Economic Theory Commons^™

The Application Of Transactional Fairness To The Gambling Sector, Seamus Mcgowan, Adam Rivers

International Conference on Gambling & Risk Taking

The idea of ‘fairness’ in consumer protection has been discussed for a long time. However, more recently there has been a renewed focus on the use of unfair pricing practices and terms in consumer markets and regulators and lawmakers are responding. Practices which can be considered unfair often emerge as companies develop new and innovative ways to engage with consumers including offering different prices and / or terms to different sets of customers.

Being ‘fair and open’ is an important principle for gambling regulation. In that context, this paper focusses on fairness in gambling markets and seeks to develop a …

The Influence Of Opponent Strategy And Psychopathic Traits On Point Gains And Cooperation In The Iterated Prisoner’S Dilemma, Mary Baggio

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The Prisoner’s Dilemma game is a paradigm used to model and measure social cooperation. Uncooperative behavior may be one manifestation of the unstable interpersonal functioning in psychopathy. I investigated the effect of opponent strategy as well as psychopathic traits of fearless dominance (FD) and impulsive antisociality (IA) on cooperation rates and total and competitive point gains in a sample of 177 undergraduates playing long, finitely iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma games against computerized opponents who varied in their interpersonal styles from very harsh to very lenient. I analyzed rates of cooperation during each game, participants’ total points gained, and the difference in …

Convergence In Income Inequality: Further Evidence From The Club Clustering Methodology Across States In The U.S., Nicholas Apergis, Christina Christou, Rangan Gupta, Stephen M. Miller

Molasky Family Department of Economics and Real Estate Faculty Research

This paper contributes to the sparse literature on inequality convergence by empirically testing convergence across states in the U.S. This sample period encompasses a series of different periods that the existing literature discusses -- the Great Depression (1929–1944), the Great Compression (1945–1979), the Great Divergence (1980-present), the Great Moderation (1982–2007), and the Great Recession (2007–2009). This paper implements the relatively new method of panel convergence testing, recommended by Phillips and Sul (2007). This method examines the club convergence hypothesis, which argues that certain countries, states, sectors, or regions belong to a club that moves from disequilibrium positions to their club-specific …

Worked To Leisure: The Intersections Of Volunteerism, Work, And Leisure, Denise Nicole Cook

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Volunteerism and work are topics which academics in several disciplines research. This study is an examination of the intersection of work and volunteerism via the lens of role theory. According to role theorists, the term role refers to behaviors which are either a result of social position or expectations (Biddle 1986). Cognitive role theorists use vocabulary such as “role conflict” and “role overload” to identify incongruences sometimes found in roles individuals have in their lives (Biddle 1986). These incongruences are primarily examined as they relate to individual level consequences. This research explores volunteerism and work as they relate to role …

Governance By Economist: An Historical Note On The Keynesian Revolution, Lewis Karstensson

Molasky Family Department of Economics and Real Estate Faculty Research

An inferential analysis of the performance of the United States economy with respect to production, employment, and average price level over the twentieth century by presidential administration.

Mountain Monitor - 1st Quarter 2015, Kenan Fikri, Siddharth Kulkarni

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

This analysis of employment, output, unemployment, and house prices finds that the 10 major metropolitan areas of the Mountain West, despite significant economic headwinds, weathered the first quarter of 2015 with robust economic growth. Eight of the region’s 10 major metro areas advanced on all four metrics of economic performance, and the remaining two metro areas slipped only on a single front.

The national economic slowdown that arrived in early 2015 did not entirely bypass the Mountain West, but the region resisted the drag better than any other. As U.S. economic output contracted by 0.3 percent in the first quarter, …

Mountain Monitor - 4th Quarter 2014, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

With the national economy gaining steam, the 10 major metro areas of the Mountain West ended 2014 with another quarter of strong economic performance. On the four indicators of economic vitality measured by the Mountain Monitor—employment growth, output growth, changes in unemployment, and house price growth—with only a few exceptions, every metro area registered advances on every indicator. Such widespread progress heretofore eluded the region, where recovery from the Great Recession has been characterized by unevenness.

In aggregate, the 10 Mountain metro areas ended 2014 with their fastest quarter of job growth of the year. Employment increased by 0.8 …

Do Gasoline Prices Affect Residential Property Values?, Adele C. Morris, Helen R. Neill

Brookings Mountain West Publications

This paper estimates the effect of gasoline prices on home values and explores the degree to which the relationship varies across a city. Using data from 930,702 home sales in Clark County, Nevada, from 1976 through 2010, we find that gasoline prices have significantly different effects on the sales price of homes in different neighborhoods. A ten percent increase in gasoline prices is associated with changes in location-specific average home values that span a range of over $13,000. This suggests that energy policies may affect household housing wealth via gasoline prices, a heretofore unrecognized distributional outcome.

