Existing literature on hospital pricing and price variation is split on whether price differentials in hospital billing are demand or supply led. To harmonize this literature, we use data from the Medicare Hospital Compare website to evaluate the interaction between demand and supply factors that influence hospital pricing structure. We use consumers’ net willingness-to-pay (net WTP) as the dependent variable to analyze how providers exploit factors that enable a provider to charge high prices to consumers. We find that high prices are reflective of the perceived quality but find no relationship with the actual quality of care. In line with previous literature, our analysis shows no evidence of cross- subsidization between inpatient DRGs. However, we find no interaction of factors that could adequately explain the full extent of observed variation in provider prices. We conclude that the question, “Should I buy here or keep driving?” is complex and cannot be answered by a simple analysis of which healthcare provider is cheaper.
This paper examines the demand for attendance at National Football League (NFL) games by taking a previously developed model that attempted to explain game-day attendance at NFL games using variables that may exhibit a relationship with game-day attendance and testing it within the context of the modern NFL. This model is then expanded to include additional explanatory variables and is once again tested using a pooled dataset that was collected by gathering game-by-game data from every NFL regular season game in the 2010, 2011, and 2012 NFL seasons. Attendance is quantified as a ratio of the actual attendance at a game compared to the maximum stated capacity of the host stadium. The expanded model explained more of the variance than the replicated model when applied to the modern NFL. In particular, the attendance at the previous home game, average ticket price, home team win percentage to date in the current season, whether or not the away team made the playoffs last year, and whether or not the game was held between members of the same conference were found to hold a significant relationship with NFL game attendance figures. From these findings, it is concluded that the NFL is suffering from correctable inefficiencies related to their scheduling practices and that moving a struggling franchise is not a viable solution for generating fan interest.
Various factors contribute to the level of debt financing used in leveraged buyouts. This paper examines the relationship between levels of buyout debt with two different categories of determinants. These determinants are broken into factors exogenous and endogenous to leveraged buyouts. Exogenous factors include credit market conditions along with industry and region of the acquired firm, while endogenous factors are firm specific, such as profitability, operating efficiency, and previous capital structure of target firms. Previous literature found that credit market conditions are the only significant indicator of debt in leveraged buyouts. This paper uses quantitative methods to show that firm specific metrics do in fact have significant relationships with buyout debt and can predict debt levels in leveraged buyouts.
The Olympic Games garner worldwide attention. This mega sporting event requires examination in terms of economic impact. The purpose of this study is to determine the effects of hosting the Olympic Games through GDP, employment, and tourism. To assess the economic impact, host nations will not only be analyzed in and of itself, but will also be compared to runner-up nations in the bidding process. Though runner-up nations tend to economically benefit more often than the host nation per Olympiad, host nations are found to benefit intrinsically.
This paper investigates the potential impact nearby unconventional gas wells may have on the value of single-family homes within Bradford County, Pennsylvania. A hedonic pricing model is utilized to determine if nearby unconventional shale wells impacted the prices of these properties from 2013 through 2014. Both OLS and single-log regression models were run using the number of active unconventional wells within five and ten kilometers as the exogenous variables of interest in addition to the characteristics of the properties. Prices of homes that had unconventional wells within ten kilometers did not seem to be affected, but when the distance was reduced to five kilometers, the value of properties declined by over four thousand dollars.
This study presents a test of the efficient market hypothesis, utilizing analysis of mutual fund performance following the turnover of top management for a random sample of 149 matched mutual funds between 2000 and 2014. Abnormal returns are calculated from the matched pairs for different timeframes in the post-departure period. Examination of the results will reveal if long term excess performance can be predicted using only historical returns and the existence of manager turnover for mutual funds. If true the findings will add to the literature rejecting the efficient market hypothesis.
