalized post-industrial labor resolve the antagonism between Labor and Capital, they would signal a critical shift in the socioeconomic dynamics of the world, similar in importance to the …

The Economic Impact Upon Modern U.S. Elections, James Jackson

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

Economic voting has been blamed for Bush’s loss in 1992, Carter’s loss in 1980, and attributed to Clinton’s win in 1996. I intend to dispel the myths against economic voting by showing that it does occur, and examining the four different manners in which it occurs: retrospective, prospective, pocketbook and sociotropic voting.

Editor's Note: The bibliography for this article is missing. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Comparative Analysis Of Max-Planck Gesellschaft And Akademie Der Wissenschften In The Years 1945-1989, Victoria Kats

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

The Realm of Science claims to be an autonomous entity, governed by its own rules and institutions. In practice it is difficult to test the extent to which different enveloping political systems affect economics of basic research, as too many cultural and historical differences would distort such a comparison. Unique historical circumstances make East and West Germany the best available ground for setting up an experiment with both experimental and control groups within societies and organizations. Testing the influence of socialistic pressure on economic performance of scientific institutions, the analysis of East German Academy of Sciences and West German Max …

Fun, Games & Economics: An Appraisal Of Game Theory In Economics, Jamus Jerome Lim

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

Game theory has had a profound influence on many fields of the social sciences since its rise to prominence more than fifty years ago. This paper provides an overview of the main concepts in game theory and studies four main areas of its application in economic problems – oligopolistic competition, externalities & public goods, market equilibrium and general equilibrium. The conclusion is that game theory has found a natural place in economics and will continue to contribute to it for many years to come.

Free Agents, Fire Sales, And Fungoes: An Econometric Examination Of Team Success In Major League Baseball, Corey R. Maynard

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

This paper explores what good organizational strategies baseball teams use to put themselves into the group of those that win more often than they lose, and conversely, what poor strategies cause teams to fall into the group of those who lose more than they win.

The Exchange Rate Mechanism And The Ruble Devaluation Of 1998, Philip Porter

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

I will first examine what I see as the common sense fundamentals of the exchange rate mechanism, noting as I go, the relationship with the current Russian crisis. In my examination, I will take the simplest approach, assuming free trade, unrestricted capital movements and negligible transaction costs. Concluding, I will delve into the quagmire of the Russian situation.

Gender Differences In The Causes Of Non-Completion Rates Among Oregon Apprentices: A Case Study Of The Metro Electrical Jtpc, Portland, Oregon, Kerstin Rock

University Avenue Undergraduate Journal of Economics

This paper will address the question of why women drop out of apprenticeship programs at a higher frequency than men. I will examine if there are in fact substantial differences in human capital and social characteristics between female and male apprentices and whether the influence of these characteristics on the probability of finishing depends on the sex of the apprentice. I hypothesize that the reasons apprentices quit prematurely will differ significantly between sexes, especially in reference to educational background, experience, and family situation.

The Fortune Of One's Birth: Relative Cohort Size And The Youth Labor Market In The United States, Diane J. Macunovich

Center for Policy Research

Using two different measures of relative cohort size--one indicating the size and placement of an individual's own birth cohort, and the other the ratio of young to prime-age adults in the United States in that year--it has been possible to isolate strong effects of the population age structure on wages in the United States over the past 33 years. These effects have been strong enough that virtually all of the observed change in the experience premium, and a substantial proportion of the changes in the college wage premium, can be explained by the relative cohort size variables alone. Even changes …

Cash Constraints And Business Start-Ups: Deutschmarks Versus Dollars, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Harvey Rosen

Center for Policy Research

In this paper we analyze microdata to explore differences in the rates at which American and German workers leave their salaried jobs to become self-employed. We document that the rate of self-employment is lower in Germany than in the U.S., and the rate of transition from wage-earning to self-employment is lower as well. We find evidence that German workers face liquidity constraints that are more severe than those of their American counterparts. Further, the difference in transition rates cannot be attributed to observable differences between German and American workers.

Environmental Clean-Up And Property Price Change, Emily Aronow

Honors Papers

In my experiment, I am trying to find the value, to Lorain County property owners, of cleaning up the Black River which runs through Lorain County. This study involves a number of property variables, a number of neighborhood variables, and the environmental variables. The hedonic price function takes this general form:
Property Price = c + β1Property Characteristics + β2Neighborhood Characteristics + β3Environmentai Characteristics + u.

This equation says that the price of a piece of property is a function of several things: the characteristics of the property, the characteristics of the neighborhood it's in, and the characteristics of the …

An Analysis Of The Traveler's Dilemma With Experimental Evidence, Eduard A. Pelz

Honors Papers

Game theory studies how people should respond in strategic situations and is naturally used for predictive purposes. The optimal strategy predictions yielded by game theoretic reasoning can be surprising when they conflict with preconceived notions of how to play, i.e. the "common sense" strategy. Consequently, the game theoretically optimal strategy may be a poor predictor of how individuals actually behave in real-life strategic situations. In order to accurately model such situations for predictive purposes it is important to know the limitations of the current game theoretic tools.

In the traveler's dilemma, Kaushik Basu presents a parable to illustrate how game …

Perceptions Of Income Inequality: An Exploratory Study, Susanna Henighan Potter

Honors Papers

Household income is one of the most common variables in economic models. Theory and logic tells us that it will influence a whole range of household choices, from the decision to go to school, to the decisions to change jobs or move. Income is also used in range of political science and sociological models. These models use income and relative economic position to explain political and social behavior. On the face of it income seems to be a straightforward concept, once you have included and excluded all relevant income streams. It also seems reasonable to assume that individual households know …