Duke Journal of Economics

The Duke Journal of Economics is published each year to showcase outstanding research in economics by Duke undergraduates. Additional pieces will appear after their authors revise them.

We congratulate the authors of the research presented in this issue.

Charles Becker & Ed Tower, Faculty Advisors to the Journal

Honor’s Theses

Foreclosure Effects on Neighborhood Property Values in Durham County by Andrew Abraham

The Relationship Between Trading Volume and Jump Processes in Financial Markets by Pongpitch Amatyakul

Agricultural Suicides in India: The Role of Rainfall and Relation to Economic Theory by Rashmi Bhat

Forecasting Global Commodity Prices Using South-American Exchange Rates by Gabriela Borges

Improving the Business of Risky Business: An Ex-post Evaluation of VaR’s Statistical Input Assumptions by Michael Dechert and John Martin

The Downfall of Durham’s Historic Hayti: Propagated or Preempted by Urban Renewal by Frederick E. Ehrsam

Equity-Infused Microfinance: A Collaborative Success by Julia Garces

Heterogeneity in the Adverse Incentive Effect of Unemployment Insurance by  Caroline Hanson

Valuation of NFL Franchises by Sam Hill

The Effects of Common Obesity Indicators on the BMI of Durham’s Youth: A Case Study of Kestrel Heights Charter School by Ifran Husain

Performance Variation in the NBA: Guaranteed Contracts and the Contract Year Phenomenon by Neal Jean

Effects of Medicaid Coverage of Preventative and Diagnostic Care on Potentially Avoidable Hospitalizations by Zachary Kazzaz

A Study of Risk Aversion: Comparing Contestant Behavior on Deal or No Deal by Ren Yu Ku

Cracking Down on Cartels: An Examination of United States Department of Justice Antitrust Division Behavior in its Criminal Sentencing of Convicted Corporate Executives of Private International Cartels by Kristen E. Manderscheid

Applied Mechanism Design: Solving for the Optimal Collusive Mechanism for First-Price Auctions by John Min

Is Defense Decisive? An Examination of the National Football League Salary Structure and Game Outcomes by Eric Ness

Resolving the Problem of Poverty: A Comparison Between the Ideas of Milton Friedman and Alfred Marshall by Paul Pan

The Effect of IT Hack Announcements on the Market Value of Publicly Traded Corporations by Nishant Patel

Decision-Making and Optimal Foraging: Norepinephrine and the Exploration-Exploitation Tradeoff by Matthew Pease

Solar Photovoltaic Installation in California: Understanding the Likelihood of Adoption Given Incentives, Electricity Pricing and Consumer Characteristics by Emily Rothfield

The Influence of Malpractice Insurance Premiums on Physician Location Decisions by Kurtis Shuler

The Distortionary Effects of Market Microstructure Noise on Volatility Forecasts by Derek Song

Portfolio Patents and the Survival of Public Software Firms by Alexander Trahey

Sex, Crime and Real Estate: How Sex Offenders Affect Property Values in Durham, N.C. by Eugene Wang

Tort Reforms and Defensive Practices in Obstetrics by Rebecca Wu

An Analysis of the Effects of Public School Quality on the Housing Prices in Durham, North Carolina by John Wulsin

Energy Efficiency Through Demand-Side Management: An Examination into the Residential Sector by James Zahniser-Word

The eighth annual Undergraduate Research Symposium was held in April 2010 in the Social Sciences building. Congratulations and thanks to all the authors, who wrote outstanding papers and gave polished presentations.

Charles Becker & Ed Tower, Faculty Advisors to the Journal

Articles

The Dynamics of Health Care Demand During an Illness Episode by David Benson

Collusion with Three Bidders at First-Price Auctions by Andrew Born

Do Teenagers Exhibit Rational Expectations About Mortality, Fertility and Education Outcomes by Nikolay Braykov

Entering the Campus Courtship Culture: Factors that Influence College Students’ Relationship Types by Scott Casale

Measuring the Likelihood of Small Business Loan Default: Community Development Institutions and the Use of Credit-Scoring to Minimize Default Risk by Andrea Coravos

Female Surname Choice: Historical, Cultural, and Branding Influences at Duke University by Corinne Grzybowski and Andrea Coravos

Oil Prices and Monetary Policy: Counterfactual Monetary Policy Responses to Oil Price Shocks by YingTe Tony Huang

Forecasting Existing Home Sales Using Google Search Queries by Brian Humphrey

Currency Crisis Early Warning Systems: Robust Adjustments to the Signal-Based Approach by Andrew Kindman

Spurious Jump Detection and Intraday Changes in Volatility by Matthew Rognlie

Rebalancing, Conditional Value-at-Risk, and t-Copula in Asset Allocation by Irvin Wang and Perry Zheng

The Duke Journal of Economics is published each year to showcase outstanding research in economics by Duke undergraduates.  Additional pieces will appear after their authors revise them.

