Since the election of President George H. W. Bush, Republican presidential candidates have had difficulty winning popular elections. Republican candidates lost five of the next six popular elections to their Democratic opponents. This paper investigates why. It outlines the growing demographic shift in electoral politics which is detrimental for future Republican success. The growing dissonance between non-white, non-male voters and the Republican Party hinders the Party’s success when its message does not resonate with a majority of voters. Utilizing realignment theory as first espoused by political scientist V. O. Key, this paper analyzes nine essential battleground states and the growing demographic shifts within them to show that Republican policies, as enumerated in The Growth and Opportunity Project, do not resonate to a larger audience. Using a 15% increase in Republican votes from the 2012 election as a baseline, this paper provides suggestions for Republican strategists to allocate funds to certain get-out-the-vote campaigns in certain states. The results of this study confirm the hypothesis set forth. Latino voters are an essential demographic which can help win Florida with a “compassionate conservative” Republican candidate. African-American voters are much more difficult to court for the Republican Party; however, a sound strategy in two adjacent states with low socio-economic upward mobility – North Carolina and Virginia – can motivate African-Americans to the polls to help win those states. Independent voters can help win small swing states with relatively little ethnic diversity. Finally, single female voters will be crucial in states in which conservative governors have had success such as Ohio and North Carolina.

No region of the United States fared worse over the postwar period than the "Rust Belt," the heavy manufacturing region bordering the Great Lakes. This paper hypothesizes that the Rust Belt declined in large part due to a lack of competitive pressure in its labor and output markets. We formalize this thesis in a two-region dynamic general equilibrium model, in which productivity growth and regional employment shares are determined by the extent of competition. Quantitatively, the model accounts for much of the large secular decline in the Rust Belt's employment share before the 1980s, and the relative stabilization of the Rust Belt since then, as competitive pressure increased.

This paper examines the long-term impact of exposure to Medicaid in early childhood on adult health and economic status by leveraging the programs gradual adoption across the states. The staggered timing of Medicaids adoption created plausibly exogenous variation in cumulative exposure to Medicaid for birth cohorts that are now in adulthood. Results suggest that in subgroups targeted by the program, exposure to Medicaid in childhood (age 0-5) is associated with statistically significant and meaningful improvements in adult health (age 18-54). We find no evidence for an economic effect.

Climate change is expected to worsen the negative effects of natural disasters like floods. The negative impacts, however, can be mitigated by individuals adjustments through migration and relocation behaviors. Previous literature has identified flood risk as one significant driver in relocation decisions, but no prior study examines the effect of the National Flood Insurance Program's voluntary programthe Community Rating System (CRS)on residential location choice. This article fills this gap and tests the hypothesis that flood risk and the CRS-creditable flood control activities affect residential location choices. We employ a two-stage sorting model to empirically estimate the effects. In the first stage, individuals risk perception and preference heterogeneity for the CRS activities are considered, while mean effects of flood risk and the CRS activities are estimated in the second stage. We then estimate heterogeneous marginal willingness to pay (WTP) for the CRS activities by category. Results show that age, ethnicity and race, educational attainment, and prior exposure to risk explain risk perception. We find significant values for the CRS-creditable mitigation activities, which provides empirical evidence for the benefits associated with the program. The marginal WTP for an additional credit point earned for public information activities, including hazard disclosure, is found to be the highest. Results also suggest that water amenities dominate flood risk. Thus, high amenity values may increase exposure to flood risk, and flood mitigation projects should be strategized in coastal regions accordingly.

