Other Economics Commons^™

Measuring Heterogeneous Preferences For Residential Amenities, Arthur J. Caplan, Sherzod B. Akhundjanov, Kristopher Toll

Applied Economics Faculty Publications

This study reports on estimates of heterogeneous preferences for residential amenities among households in the Mountain West region of the US. The estimates are derived from a choice experiment funded by the Utah Department of Transportation and Utah Transit Authority—an experiment based upon large samples of both homeowners and renters who participated in a larger, statewide transportation study. The choice experiment and transportation study allow us to control for a rich set of household-level demographic and lifestyle characteristics, which in turn permits identification of a host of factors contributing to heterogeneity in residential preferences. We leverage a percentage-change housing cost …

Nebraska Corn Basis Response To Economic Shutdown, Austin Harthoorn, Cory Walters, Jessica J. Groskopf

Extension Farm and Ranch Management News

The objective of this article is to evaluate how Nebraska corn basis evolved through this past year’s economic events. We hope growers update their commodity price marketing decision framework as this past year exposed levels prices can reach — an important factor to consider when farm survival is on the line.

A Class Of N-Player Colonel Blotto Games With Multidimensional Private Information, Christian Ewerhart, Dan Kovenock

ESI Working Papers

In this paper, we study N-player Colonel Blotto games with incomplete information about battlefield valuations. Such games arise in job markets, research and development, electoral competition, security analysis, and conflict resolution. For M ≥ N + 1 battlefields, we identify a Bayes-Nash equilibrium in which the resource allocation to a given battlefield is strictly monotone in the valuation of that battlefield. We also explore extensions such as heterogeneous budgets, the case M ≤ N, full-support type distributions, and network games.

Economics Students: Self-Selected In Preferences And Indoctrinated In Beliefs, Antonio M. Espín, Manuel Correa, Alberto Ruiz-Villaverde

ESI Working Papers

There is much debate as to why economics students display more self-interested behavior than other students: whether homo economicus self-select into economics or students are instead “indoctrinated” by economics learning, and whether these effects impact on preferences or beliefs about others’ behavior. Using a classroom survey (n>500) with novel behavioral questions we show that, compared to students in other majors, econ students report being: (i) more self-interested (in particular, less compassionate or averse to advantageous inequality) already in the first year and the difference remains among more senior students; (ii) more likely to think that people will be unwilling …

Institutions And Opportunistic Behavior: Experimental Evidence, Antonio Cabrales, Irma Clots-Figueras, Roberto Hernán-González, Praveen Kujal

ESI Working Papers

Risk mitigating institutions have long been used by societies to protect against opportunistic behavior. We know little about how they are demanded, who demands them or how they impact subsequent behavior. To study these questions, we run a large-scale online experiment where insurance can be purchased to safeguard against opportunistic behavior. We compare two different selection mechanisms for risk mitigation, the individual and the collective (voting). We find that, whether individual or collective, there is demand for riskmitigating institutions amongst high-opportunism individuals, while low-opportunism individuals demand lesser levels of insurance. However, high-opportunism individuals strategically demand lower insurance institutions when they …

In-Group Versus Out-Group Preferences In Intergroup Conflict: An Experiment, Subhashish M. Chowdhury, Anwesha Mukherjee, Roman M. Sheremeta

ESI Working Papers

Individuals participating in a group conflict have different preferences, e.g., maximizing their own payoff, maximizing the group’s payoff, or defeating the rivals. When such preferences are present simultaneously, it is difficult to distinctly identify the impact of those preferences on conflict. In order to separate in-group and out-group preferences, we conduct an experiment in which human in-group or out-group players are removed while keeping the game strategically similar. Our design allows us to study (i) how effort in a group conflict vary due to in-group and out-group preferences, and (ii) how the impact of these preferences vary when the two …

Identifying Bedrest Using Waist-Worn Triaxial Accelerometers In Preschool Children, J. Dustin Tracy, Thomas Donnelly, Evan C. Sommer, William J. Heerman, Shari L. Barkin, Maciej S. Buchowski

ESI Publications

Purpose

To adapt and validate a previously developed decision tree for youth to identify bedrest for use in preschool children.

