Master of Arts / Department of Economics / Lloyd B. Thomas Jr / Can stimulative monetary policy be effective when there is a “liquidity trap”? This question surfaced during the Great Depression and is raising its head again today due to the current financial crisis. A definitive answer never materialized for the 1930’s, as differences of opinion between non-monetarist and monetarist economists arose about this issue. This need not be the case today. In this thesis I will first enumerate several different meanings of the term “liquidity trap” and their implications for monetary policy. Then, with data from the Federal Reserve, I will attempt to validate the likelihood of a liquidity trap. I do this for the demand for money and bank liquidity traps. I use regression analysis over a fifteen year period with varying interest rates to determine if the elasticities of demand increase as interest rates fall, indicating a liquidity trap. My use of log linear regressions for both demand for money and bank liquidity traps, using data from the present financial crisis, adds to the evidence supporting the liquidity hypothesis, but does not empirically establish the existence of a liquidity trap. Following my findings, I detail actions taken by the Federal Reserve and show the subsequent results through the summer and into the fall of 2009. From this, I make a conclusion that the United States is most likely in a liquidity trap and it does matter.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Yang M. Chang / The first essay is on TRIPS (trade related intellectual property rights), biodiversity and North-South trade. This essay explores how true North-South trade and different IPR (intellectual property rights) regimes affect the level of biodiversity that is maintained by a Southern government. The results show that protecting farmers’ rights only is the regime that will be chosen by the Southern government and that will lead to the maximum level of biodiversity. This is important for policymakers as provisions for protecting farmers’ rights do not currently exist. This finding confirms previous results that did not include true North-South trade. Another result, and one that departs from existing literature, is that positive levels of biodiversity will be maintained by the Southern government if only international patent protection is implemented. The second essay focuses on factors that affect attendance at MLS soccer matches, in particular David Beckham. The primary results in the study are that David Beckham has a very large, statistically significant effect on attendance at MLS matches. This effect is estimated as at least a sixty-five percent increase in attendance in games Beckham plays in. Other results from this study are that there are no significant effects from the months matches are played and that the only day of the week with a significant effect is Saturday (its effect is positive). The results from this study provides insight to MLS as it faces upcoming decisions about designated players, such as Beckham, and about the calendar upon which the MLS season is played. The final essay is on moral hazard, market power and the demand for health insurance. The issue of health insurance is one of the main questions facing the U.S. government and its citizens. This essay explores the particular interaction of moral hazard and market power in the form of a duopoly in a pharmaceutical market. The results from this essay show that there are notable differences in the effects on the welfare of market participants under duopoly as compared to monopoly, such as the importance of cross-price effects that do not show up in a monopoly market.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Steven P. Cassou, Wayne Nafziger / This dissertation comprises three essays in open economy and international macroeconomics. The first essay investigates the propagation mechanism of real exchange rate shocks to key real sectors that constitute U.S. foreign trade. The analysis is carried out by decomposing the U.S. trade balance into agriculture, manufacturing and services and evaluating how these sectors respond through the monetary policy channel to a shock in the real exchange rate. A VAR model is constructed using quarterly data of the U.S. foreign trade from 1976Q2 to 2005Q1. The results show that a shock to the real exchange rate has a greater impact on manufacturing and services net trade relative to agriculture. Moreover, the results also indicate, at the sectoral level, that exports are more sensitive to the real exchange rate shocks than are imports. These results are important to researchers using dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models of small open economies because they show transmission features of real exchange rate and monetary policy disturbances to key sectoral components of exports, imports and the trade balance. The second essay employs a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium framework to an open economy setting in order to investigate the mechanism through which the key sectors of agriculture, manufacturing and services are affected by shocks in the real exchange rates. The essay investigates exchange rate movements as deviations from purchasing power parity, disregarding the changes in the prices of non-tradable goods relative to tradable goods among countries. The results suggest that exchange rate movements are a function of structural parameters that constitute the three sectors of