This study examines linkages between parental work arrangements and mothers subjective wellbeing, asking how mothers market work, the presence of a partner or spouse, and partners work patterns predict subjective well-being while caring for children. Further, it examines potential mediators of these linkages. In doing so, we contribute to the literature on parental employment and parenting by shedding light on contextual features that influence the moment-to-moment interactions between mothers and their children. We find that mothers long work hours are linked to more fatigue in time with children. Additionally, fathers non-employment and long work hours are associated with reductions in maternal well-being while parenting. Not having a partner was strongly associated with mothers subjective well-being in parenting; single mothers were consistently less happy and more sad and stressed in their time with children than were partnered mothers. Finally, looking at a broad range of activities with children, we find that the type of activity matters for subjective well-being in time with kids; playing and socializing are associated with improved well-being, while cleaning and market work are associated with reduced well-being. Most of the parenting activities we assessed, however, reveal the mixed bag of parentingit is meaningful but also stressful. These findings show the value of considering momentary assessments of well-being across a multidimensional set of indicators.

The welfare implications of trade integration across areas of a country rely on local real wages, typically unmeasured in ex-post analyses and unavailable in counter-factual exercises. I develop and estimate a general equilibrium frame-work where local labor markets interact via commuting ties and overlaps in sectoral specialization. Changes in real wages are poorly predicted by standard measures of exposure to trade because, first, the price of local services co-moves with local workplace wages, and, second, residents adjust commuting patterns chasing higher wages. While more exposure to trade in comparative disadvantages sector tends to lower nominal wages, all real wages grow.

We study the effect of public health insurance on labor supply by exploiting a large public health insurance disenrollment. In 2005, approximately 170,000 Tennessee residents abruptly lost Medicaid coverage. Using both across- and within-state variation in exposure to the disenrollment, we estimate large increases in labor supply, primarily along the extensive margin. The increased employment is concentrated among individuals working at least 20 hours a week and receiving private, employer-provided health insurance. We explore the dynamic effects of the disenrollment and find an immediate increase in job search behavior and a steady rise in both employment and health insurance coverage following the disenrollment. Our results are consistent with a significant degree of . . .

Formal education is widely thought to be a major determinant of individual earnings. This paper uses the American Community Survey to examine the effect of formal schooling on worker wages. Given the potential endogeneity of education decisions, I instrument for individual schooling using cohort-level mean maternal years of schooling from previous decennial censuses. The instrumental variables results suggest that schooling has a significant positive effect on worker wages. Specifically, an additional year or schooling is estimated to increase hourly wages by 10 percent for men and 12.6 percent for women.

This paper uses multiple U.S. National Health Interview Surveys (N=1,513,097) to describe and explain temporal patterns in racial health disparities using models that simultaneously consider the unique effects of age, period, and cohort. First, we employ cross-classified random effects age-period-cohort (APC) models to understand the patterns of self-rated health disparities over time. Second, we use decomposition models to understand how socioeconomic shifts in cohort composition explain the age and period adjusted racial disparities in successive birth cohorts. Third, we examine the extent to which exogenous conditions at the time of birth can explain disparities. Our results show that race disparities increase through the 1935 cohort for women, falling thereafter; disparities for men exhibit a similar pattern but begin their overall decline with cohorts born earlier in the century. Differences in socioeconomic composition consistently contribute to disparities across cohorts; notably, disparities in marital status emerge as an increasingly important predictor across cohorts for women whereas disparities in employment emerge as increasingly salient across cohorts of men. Finally, our cohort characteristic models suggest that cohort economic conditions (percent large family, farm or Southern birth) reduce both male and female disparities in health. Poor macro-economic conditions around the time of the great depression inflated disparities for those cohorts while more favorable conditions following World War II suppressed disparities. Relative cohort size had no impact on cohort disparities in health.

The converging roles of men and women are among the grandest advances in society and the economy in the last century. These aspects of the grand gender convergence are figurative chapters in a history of gender roles. But what must the "last" chapter contain for there to be equality in the labor market? The answer may come as a surprise. The solution does not (necessarily) have to involve government intervention and it need not make men more responsible in the home (although that wouldn't hurt). But it must involve changes in the labor market, especially how jobs are structured and remunerated to enhance temporal flexibility. The gender gap in pay would be considerably reduced and might vanish altogether if firms did not have an incentive to disproportionately reward individuals who labored long hours and worked particular hours. Such change has taken off in various sectors, such as technology, science, and health, but is less apparent in the corporate, financial, and legal worlds.

