The Use of Social Capital in Borrower Decision-Making

By looking beyond the financial characteristics of borrowers, this research brings to light the social factors that influence a borrower's choice of a lender and mortgage product. Previous research has indicated that distinct channels exist that funnel borrowers into lower or higher cost loan products (Apgar, Bendimerad, and Essene 2007). But little is known as to how borrowers seek out or are directed to such channels. A particular concern that this paper hopes to address is why black borrowers disproportionately have higher priced products.Some research indicates that even when credit worthiness is controlled for, blacks are overrepresented in the subprime sector and in higher-cost products (Bocian, Ernst, and Li 2006). Through in-depth interviews with 32 borrowers, this research (1) highlights how borrowers seek mortgage credit and evaluate their mortgage options, and (2) demonstrates how borrowers make use of their social networks (friends and family) when making their decisions.The preliminary findings indicate that borrowers' preferences and subsequent demands for mortgage products were shaped by the informal and formal advice they received. Those borrowers who consulted the most diverse sources of information had loans with lower interest rates. Those borrowers who received advice only from family and friends did not fare as well as those who received help from credit counselors. Thus, arguably, their loan outcomes varied not just based on if they consulted others, but especially whom they consulted. When given the right advice, potential homebuyers make better decisions in choosing both a lender and a loan

Geometrical universality in vibrational dynamics

A good generalization of the Euclidean dimension to disordered systems and non crystalline structures is commonly required to be related to large scale geometry and it is expected to be independent of local geometrical modifications. The spectral dimension, defined according to the low frequency density of vibrational states, appears to be the best candidate as far as dynamical and thermodynamical properties are concerned. In this letter we give the rigorous analytical proof of its independence of finite scale geometry. We show that the spectral dimension is invariant under local rescaling of couplings and under addition of finite range couplings, or infinite range couplings decaying faster then a characteristic power law. We also prove that it is left unchanged by coarse graining transformations, which are the generalization to graphs and networks of the usual decimation on regular structures. A quite important consequence of all these properties is the possibility of dealing with simplified geometrical models with nearest-neighbors interactions to study the critical behavior of systems with geometrical disorder.Comment: Latex file, 1 figure (ps file) include

The Impact of Professional Sports on Cities’ Economic Performance

The purpose of this paper is to estimate the impact of professional sports on cities’ economic performance as measured by real per capita income growth and changes in the unemployment rate. We use a panel model across 43 cities over eight years. Explanatory variables include the number of professional sports franchises in a city and the performance of those franchises. We find no statistically significant evidence suggesting that professional sports franchises impact cities’ real per capita income growth. We do, however, find that professional sports franchises have a statistically significant impact on unemployment rates

Generalization of the Peierls-Griffiths Theorem for the Ising Model on Graphs

We present a sufficient condition for the presence of spontaneous magnetization for the Ising model on a general graph, related to its long-range topology. Applying this condition we are able to prove the existence of a phase transition at temperature T > 0 on a wide class of general networks. The possibility of further extensions of our results is discussed.Comment: 15 pages, two figure

Who's Who in Patents. A Bayesian approach

This paper proposes a bayesian methodology to treat the who's who problem arising in individual level data sets such as patent data. We assess the usefullness of this methodology on the set of all French inventors appearing on EPO applications from 1978 to 2003.Patents; homonymy; Bayes rule

The determinants of co-inventor tie formation: proximity and network dynamics

This paper investigates the determinants of co-inventor tie formation using micro-data on genomic patents from 1990 to 2006 in France. We consider in a single analysis the relational and proximity perspectives that are usually treated separately. In order to do so, we analyse the determinants of network ties that occur within existing components and between two distinct components (i.e. bridging ties). We test the argument that formation of these two different types of ties results from distinct strategies in accessing resources. Doing so, we contrast network and proximity determinants of network formation and we investigate if social network allows economic actors to cross over geographical, technological and organizational boundaries.Social networks, relational perspective, proximity, co-patenting, network formation

Slow Encounters of Particle Pairs in Branched Structures

On infinite homogeneous structures, two random walkers meet with certainty if and only if the structure is recurrent, i.e., a single random walker returns to its starting point with probability 1. However, on general inhomogeneous structures this property does not hold and, although a single random walker will certainly return to its starting point, two moving particles may never meet. This striking property has been shown to hold, for instance, on infinite combs. Due to the huge variety of natural phenomena which can be modeled in terms of encounters between two (or more) particles diffusing in comb-like structures, it is fundamental to investigate if and, if so, to what extent similar effects may take place in finite structures. By means of numerical simulations we evidence that, indeed, even on finite structures, the topological inhomogeneity can qualitatively affect the two-particle problem. In particular, the mean encounter time can be polynomially larger than the time expected from the related one particle problem.Comment: 8 pages, 12 figures; accepted for publication in Physical Review