This dissertation attempts to explain the dynamics between movements in global oil prices and fiscal policy in oil-exporting, developing countries. It contains three essays. The first chapter investigates the correlation between government size and output volatility for a sample of oil-exporting,...
This dissertation focuses on the two important inputs in economic agents’ forecasts: models and information. Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 discuss a specific model that forecasters may use in their forecasts, which is Okun’s law. Chapter 3 studies the role of first announcements in the future economy....
This dissertation shares three common themes: (i) forecasting rare macroeconomic events, i.e. GDP declines and currency crises; (ii) the use of non-parametric methods to evaluate binary indicators, in particular, the advantages of the analysis of the Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC)...
This dissertation studies several of the macroeconomic vulnerabilities that Caribbean countries face, focusing on their constraints to economic growth like their small size and their island nature, the contributions that tourism has had in their economies, and their vulnerabilities to both...
In the first essay, a theoretical model establishes why there are NO negative spillover effects from foreign investment in the oil industries of developing countries. This is done with specific focus on side-payment transfers from foreign partners to host government officials in such...
This dissertation studies the relationship between government expenditure and economic performance. The first essay investigates a nonlinear relationship between government spending and macroeconomic performance by estimating a threshold model that relates real GDP growth to three measures of...
The dissertation contributes to the understanding of the properties of China's macroeconomic fluctuations through applying advanced econometric methods to China's quarterly real GDP, which have been investigated little due to the shortage of data. The first essay provides quarterly real GDP...
This dissertation analyzes the differences in wealth between White individuals and Black individuals and examines the reasons behind the differences. Chapter 4 analyzes the effect of income and earnings, among other variables, on the level of wealth for individuals with the same age, education,...
Debt crises that have shaken Latin America, Asia and Russia have brought increasing attention to the structure of sovereign debt in the emerging market countries. As shown by the recent debt crises in Mexico, Asia, and Russia, the structure of domestically issued debt has important implications...