Economics, 1927-2025

The dramatic increase in the cost of higher education since the 1980s has eroded public confidence in American colleges and universities. Although elite private institutions have been able to raise prices due to high consumer willingness to pay, particular features of the education market have made a high-tuition, high-aid model the norm among most colleges. As a result, the advertised “sticker price” has increasingly diverged from the “net price” students pay after receipt of grants and scholarships.

Net price has accordingly replaced tuition as the key independent variable in the economics literature examining the effects of the rising cost of higher education on multiple student outcomes. However, net price is often defined inconsistently. This paper offers a concise and repeatable definition of average net price - based on data provided by the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) at the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) - and uses this to study the effect of shock to net price on multiple outcomes.

Several studies have investigated the effect of changes to the net price of college on post-college outcomes (such as earnings and homeownership). Studies considering the effects of changing net price on currently enrolled students have focused on enrollment and persistence. I model the effect of large discrete positive shocks to net price on student satisfaction, goals, and employment using two-way fixed-effects event study models (with binary and continuous treatment). The evidence presented suggests that shocks to the net price of college increase contemporaneous self-reported student satisfaction, a finding that supports theories from behavioral economics stating that high prices are associated with high quality. Supplemental analyzes (including propensity score modeling and an examination of differential responses to net price shocks across income groups) reveal the complex matrix of student and college characteristics that moderate the effect of prices on outcomes. Based on this, I argue for increased granularity in future work on the effects of prices on student outcomes.

In recent decades, the climate crisis has become increasingly relevant in global policy. The environmental decisions made by governments, particularly those of high emitting countries like the United States, have played an important role in the formation of the global energy transition. These policy changes have a direct impact on financial markets, and it is essential that firms in each industry adapt to necessary environmental changes. This thesis aims to investigate the sector-based market responses to both regulatory and deregulatory environmental executive orders, through the lenses of President Trump’s 2017 E.O. 13783, “Promoting Energy Independence and Economic Growth” and President Biden’s 2021 E.O. 13990, “Protecting Public Health and the Environment and Restoring Science to Tackle the Climate Crisis”. The financial impacts of these executive orders will be studied through a differences-in-differences analysis in the sectors of Finance, Transportation, Industrials, Energy, Utilities, Mining and Renewables due to the importance of change and development in each sector for a successful energy transition. The analysis examines the presence of abnormal returns within a five-day event window surrounding the issuance of each E.O. and controls for firm-level fixed effects. The results show that the deregulatory E.O. 13783 positively impacts stock pricing in the Energy and Industrials sectors but produces negative abnormal returns in the Finance industry. They also reveal that the regulatory E.O. 13990 negatively impacts stock pricing in all sectors included in the study with the exception of Industrials. These results are a combination of the explicit areas that each E.O. targets and investor behaviour regarding policy uncertainty. The presence of abnormal returns provides investors and policymakers with important information to make economically informed bipartisan environmental policy decisions which are essential for a successful energy transition.

This thesis seeks to uncover the mechanisms and extent to which multinational corporations (MNCs) influence political outcomes via evidence from Switzerland. Prior literature has suggested that voter turnout is shaped by an individual’s cost-benefit analysis of political participation. This thesis uses publicly available ballot data on Swiss referendum elections to evaluate whether corporations can shape that analysis. Using a fixed effects regression model, clustering by ballot to account for intra-day similarities, I find that MNC support for a referendum strongly increases acceptance rates, and this effect is strengthened in regions where these corporations are headquartered. For voter turnout, I find that decision-makers are strongly motivated by emotional responses to vote. When there is strong opposition to a proposal, turnout increases. In addition, aggressive messaging for or against a proposal are associated with increasing turnout. To qualitatively explain my findings, I rely on interviews conducted with leaders of Swiss MNCs, which suggested that while uninformed voters may take cues from corporate recommendations on economic and international affairs, corporations give recommendations on social issues based on voter trends. These findings demonstrate the necessity for research into corporate political influence, especially within the context of democratic institutions.

