The intention of this study is to analyze the economic impact of redeveloped Major League Baseball stadiums opened between 1991 and 2004. Using two empirical models, including an event study, this impact analysis captures the economic conditions of the cities during the opening year of the stadium, as well as the prior conditions leading up to the opening of the stadium, along with any lingering effects or gradual changes in conditions. The impact was measured in relation to the Metropolitan Statistical Areas corresponding to the 18 ballparks included, specifically looking at the impact on employment rates and per capita personal income. The common assumption is that stadium redevelopment will provide a positive impact on the surrounding community, initiating revitalization of urban neighborhoods as well as increasing job opportunities, income levels, and city revenues. While previous research on the effects of stadium development have mostly concluded that there is no positive or significant quantitative impact resulting from stadiums, this study shows that the boom of ballpark redevelopment may actually have positive effects, contrasting this prior research. With the results showing small, yet positive effects, the recent boom period may actually have been so far effective in initiating new development and revitalized culture in urban areas, and will therefore be useful in further developing future plans for modernizing and redeveloping baseball stadiums.

The endowment and the framing effect are widely examined cognitive biases. The experimental economics literature, using choice data gathered through an elicitation device, commonly finds evidence of these biases. Recent work by Cason & Plott (2014) shows that the interpretation of choice data as consistent with biases related non-standard preference theory could also be consistent with confusion or misconception of the game type used to elucidate preferences. I use the Cason and Plott card auction framework to analyze offers of buyers and sellers in an experimental setting with subjects from the University of New Orleans simulating 97 sellers and 90 buyers. The two games have symmetric payoffs in order to examine cognitive biases given subjects’ misconception of the game form. Subjects of both games display misconception of game form that explains both endowment and framing effects by rational confused choice; however, buyers display a much greater dispersion of offers than sellers. I estimate card implied valuation of sellers and buyers given game form misconception and find no statistical endowment effect, but I do find valuation is more uncertain in the buyer’s game. The theory of Rational Inattention predicts this lack of offer symmetry is due to the additional cognitive steps necessary in calculating buyer offers.

This thesis has been prepared as a partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of faster of Arts, prescribed by the College of the Pacific, Stockton, California. It is sincerely hoped that it will be found useful to all of those who are at all interested in the great industry of raisin making, which has played no small part in the building up of the great San Joaquin Valley and has been responsible for bringing the much needed irrigation system to the valley. Various types of data are here available, including personal opinions from the foremost leaders of the industry, from the results of numerous personal interviews, from technical information on acreages, prices, profits, and costs, from growers' opinions, from the California Raisin Association, the California Raisin Pool, and data from the Federal and State Departments of Agriculture. I have striven to picture the growth of the raisin industry as it actually occurred, in the building up of our state, from the most reliable sources. Efforts toward organization on the part of the grower, have been made significant and much space has bean allotted to the history of the raisin industry. It is readily evident that the producer, have had a difficult up-hill battle every step of the way, and that our present raisin organizations are the results of years of sacrifice and tireless effort, on the part of the few influential leaders. An introduction and definition of terns is placed in the first part of the thesis for the convenience of the reader. The state of California has been divided into four geographical sections, with a brief description of each. An Easterner coming to California for the first time end interested in the raisin business should have no trouble in seeing, with a small amount of reading, the relative importance of each section. What determines the California sales is discussed, a discussion which should be enlightening to the students of economics. The economic status of the raisin industry is another very significant chapter to the economist, because the results of years of research on the pert of the government and state officials ore here included. I have spent considerable tire in observing processes of growing, picking, drying and shipping of raisins; also in gathering information from, persons who were responsible for the propagation of the vines, and who were responsible for their distribution. Many growers, distributors, retailers and consumers were consulted, By account of these interviews are herein contained.