Methods

Parents of healthy preschool (3-6-year-old) children (n = 610; 294 males) were asked to help them to wear an accelerometer for 7 to 10 days and 24 hours/day on their waist. Children with ≥3 nights of valid recordings were randomly allocated to the development (n = 200) and validation (n = 200) groups. Wear periods from accelerometer recordings were identified minute-by-minute as bedrest or wake using visual identification by two independent raters. To automate visual identification, chosen decision tree …

Gambling With Debt: The English Premier League, Edward Robinson

Undergraduate Economic Review

This paper aims to investigate the impact of debt on financial performance in the English Premier League from the 2000/01 season to the 2017/18 season. Panel model estimations concluded debt has a significant inverse relationship with financial performance. This relationship may potentially be stronger in larger clubs and could be present through human capital investment’s significant direct relationship with financial performance. This further emphasised usages of intangible assets as a player human capital investment indicator, rather than using wage costs like previous studies. Furthermore, filling a gap regarding how capital structures may be used to impact financial performance within’ football.

Do Truth-Telling Oaths Improve Honesty In Crowd-Working?, Nicolas Jacquemet, Alexander G. James, Stéphane Luchini, James J. Murphy, Jason F. Shogren

ESI Publications

This study explores whether an oath to honesty can reduce both shirking and lying among crowd-sourced internet workers. Using a classic coin-flip experiment, we first confirm that a substantial majority of Mechanical Turk workers both shirk and lie when reporting the number of heads flipped. We then demonstrate that lying can be reduced by first asking each worker to swear voluntarily on his or her honor to tell the truth in subsequent economic decisions. Even in this online, purely anonymous environment, the oath significantly reduced the percent of subjects telling “big” lies (by roughly 27%), but did not affect shirking. …

Monetization Of Fiscal Deficits And Covid-19: A Primer, Aidan Lawson, Greg Feldberg

Journal of Financial Crises

Monetization—also known as “money-financed fiscal programs” or “money-printing”—occurs when a government finances itself by issuing currency or other non-interest-bearing liabilities, such as bank reserves. It poses real risks—potentially excessive inflation and encroachment on central-bank independence—and some paint it as a relic of a bygone era. The onset of the COVID-19 crisis, however, forced governments to spend heavily to combat the considerable economic and public health impacts. As government deficits climbed, monetization re-entered the conversation as a way to avoid the massive debt burdens that some nations may face. This paper describes how monetization works, provides key historical examples, and examines …

Will Seasonality Patterns For Beef Export Sales And Commitments Hold In 2021?, Elliott James Dennis

Extension Farm and Ranch Management News

First two paragraphs:

Trade occurs when price differences between the two locations are large enough after accounting for transportation cost, exchange rates, tariffs, etc. Exports vary throughout the year since prices reflect current and future supply and demand situations. Seasonality in cattle production, meat demand, and market disruptions are some examples of why wholesale beef prices increase and decrease within a year.

The inability to market cattle in the second quarter of 2020 and increased demand for retail beef products due to government gathering restrictions in restaurants caused wholesale beef prices to rise to historical levels. Beef wholesalers can choose …

Foreign Direct Investment And Economic Growth: A Panel Data Analysis, Yuan Yao

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates the influences of FDI on economic growth of selected Latin American and Asian countries both directly and indirectly through factors such as technology, knowledge transfer, and trade openness. The study uses the growth regression to examine and identify not only the relationship between the FDI and economic growth of the underlying countries but also the interaction effects of FDI with human capital and trade openness on the economic growth based on the statistical performance of the interaction terms in the model. The evidence from the study shows that FDI does have an impact on economic growth both …

Star Player Bias In The Nba: A Quantile Regression Approach, Daniel Barrett

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper examines the impact of an NBA player’s salary on the number of fouls drawn by them in a season. NBA referees have complete discretion in making calls of whether a player does or does not commit a foul in game, with decisions susceptible to bias, favoring certain players with more fouls called in their favor than another player. The study uses salary to determine a player’s value, using a panel dataset of all players from the 2015-16 NBA season through the 2018-19 NBA season for salary and game statistics. The impact of salary is determined using a quantile …