Through the use of grounded theory methodology and the operationalization of a representative bureaucracy framework, this study investigates the perception of discretion within public administration in educational institutions. Public administrative actors use discretion to provide equitable learning opportunities, and without said discretion, underrepresented groups would have no extra support despite numerous disadvantages. In an attempt to give cause or further explanation as to the nature of this discretion, evidence from 20 interviews and 30 hours of observation of fifth grade classrooms in urbanized schools (n = 8) suggests a grounded theory of purposeful accountability to link an increased perception of discretion for teachers and principals. School officials can stay afloat in the age of accountability as long as their sense of belonging and ability to mobilize their organizations are maintained through proper access to centralized knowledge and expectations, the ability to fulfill needs unique to the organization, and the recognition of efforts and status through trust from centralized authority. With this theoretical foundation, public administrative actors can find greater progress and efficiency in assuring active representation through discretion.
Public college affordability has been decreasing alongside social mobility, while income inequality has been increasing. This thesis explores the interrelations between these three themes in a greater systems framework and attempts to clarify where the United States’ economy is heading. This thesis proposes a four step methodology for understanding these interrelations and creatively constructs a measure of affordability from the perspective of the average student across the variables tuition, financial aid, government appropriations, and median income. By examining these variables within this measure of affordability, this research is able to contextualize macro trajectories of many economic variables to better understand the present economic situation. The data for all of the variables comes from four sources: College Board, Grapevine Illinois, FRED, and the Census Bureau. This thesis concludes by stating that these themes are indeed part of a multidimensional system, but are not causal predictors of each other.
This analysis is focused on examining the viability of water reuse projects in the context of the Colorado Springs, CO water system. Using the Framework for Informed Planning Decisions Regarding Indirect Potable Reuse and Dual Pipe Systems developed by the Water Reuse Research foundation, the Southern Delivery System water project currently being constructed in Colorado Springs is compared to a hypothetical water reuse project developed using data gathered about the Prairie Waters project, a water reuse project in Aurora, CO. This framework uses a multi-criteria decision analysis model to evaluate the relative costs and benefits of each project based on criteria chosen by the user. The results of this comparison illuminate how water reuse can be used to ensure the future development of urban areas in water scarce regions.
The main focus of this study is to test how certain geopolitical events affected the trend in foreign direct investment into Jordan from 1993-2011. This study uses prior research on foreign direct investment and economic growth in developing countries to create a theoretical framework for the determinants of FDI into Jordan. A robust ordinary least squares regression was used to best explain the model. The study finds that the 6 events chosen did not statistically impact FDI into Jordan, and only the economic wellbeing of Jordan significantly affected foreign direct investment. The implications of these results affect the Jordanian government and foreign investors to make more conscious decisions about the economic benefits of investing. Further research is necessary to expand this theoretical model in Jordan and throughout the world.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) was created in 1933. Today, the FDIC’s presence and monitoring ensures that banks are and remain solvent. Although the FDIC does everything in its power to prevent a bank from failing, bank failure can still occur, even in times of relative economic stability. Using a Probit regression analysis, this study assesses the probability of bank failure by looking at 102 different banks, eight different financial variables, and six geographic region variables during the time periods of 1998–1999 and 2001–2002. The geographic location variable is used to investigate if failures occur more often in certain regions of the country or in more urban or rural areas. In the end, none of the financial variables were statistically significant, whereas the regional geographic variables were. This suggests that during a period of relative economic stability, regional economic conditions affect bank failures more so than financial variables.
This thesis explores the causes and effects of brain drain on Ethiopia’s development. A snowball sample was taken of participants who self-identified as members of the Ethiopia diaspora in the Denver-metropolitan area (n=8). Data was collected through individual interviews. The interviews were converted into typed transcriptions and synthesized using the grounded theory methodology. The theory proposed is one of struggle through the axial codes that were developed: migration, remittances, communal living, reasons for remaining, reasons for desire to leave, development efforts and transition. The axial codes are assessed in relation to the presented theory of struggle and exploring the effects on Ethiopia’s development. Through this data and analysis, the Ethiopian diaspora has greater access to further understanding their role in development and take actions that have a measurable impact.
