Economics Commons^™

The Effect Of Extending Unemployment Insurance Benefits On Northeast State Unemployment Rates, Guillaume Sabourin

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates the effect of changes in the length of unemployment benefits on the unemployment rates of 10 northeast US states. This study includes the most likely variables that would influence the unemployment rate during the time span preceding and following the recent recession. The study observes various contributing factors to unemployment including median income, state GDP, demographics, education, and the construction, manufacturing, and financial services rate for each state. Using state-level data from government sources and a fixed effects empirical model, results suggest that unemployment benefit extensions result in a small but statistically significant increase in the unemployment …

Do Workforce Development Programs In Minnesota Increase Wages?, Anna Jacob

Economics Honors Projects

Job training serves as an opportunity for many citizens to develop workplace skills and technical training. Due to current debates on the effectiveness of state facilitated workforce development, program evaluations are a critical tool to analyze the net impact of job training. This paper used Kernel Density Propensity Score Difference-in-Differences estimation techniques to estimate the effect of workforce development training programs on wages. Using panel data from administrative records, I provide evidence that the WIA Adult and Dislocated Worker programs in the State of Minnesota offered significant benefits to participants for several cohorts from 2007-2010.

The Great Sustainability Challenge, Isidor Wallimann

Sociology - All Scholarship

"The balance between society and nature is askew. The age of industrialization and the subsequent era of consumerism are large culprits for pollution and the degradation of the environment. Human activity on Earth has undeniably affected the planet and has contributed colossal levels of carbon emissions that are pushing global temperatures to keep rising. Significant ecological risks to human survival may result from not taking more pressing action. Governments have a role to play in moving more rapidly and effectively towards more sustainable practices – “how to be more sustainable?” is a question that must be integrated in all decision-making …

Health Plans For Employment: Stress Management, Catherine Ipsen, Bethany Rigles, Casey Nicole Ruggiero, University Of Montana Rural Institute

Employment

No matter how old we are, we all deal with stress. Although stress is a normal part of life, there are times when it may affect how well we can cope with life emotionally, socially, intellectually, or physically. This fact sheet highlights several stress management techniques.

In addition to the English version, it is also available in Spanish and Hmong.

This fact sheet was developed by RTC:Rural for Wisconsin Promise as part of the Health Plans for Employment series. Each of the four fact sheets in this series provides healthy living tips geared towards youth.

The Rise Of The Dark Side: Dark Pool Trading And The Two-Tiered Implication, Katerina Ruth Mills

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The United States equity market is made up of both private and public trading venues, creating a framework dark and light trading liquidity. Private or non-publicly visible liquidity is housed in dark venues while liquidity visible to the public sits in light locations. Light markets follow strict real-time public reporting requirements for trade volume and price; their dark counterparts execute transactions without a real-time reporting requirement. The informational asymmetries that result from this difference in reporting create a "two-tiered" market. The dark sector's participants know both the public and dark, private, trade volumes and price, while the public participating in …

An Analysis Of The Appreciation Of The Chinese Currency And Influences On China's Economy, Lina Ma

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In recent years, China's economy development has had more and more impact on the global economy. The Chinese currency continued to appreciate since 2005, which has had both positive and negative results on Chinese's economy. The Chinese government uses the monetary policy to control the inflation pressure, which could work counter to Chinese exchange rate policy. RMB appreciation also has some effects on the Chinese banking system. Through the Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP), a global computable general equilibrium model, we analyze how, when there is RMB appreciation, the Chinese exports and imports, and Chinese employment and income inequality react. …

Bankruptcy Stigma: A Socio-Legal Study, Michael D. Sousa

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

For as long as the institution of bankruptcy has existed, legal commentators have debated whether it is appropriate for debtors to experience some social stigma upon filing for personal bankruptcy--that is, whether it serves the goals of bankruptcy law for debtors to feel shame. While this issue has been extensively discussed as a theoretical matter, to date no legal commentator or scholar has examined the question as an empirical matter: do debtors in fact associate feelings of shame with filing for bankruptcy, and, if so, why (or why not)? This article, for the first time, undertakes precisely this inquiry. Specifically, …

The Reliability Of Chinese Economic Statistics, Lili Yu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

China's rapid economic growth over the past three decades has drawn attention from all over the world. The sources and reliability of the official statistics behind the tremendous growth have been the subject of heated debate among economists. This paper contributes to this data reliability debate by analyzing on the GDP statistics of China and seeks to establish whether or not the official data are valid.