<p>The aim of this thesis is to study the role of banking in society and the effect of the</p> <p>interbank market on the performance of the banking system.</p> <p>It starts by reviewing</p> <p>several studies conducted on empirical banking networks and highlighting their salient</p> <p>features in the context of modern network theory. A simulated network resembling the</p> <p>characteristics documented in the empirical studies is then built and its resilience is</p> <p>analyzed with a particular emphasis in documenting the crucial role played by highly</p> <p>interconnected banks.</p> <p>It is our belief that the study of systemic risk and contagion in a banking system</p> <p>is an integral part to the study of the economic role of banks themselves. Thus the</p> <p>current work focuses on the fundamentals of banking and aims at identifying the</p> <p>necessary drivers for a dynamical setup of the interbank market.</p> <p>Through an agent–based model, we address the issues of bank formation, bank runs</p> <p>and the emergence of an interbank market. Starting with heterogeneous individuals,</p> <p>bank formation is viewed as an emergent phenomenon arising to meet the needs for</p> <p>investment opportunities in face of uncertain liquidity preferences. When banks work</p> <p>in isolation (no interbank market), in the long run and through a long experience with</p> <p>bank failures, banking turns into a monopoly or a market with few players.</p> <p>By equipping banks with their own learning tools and allowing an interbank market</p> <p>to develop, fewer bank failures and a less concentrated banking system are witnessed.</p> <p>In addition, through a scenario analysis, it is demonstrated that allowing banks to</p> <p>interact does not weaken the banking system in almost all the cases, and improves</p> <p>the performance on multiple occasions.</p> <p>The work is concluded by studying the effects of a banking system on individuals</p> <p>and the economy in what is called social measures. We establish that the effects</p> <p>of banking on social measures such as consumption level, consumption inequality</p> <p>between individuals, long term investment and economic waste, varies significantly</p> <p>based on the structure of the society.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>Missing pages 112 and 225</p> / <p>In federal states such as Canada and the u.s., non-federal governments control a sizable fraction of total government revenues and expenditures. Despite this, the literature on the macroeconomic effect of government deficits and debt deals virtually exclusively with unitary states. Similarly, the literature which examines issues pertaining to non-federal governments ignores the issue of the effect their choosing to deficit finance might have on macroeconomic stability. This thesis represents an effort to bring together these two strands of research. The results indicate that many conclusions of the existing literature on the macroeconomic effect of government deficits and debt are either completely overturned or significantly modified when one considers a federal rather than a unitary state. In particular, we find that the condition (s) which must be satisfied for macroeconomic stability are made significantly more stringent when non-federal governments choose to deficit finance disturbances to their budget positions. We also find that the success of federal debt management policies are greatly influenced by the decision of non-federal governments to deficit finance. In conclusion then, we find that two issues which have played a prominent role in recent policy debates --whether government deficit financing must eventually lead to large tax increases (or expenditure cuts), and the magnitude of deficit reductions necessary to maintain manageable levels of debt --are both highly sensitive to decisions made not only at the federal government level but also at the non-federal level.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The U.S. is the only OECD country that does not offer any form of federal paid parental leave. Only three states—California, New Jersey and Rhode Island—have state paid parental leave policies; implemented in 2004, 2009 and 2014, respectively. Through descriptive statistics and a regression analysis of women and men’s wages in those three states, before and after the implementation of the policies, we assess the effects of paid leave programs on the gender wage gaps in those states. Our results show us that California’s paid family leave policy had greater effects on decreasing the gender wage gap than the policies in New Jersey and Rhode Island. In addition, our regression analysis shows us that women of childbearing age (19-45 years) saw an increase in their wages after the policy implementations, while men of childbearing age saw a decrease in their wages. This led us to the conclusion that paid family leave policies may be effective in decreasing the gender wage gap; however it is problematic that men’s wages decreased, implying that the policies may not be totally welfare optimizing. However, we came to an important conclusion that will hopefully entice more states and the federal government to implement policies to better support working parents.