Mountain Monitor - 3rd Quarter 2014, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

As a group, the 10 major metro areas of the Mountain West outperformed the national economy during the third quarter of 2014 on all four indicators of economic vitality measured by the Mountain Monitor: employment growth, output growth, unemployment, and house prices. In the three months ending in September, the country’s large metropolitan areas were anticipating the rapid uptick in national economic growth that took hold at the end of 2014. Mountain region metro areas led the way.

All but two major metro areas in the region added jobs, and six did so at a faster rate than the …

Mountain Monitor - 2nd Quarter 2014, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

Economic growth returned to the 10 major metro areas of the Mountain West in the second quarter of 2014 after slippage in the first quarter of the year. The resumption of vitality progressed unevenly, however. Denver and Salt Lake City pulled ahead as the fastest-growing metro areas in the region. Ogden and Provo’s days of above-average growth appeared to be fading. Las Vegas’ economic recovery advanced strongly, but Sun Belt peers Phoenix and Tucson had more difficulty moving beyond the first quarter’s slowdown. Albuquerque, for its part, welcomed a return to employment and output growth.

Across the region’s 10 major …

Economic Voting In The Developing World, Rafael Oganesyan

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

A plethora of ink has been spilled demonstrating the relationship between economics and voter behavior. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of scholarship has concentrated on the empirical assessment of economic voting within the context of developed countries. The present thesis widens the scope of study by testing the applicability of the classic economic voting theory (CEVT) strictly within developing countries. The results suggest that while voters in developing countries do take the economy into account, they do so in a manner that's partially different from what CEVT predicts. Voters in developing countries simultaneously assume both retrospective sociotropic and prospective sociotropic characteristics. …

Mountain Monitor - 1st Quarter 2014, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

The quarter’s Mountain Monitor finds that the rate of economic recovery in the major metropolitan areas of the Mountain West is no longer impervious to national trends.

The previous edition of the Mountain Monitor observed that the regional rate of recovery seemed to be converging toward that of the nation. This edition of the Mountain Monitor suggests that the trend has progressed further.

The rate of economic recovery broadly slowed across the region from the fourth quarter of 2013 to the first quarter of 2014, just as it did nationally. The national headlines in the first three months of the …

Mountain Monitor - 4th Quarter 2013, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

The quarter’s Mountain Monitor finds that the pace of economic recovery in the Mountain West region’s major metropolitan areas converged toward that of the rest of the nation in the last quarter of 2013.

While quarterly performance on the Monitor’s four indicators of economic recovery—employment, output, the unemployment rate, and house prices—varied considerably across the 10 major metro areas of the region, their combined performance broadly slowed to track with the rate of national economic recovery. The quarter’s average job growth remained unchanged in the region at 0.4 percent as the national economy caught up. The gap between the national …

Cracking The Code On Stem: A People Strategy For Nevada's Economy, Jessica A. Lee, Mark Muro, Jonathan Rothwell, Scott Andes, Siddharth Kulkarni

Brookings Mountain West Publications

Nevada has in place a plausible economic diversification strategy—and it’s beginning to work. Now, the state and its regions need to craft a people strategy. Specifically, the state needs to boost the number of Nevadans who possess at least some postsecondary training in the fields of science, technology, engineering, or math—the so-called “STEM” disciplines (to which some leaders add arts and design to make it “STEAM”).

The moment is urgent—and only heightened by the projected worker needs of Tesla Motors’ planned “gigafactory” for lithium-ion batteries in Storey County.

Even before the recent Tesla commitment, a number of the more high-tech …

Cracking The Code On Stem: A People Strategy For Nevada's Economy Executive Summary, Jessica A. Lee, Mark Muro, Jonathan Rothwell, Scott Andes, Siddharth Kulkarni

Brookings Mountain West Publications

Nevada has in place a plausible economic diversification strategy—and it’s beginning to work. Now, the state and its regions need to craft a people strategy. Specifically, the state needs to boost the number of Nevadans who possess at least some postsecondary training in the fields of science, technology, engineering, or math—the so-called “STEM” disciplines (to which some leaders add arts and design to make it “STEAM”).

The moment is urgent—and only heightened by the projected worker needs of Tesla Motors’ planned “gigafactory” for lithium-ion batteries in Storey County.

Even before the recent Tesla commitment, a number of the more high-tech …

Mountain Monitor - 3rd Quarter 2013, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

The quarter’s Mountain Monitor marks the four-year anniversary of Brookings Mountain West's quarterly tracking of the uneven pace of recovery across the major metro areas of the Intermountain West and it finds that, although the region continues to outperform the national economy the rate of recovery slowed moderately in the region’s metro areas.

As a group, Mountain region metro areas advanced on all four indicators of economic recovery tracked by the Monitor—employment, output, unemployment, and house prices—but their progress was more restrained in the third quarter of 2013 than it was in the second.

