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In January of 1964, Lyndon B. Johnson introduced programs to provide education, health, jobs and economic opportunities to those who economically disadvantaged. Job Corps is one of the many programs established under his “War on Poverty.” In this paper, I will be looking at the relevant areas of research studying the impacts of Job Corps on participants and society. I will also evaluate the effects of the existing economic situations within the county on the earnings and job placement of the participants.

This thesis explores how the market size of Major League Baseball Teams affects their player valuations. By examining player eligibility for arbitration and free agency, and players' Wins-Above-Replacement, I determine the factors that teams value for making player valuations based on their market size. I also examine the impact of television revenue and revenue sharing on player valuations. Ultimately, I determine how smaller market teams are able to remain competitive using alternative methods of player valuations against larger market teams.

Alaska’s state government has long relied on oil revenue as its primary source of funding. In recent years, however, a combination of decreasing oil production and low oil prices has drastically reduced how much revenue Alaska can obtain from taxing oil. As a result, Alaska currently faces severe budget deficits. In order to close this funding gap, there have been numerous proposals for new ways to generate revenue. This thesis analyzes the main proposals, with particular attention given to the role the permanent fund and the permanent fund dividend plays in Alaska’s current funding structure and its future. This thesis concludes by advocating that in the long-term it will be necessary to alter the way the permanent fund functions in order for Alaska to have a sustainable future.

Pre-marital cohabitation has become a mainstream practice among couples in the United States, yet initial empirical evidence demonstrated significant correlations between cohabitation and subsequent marital instability. Later studies disputed a causal relation and have attempted to show a weakened connection over time, but have themselves suffered from the use of exclusively older and/or unreliable data. This paper uses figures from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (1997-08) and the National Survey of Family Growth (2006-08) to provide an updated analysis of cohabitation’s effect on marriage over the past decade. Using proportional hazard and competing risk models, this paper confirms a now minimal impact of cohabitation on marriage stability, with possible exceptions for serial cohabitation and cohabitation begun prior to engagement. Moreover, this study finds that cohabitation overwhelmingly remains a step toward, rather than serious substitute for, marriage.

In the U.S. firms spend millions of dollars each year on climate lobbying. Climate lobbying is often seen as “dirty” firms lobbying against environmental regulations; however, my study reveals a subset of major climate lobbying contributors actually have positive environmental performance records. This paper analyzes the relationship between firm-level environmental performance indicators and climate lobbying expenditures. To explore this relationship, I combine a firm level climate lobbying expenditures dataset from the Center for Responsive Politics, financial measures from Compustat and CRSP, and environmental performance indicators from MSCI. My results indicate more climate lobbying among firms that derive substantial revenues from products and services with environmental benefits and those with proactive carbon emission reduction policies/technologies

Using panel data from 31 small, liberal arts colleges from three academic years 2014-2017, I explore how the incidence of sexual assault is related to institutional characteristics. I use the number of sexual assaults per 100 students (sexual assault ratio) as my dependent variable and the following as my independent variables: total number of undergraduate students, female to male ratio, majority racial percentage, percent accepted, percent of students awarded financial aid, cost of attendance, religious affiliation, whether Greek life is available and racial percentages. I include racial percentages as additional independent variables in two of my regressions to analyze the relationship between these percentages and the majority racial percentage. Using a linear fixed effects model, it is concluded that increasing the total number of students, majority racial percentage, and cost of attendance decreases the sexual assault ratio of a college campus at a statistically significant level. Furthermore, using an OLS linear regression model to analyze cross-sectional college variation, I find that an increase in the total number of undergraduate students, female to male ratio, and percentage of students on financial aid is correlated with a decrease in the sexual assault ratio while an increase in the cost of attendance and percentage of White students is correlated with an increase the sexual assault ratio. If the impacts can be interpreted as causal, then the results of this study can help academic institutions understand how campus climate can affect the safety of their students and also assist college administrations with improving sexual assault prevention programs.

The retail feed industry has grown continually in importance during the past 60 years. Increased population has placed ever greater demands upon food production to feed our nation's people. During 1968, the average American consumed 80 pounds of beef, 63 pounds of pork, 8 pounds of veal, 4 pounds of lamb, 26 pounds of chicken, and 11 pounds of lard. This amounted to an annual per capita consumption of 188 pounds of red meat. With 173 million people to feed, vast quantities of livestock must be produced, finished, and marketed to satisfy our nation's needs.

For 98 years after the first "Mormon" pioneers entered the Salt Lake Valley there was no statewide control of the sale and distribution of fluid milk. Prior to any statewide control, however, laws were passed in Salt Lake City and Ogden outlawing sale of raw milk to final consumers in those cities as of January l, 1945.

Utah is a popular tourism destination, evidenced by the 10.7 million visitors who spent $7.5 billion in 2013 (BEBR, 2015). The tourism industry is an important component of Utah’s economy, but who are Utah tourists? A key research purpose of this study is to provide the demographic and psychographic information necessary to improve tourism industry practices through targeted marking and development. Data were collected from Utah tourists in 2013-2014 through an in-person survey in various tourist locations throughout Utah. The characteristics, behaviors, and interests of Utah tourists, especially in regards to food and agricultural tourism, were examined in the context of consumer profiles. Exploratory factor and cluster analysis were used to group tourists according to demographic variables and participation in food and agriculture related activities when at home and while traveling. Seven factors underlying respondents’ perceptions of food and agriculture related practices when at home and while traveling were identified. Four consumer segments were then constructed using cluster analysis. Examining the characteristics of tourists who make repeated return trips to Utah was another research purpose of this study. An ordered logit regression model was used to explore the relationship between return tourism and demographics, travel motivation, destination image, and travel experiences. Results suggested a positive correlation between propensity to return and certain travel motivations, such as traveling for business or to visit culture and heritage related sites, destination image, and travel experiences. Traveler age and traveling with children were negatively correlated with propensity to return. Results suggested that marketers, tourism industry providers, businesses, and local governments may improve their operations through a better understanding of the characteristics and behaviors of specific consumer segments. The consumer segments explored in this study provide the information necessary for the development of targeted marketing campaigns directed towards specific tourist types. The information provided and examined in this study may also be used to develop attractions, activities, and products that encourage Utah tourists to spend their trip budget in ways that are most favorable to local businesses and producers. The importance of quality food and agriculture related offerings in the Utah tourism experience were also highlighted.