Alumni

Recent PhD Ria Bhattacharya publishes on COVID-19

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Recent graduate Ria Bhattacharya (PhD 2019) has published an article “COVID-19: G-20’s Response to Education” in the August 2020 volume of G-20 Digest.

Abstract: This paper examines the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on education. It discusses G20 current status in the education sector and its response to COVID-19 impact on education. The paper highlights the challenges thrust upon the G20 economies concerning education, a crucial sector in any economy. Currently, there are over 23 million confirmed cases globally, with the United States leading the death count at 176000 deaths and counting, due to COVID-19. As the entire world braces itself for a severe recession comparable to the Great Depression which will have long-lasting effects on every sector of the global economy, we examine how G20 nations can provide leadership in provision of education during the current crisis.

The article may be found at https://www.ris.org.in/journals-n-newsletters/G20-Digest, and is also linked online at https://mobile.twitter.com/RIS_NewDelhi/status/1303781794030862340

Pilot Project Approved for Professor Agüero and PhD Student Mendiola

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Professor Jorge Agüero and third year PhD student Miranda Mendiola’s proposal “Role models: Information and Gender Stereotypes” for a pilot project, sponsored by the Innovation Laboratory for Cost-Effective Educational Policy – MineduLAB in the Peruvian Ministry of Education, has been approved.

Their project has the objective of reducing gender stereotypes and improving grades for high school students through the use of role models. Traditionally, efforts to reduce gender gaps have focused on empowering women. Professor Agüero and Miranda’s project focuses on changing the perception of both genders’ abilities by showing students movies that have young main characters being successful in careers that are nontraditional for their gender. They hope to improve women’s scores in STEM courses, where they traditionally perform worse, and also to improve men’s scores in courses they traditionally struggle with (Spanish and history). They will measure changes in gender bias through a questionnaire and a game, with the objective of measuring both explicit and implicit biases. 

This project will hopefully be a pilot for a larger project in Peru, aiding in the reduction of gender bias in Peruvian schools.

Professor Ray publishes in Empirical Economics

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Professor Subhash Ray published his recent paper “Unrestricted geometric distance functions and the Geometric Young productivity index: an analysis of Indian manufacturing” coauthored with Arnab Deb (Associate Professor, International Management Institute New Delhi) and Kankana Mukherjee (Associate Professor, Babson College) in Empirical Economics.

At this point, the paper is available online at https://doi.org/10.1007/s00181-020-01925-0.

Both of his coauthors are his former PhD students: Arnab Deb (PhD UConn 2012) and Kankana Mukherjee (PhD UConn 1997).

Professors Harmon and Tomolonis Publish in Journal of Economic Education

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JEE LogoOskar Harmon and Paul Tomolonis (UConn PhD 2017) have co-authored the article “Learning Tableau – A data visualization tool”, published in the Journal of Economic Education.

ABSTRACT: “Doing economics” is an important theme of undergraduate economics programs. Capstone courses increasingly include instruction in “data literacy” and the STEM-related skills of quantitative and empirical methods. Because the professional discipline has moved in this direction and because of greater employer demand for these skills, data visualization is a key component of data literacy. Tableau is a free data visualization software widely used in the data analytics industry. In this article, the authors introduce an exercise that teaches the fundamental Tableau concepts and commands needed to create charts, assemble them in a dashboard, and tell a story of patterns observed in the data. The exercise assumes no prior experience in Tableau and is appropriate for undergraduate upper-level economics courses or an empirical methods course.

The article is available at the JEE website

UConn Researchers Awarded Grant to Study Domestic Violence and COVID-19

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UConn’s Nishith Prakash and Lindsey Buck, along with coauthors Maria Micaela Sviatschi and Sofia Amaral were awarded a $76,000 grant from Princeton in order to study COVID-19’s implications on domestic violence.

Project Title: Macroeconomic Shocks and Domestic Violence: Evidence from COVID-19

Abstract:

Domestic violence (DV), defined as stalking, rape, or physical violence, is a global problem with 35% of women worldwide reporting experiencing DV (WHO 2017). In this project, our goal is twofold. First, we aim to look at COVID-19 – a large macroeconomic and health shock — on an important outcome from a welfare perspective: domestic violence (DV). DV is an important outcome to study because it has large financial and health implications; DV survivors suffer reductions in earnings and poor health (Aizer, 2011) and the CDC spends $5.8bn annually on health costs related to DV (St. Jude House). Second, we also aim to test two interventions that are likely to determine pathways to aid victims of DV during a pandemic: one consists of providing labor market opportunities for women and a second one on providing information on how to identify and respond in DV cases. We will sample 4000 women in the U.S. on the M-Turk platform and collect information on their financial, emotional, and relationship stress levels. Then, we provide two interventions. The first treatment will provide information on the National Domestic Violence Hotline (NDVH), where trained advocates are available to talk confidentially and provide resources on DV. We will also provide the NDVH’s resources on healthy relationships, legal help, and conflict resolution. The second treatment will provide a cash transfer to women for completing tasks on M-Turk; in this way we will increase women’s labor market opportunities at home. Our results will shed light on two important questions: First, can information mitigate the effects of DV? Secondly, can labor market opportunities mitigate the effects on DV? Our goal is to look at the broad implications of COVID-19 on DV and illustrate policy opportunities to mitigate DV in the wake of an unprecedented macroeconomic shock.

