Social connections represent an important determinant of economic agents’ behaviour. The three chapters of this thesis empirically analyse the effect of different types of networks on several economic outcomes. The first chapter analyses the role played by co-worker networks on immigrants’ employment outcomes. It investigates how immigrants’ job search outcomes are affected by the labour market outcomes of co-workers from the same country of origin. Using matched employer-employee micro data from Italy and an instrumental variables approach, I show that an increase in the employment prospects of socially connected workers improves immigrants’ job search outcomes. The paper also sheds light on the different mechanisms generating the social effect and it highlights the role of migrant networks in explaining immigrant segregation. Chapter 2 employs a unique dataset on articles, authors and editors of the top four economics journals over the period 2000-2006 to investigate the role of social ties in the publication process. Connections between editors and authors are identified based on their academic histories. Regression results show that the existence of a social tie with an editor positively affects publication outcomes of connected scholars. The analysis of citations shows that connected articles receive on average a higher number of citations than non-connected ones. The final chapter focuses on the impact of female managers on female workers’ employment outcomes. Exploiting changes in the share of female managers induced by firms’ takeovers, I find no statistically significant effect of an increase in the presence of female managers on employment outcomes of female workers. However there is an interesting negative effect on wage inequality within the acquiring firm, which may matter for both equity and efficiency reasons.

Casual empiricism suggests that the arrival of a major technology company into an area has the ability to transform the local economy. I examine the economic impact on residential real estate rental prices by the opening of offices by four of the top technology companies—Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft. Rents are about 2.8% lower in metropolitan areas with top technology company presence compared to metropolitan areas without top technology company presence. Taking this economic outcome into account may influence the public and policymakers’ willingness to give tax breaks and other incentives to attract major technology companies.

This paper assesses how women of different racial backgrounds and their contraceptive method choices impact their economic well-being. While there is extensive literature on the impact of contraceptive use and women’s economic outcomes, there is less concerning women’s contraceptive method choice and their economic outcomes. However, birth control is only as effective at supporting women’s economic advancement as it is effective at preventing unintended pregnancy. Given a legacy of reproductive and economic disempowerment, Women of Color in the United States have unevenly reaped the economic benefits of contraception. Therefore, it is important to look at how race and contraceptive method choice may factor into women’s economic health. In this paper, I define women’s economic well-being in terms of human capital, through the lens of educational attainment, and income. Further, I stratify contraceptive methods into three categories: high, medium, and low, based on the method’s effectiveness rate and user maintenance requirements. Using a Simple Linear Regression Model, I find that medium forms of birth control have the greatest impact on educational attainment and earnings for both White women and Women of Color.

Within the sample of Muslim-majority countries, the links between how explicitly "Islamic" a society is, the status of women, and economic and other societal outcomes is explored. A country is considered more or less "Islamic" depending upon if Islam is the official state religion, if Islamic law forms a basis for the legal system, and the degree to which the country has rejected or maintained traditional Islamic norms such as regarding the acceptance of polygamy and the legal obligation of women to wear the veil in public. It is found that if a country is more "Islamic," it tends to also have worse outcomes along different dimensions, such as degree of authoritarianism and absence of women's rights. However, focusing exclusively on whether the country has Islamic law as a basis of the legal system, these countries tend to be richer. An extremity index is composed, which contains only variables which describe the status of women in Muslim countries, along educational and legal dimensions. It is found in regressions that this extremity index is a statistically significant predictor of economic growth, where higher extremity leads to lower GDP growth rates. Oil is still an extremely important factor in explaining the variation in GDP levels and growth rates in the Muslim world.