This study begins with a review of the prominent research on the topic. The majority of these studies, reviewed in chapter two, point to a series of inherent contradictions in the official figures, which …

Earning A Living In Nonmetropolitan Nebraska: 2014 Nebraska Rural Poll Results, Rebecca J. Vogt, Cheryl A. Burkhart-Kriesel, Randolph L. Cantrell, Bradley Lubben

Nebraska Rural Poll

Most rural Nebraskan households have full-time employment and many employed households derive part of their household income from self-employment. Self-employment is more prevalent in smaller communities. Most rural Nebraskans living in or near the smallest communities have self-employment in their household.

Some rural Nebraska households also have multiple job holding by members of the household. Again, this is more likely to occur in the smallest communities.

Most self-employed rural Nebraskan households get less than one-half of their total household income from self-employment. However, over one-quarter (29%) of self-employed rural Nebraskans get almost all of their household income from self-employment. Many …

Got Milk? The Impact Of Heifer International's Livestock Donation Programs In Rwanda On Nutritional Outcomes, Rosemary Rawlins, Svetlana Pimkina, Christopher B. Barrett, Sarah Pedersen, Bruce Wydick

Economics Faculty Publications

International animal donation programs have become an increasingly popular way for people living in developed countries to transfer resources to families living in developing countries. We evaluate the impact of Heifer International’s dairy cow and meat goat donation programs in Rwanda. We find that the program substantially increases dairy and meat consumption among Rwandan households who were given a dairy cow or a meat goat, respectively. We also find marginally statistically significant reductions in weight-for-height z-scores and weight-for-age z-scores of about 0.4 standard deviations among children aged 0-5 years in households that were recipients of meat goats, and reductions in …

Do In-Kind Transfers Damage Local Markets? The Case Of Toms Shoe Donations In El Salvador, Bruce Wydick, Elizabeth Katz, Brendan Janet

Economics Faculty Publications

We carry out a cluster randomized trial among 979 households in rural El Salvador to test whether shoe donations exhibit negative impacts on local shoe markets. Households in half of our communities were given a pair of children’s shoes at baseline (treatment communities), while all households were given coupons that could be used for shoe purchases at a local shoe store. Although point estimates on coupon redemption and difference-in-difference estimations indicate shoe purchases to be slightly lower among households receiving the donated shoes, we find no statistically significant difference in market shoe purchases between treatment and control households.

Does Child Sponsorship Pay Off In Adulthood? An International Study Of Impacts On Income And Wealth, Bruce Wydick, Paul Glewwe, Laine Rutledge

Economics Faculty Publications

We estimate the impact of international child sponsorship on adult income and wealth of formally sponsored children using data on 10,144 individuals in six countries. To identify causal effects, we utilize an age-eligibility rule followed from 1980 to 1992 that limited sponsorship to children 12 years old or younger when the program was introduced in a village, allowing comparisons of sponsored children with older siblings who were slightly too old to be sponsored. Estimations indicate that international child sponsorship increased monthly income by $13-19 over an untreated baseline of $75, principally from inducing higher future labor market participation. We also …

Developing Hope: The Impact Of International Child Sponsorship On Self-Esteem And Aspirations, Paul Glewwe, Phillip H. Ross, Bruce Wydick

Economics Faculty Publications

Recent research (Wydick, Glewwe, and Rutledge, 2013) finds positive and statistically significant impacts on adult life outcomes from child sponsorship, including large impacts on schooling outcomes, the probability and quality of employment, occupational choice, and community leadership. This paper uses data from two countries to explore whether these impacts may be due not only to a relaxation of external constraints, but also to higher aspirations among sponsored children. We use survey data from Kenya and Indonesia, and psychological data from Indonesian children’s self-portraits, to test whether sponsorship significantly affects psychological variables in children that are likely to foster better economic …

Do Risky Microfinance Borrowers Really Invest In Risky Projects? Experimental Evidence From Bolivia., Eliana Zeballos, Alessandra Cassar, Bruce Wydick

Economics Faculty Publications

This paper reports the results of an experiment designed to test a fundamental assumption in Stiglitz and Weiss (1981) model of credit rationing, that defaulting borrowers are associated with investment in risky projects. Through an artefactual field experiment with 200 Bolivian microfinance borrowers, we observe that subjects from real-world delinquent borrowing groups do not prefer risky projects to safer ones significantly more than subjects from repaying groups. Moreover, when faced with the choice between two options framed as consumption or a relatively safe investment project, risky borrowers significantly opt more for consumption, supporting more recent behavioral theories of credit market …