agriculture, manufacturing and services such as labor shares and the elasticity of substitution between domestic and foreign goods. The third essay examines the key forces driving innovation among entrepreneurs of ICT (information and communications technology) firms within Bangalore, India’s leading software city. The essay employs the multinomial logistic technique on qualitative variables related to education, social strata, experience, and diaspora of Indian software entrepreneurs to show empirically their relevance in explaining Schumpeterian innovation in the Indian software industry. This study not only looks at the impact of years of schooling on innovation, but also the types of education received by an entrepreneur, such as technical or commercial type of education, whether the last degree was received from India or from abroad and whether the entrepreneur attended the Indian Institute of Technology. The empirical results indicate that, the level of education, in terms of number of years of schooling and types of education received by an Indian software entrepreneur are statistically significant in explaining innovation in the Indian software industry. The results also show that, more years of experience in the software industry by an entrepreneur, increases the probability that they become innovators and reduces the likelihood of imitation. Moreover, the likelihood of adaptation is invariant to years of experience in the industry. We also investigate whether exposure to foreign technology increases the likelihood of innovation in the industry by examining three types of diaspora networks, that is, living abroad, working abroad and being a CEO abroad at least 6 months before establishing a software company in India. The results suggest that this foreign exposure increases the likelihood of innovation and reduces imitation and adaptation. Among studies of Indian entrepreneurs examining caste, this study is unique in that caste has no statistical significance in explaining entrepreneurship.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Yang M. Chang / There have been considerable discussions about why countries have interests in forming preferential trade agreements (PTAs), which typically take the forms of a “free trade area” (FTA) with Rules of Origin (ROO) and a “customs union” (CU) (World Bank, 2005). This dissertation contains three essays with three different models of trade under oligopoly to analyze various issues on preferential trade agreements. The first essay examines welfare implications of forming preferential trade arrangement (PTAs) between two asymmetric countries that differ in their market sizes. Key findings are as follows. First, when market size asymmetry between two countries is not too large and ROO requirements are not too restrictive, the formation of an FTA with effective ROO can be welfare-improving to both members. Second, the formation of a PTA is more likely to emerge between countries of similar in their market sizes, ceteris paribus. Third, compared to the pre-PTA equilibrium, there are greater reductions in external tariffs under an FTA than under a CU such that a non-member country is relatively better off under the FTA. The second essay presents a three country model of trade under Bertrand price competition to analyze differences in welfare implications between an FTA with ROO and a customs union (CU). It is shown that the maximum limit of ROO requirements over which there are welfare gains from trade for FTA members depends crucially on the degree of substitutability of final goods (or the intensity of product market competition). It is also found that member countries and their final-good exporters are better off in a CU than in an FTA. There are greater reductions in external tariffs under an FTA than under a CU such that a non-member country is relatively better off under the FTA. The third essay presents a three country model of FTA with Cournot quantity competition and derives the maximum enforceable level of ROO over which there are welfare gains from trade to each member country. It is shown that ROO and external tariffs are strategic complements such that the higher is the regional input restrictions, the higher is the external tariff necessary to induce firms to fully comply with ROO requirements. It is also shown that an FTA with effective ROO has a positive effect on the final-good trade. But the trade-diverting effect does not occur in the final-good sector.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Yang M. Chang / The first essay develops a simple sequential-move game to characterize the endogeneity of third-party intervention in conflict. We show how a third party’s “intervention technology” interacts with the canonical “conflict technologies” of two rival parties in affecting the sub-game perfect Nash equilibrium outcome. From the perspective of deterrence strategy, we find that it is more costly for a third party to support an ally to deter a challenger from attacking (i.e., to maintain peace), as compared to the alternative case when the third party supports the ally to gain a disputed territory by attacking (i.e., to create war), ceteris paribus. However, an optimally intervening third party can be either “peace-making,” “peace-breaking,” or neither depending on the characteristics of the conflict and the third party’s stake with each of the rival parties. The second essay develops a simple model to characterize the role that an intervening third party plays in