Player compensation in professional sports is assumed to reflect on-field value, yet this relationship is less clear in leagues where individual performance is difficult to isolate or where institutional constraints shape wage structures. In Major League Soccer (MLS), compensation is determined within a system that centralizes contract ownership and imposes strict salary regulations. This thesis investigates the relationship between player salaries in the MLS and the value players contribute on the field. Specifically, it estimates each player’s Marginal Revenue Product (MRP) – a measure of the additional revenue a player generates for their team – to evaluate whether compensation aligns with individual performance. Using detailed data on individual on-field performance, the analysis constructs performance indexes inspired by Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to represent key dimensions of play. These indexes are used to trace the pathway from individual contributions to team performance, from team performance to competitive success, and from success to revenue. The estimated MRPs are then compared to actual salary figures to assess the alignment between contribution and compensation. The findings reveal a disconnect: while high-profile attackers are often paid in excess of their estimated MRP, a substantial majority of players – particularly those in midfield and defensive roles – are undercompensated. Approximately three quarters of players in the MLS earn at least 5% less than their MRP suggests, indicating that MLS salaries reflect more than just performance-based economic value. These results point to the influence of positional visibility, marketability, and structural wage-setting mechanisms on compensation in a League where performance is not the sole currency of value.

In this thesis, I examine how the performance of eliminated and otherwise struggling MLB teams responded to changing incentives as a result of the MLB’s draft format adjustment in 2023. The existing literature analyzes how NBA and NHL draft format alterations impacted outcomes for eliminated teams, but there has not been a study of the effects of the MLB’s draft format change. I regress a team’s win probability on various interaction terms that include a dummy variable for being eliminated by a certain date, a dummy for possessing a win percentage below 40% on a certain date, and a continuous variable that represents a team’s difficulty of qualifying for the playoffs. I find that, unlike in previous studies, MLB’s choice to move from an inverse order draft to a weighted lottery draft had no clear effect on the performance of eliminated teams as a group. However, possessing a win percentage below 40% had a negative effect on win probability in inverse order draft seasons and an ambiguous impact in weighted lottery draft seasons. Still, the true difference between those effects remains unclear.

This study examines the effect of anticipatory and unexpected discrete labor income shocks on household consumption. By implementing a panel event study, we can allow for the staggered timing of intervention (e.g., voluntary or involuntary job loss). This allows us to test for causal effects of income shocks on consumption alongside their dynamic, persisting, or transitory effects. Drawing on data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the longest U.S. longitudinal panel survey of American families' household dynamics, we can identify plausibly exogenous income shocks and heterogeneous household post-treatment effects to test the applicability of the Permanent Income Hypothesis (PIH). The dynamic regression results in statistically significant declines in household consumption following an unexpected shock to income, particularly in the case of a persistent decline in labor income. There are no effects on consumption when a voluntary job loss, such as when quitting occurs, which aligns with PIC but may be due to unobserved heterogeneous factors and negative income shock distribution skewness.

In 1992, the United States passed the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA) essentially banning states from legalizing sports betting. However, in 2018, the Supreme Court repealed PASPA, opening the door for states to legalize as they wished. Following the repeal of PASPA, 38 states and Washington D.C. have all legalized sports betting, bringing unprecedented change in the NFL. NFL revenue has increased by billions of dollars in the years following and are expected to continue to increase. With this increased revenue with the NFL, is it possible that the players are feeling the impact of any of this in their contracts? I hypothesize that the increase in revenue will serve as an exogenous shift in the aggregate demand in the labor market of the NFL, leaving the players with higher salaries as a result of sports betting legislation. This thesis uses a difference-in-difference model to estimate the impacts of sports betting legislation on both NFL rookie and non-rookie total contract values, and total real guaranteed money included in those contracts, finding that while there is no average effect, the top 90th percentile of players are earning less as a result of sports betting, while the bottom 10th percentile of NFL earners are earning more. This stands for rookies and non-rookies. Additionally, sports betting allowed the highest paid and lowest paid player in the league each year to earn more in their total contract value and total guaranteed money included in the contract as well.

