In the last two decades, across a range of countries high growth rates have reduced poverty but have been accompanied by rising inequality. This paper is motivated by this stylized fact, and by the strong distributional concerns that persist among populations and policy makers alike, despite the...

China’s spectacular growth and poverty reduction has been accompanied by growing inequality which threatens the social compact and thus the political basis for economic growth and social development. The regional dimension of inequality— rural/urban, inland/coastal and provincial—dominates...

This paper is about aging and the ability to perform under pressure on the PGA tour. Performance increases with golfing skill, but may first increase and then decrease with age as experience interacts with changes in physical condition. Similarly, mental fortitude or the ability of a golfer to...

The spread of Asian Soybean Rust (ASR) represents a real threat to the U.S. soybean sector. We assess the potential impacts of ASR on domestic soybean production and commodity markets as well as the competitive position of the US in the soybean export market. We develop a mathematical stochastic...

We study the impact of analyst forecasts on prices to determine whether investors learn about analyst accuracy. Our test market is the crude oil futures market. Prices rise when analysts forecast a decrease (increase) in crude supplies. In the 15 minutes following supply realizations, prices...

Corn ethanol plants consume large amounts of corn and their location has the potential to alter local crop prices and surrounding agricultural land values. The relationship between ethanol plant location and agricultural land prices is examined using data obtained from the Agricultural Credit...

The production and profit impacts of recombinant Bovine Somatotropin (rbST) on select New York dairy farms were estimated using data over the years 1994 through 2004, by comparing matching farms which use and do not use rbST. The use of rbST increases milk production per cow and decreases the...

Despite the fact that 529 College Savings Plans have existed for over a decade, there has been limited scholarly attention on investment questions related to this savings vehicle. In some of the first academic literature on this topic, Alexander and Luna (Supplement 2005) identified a surprising...