Is Us Bank Lending Sensitive To Exchange Rates? A Panel Data Investigation, Michael R. Jonas

Economics Faculty Publications

The goal of this paper is to examine the sensitivity of US bank lending to movements in the exchange rate. Using a panel of quarterly bank-level balance sheet observations, I show that there exists significant and meaningful exchange rate sensitivity of cross-border lending activity and total domestic loans. This relationship operates through traditional net export channels, as well as mechanisms specific to banks engaged in international lending. Further, I show that exchange rate innovations represent a source of long run lending volatility equivalent to monetary policy shocks for small banks. Lastly, exchange rate movements are shown to be associated with …

Institutional Quality, Culture, And Norms Of Cooperation: Evidence From Behavioral Field Experiments, Alessandra Cassar, G D'Adda, P Grosjean

Economics Faculty Publications

We examine the causal effect of legal institutional quality on informal norms of cooperation and study the interaction of institutions and culture in sustaining economic exchange. A total of 346 subjects in Italy and Kosovo played a market game under different and randomly allocated institutional treatments, which generated different incentives to behave honestly, preceded and followed by a noncontractible and nonenforceable trust game. Significant increases in individual trust and trustworthiness followed exposure to better institutions. A 1- percentage-point reduction in the probability of facing a dishonest partner in the market game, which is induced by the quality of legal institutions, …

How Effective Are Current Household Recycling Policies? Results From A National Survey Of U.S. Households, Hilary Nixon, Jean-Daniel M. Saphores

Faculty Publications, Urban and Regional Planning

This paper analyzes a unique dataset collected during a 2006 national survey of U.S. households to explore the effectiveness of common household recycling policies for metals, glass, and plastics: curbside recycling, drop-off recycling, deposit–refund systems (bottle bills), and marginal pricing for household waste. After estimating either generalized ordered logit or multinomial logit models, we find that the most important determinants of household recycling are people's attitudes toward recycling. Our results also suggest that omitting internal variables (perceived recycling obstacles and benefits as well as moral considerations) may bias policy coefficients. Socio-economic variables are typically not statistically significant, with the exceptions …

Lessons From The Great Recession 2014-15, Department Of Economics

Werner Sichel Lecture Series

The 2014-2015 Sichel Lecture Series brings to WMU campus six distinguished economists whose presenta-tions will discuss the lessons from the Great Recession. This year’s Sichel Lecture Series is directed by Professor Eskander Alvi and is co-sponsored by the Department of Economics, College of Arts and Sci-ences and the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research. Speakers: Laurence Ball "Can We Reverse the Damage from the Great Recession?", Gary Burtless "Lessons of the Great Recession for Economic Policymaking", Donald Kohn "Central Banking in the Great Recession", Kathryn Dominguez "International Dimensions of the Great Reces-sion and the Weak Recovery.", Barry Eichengreen "Hall of …

Economic Profitability Of The Bakken, North Dakota Unconventional Oil Plays Based On A Typical Well Performance With Current Market Conditions, Mehmet Apaydin

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

Increases in oil prices after the economic recession have been surprising for domestic oil production in the United States since the beginning of 2009. Not only did the conventional oil extraction increase, but unconventional oil production and exploration also improved greatly with the favorable economic conditions. This favorable economy encourages companies to invest in new reservoirs and technological developments. Recently, enhanced drilling techniques including hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling have been supporting the domestic economy by way of unconventional shale and tight oil from various U.S. locations. One of the main contributors to this oil boom is the unconventional oil …

The Effects Of Country Of Origin Image And Patriotism On Consumer Preference For Domestic Versus Imported Beef, Thong Meas

Theses and Dissertations--Agricultural Economics

Country of origin (COO) effect is a well-researched topic in the international marketing literature. It is well recognized that consumers are biased against imports, due to consumer ethnocentrism or patriotism tendency. However, the research on COO effects also suggests that consumers form certain image of origin countries (COO image) and favorable image, be it associated with the countries, their people, or general product quality, improves the evaluation and acceptance of foreign imports.