More information on the project can be found here: https://www.eeassoc.org/index.php?site=JEEA&page=298&trsz=299 and in a recent article in UConn Today:

How will COVID-19 Affect Domestic Violence?

Associate Professor of Economics Nishith Prakash and graduate student Lindsey Buck are part of a research group that was awarded a $76,000 grant from Princeton University to study COVID-19’s implications on domestic violence. They will test two interventions that are likely to determine pathways to aid victims of domestic violence during a pandemic: One consists of providing labor market opportunities for women, and a second one that provides information on how to identify and respond in domestic violence cases.

 

https://today.uconn.edu/school-stories/clas-faculty-students-shifting-work-covid-19/?utm_source=listserv&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=weekly&utm_content=uconn-today

2020 Spring Awards

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Uconn sealAlthough the department was not able to celebrate with an awards banquet this year, we still are able to recognize the best among undergraduate and graduate students, as well as faculty! This year’s award recipients are:

Undergraduate Awards

Economics Department General Scholarship

Yulia Bragina
Tyler DiBrino
Kevin Fiddler
Melissa Mendez
Sueing Ngov
Shannon O’Connor
Gabriela Rodriguez

Kathryn A. Cassidy Economics Scholarship

Kelly-Anne Moffa
Katelyn Mooney

Rockwood Q. P. Chin Scholarship

Kevin Fiddler
Devin Pallanck
Gabriela Rodriguez
Yumeng Shao

Louis D. Traurig Scholarship

Marisa Infante
Spencer Kinyon
Linge Yang
Ajshe Zulfi

Albert E. Waugh Scholarship

Xiaofeng Gong

Paul N. Taylor Memorial Prize

John Peterson

Julia & Harold Fenton and Yolanda & Augustine Sineti Scholarship

Tyler DiBrino

Charles Triano Scholarship

Tiffany D’Andrea
James Rice

Dr. Joseph W. McAnneny Jr. Scholarship

Madeline Danziger
Zian Zhang

Robert J. Monte Scholarship

Luis Cruz

Ross Mayer Scholarship

Michelle Grieco
Mary Vlamis


Graduate Awards

W. Harrison Carter Award

Lindsey Buck

Abraham Ribicoff Graduate Fellowship

Yangkeun Yun

Timothy A. and Beverly C. Holt Economics Fellowship

Yijia Gao
Xuejian Gong
Ruohan Huang
Ha Kyeong Lee
Wensu Li
Miranda Mendiola Valdez
Ziyun Wu

Economics Department General Scholarship

Jingyun Chen
Chun Li
Jinning Wang
Heli Xu

Best Third Year Paper Award

Erdal Asker
Deepak Saraswat

Graduate School Pre-Doctoral Fellowship

Treena Goswami
Huarui Jing
Anastassiya Karaban
Xizi Li
Shilpa Sethia
Rui Sun
Jiaqi Wang
Wei Zheng


Faculty Awards

Grillo Family Research Award

Jungbin Hwang

Grillo Family Teaching Award

Delia Furtado

 

Congratulations to everyone!

Women in Economics Symposium

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On February 27, 2020, two Economics students from the Storrs campus (Daija Brunson and Pershae Gilling) and one Economics student from the Stamford campus (Viviana Castillo) got the chance to travel to Cleveland, OH, for a Women in Economics Symposium. In the morning of the event the students got the chance to meet Research Assistants for the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland and ask them questions about their journey so far. A lot of insight was given by the Research Assistants and they were very helpful in providing guidance to the students about what they should do in the future.

The students also got the chance to tour the bank and they were even able to go down to the cash processing center where they could see how automation plays a big role in their daily processes.

The symposium was held at the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland and included keynote addresses from Dr. Lisa Cook, Director of the AEA Summer Program and Dr. Julianne Malveaux, Founder of Economic Education Institute. In addition, during the symposium the students got the chance to sit through different discussion panels with topics about what to do with a degree in economics, how to get a PHD, and how to navigate the workforce as a female.

During the reception they got a chance to meet other students and employees from the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, including Dr. Loretta Mester, the President and CEO of the bank. Overall, the full day was filled with a lot of information and it provided the students with a lot of guidance as to what they should do in the future. The students came back feeling very energized and excited as to what the future holds for them.

 

Written by Viviana Castillo and Dr. Natalia Smirnova

PhD Graduate Matthew Ross in The Guardian

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Matt Ross, one of our Ph.D. graduates, was interviewed by The Guardian about the new study of racial profiling in police stops in the State of California, as well as about his own research with UConn faculty member Steve Ross and another Ph.D. graduate Jesse Kalinowski:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/02/california-police-black-stops-force

Former PhD student accepts Professorship

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Anupam Nanda has accepted a Professorship at the University of Manchester, UK.  He will start in November this year.

Anupam completed his Ph.D. in Economics at the University of Connecticut in 2006. Anupam has been at the University of Reading and has developed a significant scholarly reputation for his research in real estate markets. Professor Stephen Ross was his major advisor.