Beneath the regional headline of moderating …

Mountain Monitor - 2nd Quarter 2013, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

Economic recovery progressed steadily across the metropolitan Mountain West in the second quarter of 2013. Many of the region’s major metro areas counted among the strongest economic performers nationally, but output growth slowed over the quarter and the region‘s unemployment recovery looked to be stagnating. Moderate job growth and a fast and accelerating housing recovery buoyed the Mountain West economy in the second quarter.

Mountain Monitor-1st Quarter 2013, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

Economic recovery gained strength across the major metro areas of the Mountain West in the first quarter of 2013. Multiple metro areas achieved long-awaited full employment recoveries in the first quarter and regional production surpassed pre-recession levels of output for the first time. The region’s strong housing rebound continued to be a boon. Additionally, a special supplement to the Monitor shows that the healthcare sector has been an outsized contributor to recovery throughout the region. Despite progress on multiple fronts, though, many Mountain metro areas remain scarred with high unemployment rates, severely depressed house prices, and daunting jobs deficits.

Mountain Monitor-4th Quarter 2012, Kenan Fikri, Mark Muro

Mountain Monitor Quarterly

Indicators of economic recovery depicted continued progress in the major metropolitan areas of the Mountain West in the fourth quarter of 2012. The region’s employment recovery gained momentum, and solid home-price increases in the region contributed to the nation‘s broader housing recovery. Such inroads bode well for further advances in 2013. At the same time, the region’s output recovery slowed and unemployment refused to budge.

Moral Markets And The Problematic Proprietor: How Neoliberal Values Shape Lottery Debates In Nevada, Christopher Wetzel

Occasional Papers

All but seven states have legalized lotteries since New Hampshire ushered in the modern lottery era in 1964. Although casino gaming has been permitted since 1931, Nevada has rejected multiple legislative proposals amend the State Constitution and create a state-run lottery. This paper theorizes the lottery’s absence in Nevada, focusing in particular on the role of the state. Lotteries are distinct from other forms of gaming because states act simultaneously as the operation’s regulator and proprietor. In this case, Nevada’s lottery legalization debates over the last half century reflect the profound moral valence of markets. The state as a potential …

State Juvenile Justice Spending Decisions: The Effects Of Federal Aid, Race, Politics, And Other Socioeconomic Factors, Willie B. Coleman Smith

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Historically, juvenile justice in the United States has been the responsibility of state governments with limited federal support. There is a notable gap in the empirical literature on factors that affect funding policies for state juvenile justice programs. In this dissertation research, I used two theoretical perspectives to examine determinants of juvenile justice spending: economic theory on intergovernmental aid and tenets of the Politics of Social Order Framework, developed by Stucky, Heimer, and Lang (2007) to investigate corrections spending. Two research questions were considered: 1) What impact does federal aid have on state spending on juvenile justice programs? and 2) …

Halos, Alibis And Community Development: A Cross National Comparison Of How Governments Spend Revenue From Gambling, Lynn Gidluck

Occasional Papers

This paper provides a cross-national comparison of how governments around the world distribute revenues from state-directed gambling and how these choices have been justified by proponents and vilified by critics. Case studies where governments have popularized gambling expansion by “earmarking” revenues for particular good causes and where the state has collaborated with the voluntary sector to deliver programs from this revenue stream are examined. Lessons learned from challenges of various approaches are considered.

Reclaiming Prosperity: Repositioning Southern Nevada For The Next Economy, Bruce Katz

Brookings Scholar Lecture Series

The outlines of the next American economy are coming into focus, yet the future remains uncertain in Southern Nevada as America's newest metropolis labors through a major recession. It is time therefore to get back on track and begin laying the foundation for a new and more durable kind of growth in metropolitan Las Vegas and across the Intermountain West. To help with that, urban visionary Bruce Katz advanced a powerful depiction of the next American economy in a major UNLV lecture and articulated a bold agenda for helping Las Vegas reclaim prosperity in the new era.

Should The Economic Crisis Change Our Assessment Of Markets And Government?, Clifford Winston

Brookings Scholar Lecture Series

Broad Objectives of the Study:
- Base policy debates on empirical counterfactual evidence.
- Begin accumulating evidence and identifying common themes so we don’t have to start from “square one.”
- Provide guidance for policymakers.

The Effects Of Gaming On Residential Real Estate Prices And Sales: A Case Study Of Las Vegas: 1990--2008, Christopher Alan Miller

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This dissertation empirically investigates the effects of the gaming industry on a local economy, specifically housing prices and sales in the city and surrounding areas of Las Vegas. This study explores many of the economic effects that Las Vegas' relatively unrestricted gaming industry has on surrounding home prices and sales and analyzes the specific forces and the issues they involve. As of this writing, little to no research has used seminal economic theories to analyze the effects of the performance of a locale's gaming industry on the surrounding residential real estate market. This study addresses this gap by examining the …