The U.S. is the only OECD country that does not offer any form of federal paid parental leave. Only three states—California, New Jersey and Rhode Island—have state-provided paid leave policies; implemented in 2004, 2009 and 2014, respectively. Through descriptive statistics and difference-in-difference-in-difference regression analyses of the wages of women and men of childbearing age (19-45 years) in those three states, we assess whether the paid leave programs have effected wages, and whether these effects vary depending on gender. Our results show that wages of women of childbearing age saw negligible net effects post-policy in policy states, although statistically insignificant. On the other hand, the wages of men of childbearing age saw improvements post-policy implementation in policy states, compared to wages in non-policy states. Although the policies do not necessarily widen the gender wage gap, they do not work to help close it, due to flaws in the policies. To be more effective in reducing gender wage gaps, these policies need to increase the amount of paid support, and implement job protection rights in order to decrease the opportunity costs of men taking leave. If more men are able to take paid leave, then potentially parts of the gender wage gap that are due to employers viewing women as less attached to the workforce can decrease. Through this research we came to important conclusions that highlight the ways in which support of working parents in the US is lacking, and offered recommendations to create more equitable and effective policies.

Amid increasing trends of market concentration and corporate political activity in the United States, this thesis takes a quantitative approach to evaluating Luigi Zingales’ political theory of the firm. Using data from the Economic Census and from the Center for Responsive Politics, I find that concentration as measured by four and eight largest firms’ share of establishments exhibits a significant positive relationship to corporate lobbying at the intensive margin. On the other hand, concentration as measured by four and eight largest firms’ share of employment exhibits a significant negative relationship on politically active firms’ decision to lobby at the extensive margin. Through drawing upon existing quantitative literature on this subject, I conclude that Zingales’ theory remains sound and its implications on the political economy of the United States are bleak. Further research should look into politically feasible policy solutions to this troubling relationship.

This thesis uses cross-country panel regressions to identify the effects of fossil-fuel subsidies for both oil importers and oil exporters on GDP growth, industry growth, crowding out of government expenditures in education, health, and infrastructure, government debt, carbon dioxide emissions, inequality and poverty. Fossil-fuel subsidies are found to be associated with lower levels of growth and industry growth, less government expenditure on health and education, poorer infrastructure quality, more government debt, and higher rates of carbon dioxide emissions. No relationship is found between fossil fuel subsidies and poverty and inequality. These results confirm the arguments of those that argue that fossil-fuel subsidies should be rationalized. However, removing subsidies is politically challenging. In order to identify strategies for fossil fuel reform, the successful reform efforts of Indonesia and Turkey are examined. These cases are then used to draw lessons for governments undertaking subsidy reform. The key strategies used were to exempt some regions, groups, or fuels from reform, use funds from subsidy removal for social safety nets and other poverty alleviation programs, time the reforms strategically, and communicate clearly to the public the reason for reform and how the funds will be used. These lessons are applied to countries in the developing Middle East and North Africa, including Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco.

This thesis uses cross-country panel regressions to identify the effects of fossil-fuel subsidies for both oil importers and oil exporters on GDP growth, industry growth, crowding out of government expenditures in education, health, and infrastructure, government debt, carbon dioxide emissions, inequality and poverty. Fossil-fuel subsidies are found to be associated with lower levels of growth and industry growth, less government expenditure on health and education, poorer infrastructure quality, more government debt, and higher rates of carbon dioxide emissions. No relationship is found between fossil fuel subsidies and poverty and inequality. These results confirm the arguments of those that argue that fossil-fuel subsidies should be rationalized. However, removing subsidies is politically challenging. In order to identify strategies for fossil fuel reform, the successful reform efforts of Indonesia and Turkey are examined. These cases are then used to draw lessons for governments undertaking subsidy reform. The key strategies used were to exempt some regions, groups, or fuels from reform, use funds from subsidy removal for social safety nets and other poverty alleviation programs, time the reforms strategically, and communicate clearly to the public the reason for reform and how the funds will be used. These lessons are applied to countries in the developing Middle East and North Africa, including Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco.