Matching Items (20)
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- All Subjects: Economics
- Creators: Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business
- Status: Published
Description
South Mountain is the largest municipal park in the nation. It is a bundled amenity, providing a series of linked services to the surrounding communities. A dataset of 19,209 homes in 155 neighborhoods within three miles of the park was utilized in order to complete a hedonic estimation for two nearby urban villages, Ahwatukee Foothills and South Mountain Village. Measures of access include proximity to the park, trailhead access, and adjacency to the park. Two regressions were estimated, the first including lot characteristics and subdivision fixed effects and the second using the coefficients for each subdivision as the dependent variable. These estimates describe how the location of a house in a subdivision contributes to its conditional mean price. As a result they offer a direct basis for capturing amenities measured at the neighborhood scale on home values. Park proximity, trailhead access and adjacency were found to significantly influence the price of homes at the 5% confidence level in Ahwatukee, but not in South Mountain Village. The results of this study can be applied to issues of environmental justice and park access in determining which areas and attributes of the park are associated with a high premium. Though South Mountain was preserved some time ago, development and future preservation in the City of Phoenix can be informed by such studies.
ContributorsRamakrishna, Saritha Kambhampati (Author) / Abbott, Joshua (Thesis director) / Smith, V. Kerry (Committee member) / Schoon, Michael (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / Department of English (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
Is nuclear power sustainable when compared to other energy sources? A truly sustainable energy source provides an environmental benefit, minimizes costs to consumers both socially and economically, and continues to do so in both the short and the long term. Taking the zero-carbon nature of nuclear generation as its net environmental benefit, this paper the evaluates the economic and social costs of nuclear power to determine if nuclear power's reputation as "unsustainable" is warranted. The sustainability of nuclear power is evaluated in two main categories. The first part focuses on the economics of nuclear power. There are many preconceived notions regarding nuclear power and its associated industry. This section addresses those notions to determine their validity given recent data. The prevalent types of nuclear plants across the U.S., the economics of the stages of nuclear energy production, and its competitiveness relative to other energy sources are addressed, culminating in an evaluation of its modern economic attractiveness as well as its future economic viability. A sustainability assessment would not be complete without addressing the social costs of an energy source, as a sustainable source must be both economically and socially viable. If it can be established that nuclear power can provide energy at lower rates and at a lower cost in terms of externalities, then it would be considered truly sustainable. To investigate those externalities, the second part of the analysis focuses on the human costs associated with the various stages of nuclear energy production. Those costs are then compared to those of alternatives sources of power, and selected case studies are examined to illustrate the ultimate risks associated with nuclear power operations. By quantifying these aspects and comparing the results to alternatives in the field, a better understanding of nuclear energy technology and its potential is achieved. The reader can then ascertain whether nuclear power's reputation as being "unsustainable" is, or is not, a reputation it deserves.
ContributorsRudolph, Alexander James (Author) / Miller, Clark (Thesis director) / Richter, Jennifer (Committee member) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
There are three known materials that readily undergo fission, allowing their use as a base for nuclear fuel: uranium-235, a naturally-occurring but uncommon isotope; plutonium, created from irradiated natural uranium; and uranium-233, produced from thorium. Of the three, uranium-235 and plutonium feature heavily in the modern nuclear industry, while uranium-233 and the thorium fuel cycle have failed to have significant presence in the field. Historically, nuclear energy development in the United States, and thorium development in particular, has been tied to the predominant societal outlook on the field, and thorium was only pursued seriously as an option during a period when nuclear energy was heavily favored, and resources seemed scarce. Recently, thorium-based energy has been experiencing a revival in interest in response to pollution concerns regarding fossil fuels. While public opinion is still wary of uranium, thorium-based designs could reduce reliance on fossil fuels while avoiding traditional drawbacks of nuclear energy. The thorium fuel cycle is more protected against proliferation, but is also much more expensive than the uranium-plutonium cycle in a typical reactor setup. Liquid-fueled molten salt reactor designs, however, bypass the prohibitive expense of U-233 refabrication by avoiding the stage entirely, keeping the chain reaction running with nothing but thorium input required. MSRs can use any fissile material as fuel, and are relatively safe to operate, due to passive features inherent to the design.
ContributorsGalbiati, Joseph Nicco (Author) / Martin, Thomas (Thesis director) / Foy, Joseph (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
Yearly changes in the consumer price index are used to adjust social security benefits in order to keep the purchasing power of social security beneficiaries the same. Currently, social security benefits are adjusted using a fixed-weighted price index that reflects the purchasing patterns of workers. However, some believe that a price index that captures the spending habits of the elderly should adjust monthly social security benefits, while others argue that a chain-weighted price index is a more accurate indexation technique. This report finds that if an elderly or chain-weighted price index were implemented this year, there would not be a significant change in the projected insolvency of the social security trust fund, but there could be a substantial decrease in the social security trust fund's yearly cash-flow deficit. Therefore, changing the indexation of social security benefits should not be seen as a short-term solvency fix. Instead, adjusting monthly social security benefits should be about keeping the purchasing power of beneficiaries relatively the same.
ContributorsScobas, Peter Jonathan (Author) / Hobijn, Bart (Thesis director) / Smith, Kerry (Committee member) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-05
Description
A global trend towards cashlessness following the increase in technological advances in financial transactions lends way to a discussion of its various impacts on society. As part of this discussion, it is important to consider how this trend influences crime rates. The purpose of this project is to specifically investigate the relationship between a cashless society and the robbery rate. Using data collected from the World Bank’s Global Financial Inclusions Index and the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime, we implemented a multilinear regression to observe this relationship across countries (n = 29). We aimed to do this by regressing the robbery rate on cashlessness and controlling for other related variables, such as gross domestic product and corruption. We found that as a country becomes more cashless, the robbery rate decreases (β = -677.8379, p = 0.071), thus providing an incentive for countries to join this global trend. We also conducted tests for heteroscedasticity and multicollinearity. Overall, our results indicate that a reduction in the amount of cash circulating within a country negatively impacts robbery rates.