Building upon a previous attempt, the study simulates a closure of the South China Sea to maritime trade and estimates welfare changes for economies around the world. Heightened tensions in the region have increased the risk of outright conflict between major powers to the highest level in decades, so the author interacts trade distance data with country-country trade data in both a CES model and multi-industry model to offer refined estimates of gains from trade in the region. The results estimate het- erogeneous and severe welfare declines for many countries, though to a more modest degree than those of previous estimates. A multi-industry approach accounting for heterogeneity in price and trade elasticity is shown to magnify implied gains from trade than does a CES model. Analysis suggests both models offer distinct geopolit- ical incentive structures that may lend explanatory value for nations’ grand strategic moves.

This paper establishes a novel causal relationship between housing markets and high-growth entrepreneurship characterized by a surprising reversal pattern beyond a critical homeownership threshold. Using metropolitan-level panel data from 2006-2016 and employing a Bartik-inspired instrumental variables approach, I demonstrate that a 1% increase in housing prices boosts high-growth entrepreneurship by 5.9% in high-income metro areas. This effect, however, depends on homeownership rates: it's strong in areas with average or below-average homeownership, weakens as homeownership increases, and becomes negative once homeownership exceeds 69.1%. This homeownership paradox challenges conventional wisdom in entrepreneurial finance, which typically assumes uniformly positive effects operating through collateral channels. Crucially, the homeownership paradox operates specifically through entrepreneurial quality rather than quantity, indicating housing wealth enables founders to pursue more ambitious, growth-oriented ventures. The results are robust across multiple specifications and remain consistent even when distinguishing between technology hubs and other high-income metropolitan areas. These findings significantly advance our understanding of the complex relationship between housing markets and entrepreneurial activity, with important implications for both housing and innovation policy.

Since its federal legalization in 2018, sports betting has become an increasingly important segment of American entertainment spending. While the effects of this change on the sportsbook industry and government revenues have been extensively studied, there has been limited exploration of its impact on the sports industry itself. This paper addresses this knowledge gap by looking at operating incomes, salary expenditures, and pre-salary operating incomes of teams in the four major American professional sports leagues. Specifically, I utilize franchise financial data from Forbes and Spotrac to perform a linear regression of franchise financials on sports betting handles and team characteristics. Additionally, I employ a staggered difference-in-differences regression to analyze the impact of state-by-state legalization on franchise financials. My findings indicate that federal sports betting legalization has increased the operating income of American professional sports franchises. However, I also observe a brief decrease in pre-salary operating income following in-state legalization, though franchise health returns to normal after the first few years. Furthermore, I find that the operating incomes and pre-salary operating incomes of the largest quartile of franchises in each league have been negatively affected by in-state sports betting legalization. This suggests that revenues from legalization may be distributed primarily through shared revenue channels, such as television deals and sportsbook partnerships. Overall, this study provides evidence that sports betting legalization is reshaping the competitive dynamics of franchise financials in the sports ecosystem. This development is of heightened importance given the increase in private investments in sports franchises as well as the emergence of new betting markets.

