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Full-Text Articles in Behavioral Economics
Understanding The Racial/Ethnic Gap In Bank Account Ownership Among Older Adults, Luisa Blanco, Marco Angrisani, Emma Aguila, Mei Leng
Understanding The Racial/Ethnic Gap In Bank Account Ownership Among Older Adults, Luisa Blanco, Marco Angrisani, Emma Aguila, Mei Leng
School of Public Policy Working Papers
The observed racial/ethnic gap in bank account ownership among older adults is substantial. We investigate socio-economic, cognitive and cultural barriers underling it. As additional potential barriers are accounted for, the residual gaps in financial inclusion with respect to Whites is reduced by 19 percent for Blacks and 46 percent for Hispanics. We find that citizenship and “taste for privacy” play a limited role for both minority groups, while real asset ownership, health, cognitive ability and cultural hurdles contribute substantially to the gap. For Hispanics, language barriers explain most of the gap, while neighborhood-level socioeconomic characteristics are more salient for Blacks. …
Mobile Banking As A Mechanism To Increase Access To Financial Services, Luisa Blanco, C. Andrew Bosque, Xizhu Wang
Mobile Banking As A Mechanism To Increase Access To Financial Services, Luisa Blanco, C. Andrew Bosque, Xizhu Wang
School of Public Policy Working Papers
We study the determinants of mobile banking adoption, with a special interest on how mobile banking can increase access to financial services among racial and ethnic minorities in the United States. In our analysis, we use survey data from two different sources: 1) Survey of Consumers' Use of Mobile Financial Services (SCUMFS) We conduct a regression analysis and Oaxaca Decomposition to determine the explanatory factors of racial and ethnic gaps in bank account ownership. We find that minorities are less likely to use mobile banking than Whites in the NSUUH, but more likely to adopt mobile banking according to SCUMFS, …
The Importance Of Transportation, Broadband, And Intellectual Infrastructure For Entrepreneurship, James E. Prieger, Heng Lu, Habi Zhang
The Importance Of Transportation, Broadband, And Intellectual Infrastructure For Entrepreneurship, James E. Prieger, Heng Lu, Habi Zhang
School of Public Policy Working Papers
This empirical study uses a unique panel dataset to investigate the link between regional entrepreneurship and infrastructure. This topic is vital for understanding the factors that facilitate entrepreneurship, yet it receives scant scholarly attention. It is of particular value to policy makers because entrepreneurship is crucial for economic growth. We therefore examine how broadband infrastructure (internet connectivity), intellectual infrastructure (human capital), and transportation infrastructure (roads, bridges, and intermodal facilities) affect the establishment of new businesses in the United States. We primarily focus on broadband infrastructure, which is the least explored of these factors in the literature. We find that all …
Mobile Data Roaming And Incentives For Investment In Rural Broadband Infrastructure, James Prieger
Mobile Data Roaming And Incentives For Investment In Rural Broadband Infrastructure, James Prieger
School of Public Policy Working Papers
Mobile broadband Internet access is highly important to the American economy and millions of users. There were almost 200 million mobile broadband connections by the end of 2013 in the United States, far more than the number of fixed broadband connections (FCC, 2014a, Table 1). The economic activity created by the provision and usage of mobile broadband is sizeable, and has been documented at the national level (Gruber and Koutroumpis, 2011; Thompson and Garbacz, 2011; Katz, 2012) and specifically for rural areas (Whitacre, Gallardo, and Strover, 2014). The benefits of mobile broadband—and indeed the entire broadband ecosystem—depend on investment in …
Targeted Enforcement Against Illicit Trade In Tobacco Products, James Prieger, Jonathan D. Kulick, Mark A. R. Kleiman
Targeted Enforcement Against Illicit Trade In Tobacco Products, James Prieger, Jonathan D. Kulick, Mark A. R. Kleiman
School of Public Policy Working Papers
Illicit trade in tobacco is a substantial and growing problem in the U.S., causing loss of tax revenue, damage to public health, and threats to public safety. Decisions about enforcement against ITTP involve tradeoffs among competing objectives. Good policy design can improve the terms of those tradeoffs but cannot eliminate them. We examine questions about the allocation of enforcement resources against ITTP, and its distribution across activities, individuals, and organizations: in particular, whether and how to differentially target ITTP that involves violence or support for terrorism. We consider the problem of developing effective strategies for enforcement, applying both lessons from …
Retirement Planning Among Middle-Aged And Older Hispanics, Luisa Blanco, Emma Aguila, Arturo Gongora, Beverly Weidmer, O. Kenrik Duru
Retirement Planning Among Middle-Aged And Older Hispanics, Luisa Blanco, Emma Aguila, Arturo Gongora, Beverly Weidmer, O. Kenrik Duru
School of Public Policy Working Papers
The goal of this study is to deepen the understanding of how middle age and older Hispanics plan for retirement, where we conducted four focus groups in the Los Angeles area with a total of 38 participants. Our study provides interesting findings, specifically for women since 84 percent of the participants were female. We find that that most participants, whether they were already retired or not, are not well prepared for retirement since they have been unable to save for retirement and have not made specific retirement plans, such as determining desired retirement age, estimating retirement budget, and collecting information …
A Qualitative Analysis Of The Use Of Financial Services And Saving Behavior Among Older African Americans And Latinos In The Los Angeles Area, Luisa Blanco, Maria Ponce, Arturo Gongora, O. Kenrik Duru
A Qualitative Analysis Of The Use Of Financial Services And Saving Behavior Among Older African Americans And Latinos In The Los Angeles Area, Luisa Blanco, Maria Ponce, Arturo Gongora, O. Kenrik Duru
School of Public Policy Working Papers
For this study, we conducted 7 focus groups in the Los Angeles area with a total of 70 participants (42 Latinos and 28 African Americans) recruited from 3 senior centers and a church. Overall, participants were not well prepared for the future in terms of their health care financing. African Americans in the study tended to participate more in the formal financial sector and show a high level of sophistication when managing their finances than Latinos. African Americans also were more likely to save than Latinos, but their level of saving was not very large. We also find that participants …