This thesis consists of four empirical essays on the topics of ethnic segregation, gender economics, and self-employment.    Essay I investigates how the residential mobility of Sweden's native population contributes to ethnic segregation, by applying regression discontinuity methods. The results show that the growth in the native population in a neighbourhood discontinuously drops as the share of non-European immigrants exceeds the tipping point. Tipping is driven by the departure of natives and their avoidance of tipped neighbourhoods. Tipping behaviour is selective in the sense that highly educated and high earning natives are more likely to leave neighbourhoods that have tipped.    Essay II studies the relationship between the childhood neighbourhood's ethnic composition and economic outcomes in adulthood for second-generation immigrant sand natives. The results reveal that a high concentration of immigrants in aneighbourhood is associated with a lower probability of second-generation immigrants continuing to higher education. Natives' earnings and educational attainment are negatively correlated with, and the probability of social assistance and unemployment are positively associated with a high immigrant concentration. Among non-Nordic second-generation immigrants, reliance on social assistance and unemployment are negatively correlated with the share of co-ethnics and positively associated with the proportion of other ethnic groups.    Essay III explores the role of social norms and attitudes about gender for labour market outcomes of immigrant men and women in Sweden. The results show that immigrants originating from countries with large gender disparities in labour force participation also have large gender gaps in labour force participation within their immigrant group on the Swedish labour market. In contrast, source country gender differences in earnings are not correlated with gender gaps in earnings within immigrant groups in Sweden. In addition, gender gaps in labour force participation among immigrants assimilate towards the corresponding gap among natives as time inSweden increases.    Essay IV empirically tests the Jack-of-all-trades theory, which states that individuals who are more balanced in their abilities are more suitable for self-employment. Using Swedish Military Enlistment data, a measure of balance in endowed abilities is constructed and this balance measure is, in relation to previous research, less likely tobe endogenous. The results support the Jack-of-all-trades theory, in the sense that propensity for being or becoming self-employed is greater for individuals with abalanced set of abilities. In addition, earnings from self-employment tend to be higher among individuals with a balanced set of skills.

nÃo hà / Foi analisada tÃcnica-economicamente uma produÃÃo de juvenis de tilÃpia, Orechromis niloticus, em pequena escala no estado do CearÃ. A anÃlise tÃcnica restringiu-se à produÃÃo e manejo da piscicultura, comparada ao seu projeto inicial e a situaÃÃo atual. A anÃlise econÃmica dividiu-se em trÃs partes: medidas de resultados econÃmicos, anÃlise financeira e anÃlise de sensibilidade. Para as medidas de resultados econÃmicos foram considerados os seguintes parÃmetros: receita lÃquida, ponto de nivelamento, Ãndices de rentabilidade e lucratividade, capacidade de pagamento, taxa de remuneraÃÃo e tempo de reposiÃÃo do capital investido, taxa de lucro e relaÃÃo benefÃcio-custo. Na avaliaÃÃo financeira utilizou-se os parÃmetros da taxa interna de retorno (TIR), valor presente lÃquido (VLP) e a relaÃÃo benefÃcio custo atualizado. As anÃlises de sensibilidade consideraram variaÃÃes nas taxas de juros de mercado, nas receitas e custos com raÃÃo e alevinos. Os resultados obtidos foram todos positivos, demonstrando a viabilidade da produÃÃo de juvenis de tilÃpia do Nilo pela Piscicultura Santa Tereza, nos dias atuais e ao longo dos prÃximos anos / A technical and economic analysis tilapia, Orechromis niloticus, juvenile production on a small scale in the state of Ceara. The technical analysis was restricted to the production and handling, compared to its initial design and actual situation. The economic analysis was divided into three parts: measures of economic outcomes, financial analysis and sensitivity analysis. To measure the economic outcomes were considered the following parameters: net income, the point of flatness, profitability ratios and profitability, ability to pay, the rate of return and spare time on invested capital, profit rate and cost-benefit ratio. In the financial evaluation, we used the parameters of the internal rate of return (IRR), net present value (NPV) and benefit cost updated. The sensitivity analysis considered variations in market interest rates, revenues and costs for feed and fingerlings. The results were all positive, demonstrating the feasibility of production of juvenile Nile tilapia fish farming by Santa Tereza, today and over the next years

No description available.

This thesis identifies the effect of traditional political coalitions on the left-right spectrum in Swedish municipal politics on economic outcomes such as Municipal Revenues, Expenditures, Net-expenditures, Municipal Tax-rates, Unemployment, and the share of Municipal Employment. To do so, varying time spans of Swedish municipal data from 1994-2017 are used in a regression discontinuity design, basing its identification on quasi-random variation created by close municipal elections. The results indicate that the left-leaning Red-Green coalition has no isolated impact on economic variables when considering the entire sample, but seems to have a significant impact on some economic variables compared to others when the sample is restricted to decrease the number of mixed coalitions in the sample. These results indicate that the increase in mixed governing coalitions in recent years could have watered down the clear left-right dimension in Swedish politics found in previous research.