raising the cost of rebellion in an intrastate conflict. Extending the Gershenson-Grossman (2000) framework of conflict in a two-stage game to the case involving outside intervention in a three-stage game, we examine conditions under which an outside party optimally intervenes such that (i) the strength of the rebel group is diminished or (ii) the rebellion is deterred altogether. We also find conditions in which a third party optimally intervenes at a level insufficient to deter rebellion. Such behavior, which improves the incumbent government’s potential to succeed in conflict, is often overlooked in conflict studies evaluating the effectiveness of intervention. One policy implication of the model is that an increase in the strength of inter-governmental trade partnerships increases the likelihood that third-party intervention acts to deter rebellion. In the final essay, a simple model of a college basketball season is constructed to examine the existence of conference bias in college basketball’s Ratings Percentage Index. Given the nature of the RPI formula and the hierarchical structure of college basketball’s 31 conferences, we expect the RPI to be biased against teams playing a difficult conference schedule. The model verifies that, even in a perfect world where teams play to expectation and can be transitively compared based on revealed performance level, the RPI does not necessarily provide an ordinal mapping from revealed team ability level to the real number line. This result has important implications on NCAA tournament selection and seeding.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Lloyd B. Thomas Jr / Dennis L. Weisman / This dissertation has focused primarily on the relationship between aggregate private output and a measure of the public fixed capital stock for the U.S. economy using two different approaches for the years 1947-2005. The study starts with a brief survey of the existing literature on the relationship between private output and public capital and continues with an analysis of data on some macroeconomic variables related to private output and public capital. It employs a production function approach to provide empirical estimates and analyze its econometric problems, and continues with a vector autoregression (VAR) model. It uses two criteria, the Akaike Information Criterion and the Schwartz Bayesian Criterion, to compare the performance of the two models tested. There are several differences between this study and the existing literature. The most important difference is that each of the other studies uses only a single approach to analyze the relationship between the public capital stock and private economic growth while this study uses two different methodologies to analyze the same relationship and tests the two models using the same aggregate macroeconomic annual data on the U.S. economy from 1947 to 2005. This study represents the first attempt to provide estimates of the elasticities of private output with respect to the private capital stock, private labor stock, public nonmilitary capital stock, and public core infrastructure capital stock by employing two different approaches so that the comparison of the elasticities resulting from the two different approaches can be most meaningful. Moreover, this study also represents the first attempt to provide estimates of the marginal products of the above four inputs. Second, the studies that employ a production function approach are ad hoc and so is the production function approach of this study, but the production function approach section of this study is the only one having an explicit capital evolution equation for both the private and the public capital stock. All of the other studies using annual data use aggregate macroeconomic data on related variables for less than thirty years while this study employs aggregate data from 1947 to 2005 (fifty nine years). Lastly, the other production function studies are incomplete in the sense that they either do not attempt to deal with some major econometric problems such as a common trend (resulting in a spurious correlation) and the direction of the causation or when they do acknowledge major econometric problems, they do not do anything to correct them. This study, on the other hand, will try to detect major econometric problems. Once the problem is detected, the study will employ measures to deal with the problem. Major findings of this study are as follows. First, the causation runs from the public fixed capital stock to private output rather than in the other direction. Second, most of the studies in the existing literature report a positive impact of the private fixed capital stock on private output that is too small to be credible, whereas they report a positive impact of the public fixed capital stock on private output that is too large to be credible. However, the estimates of this study suggest not only a positive impact of the public capital stock on private output that seems credible but also a positive and very large impact of the private capital stock on private output. Third, the results of several joint hypothesis tests conducted show that there is enough sample evidence to claim that not only that the private sector operates under constant returns to scale in all inputs, private and public, for the years 1947-2005 but also that the private fixed capital stock is more important to the aggregate private production process than either of the two measures of the public fixed capital stock.