We congratulate the authors of the research presented in this issue.

Charles Becker & Ed Tower, Faculty Advisors to the Journal

Honor’s Theses

Sexually Risky Behavior, its Social Determinants, and the Economic Consequence of HIV/AIDS in Zimbabwe by David Bochetto

Oil, Population Growth, and the Resource Curse by Tim Gu

Cell Phones and Cattle: The Impact of Mobile Telephony on Agricultural Productivity in Developing Nations by Daniel Houghton

Is Public Expenditure on Primary Education Effective? Evidence from Districts Across India by Tara Iyer

Do Medical Malpractice Reforms Affect Health Care Costs and Outcomes? by Matt Johnson

A Bargaining Theory of the “Edwards’ Effect” on the 2007-8 Democratic Presidential Primary by Alex S. Li

A Model of Speculative Attacks and Devaluations in Korea and Indonesia by Austin Yi Lin

Bundling Donations to Charity with Product Purchases: A Business Incentives Model by Kassity Liu

Rational Lifetime Investment Strategies: Gender Differences in the Allocation of Assets in Retirement Savings Plans by Chase Lancaster & Anubhav Raj

Leveraging the American Dream: Explaining the Shift Towards Mortgage Debt since the 1970’s by James Robert Melnick and James Colin Montupet

Contagion in Risk Markets by Matthew Moore and James Schulhof

Valuing Localized Externalities: Hog Operations in North Carolina by Sara Murray

Seasonal Volatility of Corn Futures Prices by Caleb Seeley

Does the Quality of Public Transit Affect Commuters’ Response to Gasoline Price Changes? by Allison Smith

Does the NBA Encourage Early Entry? by Griffin T. Tormey

The Thought That Counts: Towards a Rational Theory of Gift-Giving by Lydia Yao

Building Quality in Wikipedia: A Theoretical Approach by Guangyuan Zhu

Articles

Intractable Immigration: Why Americans Cannot Reach Consensus by Jonathan E. Amgott

Engaging with Malthus: Joseph J. Spengler and Economic Demography by Thomas F. Aten

Clarifying the “Win”: An Economic Review of the CARS Bill by Daniel DeVougas

A Comparative Assessment of New Urbanist Neighborhoods: Durham, NC & Greenville, SC by Phillip Gao

The Campaign Against NAFTA: An Irrational Attack on Free Trade by Jackie Lopez

The seventh annual Undergraduate Research Symposium was held in April 2009 in the Social Sciences building. Congratulations and thanks to all the authors, who wrote outstanding papers and gave polished presentations.

Charles Becker & Ed Tower, Faculty Advisors to the Journal

Articles

Assessing Consumer Valuation of Fuel Economy in Auto Markets by Nicholas Bunn and Daniel Fifer

Soft-Targets and Incentive Compensation in Non-Profit Organizations by Helin Gai

Testing the Relationship Between Oil Equities and Oil Futures with High-Frequency Data: A Look at Returns, Jumps and Volatility by Brian Jansen

Do Medical Malpractice Reforms Affect Health Care Costs and Outcomes? by Matt Johnson

Caught Red-Handed: Corporate Labor Practices and the Investigatory Media, a New Look at Corporate Social Responsibility by Jessica Lohrman

Contagion in Risk Markets by Matthew Moore and James Schulhof

Does the Quality of Public Transit Affect Commuters’ Response to Gasoline Prices? by Allison Smith

Does the NBA Encourage Early Entry? by Griffin Tormey

A Theory of Optimal Sick Pay by Andrew Tutt

The Impact of Sector and Market Variance on Individual Equity Variance by Haoming Wang

The Risk-Loving Decisions of Low-Income Households by Sarah Whitley

The Thought That Counts: Towards a Rational Theory of Gift-Giving by Lydia Yao

The Duke Journal of Economics is published each year to showcase outstanding research in economics by Duke undergraduates. This volume contains both honors theses and essays. The articles are examples of research written by Duke Undergraduates and Masters students at various stages of their economics education at Duke. Honors theses which were presented at the 2008 undergraduate research symposium and are to be published in the special edition of the Duke Journal of Economics devoted to that symposium are not included here. Additional pieces will appear after their authors revise them.

The Allen Starling Johnson, Jr, prize for the best honors thesis was earned by Andrey Fradkin for his thesis: “A Comparative Study of the International Content of Implied Volatiling.” The prize for the best presentation at the 6th Annual Economics Undergraduate Economics Symposium was earned by Aleksandr Andreev for his honors thesis: “Assessing Disability Rates in the Russian Federation.” He has been awarded a Fulbright to Russia to continue work on the project.

