Let’s Talk About Race (or Anything)
by Julia Ruolan Ma Abstract Oral history interviews contain rich information about how individuals understand their experiences, but their length and complexity have limited their use in empirical research. I develop episodic interview analysis, a framework that segments each interview into thematic episodes at natural transition points, constructing six composite indices capturing both what narrators […]
Intergenerational Economic Transfers and Wealth Inequality in the United States
by Parinay Gupta Abstract Using longitudinal data from Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) from 2007-2021, this paper investigates the role of economic transfers (inheritances and gifts) in asset accumulation processes of US households, in both short-term and long-term. Analysis is done through dimensions of race, wealth quartile, and age. Examining quartiles reveals significant wealth […]
The Case for Clemency: Differential Impacts of Pretrial Detention on Case and Crime Outcomes
by George Rateb Abstract About half-million of individuals in US jails are detained pretrial while legally presumed innocent. Using data on quasi-randomly assigned bail judges in the third-largest court system in the U.S., we study the impact of pretrial detention on defendants’ court and crime outcomes between 2008 and 2012. We supplement our primary analysis […]
Subprime’s Long shadow: Understanding subprime lending’s role in the St. Louis vacancy crisis
by Glen David Morgenstern Abstract Using loan-level data, this analysis attempts to connect the events of the subprime home loan boom to the current vacancy crisis in St. Louis, Missouri. Borrowers in Black areas in the north of St. Louis City and St. Louis County received subprime home loans at higher rates during the subprime […]
Analysis of Brain Diagnoses and the Incidence of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE)
by Arjun Lakhanpal Abstract Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) has become a significant area of scientific inquiry in relation to various sports with contact exposure, specifically boxing and professional football, resulting from many individuals who participated in these sports being diagnosed with CTE neuropathology after death. This paper contributes to the CTE literature by analyzing the […]
An Unequal Dream: The Mortgage Rate Premium Paid by Black Communities
By Michael Nicholson This paper analyzes loan pricing discrimination against predominantly black communities in U.S. mortgage markets. Building on previous literature, this paper posits that ceteris paribus predominantly black communities continue to face economically significant discrimination in mortgage pricing. Ultimately, this paper concludes that predominantly black communities face 10-14 basis points of pricing discrimination […]
Female Labor Force Participation in Turkic Countries: A Study of Azerbaijan and Turkey
By Natasha Jo Torrens Encouraging female labor force participation (FLFP) should be a goal of any country attempting to increase their productive capacity. Understanding the determinants and motivations of labor force participation requires isolating the factors that influence a woman’s decision to enter or leave formal employment. In this thesis, I utilize data from the […]
Asylum Determination within the European Union (EU): Whether Capacity and Social Constraints Impact the Likelihood of Refugee Status Determination
By Louden Paul Richason This paper analyzes whether capacity and social constraints impact acceptance rates for asylum seekers in the European Union from 2000-2016. Theoretically people should receive asylum based on the criteria outlined in international law – a well founded fear of persecution – but the influx and distribution of applicants in the European […]
Immigrant Workers in a Changing Labor Environment: A study on how technology is reshaping immigrant earnings
By Grace Peterson This research determines how automation affects immigrant wages in the US and how closely this impact follows the skills-biased technical change (SBTC) hypothesis. The present study addresses this question using American Community Survey (ACS) data from 2012 to 2016 and a job automation probability index to explain technological change. This research leverages […]
Endogeneity in the Decision to Migrate: Changes in the Self-Selection of Puerto Rican Migrants before, during, and after the Great Recession
By Aasha Reddy Migrants self-select on characteristics such as income. We use the U.S. Census’ ACS and PRCS to study changes in selection patterns of Puerto Rican migrants to the to the U.S. mainland (50 states) before, during, and after the Great Recession (2005 to 2016). We construct counterfactual income densities to compare incomes of […]
