Do Tournaments with Superstars Encourage or Discourage Competition?

To test and replicate the superstar effect reported by Brown (2011) we empirically study contests where a single entrant has an endogenously higher probability of winning. Unlike the previous literature, we test for the presence of the superstar effect in several different contexts. Ultimately, we collect and explore data from four sources: men's and women's professional golf, and men's and women's professional alpine skiing. Our baseline study of men's professional golf serves as a replication of Brown's (2011) study. Empirically, we find little robust evidence of the superstar effect in any of our datasets. In our replication exercise, we approximate the findings of Brown (2011), however, we cannot reject the null that the presence of a superstar has no impact on high ranked competitors. In our other settings, we cannot reject the null that superstars have no influence on the performances of highly ranked competitors

Analysis of County Level E-Government Implementations

This study examines the stages of development for county-level e-government implementations in the United States for 344 randomly selected websites. Population size, poverty levels and income levels were examined. Results indicate that most counties have some form of e-government but counties with smaller populations are more likely to have only an online presence with no citizen interaction

Lessons from the Tennessee Valley Authority

This dissertation is a program evaluation of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) the largest publicly owned utility in the United States. The first essay in this dissertation examines the TVA's use of eminent domain in order to acquire property for the construction of reservoirs. It develops a new model of asymmetric information and then tests the model predictions using property level data from TVA property purchases in the 1930's.The second essay of this dissertation examines the unintended consequences of reservoir development my examining changes in the malaria rate associated with TVA reservoirs. Using panel data methods, I find that the presence of a TVA reservoir leads to large increases in the malaria mortality and morbidity rate, which cost up to 30 percent of TVA federal appropriations. The final essay in this dissertation examines the impact of TVA electrification programs on economic growth. It combines archival and panel data methods to show that contrary to the historical account, TVA electric rates did not differ substantially from the rates charged by private utilities, and secondly, shows that counties that had electricity contracts with the TVA did not have differential economic growth rates for a variety of economic outcomes. In order to control for selection into contracts, I adopt an instrumental variables strategy based on the cost of electric service

Replication Data for: "National Policy for Regional Development"

Review of Economics and Statistics: Forthcomin

Economic Geography and the Efficiency of Environmental Regulation

We develop a spatial equilibrium model to evaluate the efficiency and distributional impacts of the leading air quality regulation in the United States: the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS). We link our economic model to an integrated assessment model for air pollutants which allows us to capture endogenous changes in emissions, amenities, labor, and production. Our results show that the NAAQS generate over $23 billion of annual welfare gains. This is roughly 80 percent of welfare gains of the second-best NAAQS design, but only 25 percent of the first-best emission pricing policy. The NAAQS benefits are concentrated in a small set of cities, impose substantial costs on manufacturing workers, improve amenities in counties in compliance with the NAAQS, and reduce emissions in compliance counties through general equilibrium channels. These findings highlight the importance of accounting for geographic reallocation and equilibrium responses when quantifying the effects of environmental regulation