While current research has established and explored the existing racial disparity in the US penal system, it focuses exclusively on the period from the late 1960s to the present. We seek to explore whether or not this disparity existed in the American South following Reconstruction. In particular, we examine the relative incarceration rates within the context of the political economy existing at this period. Using the census IPUMS data, we establish and examine this racial disparity at the aggregate level. Furthermore, the state of Alabama is investigated at the county level to explore factors influencing incarceration. Most notably, we analyze paternalism as an explanation for some of the variation in incarceration.

This project investigates the long-term effects of exposure to Medicaid in early childhood on adult health and economic status by leveraging the program's gradual adoption across the states. The staggered timing of Medicaid's introduction created variation in cumulative exposure to Medicaid for birth cohorts that are now in adulthood. I use this natural experiment in a generalized difference-in-differences framework that is complemented by a rich set of state-by-year and county-by-year controls that measure changes in public spending on the poor and health care supply. I demonstrate further support for the study design by comparing Medicaid's impact in groups that were targeted by the program versus groups that had a low probability of being eligible for benefits. I first examine the impact of Medicaid's introduction on short-run measures of utilization and infant health to establish that the program had short-term effects that could have persisted over time. Using data from the National Health Interview Survey I find that Medicaid increased the probability of any annual hospital stay by approximately 3 percentages points among low-income children under 6. Data from the National Natality Survey suggests that the program reduced the incidence of low-birth weight in the low-income population by 4 percentage points. Both findings provide evidence that the introduction of Medicaid created meaningful short-run benefits that could have persisted over time. To examine the program's long-term impacts I use data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Results suggest that in subgroups targeted by the program, exposure to Medicaid in childhood (age 0-5) is associated with statistically significant and meaningful improvements in adult health (age 18-54). I find no evidence for an economic effect, but the point estimates are imprecise and the findings are inconclusive. I discuss the significance of my results in the context of a dynamic model of child development that interacts with an evolving U.S. health system.

Still Failing: The Continuing Paradox of School Desegregation is a significantly updated and revised version of Caldas and Bankston s previous book Forced to Fail: The Paradox of School Desegregation. The book includes an analysis of the most significant Supreme Court cases that have been decided in the ten years since the first edition of the book appeared. The authors consider the important implications of these recent rulings for the future of school desegregation in America s schools. Social capital theory is used to explain why schools and communities continue to be segregated along racial and ethnic lines. Still Failing also provides the most recent U.S. census and Department of Education statistics documenting the continuing segregation of American schools and districts. The book also continues to track the persistent racial achievement gap, using the newest ACT, SAT, and NAEP testing figures. Finally, the book considers what present segregation trends portend for future efforts to racially and ethnically integrate schools, and close achievement gaps. Additional key features of this book include: Historical antecedents showing how and why American schooling became racially segregated Social capital theory to explain school and community segregation The legal history of all important supreme court cases, congressional laws and presidential executive orders related to school segregation and desegregation Easy-to-read and interpret graphs and figures The most up-to-date school population and census information"

To maintain a healthy weight and minimize the risk of negative health outcomes, federal guidelines advocate for regular participation in moderate-intensity exercise. Despite the efforts of such public health campaigns, many Americans may find it difficult to engage in the recommended amount of exercise while also devoting time to the demands of work and parenting. Previous research examining the relationship between work, parenting, and taking part in exercise has not adequately teased apart the differences between occupying a role and performing said role. Using data from the American Time Use Surveys (ATUS) Eating and Health Module (EHM), I draw on social role theory and the time availability perspective to examine whether there are distinct effects of worker/parental occupancy versus work/parenting role performance. Results from zero-inflated negative binomial regression models indicate that the relationship among work, parenting, and exercise varies depending on whether the worker/parent role is operationalized in terms of occupancy or performance. I conclude that research focusing on the link between social roles and health behaviors must take care not to conflate role occupancy indicators with role performance indicators.