This paper investigates the “return gap” – the difference between reported fund returns and investors’ actual realized returns – in relation to sustainable exchange-traded funds (ETFs). The return gap reflects behavioral inefficiencies, often caused by investors’ reactions to market fluctuations, that cost investors billions of dollars annually. Using over 64,000 global ETF-year observations from 2006 to 2023, I analyze how sustainability, past performance, volatility, and key ESG (environmental, social, and governance) events shape investor outcomes through pooled panel OLS (ordinary least squares) regressions. Results show that sustainable ETFs are associated with significantly lower return gaps – and therefore better realized returns for investors – from 2017 to 2021, a time when ESG funds gained popularity, suggesting more stable and better-timed behavior among sustainable investors. On average, investors in sustainable ETFs actually outperform their funds’ reported returns. In contrast, ETFs not labeled as sustainable exhibit larger return gaps, reflecting more erratic, return-chasing investor behavior. However, the return gap for sustainable ETFs widens after 2021, coinciding with increased media scrutiny and weaker ESG performance. These findings suggest sustainable investment frameworks may help attenuate behavior-driven losses, though their effectiveness depends on market sentiment and media narratives. This paper aims to help clarify how sustainability influences investor behavior and realized returns, with implications for ESG policy, fund design, and long-term financial and social goals.

This paper intends to study the relationship between anchoring bias and financial markets, specifically global indices, comparing the S&P 500 and FTSE 100. Behavioural economics has the ability to influence financial markets but its effects can be difficult to quantify and measure. Hence, this study analyses the impact of heuristics, anchoring bias for this comparative study, and to what extent it can influence investor sentiment and impact index returns with a direct comparison of indices across time. This furthers on previous academic literature through a direct comparison of a heuristic across global indices in an attempt to explain cultural differences in relation to investor sentiment. Through quantifying anchoring bias through a rolling high and low window spanning 250 trading days across a 15 year period, we find statistically significant results, highlighting a substantial difference in anchoring bias between US and UK investors. Furthering the depth of this analysis, we conduct a sub-analysis of different market conditions and the cumulative abnormal returns of indices to investigate how the magnitude and significance of anchoring bias shifts in different economic conditions.

This thesis examines how rising urban housing costs and the rise of remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic reshaped migration patterns in the United States, with a focus on how these changes varied by income and industry. Using American Community Survey microdata, Zillow housing price data, and work-from-home exposure rates by industry, the study explores whether individuals in remote-eligible jobs were more likely to migrate in response to local housing cost increases. Contrary to expectations, the results show that housing prices are not highly correlated with migration for individuals working in more amenable to WFH industries, suggesting that financial constraints, job security, or early-pandemic moves may be more influential when determining migration decisions. Demographic variables like age and education are consistently stronger predictors of migration with younger and more educated individuals showing greater mobility. Furthermore, my findings suggest that while remote work offers greater flexibility for some, it does not overcome the underlying structural barriers that limit mobility for many. As a result, addressing the geographic and economic divides deepened by the pandemic will require policy efforts focused on housing affordability and general support for vulnerable populations.

This paper explores the effects of brand-stacking, a real estate development trend popularized in Miami, FL. Brand-stacking refers to the practice of real estate developers partnering with luxury consumer brands to create high-end residential properties marketed specifically towards international buyers. While proponents argue such developments may enhance property values and attract investors, this study investigates the broader economic and social consequences of this trend at the zip code level, particularly its role in exacerbating Miami’s housing affordability crisis. My data consists of Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI) values and Zillow Observed Rent Index (ZORI) values, allowing effects to be analyzed at monthly intervals. Using a difference-in-differences model and introducing intensity treatment alongside zip-code linear time trends and lagged effects, I find that the effects of branded development are largely heterogeneous, but statistically significant at the zip code level in some cases. Particularly when brand-name partnerships carry increased prestige, the spillover effects of anticipated development are far greater than existing findings on luxury new construction home price impacts. Contextualizing Miami’s housing affordability crisis within the broader framework of brand-stacking real estate development patterns, this study provides insights into the negative implications of this newfangled trend in the real estate industry. The findings contribute to existing literature on urban development policies, international real estate trends, and money laundering practices associated with foreign real estate investment.