Three essays in this dissertation explore the behavior of individuals in response to the housing crisis and its consequences, and the impact of the pandemic on the short-term rental markets. The first essay examines the economic outcomes of young people who have returned to their parents' home, using data from 2003-2017 waves of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 Cohort (NLSY 97). The economic outcomes of boomerang movers did not improve compared to the period of independent living, and the income gap with young people who remained independent widened. The residential movement of young people who make boomerang moves has an impact on their income, but this effect is short-lived. Going back to a parental house changes the region and urban form significantly, and movement of urban form from the central city to the suburban and from the suburban to out of the MSA has a negative impact on income. Findings from the study suggest implications. First, more affordable housing should be provided to reduce boomerang moves. Second, ways to increase job opportunities should be explored to reduce the short-term negative impact of boomerang move. Finally, education and vocational training opportunities must be increased to close the income gap among young people. The second essay seeks to answer the following questions through the experiences of individual households due to the foreclosure. First, did foreclosed households regain homeownership? Second, is there a relationship between socio-demographic characteristics of foreclosed household and regaining homeownership? Third, where do homeowners who have lost their homes migrate? Finally, what characteristics of the neighborhood help foreclosed households recover? While previous studies have focused on the resilience of housing markets and regions, this study explores the link between regional characteristics and individual household recovery. The recovery of financially disadvantaged households is an important issue for communities and states. Identifying the mechanism that is responsible for household recovery has implications for implementing programs to aid household recovery. This study primarily relies on the 2005 -2019 Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID). Since 2009, PSID has added survey questions about foreclosure; Whether a foreclosure process has begun, the year and month of the start, the result of the process, and whether a foreclosed home is a primary residence. The findings of this study suggest that the government's recovery assistance program should aim to support relocation to areas with lower poverty rates and higher job and educational opportunities. The final essay explores changes in short-term rentals resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. To identify the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, this study uses New York City's Airbnb listing data from Inside Airbnb (IA), as well as supplemental data such as American Community Survey (ACS) data. Change in the number of STRs is divided into (1) the number of units left the platform and (2) the number of new units. The former relates to the survival of existing STR units and, the latter to the location choice of new units. The results show that the impact of several variables on survival and generation mechanisms changed since the COVID-19 pandemic. Since the survival mechanism and the generation mechanism of short-term rentals are different, they should be considered separately in regulating the STR to stabilize local housing markets. / Doctor of Philosophy / Although research has been conducted on the housing crisis and recovery of the housing market, there are still unanswered questions from two aspects. First, have the individuals affected by the crisis recovered? Were the individual decisions in response to the crisis effective? Second, how has the new crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the housing market? Are different characteristics observed from previous housing crises? While the evidence is reported that the relationship between the new crisis and housing demand has changed, the impact of the pandemic on contemporary housing crises such as gentrification and reduced housing stock is unknown. This dissertation explores the trajectories of individual behavior in the housing market, using various data sources and methodologies. Of the three essays in this dissertation, the first two essays explore the behavior of individuals in response to the housing crisis and its consequences, and the final essay explores the impact of the pandemic on the short-term rental markets. The first essay investigates the economic outcomes of young people who return to their parental homes after periods of independent living using NLSY97 data. The second essay investigates the relationship between neighborhoods and the economic recovery of households using Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The third essay explores changes in the survival and generation mechanism of Airbnb units associated with the COVID-19 pandemic using New York City's Airbnb listing data. The results of each study commonly lead to the conclusion that housing affordability should be improved. It also suggests that more affordable housing should be provided in areas of greater opportunities. This dissertation ultimately contributes to identifying individuals at risk from external shocks and suggesting goals and strategies for a healthy housing market.

A quantitative study was conducted to determine the socio-economic outcomes for the beneficiaries of the Expanded Child Survival Initiative in Uganda. The population comprised of all orphans and vulnerable children who were trained under the Expanded Child Survival Initiative of which a sample of 102 respondents were included in the structured data collection process. The outcomes that were explored were employment, income, assets and family support to siblings and other dependants by the primary beneficiaries. The findings show that the outcomes of the Expanded Child Survival Initiative were positive and benefited socio economic lives of the respondents and their family members. The majority of the respondents were using the skills obtained from the training and were employed. The employment provided a source of income and the income earned facilitates the respondents in providing the basic needs of the family members. They were able to provide adequately for most of their basic needs. The findings also show that the respondents had accumulated some assets. A number of factors influenced the utilisation of the newly acquired skills including having tool kits, start-up capital and business management skills. It is recommended that training providers should provide start-up support to the apprentices in order to facilitate them to utilise the skills obtained from apprenticeship trainings. / Public Health / Thesis (M.A. (Public Health))