Date of Award
5-1-2016
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy
Department
Economics
First Advisor
Sylwester, Kevin
Abstract
This dissertation considers to what extent changes in the unemployment rate – a proxy for the business cycle – drives changes in mortality and crime. I use a panel of U.S. counties from 1990 to 2013. I allow changes in the unemployment rate to have different effects upon mortality / crime in large versus small counties as well as between increases versus decreases in the unemployment rate. My results show great nuance along both these dimensions, suggesting that the effects of the business cycle are more subtle than what previous studies report. These results also give one greater insight into what factors could be driving these effects of the business cycle.
Access
This dissertation is Open Access and may be downloaded by anyone.