The number of people living in China’s cities, which last year for the first time surpassed 50 percent of the national population, is considered a boon for the consumer goods market. That is based on the assumption that there will be more families with more disposable income when poor farmers from China’s countryside move to cities and become middle-class industrial and office workers. (more…)
New research into how the stock market perceives the capabilities of female company directors finds that an initial negative response by investors is overturned in the longer term, once markets respond to corporate performance rather than stereotypes.
The study analysed the stock market response to male and female directors’ purchases of their own company shares, examining both the short-run and long-run stock market reaction response to directors’ trades.
Results suggest that the price reaction to male directors’ share activity is initially faster and larger than that for female directors, showing that the short-term market reaction retains a gender bias reflecting the prevalence of negative stereotypes; where the market reacts to beliefs rather than performance. (more…)
ANN ARBOR, Mich.— One in five households with children in poverty are surviving on the cash equivalent of a half gallon of milk per person per day in a given month.
The National Poverty Center has released a new report that examines poverty trends between 1996 and 2011. The number of households with children who are in extreme poverty in a given month—living at $2 or less in income per person per day—in 2011 totaled roughly 1.46 million households, including 2.8 million kids. This number is up from 636,000 households in 1996, nearly a 130 percent increase. (more…)
EAST LANSING, Mich. — Contrary to common perception, state and local police are often on the front lines against product counterfeiting, yet it’s unclear how prepared they are to deal with the growing crime, according to a new report from two Michigan State University criminologists. (more…)
Higher education, a jewel of American society and an engine of its economy, is under threat, and if the nation is to remain competitive the financial model must be overhauled, says a new book.
Authors of Financing American Higher Education in the Era of Globalization say reforming the model will take a long-term, top-level coalition composed of the president, the nation’s governors, college and K-12 leaders, and leaders in the business community. (more…)
*No silver bullet but hope for economy remains, experts tell audience at UD*
Analogies abounded at the 2012 Economic Forecast, where speakers compared monetary policy to turnpike driving, fiscal policy to an empty toolbox and investing to “finding the least worst house on an unstable block.”
Charles I. Plosser, president and CEO of the Philadelphia Federal Reserve, was one of three featured speakers at the annual event, which was sponsored by Lyons Companies and the University of Delaware’s Center for Economic Education and Entrepreneurship (CEEE) and held Tuesday, Feb. 14, at UD’s Clayton Hall. (more…)
You could say that the economic field of benefit-cost analysis has been stuck in a loop on a specific matter for 70 years — a kind of logical figure-eight that leads not forward, but back upon itself. (more…)
EAST LANSING, Mich. — Many people are willing to pay a premium for ethanol, but not enough to justify the government mandate for the corn-based fuel, a Michigan State University economist argues.
Soren Anderson studied the demand for ethanol, or E85, in the United States. He found that when ethanol prices rose 10 cents per gallon, demand for ethanol fell only 12 percent to 16 percent on average. (more…)