Ten undergraduates and M.A. students wrote book reviews in the spring of 2008, which have been scheduled for publication in scholarly journals. We are delighted that their critical skills are being appreciated by the profession.

These are:

• Megha Bisarya, Escape From Empire: The Developing World’s Journey Through Heaven and Hell, by Alice Amsden, MIT Press, 2007, Asian Journal of Social Science, forthcoming in early 2009.
• Mark Curtis, What Do We Know About Globalization? by Guillermo de le Dehesa, Blackwell, 2007, Journal of Economic Issues, forthcoming in December 2008.
• Johannes Fritz, Europe’s Troubled Region: Economic Development, Institutional Reform and Social Welfare in the Western Balkans, by William Bartlett, Routledge, 2008, Journal of East European and Black Sea Studies (published by the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy and Routledge in Great Britain), forthcoming in September 2008.
• Ikee Gardner, Capital Rules: The Construction of Global Finance, by Rawi Abdelal, Harvard University Press, 2007. Journal of Economic Issues, forthcoming in September 2008 or March 2009.
• Chamindra Goonewardene, The Future of Microfinance and Poverty Alleviation, by Tazul Islam, Ashgate, 2007, Journal of South Asian Development (published in Australia), forthcoming in August 2008.
• Caitlin McLaughlin, Creating a World Without Poverty: Social Business and the Future of Capitalism, by Muhammad Yunus, Perseus Publishing, 2008, Linked on the author’s web site: http://www.muhammadyunus.org
• Brian Mokoro, After War: The Political Economy of Exporting Democracy, by Chrisopher Coyne, Stanford University Press, 2007, New Perspectives on Political Economy (published in the Czech Republic, Volume 4, Issue 1), http://pcpe.libinst.cz/nppe/
• Nur M. Adhi Purwanto, Colonial Legacies: Economic and Social Development in East and South East Asia, by Anne E. Booth, Hawaii University Press, 2007, ASEAN Economic Bulletin (published in Singapore), forthcoming in August/December 2008.
• Parul Sharma, India – The Emerging Giant, by Arvind Panagariya, Oxford University Press, 2008, South Asia Economic Journal (published by The Institute of Policy Studies, Colombo and Research and Information Systems for Developing Countries, New Delhi), forthcoming in Volume 9, No. 2., July 2008.
• Gracia Sierra, The Elephant and the Dragon: the Rise of India and China and what it Means to All of Us,  by Robyn Meredith, W. W. Norton and Company, July 2007, ASEAN Economic Bulletin (published in Singapore), forthcoming in September or December 2008.

We congratulate the students mentioned above and the authors of the research presented in this issue.

Thanks go to Chris Genwright, who put the journal online.

Charles Becker & Ed Tower, Faculty Advisors to the Journal

Honor’s Theses

Tracking Decisions in North Carolina’s Public High Schools by Michael B. Harris

Predicting Financial Debt Crises: A Case Study of India by Matthew Sperber

How Information from a Strategic Alliance Network Relates to Future Acquisition Performance in the Biotechnology and Pharmaceutical Industries by Stephen McGregor Raymond

Analyzing and Applying Existing and New Jump Detection Methods for Intraday Stock Data by W. Warren Davis

The Role of Conflict Diamond Sanctions in Civil War Resolution by Karin Sun

Socioeconomic Factors and the Outcomes of Thailand’s Prevention of Mother-To-Child Transmission program (PMTCT) by Wichsinee Wibulpolprasert

Articles

The impact of cigarette excise taxes on beer consumption by Jeremy Cluchey & Frank DiSilvestro

Greed and the Bloomsbury Group How the Concept of Greed Impacted John Maynard Keynes and His Friends by Adam Finkelstein

Predicting Urban Crime In Diverse Settings by Johannes Fritz

Does the State Business Tax Climate Index Provide Useful Information for Policy Makers to Affect Economic Conditions in their States? by Geoffrey King and Jake Palley

The Economic Implications of Child Labor: A Comprehensive Approach to Labor Policy by Jamie Gordon

The “Balancing Trade Act of 2007” by Brian Grube

Empirical Analysis of Rural Development along Interstate Highways by Andrew Kindman

Evaluating the Elderly Retired in a Tiebout Context by Harry Lee

Racial Disparities in Durham County Public Elementary Education: A Picture That Is More than Black and White by Kristen Manderscheid

Do Mandatory and Recommended Arrest Laws Decrease Female Homicide Rates? by Kari Points and Celeste Richie

U.S. Bilateral Free Trade Agreements with Chile and Singapore by Grant M. Reeves

Residential Water Demand in Durham, NC, at the Onset of the 2007 Drought 
by Wichsinee Wibulpolprasert