Semester

Spring

Date of Graduation

2023

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Type

PhD

College

Chambers College of Business and Economics

Department

Economics

Committee Chair

Brad Humphreys

Committee Member

Bryan C. McCannon

Committee Member

Jane E. Ruseski

Committee Member

E. Frank Stephenson

Abstract

The first paper investigates the relationship between intimate partner violence (IPV) and United States presidential elections. There exists a sizeable literature studying IPV that occurs during or after stressful events (such as a sports team loss), and a considerable non-economics literature examining election-related stress. However, very limited research has been done studying potential negative outcomes after a political loss (when one’s candidate loses), and these findings in other fields have not been synthesized into the economics lexicon. By interacting with the margin of victory for each state, I find large and significant decreases in IPV in states that vote for the winning candidate. “Losing” states (those that vote for the losing candidate) also see significant increases in IPV on Election Day. I also find this effect can vary substantially between elections, with the most prominent results found during the 2000 presidential election.

The second paper examines a possible role hosting large sporting events can play in maintaining political power. With the overwhelming economic consensus being that mega-events contribute little economic benefits ti justify their costs to the public, questions must arise as to why mega-events continue to be publicly subsidized. I propose a possible explanation that hosting a mega-event can contribute to a country’s political stability and possibly keep a head of state in power. Using two datasets of social, political, and economic events (a proxy for political and societal unrest), I test if hosting a Formula One Grand Prix is associated with more days of unrest. Using a Poisson regression and propensity score matching, results provide evidence that hosting a Formula One Grand Prix leads to fewer days of unrest.

The final paper, coauthored with Joshua C. Martin, is an empirical test of a sporting norm and an application of a labor economics phenomenon to a sports setting. We test the “love is the enemy of speed” hypothesis- an axiom that married racing drivers perform worse than their unmarried counterparts. This also serves as an opportunity to test if the marital performance premium identified in labor economics exists in a sports setting. Using hand-collected data on the marital status of Formula One drivers, we test whether married drivers take fewer risks and drive more conservatively during qualifying periods (as the “love is the enemy of speed” axiom predicts), or if the marital performance premium holds. Using a variety of estimation methods, including a standard fixed effects regression, an event-study approach, and a two-stage least squares approach, we find no evidence that “love is the enemy of speed.” Married drivers see no drop in performance after their wedding dates, nor do their performances improve.

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