Formula One has grown rapidly in recent years, and car manufacturers want to get back on the grid. Literature has centered on whether sponsors of Formula One teams display abnormal returns after specific race outcomes, though analyses on the teams themselves are rarely found. We fill this gap by investigating the relationships between Formula One race outcomes, standings, and stock market responses for the parent company of teams between 2018 and 2024. We employ a two-stage analysis, first estimating cumulative abnormal returns using the event-window of [-1, +1], then assessing their association with F1 performance under univariate tests and multivariate regressions. Our findings contradict the importance of individual wins or podiums, emphasizing the role of mechanical DNFs in influencing short-term returns, though the plausibility of this is dubious. For standings, we find statistically significant relationships dynamic by type and asymmetric by magnitude. It appears top standings positions increase in cumulative abnormal returns as the season progresses, suggesting the presence of a confirmation bias for competitive teams, despite poor individual results. We also find standings moves are only significant for positive changes, with moves to top spots rewarded more. Taken together, our results support a blend of psychological biases, sentiment-driven effects, and rational revisions of expectations as potential reasons for these share price fluctuations. Though individual successes may not drive short-term returns, cumulative performance likely does, emphasizing the further risks that come with entering Formula One.

The recent rollback of federal abortion protections in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization has resulted in a fragmented legal landscape, where abortion access is now shaped almost entirely by state policy. Emerging research on post-Dobbs abortion bans has begun to document their effects on migration, revealing net outflows from ban states. This thesis extends that line of inquiry by examining an earlier set of supply-side abortion restrictions—Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) laws—enacted before Dobbs and serving as a useful historical precedent. Using individual-level data from the American Community Survey from 2001 to 2018, I employ a staggered difference-in-differences event study design to estimate the causal effect of TRAP law implementation on women’s likelihood of relocating across state lines. Results indicate that TRAP laws significantly increase the probability of female out-migration, with effects persisting up to five years post-implementation. Additional analyses suggest that more severe TRAP laws may be associated with larger migration responses. I also reveal that women affected by these laws are more likely to move to Democratic-leaning states, suggesting that access to abortion plays a role in destination choice. Taken together, these findings indicate that supply-side abortion restrictions can generate shifts in population distribution, with potentially wide-ranging demographic and economic consequences.

This thesis poses the question of whether football matches taking place in an area increase instances counts of hate crime. Additionally, if such relationship exists, what best explains it. Moreover, does the Brexit referendum—an event that acted as an information shock within society— affect this dynamic in any way if at all. Using granular football match and hate crime data on the daily-borough level within London between 2011 and 2024, this study uses a fixed effects regression model with increasing levels of controls and fixed effects, to answer these questions. The main findings reveal a consistent and significant relationship between football games and hate crime. Furthermore, football matches in higher leagues and with more unexpected outcomes drive greater increases in hate crime. Finally, whereas Brexit itself has impacts on hate crime, it does not meaningfully impact the relationship between football and hate crime.

This study examines the transmission mechanisms of oil price shocks to GDP growth across four African economies with varying levels of oil dependency: Angola (95%), Nigeria (80%), Gabon (70%), and Ghana (30%). Using quarterly data and employing both Vector Autoregression with Exogenous Variables (VARX) and Structural Vector Autoregression (SVAR) methodologies, I analyze how oil export revenue shocks propagate through each economy. I find a non-linear relationship between oil dependency and macroeconomic vulnerability, with disproportionately greater vulnerability at extreme dependency levels. The transmission mechanisms differ qualitatively across the dependency spectrum, with highly dependent economies exhibiting more complex dynamics including potential negative feedback effects, while less dependent economies show more stable positive responses. Monetary transmission channels play a crucial role, as oil shocks in highly dependent economies generate substantial monetary expansion and inflationary pressures that often overwhelm conventional monetary frameworks. Institutional factors and economic structures significantly moderate the dependency-vulnerability relationship, helping explain why countries with similar dependency levels may experience substantially different outcomes. The findings suggest graduated policy approaches to managing oil dependency, with implications for diversification strategies, monetary policy frameworks, and fiscal management tailored to specific dependency levels.