Master of Agribusiness / Department of Agricultural Economics / Michael R. Langemeier / With increased focus on food safety and protection, the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has examined the possibility of removing the exemption for elevators pertaining to Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPs). The objective of this thesis was to determine the extent to which Kansas Elevators have adopted GMPs. To accomplish the objective of this thesis, information from an online survey completed by 42 elevators was summarized and analyzed. The information that was collected focused on the general classification of the elevators, grain safety programs, pest control programs and procedures, operational methods and personal practices, and maintenance of the facilities and equipment. Correlation coefficients were computed to determine if there were any significant correlations between elevator characteristics and GMPs. The study found that many of the elevators surveyed do not comply with the GMP requirements, and would require more resources in order to do so. Little connection was made between classification information such as size, location, or number of employees and GMP implementation. The significant correlations found were between HACCP and Pest Management, and HACCP and Traceability. The main limitation of this thesis was the small number of survey participants.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Yang M. Chang / Concerns over the possible loss of government revenue resulting from tariff reductions under trade liberalization have triggered many developing countries to opt for a strategy of raising destination-based consumption taxes on tradable goods. The first essay analyzes the welfare effects of a coordinated tariff reduction and domestic tax reform when the objective of a reforming country is to keep its government revenue unchanged. Assuming imperfect competition in an import-competing industry, we find that revenue-neutral reform involving tariff reduction and an increase in domestic tax rate may reduce domestic welfare under plausible assumptions. It also discusses the scenario in which the reforming country's objective is to keep domestic profit (or production) unchanged. We further identify the conditions under which a profit-neutral tariff and tax reform may be welfare-improving or welfare-deteriorating. The second essay uses a reciprocal-dumping model to examine the welfare effects of the Byrd Amendment (i.e., the Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act, or CDSOA). It analyzes the differences in optimal tariffs set by the home and foreign governments when the home (i.e., the U.S.) government redistributes anti-dumping duties to its domestic firm under the new trade law, as compared to the traditional antidumping policy under which these duties are government revenues. We derive conditions under which the CDSOA may raise or lower the price of an import-competing good in the U.S. market. The results show that the CDSOA is an instrument of protectionism and strictly improves the home country welfare when markets are less competitive than in Cournot equilibrium. We find that under the same market characteristics, the new trade law strictly reduces foreign country welfare. The CDSOA's welfare effect is shown to be ambiguous, however, when markets are more competitive than Cournot. The third essay modifies the model presented in Essay 2 to allow for the scenario in which the foreign country strategically responds to the home country's CDSOA law by adopting similar trade law. The results show that the foreign country is able to enhance its national welfare when the import-competing markets are less competitive than in the Cournot equilibrium. We also discuss whether it is welfare-improving for the U.S. to voluntarily repeal the Byrd Amendment and restore the traditional antidumping policy, considering that, otherwise, its trading partner may also adopt the CDSOA law. We find that it is still in the best interest to the U.S. not to revoke the Byrd Amendment when markets are less competitive than Cournot. When markets are more competitive than Cournot, however, repealing the Amendment may turn out to be socially welfare-improving.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Steven P. Cassou / Although geographic proximity is not enough to imply similar social, political and economic outcomes, the Portuguese and Spanish development experiences have been quite alike since the 15th century and in particular during the post-WWII period. Since 1950, both countries went through significant market transformations, ranging from democratization to market liberalization and adhesion to the European Union. However, even today, these economies, and in particular Portugal, do not rival those of the more developed European countries. This dissertation contributes to the growing body of literature on the Iberian economies by presenting three essays that employ modern macroeconomics tools to further our understanding about the growth and development experiences of these countries. The first essay provides a detailed growth accounting exercise and reconciles the results with the political and socioeconomic context of the 1950-2004 period. Since Total Factor Productivity is identified as the main engine of growth, the second essay explores a quantitative measure for the level of barriers that each country faced in the process of adopting new technologies. The numerical experiments suggest that Spain had consistently lower barriers than Portugal and that the gap has been increasing since the establishment of the European Single Market. The last essay investigates the role of fiscal policy and, specifically, if distortionary taxes on capital and labor income may have been a key factor behind the observed volatility for factor inputs. The simulation results derived from several potential scenarios support this conjuncture. Additionally, the last essay contributes by offering a time series for the levels of effective tax rates on labor and capital income in the Iberian economies over the 1975-2004 period.

Master of Arts / Department of Economics / Lance J. Bachmeier / This thesis examines the properties of two short-term interest rates: the federal funds rate and the rate of return on 90-day Treasury securities (T-Bills). Findings indicate strong evidence of cointegration among the two series. This result leads us to consider whether future movements in T-bill returns are predictable using the same methods used to predict the target federal funds rate. The “Taylor Rule,” introduced by Taylor (1993), assumes the Federal Reserve considers inflation and the output gap in their deliberation of how to adjust the federal funds target rate. We do an in-sample analysis followed by an out-of-sample forecasting comparison. Findings show that, in addition to inflation and the output gap, the unemployment rate and stock market contain valuable information for forecasting future T-bill rates.