This paper uses a novel dataset of trademark activity for U.S. apparel firms to examine the economic relevance of trademarks to firm market value. Trademarks are the legal representations of a firm’s brands and, as brand assets, have the ability to improve firms’ market position and influence consumer purchase behavior. However, our understanding of the role trademarks play in firms’ valuations in financial markets is limited. This study finds that firms’ trademark portfolios are value relevant to market participants, and carries important implications for corporate IP policies and practices.
With the growing concern about climate change, integrated impact assessment models (IAMs) have been developed to assess climate mitigation policies. Previous attempts to endogenize technology into regional climate policy models have assumed learning-by-doing or include a single energy sector. This study corrects for the previous limitations in a regional model of the United States and the rest of the world. A backstop technology and knowledge spillovers are added to the model to improve the model’s capacity to simulate a real policy. Each specification is then simulated under no policy (business as usual), an optimal policy, and restrictions of emissions back to 1995 levels. Since the United States has refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, it is particularly important to evaluate climate policies specific to the United States, like the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). This study also aims to evaluate the effectiveness the RGGI by modeling permit-funded R&D in the energy sector.
Modeling decision making behavior has challenged economist and psychologist alike. This study uses data from the game show Deal or No Deal from the Netherlands, Germany, United States to study the factors that influence decision making. Each decision on the show is the choice between a definite amount offered by a “banker” or the choice to continue playing in hopes of winning more money, much like a stock option holder’s decision to exercise their option. Using a model similar to one that was used to determine the psychological factors that affected stock option exercise activity, this study seeks to find what drives the decisions on the show. The findings are that the bank offers are not significant, however, the percent of the expected value of the bank offer is. This suggests that players are viewing their choice in a complex manner, expanding the influences outside of the offer and what is expected if they keep playing. The results of how contestants play in comparison to one another varied across countries in significance, indicating that cultural difference may play a role in decision making behavior.
Many studies have investigated which factors contribute to attendance in sports; however, many have not performed such analysis for the sport of football. This article, therefore, investigates the determinants of attendance in English football over eleven seasons, from 2002-2003 to 2012-2013 using a panel estimation method. Various seasonal statistics, economic factors, and demographic factors are used as determinants in the analysis. The results indicate that the league a team plays in, transfer expenditure, and team performance have a positive effect on attendance. On the other hand, we find that city population has a negative effect on attendance. These results provide suggestions for how club owner’s can implement policies in order to increase attendance, consequently increasing revenue and profits.
This thesis analyzes the determinants that influence Southeast Asian immigrant labor force participation. In this analysis variables regarding human capital, time allocation and assimilation are used in a probit model. These variables include educational attainment, family income, citizenship status, marital status, family structure characteristics, age, sex, and others. Findings suggest that sex, age, citizenship status and family structure (having more than one family in a household, being married and being linguistically isolated) have a greater impact on labor force participation than traits such as educational attainment or the ethnic enclave effect.
Prior studies that estimate the impact of amenity accessibility on residential property prices have largely treated housing as a homogenous commodity. Yet there is strong evidence that differentiation in metropolitan housing sub-markets matter (Goodman and Thibodeau, 1998; Hoesli and Peng, 2002). Using an hedonic pricing approach and controlling for spatial effects, this paper examines the preferences of house and apartment buyers regarding amenity accessibility in Brooklyn, NY, for the period 2008 to 2013. We find that the preferences for amenities between the two types of home-buyers are indeed different. More specifically, our findings show that the marginal implicit value, as evidenced through home sales prices, of accessibility to cultural amenities (e.g. proximity to monuments, beaches, parks and cafes) is greater for apartment than house buyers. On the other hand, the marginal implicit value of workplace amenity accessibility (e.g. proximity to central business district and subway stations) is greater for house than apartment buyers. The result illustrates the importance of differentiating housing sub-markets when estimating these impacts. Urban policy makers and real estate developers can also use the result to inform land use planning in metropolitan areas aimed at further increasing residential property values.