ContributorsChoksi, Aashini S (Co-author) / Elliott, Keeley (Co-author) / Goegan, Brian (Thesis director) / McDaniel, Cara (Committee member) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Department of Economics (Contributor) / Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2019-05
Description
Existing research into the health benefits of insurance fall into two major categories \u2014 observational and experimental. Observational studies have centered on data sets from before 2000 and focus on the mortality differences between the privately insured and the uninsured. Experimental studies began with Massachusetts' 2006 health reform and continued after the passage of the Affordable Care Act. These studies measure the effects of public insurance among the coverage expansion populations. These two bodies of literature come to ambiguous and contradictory conclusions to the mortality effects and health value of insurance. This study extends the observational methodologies to the publicly insured in samples from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey in both the 1988-1994 survey and the 2001-2002 survey. Using the Cox Proportional Hazard model, this study estimates the hazard ratios faced by the privately and publicly insured compared to the uninsured. This study finds the publicly insured face hazards 1.5 times those of the uninsured (p<.001), while the privately insured do not face hazards significantly different from those of the uninsured. Literature suggests that some unobserved characteristic of the publicly insured are influencing their mortality. Interacting with participants health reveals that these differences across groups shrink as health declines. Experimental literature suggests that public insurance lowers the uninsured risk from "healthcare amenable" conditions. Treatment of these conditions may explain the hazard reductions among the uninsured in non-excellent health. The high risk of the publicly insured in excellent health defies explanation.
ContributorsMorita, Aidan James Donnelly (Author) / Veramendi, Gregory (Thesis director) / Zafar, Basit (Committee member) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
This thesis looks at the theory and empirical evidence that surrounds the debate between environmentalists and economists regarding the link between trade liberalization and environmental degradation. The main points of the theory are the scale, composition, and technique effects which, when aggregated, are ambiguous as the harm or benefit of trade's effect on the environment. The empirical evidence studied ranges in time periods from the early 1990s to 2011 and mainly focuses on the existence or absence of an environmental Kuznets curve for certain pollutant. However, the data still proves to be inconclusive. The debate about the possible link between trade and the environment is as important as ever, especially in regards to carbon dioxide emissions. Going forward, it is extremely important that international cooperation regarding emissions targets and abatement goals increases. Trade will prove to be an invaluable tool in this endeavor as it provides a mechanism for the spread of green technology as well as can be used as a method of environmental policy enforcement.
ContributorsCotterell, Emily Claire (Author) / Mendez, Jose (Thesis director) / McDaniel, Cara (Committee member) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / Department of Economics (Contributor) / Department of Supply Chain Management (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
This thesis details the impact of sustainable practices, or lack thereof, among IKEA and Chanel. It takes these principles and analyzes the effectiveness of them and works to implement them across industries and companies of different sizes and organizational structures.
ContributorsL'Heureux, Kendall James (Author) / Foote, Nicola (Thesis director) / Alcantara, Christiane (Committee member) / Department of Marketing (Contributor) / Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2021-05
Description
One of the most pressing questions in economics is “why are some countries richer than others?” One methodology designed to help answer the question is known as “Development Accounting,” a framework that organizes the determinants of income into two categories: differences in inputs and differences in efficiency. The objective of our work is to study to what extent differences in the levels of pollution can help explain income differences across countries. To do this, we adjusted a factor-only model to allow us to enter PM2.5, a measure of pollution that tracks the concentration of fine particulate matter in the air and looked to see if the model’s predictive power improved. We ultimately find that we can improve the model’s success in predicting GDP by .5 - 6%. Thus, pollution is unlikely to be a major force in understanding cross-country income differences, but it can be used with other economic factors to potentially magnify its impact with other additions in the future.
ContributorsShelton, Jacinda Bridget (Co-author) / Perdue, Liam (Co-author) / Datta, Manjira (Thesis director) / Vereshchagina, Galina (Committee member) / Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Department of Economics (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2021-05
Description
This research explores the use of transformative urban scenarios and timelines as a planning tool for addressing future sustainability challenges in urban environments. The analysis comes from a set of scenarios that were explored through workshops conducted in 2019 in which Phoenix stakeholders developed timelines toward their visions of Phoenix 60 years into the future. To evaluate the pathways created in these timelines, we employed process tracing methodology to understand which causal mechanisms lead to certain phenomena. Or in other words, it helps us understand how changes happen. We converted the timelines into process tracing diagrams that categorized the relationship between actions, actors, and observable manifestations (OM’s) of change over time. To understand the relationship between these components, we then used a combination of inductive and deductive coding to categorize types of activities, actors, OM’s and sustainability topics and organized them into themes. This helped us to understand how city decision-makers and community leaders think sustainability and resilience transformation can and should occur. This thesis takes a closer look at one particular scenario, Some Like it Hot, which explores resilience to extreme heat. Through coding and analysis, we found trends, correlations, and missing pieces in the participants’ timeline. There are numerous overarching causal mechanisms throughout the scenario timeline. These trends offer insight into which activities and stakeholders are seen as significant drivers of sustainable transformation according to the workshop participants. The file attached is a pdf version of an ArcGIS Story Map completed for this honors thesis. To view the full, interactive thesis deliverable, visit https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/14d1e52a9448498e87f20e7566651a13
ContributorsHarris, Madison (Author) / Caughman, Liliana (Thesis director) / Grimm, Nancy (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning (Contributor) / Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor)
Created2023-05