This article examines the extent to which the settlement pattern of migrants arriving in the United States during the major migration waves of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries left a legacy on the economic development of the counties where newcomers settled and whether this legacy endures today. Using data from the 1880, 1900, and 1910 censuses, we first look at the geography of migration by county in the forty-eight continental states. We then link this settlement pattern to current levels of local developmentproxied by per-capita gross domestic product at the county level in 2005while controlling for a number of factors that could have influenced both the location of migrants at the time of migration and the economic development of the county today. The results of the analysis underline that the earlier migration waves have left an indelible trace on territories that still determines local economic performance. U.S. counties that attracted large numbers of migrants more than a century ago remain more dynamic today than counties that did not. The results also show that the territorial imprint of migration has become more pervasive than all other local characteristics that would have shaped the economic performance of U.S. counties in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

We estimate the local spillovers from research university activity in a sample of urban counties. Our approach uses the interaction between university endowment values and stock market shocks over time for identification. We find statistically significant local spillover effects from university activity. The effects are significantly larger when local universities are more research intensive or local firms are technologically close to universities. Our results suggest that the longer-term effects that universities have on their local economies may grow over time as the composition of local industries adjusts to take advantage of the heterogeneous knowledge spillovers we identify.

This paper shows that within a regional economy, employment in the nontradable sector benefits from attracting jobs in the tradable sector. I rework Moretti’s study of U.S. cities (AER 2010) and find that one new job in a given city’s tradable sector will result into 1.02 new jobs in the nontradable sector in the same city. I show Moretti overestimated the size of this local multiplier by 0.57, because he made five perfunctory assumptions that had a major impact on his results. Subsequently I extend Moretti’s analysis by including the unemployment rate and migration. The size of the local multiplier increases with the unemployment rate in a city. Almost all jobs in the nontradable sector created by the local multiplier effect are fulfilled by workers that migrate from other regions, therefore local unemployment is not reduced. These findings are important for regional economic policy. They suggest that cities with a high unemployment rate will experience the greatest increase in local employment in the nontradable sector by attracting tradable industries, but their current residents are not likely to benefit from the additional jobs. Therefore it remains to be seen if policy to attract tradable firms - to boost local employment - is welfare improving.

Labor force participation rates of married women have increased substantially since 1950s; and the educational gender gaps for cohorts born after 1950 have also witnessed a shrinkage and, in fact, a reversal. In this paper, we advance a novel connection between the two trends: the decrease in the maternal time input in the childrens education as a result of the increase in maternal employment has a stronger negative impact on the skill production on boys than on girls. We present three sets of evidences supporting our hypothesis. First, we find that in the US, at both the state and the individual level, the educational gender gap is significantly and positively correlated with the LFPR of married women in the birth state within five years after birth. Cross-country evidence also shows a strong correlation between female LFPR of the mother generation and the educational gender gap among their childrens generation. Second, we directly examine and find evidence of the asymmetric effects of maternal employment on their childrens educational achievement which favors girls than boys in the Norwegian registry data. Third, we propose a model showing that the gender asymmetric effect of maternal employment implies that a rational and altruistic mother would work more if she has higher ratio of girls, controlling the total number of children. We find supporting evidence for this prediction in both the US and the Norwegian data.

Do local effects of university research 100 years ago remain today? Because the nature of scale economies in idea discovery and learning are unclear we do not know. We use the establishment of agricultural experiment stations in the late 19th century to provide an answer. Our analysis of country-level agricultural census data from 1870 to 2000 reveals station establishment increased local land productivity over the medium term. Peak effects imply land a standard deviation closer to university research became 36% more productive. While average proximity effects disappear 30 to 50 years after station opening, they remain today where stations focused on basic research and farmers were not producing with frontier technology.