Over recent decades, corporate social responsibility has become a very common strategy that companies are using to differentiate themselves in competitive markets. This paper uses a unique survey of Colorado College faculty and students and investigates whether this is an effective strategy. The results show that corporate social responsibility has a slightly negative effect on consumer’s intentions to purchase goods from a given company. On the other hand, the results show that corporate social responsibility has a positive effect on consumer’s likelihood to recommend products to someone else in the future. Also, previous literature has demonstrated that demographics matter. Therefore, we estimate the difference in difference coefficient for gender, nationality , department associated with at Colorado College, product type, and being a student or a faculty member. Each of these characteristics are found to be significant on whether an individual is affected by corporate social responsibility. These results show that corporate social responsibility initiatives are not always successful. Companies need to be mindful of the types of consumer behavior that are influenced as well as the types of people that are more likely to be influenced by corporate social responsibility initiatives.
This paper synthesizes prevailing theories on optimal crime control, recidivism, and analyses of the determinants of drug use and offers suggestions to improve correctional efficiency through alternative means of drug prohibition punishments. It is likely that reduced crime rates, recidivism rates, inmate populations, and correctional costs without significant negative externalities could result from alterations in drug prohibition laws and enforcement policies. The decriminalization of all or most illicit drugs is suggested to be the most efficient means of controlling illicit drug use and should reduce the resources necessary for the maintenance of drug control policy.
African elephant populations have been plummeting over the past few decades due to increased poaching and demand for ivory. This thesis investigates the influence that poverty and tourism have on the level of African elephant poaching, as well as the influence that poverty and elephant poaching have on the level of tourism in Africa. Through the use of an ordinary least squares regression, poaching, tourism and socioeconomic data between the years 2002 and 2012 for 27 African countries are used to examine these relationships. Results have shown that poverty and elephant poaching have a positive relationship; poverty and tourism have a negative relationship; and elephant poaching and tourism have a negative relationship.
This paper investigates the determinants of carriers’ wireless spectrum holdings in counties across the United States. Through the use of a Heckman selection model, our equations exhibit results observable at the highest significance level. Size, carrier-owned towers and population counts/density were found to be primary determinants of spectrum ownership levels. Results yield significant implications for firms as spectrum position becomes increasingly crucial to success within the wireless industry.
In previous two-player experimental versions of the centipede game, the theoretically rational outcome has proven highly paradoxical. In this paper, I report on the findings of an experimental five player, high pay centipede game in a finite-repeated context over 60 rounds. The results show that additional players, and subsequently additional counterfactual conditions, do not necessarily lead to an increase in the Nash-equilibrium outcome. In the five player game, a large portion of the population were found to act as consistent cooperators, which had major effects on other subjects. Using a model of adaptive learning, previous game outcomes are shown to influence play over time. The significance of a lagged-historical based model at the first three decision nodes suggests a large amount of learning within the sessions. The combination of this adaptive play with cooperative types results in a significantly smaller move to Nash than found in an equivalent three player experimental treatment.
This thesis looks to investigate the effect of player talent distribution on competitive balance in the National Basketball Association (NBA). In the thesis, player talent distribution is measured using the standard deviation of win shares throughout the league and competitive balance is measured using dHHI. This thesis finds the expected result that a larger distribution of player talent amongst the league leads to better competitive balance. Additionally, this thesis concludes that the salary cap is insignificant in its effect on competitive balance in the NBA.
Today, approximately 10 million Filipinos, either temporary or permanent migrants, are sending about US$20 billion worth of remittances to their families in the Philippines. The current government seeks to provide better economic opportunities so Filipinos will not see working abroad as the only choice but instead as an option. This thesis project attempts to quantitatively evaluate the extent of both push and pull factors determining a Filipino’s decision to migrate, either for permanent or for temporary purposes. Since migration is a national policy issue, understanding these factors that push and pull people to leave would be central to retaining Filipinos who would otherwise seek employment and serve abroad. The Ordinary Least Squares regression models are utilized and separated into permanent and temporary Filipino migrants to better differentiate push and pull factors influencing decisions made by Filipinos when migrating. The final results suggests that push and pull factors have different effects on the decisions of Filipinos depending on their destination countries and whether they are a permanent or temporary migrant.
