Sustainable economic growth is vital to reduce poverty and a challenge to development. To aim and maintain a greater level of economic growth that will assist African countries in reducing poverty, they must investigate the specific determinants of economic growth. In this paper, we determine the impact of economic freedom, political freedom, and foreign direct investment on the gross domestic product. The gross domestic product was observed over a nine year-time period on a sample of 38 low-income and upper-income countries in Africa.

The objective of this research concerns identifying whether or not there is a relationship between oil price increases in a given quarter and the likelihood of a recession in the subsequent quarter. The data used is gathered from the St. Louis Fed's Fred II, the National Bureau of Economic Research, and the Energy Information Administration to generate modified variables. These variables are tested using a qualitative dependent variable, recession, in a binary choice model. The findings validated the assumption that oil prices do have a correlation with recessions, and that the relationship is a direct one. Based on the model, an increase in the price of oil will positively affect the likelihood of a "recession" outcome versus the alternative, "no recession". It is anticipated that the results will inspire future research into the causes and effects of oil price surges, as well as the determinants of economic contractions in the future based on policy decisions and economic decision-making practices in the present.

In order to provide enough economic growth so that the majority of individuals within the jurisdiction are satisfied with government services, state governments typically pursue two budgetary choices for economic growth: overall increased production and stabilization (Bivens, 2014). According to two budgetary choices as a path to economic growth, this research investigates the relationship between capital expenditure or savings and economic growth. It covers the years 1990 through 2013 and uses a paneled data set at the state level in the United States. The first model for this study is the structural equation model (SEM), which examines the direct and indirect effects of capital expenditure and state government savings on economic growth by including the volatility of the total expenditure as a mediating factor. Then, this dissertation investigates the relationships among capital expenditures, the total expenditure volatility and savings by using the endogenous growth or the OLS regression model. This dissertation can conclude that both of the two budgetary choices for state governments are effective for economic growth. Under controlling state characteristics, they are positively related to economic growth, which supports the allocation role of government for economic growth. However, this study finds that state governments do not find any supportive evidence on the fact that they can attain the stabilization role of government for economic growth. Even though they spend money on savings or capital expenditure from Keynesian macroeconomic theory, it does not lead to budgetary stabilization of the total expenditure. Thus, this dissertation leaves the missing links of the relationship between both fiscal policies and volatility inconclusive while it supports that volatility can negatively affect economic growth.

This dissertation is comprised of three studies which examine, among other issues, racial economic disparity. The first study examines racial and gender wage gaps and considers preferences among supervisors and workers as possible sources of wage differentials. After controlling for various wage determinants, I find little statistical evidence of a racial wage gap. However, I do find evidence of a significant gender wage gap. Also, the race of an individual‟s supervisor is found to be unimportant, but workers with male supervisors are found to earn significantly higher wages than workers with female supervisors. The results reveal little evidence of employee discrimination. However, it is found that both white and male workers receive a wage premium when working for a white male supervisor. I find these results to be strongest for, and possibly driven by, small firms in the South. The second study examines the factors that Bowl Championship Series (BCS) universities use in their decision to offer athletic scholarships to high school football players. I find that a player‟s physical characteristics are important in determining the number of scholarship offers he will receive as well as his athletic performance in high school. However, a player‟s high school grade point average is not a significant determinant of the number of scholarship offers he receives. The analysis also indicates a significantly higher labor market demand for African-American high school football players, and there is also evidence of racial position segregation as well. The third study analyzes the relationship between the racial makeup of counties and economic growth and convergence in the southern U.S. The results provide strong evidence that spatial dependence is present in the data, and it is determined that the spatial lag model is appropriate for modeling the data. Significant evidence of conditional beta-convergence among the counties in the sample is found. The results also reveal that the balanced growth paths of counties are inversely related with the percentage of the county population that is African-American. That is, counties with a higher concentration of African-Americans tend to exhibit relatively slow rates of income growth.

This dissertation explores the determining effects of non-economic factors on economic growth of developed versus developing nations. While earlier economic theories have traditionally focused on land, labor, capital and technology as the principle determining factors of economic growth, latter-day normative theorists demonstrated the importance of cultural forces and human capital variables on economic growth of nations. This dissertation is an extension of this emphasis put on economic growth by the latter-day normative theorists. Economic activities for developed and developing nations have been used as a proxy stock variable (for economic growth) for three points in time ? 1980, 1990 and 2000. The data for economic activities has been obtained from Jerry Dwyer?s dataset while the independent variables such as economic freedom has been obtained from the Fraser Institute and that of social capital variables have been obtained from the World Values Survey for the years 1980, 1990 and 2000. The central focus of the research has been to observe the correlations between the several components of economic freedom and social capital variables (such as trust and membership) among developed and developing nations followed by multiple regression analyses of the economic freedom and social capital variables on economic growth of developed and developing nations. The findings of this research suggest that physical capital and economic freedom and unequivocally significant determinants of economic growth in both the developed and developing nations. Trust on the other hand has been understood to be a limited variable in the way it is conceptualized in the World Values Survey. Within this limitation, ?personal trust? has been found to be declining over the years for all the nations, has very little association with membership categories over the years and is negatively correlated with economic activities/economic growth or output per worker. The impact of membership or belongingness on economic activities is very different in developed versus developing countries. Overall, this research has helped to broaden the boundaries of economic growth with the extension of sociological variables (such as trust and membership) into the field of Economics. The research has broad-based implications on the public policies of government across nations.

Manufacturing in the United States has been in a period of general decline over much of the past fifty years, though this overall pattern of de-industrialization has occurred at different times and intensities in specific geographical regions. However, local officials and development experts still focus efforts on attracting manufacturing industries into their communities, an effort often referred to as “smokestack chasing.” At the same time, environmentalism has been of increasing importance in the consciousness of American citizens. One of the central concerns of environmentalists and environmentally-oriented policy makers has been the pollution generated by these manufacturing facilities. As a result of these conflicting foci and interests, an intractable dividing line has emerged between those who view manufacturing as a source of local economic growth and employment opportunities, and those who are primarily interested in environmental quality and protection. This debate, characterized as one of “jobs versus the environment,” has been a central rhetorical frame utilized by the competing sides in both the policy and academic arenas. Numerous diverse strands of thought about these issues are synthesized into three primary theoretical perspectives, each of which purports to explain the economy-environment relationship. An assessment of the empirical relationship between economic standing, change, and environmental quality conducted using a variety of data sources and analytical techniques. Significant findings emerged which can be utilized to inform the environmental social sciences as well as policy makers and communities facing these issues.

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