The Place And Role Of Pharmacy Benefit Management (Pbm) Companies In Us Healthcare System, George Mattis Ii

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

On average, prescription drugs cost US consumers more than any other developed country in the world. US drug makers claim that intermediaries in the prescription drug supply chain, companies called pharmacy benefit managers (PBM), are forcing them to increase their drug prices. PBMs counter that the discounts they receive from drug makers are channeled to insurers. This thesis will examine the role that PBMs play in the prescription drug supply chain and determine what effect they have on drug prices. This thesis will utilize a comparative static model, Structure, Conduct, Performance (SCP) framework to analyze the pharmaceutical manufacturing and the …

Trade Liberalization And Economic Performance: An Empirical Analysis, Brandon Fontaine

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

Trade liberalization has long been a debated topic; free traders will argue it makes all involved parties more prosperous while protectionists say that it costs jobs and hurts countries’ economies. This paper will study the relationship between a country’s trade freedom, as measured by the Heritage Foundations trade openness metrics, and the nation’s economic performance. This study will incorporate indicators such as gross domestic product, unemployment, and investment flows across 56 countries of different income levels to determine whether free trade policies lead to greater economic performance. The three income levels analyzed will be high-income, medium-income, and low-income. The empirical …

The Effect Of Poor Working Conditions And Income Inequality On Gdp Growth, Trent Remillard

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper looks to see if there is a relationship between poor working conditions and growth in GDP annually. Many nations have historically treated their workers very poorly, and offered little in support or protection to them. Consequently, many of these same nations have seen large boosts in annual GDP growth. This paper aims to see if there is a correlation between this treatment of workers, and these subsequent boosts of GDP growth, and if there is, is it possible to predict the expected level of growth based on these factors.

Macroeconomic Drivers Of Reit Stock Prices, Nicholas Mulligan

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates several variables as potential drivers of REIT stock performance. The results show that four of the six independent variables, all of positively correlated ones, were significant. The combination of variables proved to be very predictive, yielding an R-squared of 0.9712. The two variables that were added in this study versus the benchmark Morgan Stanley study proved to be highly significant. The two negatively correlated variables proved to be insignificant.

Quality Analysis Of Lift Ticket Prices In The United States Using Logistic Regression, Jared Murphy

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper investigates the possibility of a relationship between Lift Ticket Prices and quality of resorts in the United States of America. The study incorporates information from a number of past research papers analyzing the price of lift tickets and the individual characteristics of the ski area. In recent years, the price of lift tickets has increased far greater than the rate of inflation. With over 350 companies operating in the industry in the United States, they combine for annual revenue greater than $2 billion. Consumers who enjoy the sport have seen a sharp increase in prices throughout the past …

Economic Determinants Of Within-Country Political Instability And Violence: A Panel Data Examination Of Central And South America, Michael Biskupic

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

This paper examines the potential impact of economic factors on withincountry violence and instability utilizing a panel data approach. More specifically, this paper examines the impact of within-country income inequality on a measure of political stability and a measure of within-country violence. Utilizing a Generalized Least Squares method, this paper finds that only in countries with a per-capita income less than $5000 is there a significant relationship between income inequality and violence. This paper concludes with a discussion of the results, recommendations for future research, and a section on policy recommendations based on the empirical results and potential risks not …

Student Achievement In Rhode Island Charter Schools: A Cross-Sectional Analysis, Edward Golas

Empirical Economic Bulletin, An Undergraduate Journal

Using standardized test results from the school year 2018-19 this study compares the performance of 3rd through 8th graders in Rhode Island charter schools to their peers in traditional public schools (TPSs). This study also uses OLS techniques to test if Rhode Island charter schools help to bridge the achievement gap between minority (black and Hispanic) students and white students. The results show that in approximately ¾ of comparable instances, Rhode Island charter schools outperform TPSs on both English and math standardized tests. Additionally, it was found that Hispanic students attending a charter school are predicted to score higher on …