The publications related to COO effects which focus on consumer durables are abundant. However, the contrasting COO effects on food products are much less investigated. This study surveys …

Socioeconomic Determinants Of Obesity In The United States, Jonathan Skaza

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates the socioeconomic determinants of obesity (as measured by BMI) in the United States. Logistic regression is employed on cross-sectional data from the 2011-2012 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). The results show that, in general, holding other factors constant, individuals with a college diploma are less likely to be obese than those with a lesser education (except in extreme cases), married individuals are more likely to be obese than those that are not married, and females are more likely to be obese than males. Additionally, compared to white persons, Black and Hispanic persons have a greater …

Determinants Of Foreign Direct Investment In Brazil, Matthew J. Duguay

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper is a time series analysis of the determinants of foreign direct investment inflows regarding the country of Brazil over the past 34 years. Brazil has seen rapid change throughout their country over the past few decades, and it now is one of the most popular hosts for foreign investors. GDP growth, trade openness, taxes, political instability, energy imports, and inflation are all as possible significant determinants of FDI inflows in Brazil that this model analyzes. The results show that inflation, trade openness, and political instability are the most significant variables when it comes to understanding FDI inflows.

The Effect Of Income Inequality On Happiness Levels, Spencer Carlin

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates and presents the impact of income inequality upon general levels of happiness. The study will examine the influence of the income gap upon life satisfaction. Incorporating information from OECD databanks and the World Bank into a standard model in happiness studies, we will examine the effect on nations measured Happy Life Years (HLY). After careful examination this study provides a conclusion that reinforces past studies. Income inequality has a consistent significant and negative impact on subjective well-being and happiness levels. The study contributes to the inequality happiness literature, by examining the effects of inequality on happiness amongst …

Learning By Exporting In India, Stephanie Lizardi

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper examines learning by exporting, in which a firm experiences growth in productivity after entering export markets. The results of existing studies show conflicting evidence regarding whether productivity gains result from learning by exporting or whether productivity gains lead to exporting. This paper discusses the relationship between entering exporting markets and subsequent product innovation. Using data from nearly 6,000 firms in India, the results suggest that learning by exporting occurs when firms enter export markets, but only during the first year.

Determinants Of Health In South American Countries, Andres Pernia

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates, analyzes, and expands the relationship between under-five mortality and socioeconomic and health system factors. The study utilizes fixed effect panel data to estimate the determinants of under-five mortality in 12 counties across South America. As expected, the results show that GDP per capita is statistically significant and is robust in all of the estimated models. In addition, improved sanitation, gender equality, access to improved sanitation facilities, provision of primary education, and governance are also statistically significant and have positive effect on child mortality.

Infant Mortality And Macroeconomic Changes In Latam, Daniel Mujica

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper would analyze the effects that economic indicators have over mortality rates in Latin America. Hence, the purpose would be to represent the drives of changes in mortality. This will be achieved by undergoing a thorough analysis of correlated variables that will create a significant outcome over this important problem that emerging countries in Latin America need to solve in order to achieve long term economic and social prosperity.

Institutions And Economic Growth In Bric Nations, Doug Flink

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper looks at the impact of institutions on economic growth in the six largest countries in BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia, India, and China. The study will us OLS to examine the time period between the years 2002 and 2011. More specifically, it will measure the effect of institutions through a variety of measures including democracy and regulatory related variables. Through ordinary least squares regression analysis, the variables for democracy and regulation will be significant and have a positive effect on economic growth. This study will show that quality of institution does in fact support economic growth.

The Effect Of Immigration Status On Income In Southern States Of The United States, Camila Espinal

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

According to the U.S census Bureau, in 2013 nearly a third of the U.S population are immigrants and 7.7/189 million are illegal. I will develop an econometric model to show the effect of immigration status Income. The ultimate goal of the paper will be to demonstrate the significance of immigration status on an Individual’s income. This paper will analyze if a person’s immigration status has a significant effect on the individual’s average wage and salary by focusing on three major high immigration density states: California, Florida, and Texas. The paper will focus on Hispanic immigrants to ultimately determine if immigration …

Determinants Of Healthcare Expenditure In The Organization For Economic Cooperation (Oecd) Countries, Harry Waterton

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates the factors that determine the expenditure in healthcare within the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) countries. The study will contain and be based around a regression model, using healthcare expenditure per capita as the dependent variable, for 10 of the 34 OECD countries. The data that will be analyzed ranges from 2000 to 2010 using the panel data analysis format, and will be extracted from the World Bank and OECD statistics websites.

The Relationship Between Crime And Unemployment In China, Kuan Lu

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates the relationship between crime and unemployment in China. The study incorporates the information, including data of the current crime rate, unemployment rate, income level, GDP growth, Gini index and urbanization rate, into a linear regression model to examine the influence of the unemployment rate on crime in China. The crime in China is measured by crime rate, which includes six specific types of crimes: homicide, assault, rape, robbery, theft and burglary. The results show that there is a positive relationship between crime and unemployment in China. When there is an increase in the unemployment rate, crime rate …