Multiple Items

As a reminder, Dr. Filer is conducting a workshop on applying to PhD programs Tuesday at 9:30 pm in 1537.

The conference room has been reserved from 1:30-4:30 for a study group for Financial Economics (ECO 760)

On November 29th at 6pm, in 1537 (conference room), Nikola Duravcevic, a Portfolio Manager from the Seneca Capital Group will be holding an informal session on how to get jobs after you graduate.

The new computer is in the TA office (many thanks to Dr. Honig and ICIT), while TA work has priority, you are welcome to use either computer if you need to utilize any of the installed programs. Please note there are guidelines (behind the monitor) as to where you need to save items if you want them to be backed up before the computers undergo periodic re-imaging.

Best Regards,
Ken Lord

Job opening at ACCION

Recent BA/MA alumnus Anne Sormani, who has already been very successful at ACCION New York, is looking to hire more Hunter students to work in microfinance. She writes:

... I am also looking for a Business Systems Analyst, which I thought could be of interest to a recent graduate (undergrad or grad students). If you would like to forward on this email to someone you know please feel free.

Description of the position http://www.accionnewyork.org/employment.asp

Course Offerings Spring 07

Course # Code Title Day Time Professor

703 4738 Macroeconomic Theory Wednesday 5:30 Thurston
722 3032 Econometrics Thursday 5:30 Deb
723 4401 Time Series Monday 7:30 Makram
732 4215 Economic Growth Thursday 7:30 Kearney
748 4735 Health Economics Wednesday 7:30 Tennant
756 4381 Law & Economics Monday 5:30 George
761 4384 Adv. Concepts in Financial Markets Tuesday 7:30 Thompson
762 4216 Corporate Governance Tuesday 5:30 Nyman

Please note that there will be other 700 level courses listed in the on-line schedule. These will be MA courses for the new ACCOUNTING program and may not be used for the MA in economics.

As before, please respond by return e-mail indicating your desired courses. You MUST include in the e-mail your name, ID Number, and status (matriculated MA or BA/MA at Hunter, nonmatriculated, BA only or other). the reason for this new requirement will be obvious in a couple of lines.

As always, registration permissions will be allocated in the following order:

1) Matriculated Hunter Students in the order received
2) Non-matriculated Graduate students
3) Hunter undergraduates
4) Permit students from other colleges.

The college has not yet found a room for Econ 703. If they do not do so, we will have to teach it in the Economics Department conference room. In that case, there will be a STRICT limit of 25 students, which will bind very early. (Of course, if we have requests for many more than that, it will increase the odds that they will find a larger room). If we must stick to the low limit, Dr. Filer will violate the order received priority to accommodate students who plan on graduating by January 2008.

New School Open House

I know many of you have already narrowed down your lists of PhD programs, but if you have not, depending on what kind of program you are interested in, you may wish to look into the program at New School. The New School for Social Research (where the Economics Dept. is) is holding open houses on November 8, 2006 and December 5, 2006 5:30 pm - 7:30 pm in the Wolff Conference Room (65 Fifth Avenue 2nd Floor New York, NY 10003). If you would like to RSVP, the phone number and email to do so are: (212) 229-5710 and socialresearchadmit@newschool.edu , respectively.

If any of you become aware of other open houses for PhD Econ programs in the near future, please email me at klord@hunter.cuny.edu so I can post them here.

Best Regards as always,
Ken

Joe Stiglitz a the Grad Center Tuesday

Reminder: The seminar with Joseph Stiglitz will be held tomorrow (Tuesday at 11:45am) in rooms
C201-202 (Concourse, below the first floor). Professor Stiglitz will talk on: “A Modest Proposal for the Reform of the Global Financial System.”

Career Panel

On November 16th, from 1400-1600, Hunter will be hosting "Career Opportunities In City Government" in the Student Center. Among others, there will be speakers and representatives present from the NYC Department of Finance as well as from the NYC Department of Management and Budget. Students are asked to email career@hunter.cuny.edu if you are interested in attending.

An Article of interest

An interesting article appeared in the Financial Times

Business students portrayed as ethically minded in study

By Rebecca Knight in Boston

A study portrays today's business school studentsas ethically minded and concerned about issues of corporate social responsibility. The study, released yesterday, is based on research conducted by Net Impact, a group of MBA and graduate students who advocate that businesses should work for the social good. Net Impact polled 2,100 MBA students in 87 programmes in the US and Canada.

Students surveyed overwhelmingly said that they believed corporate profits and social responsibility could co-exist.

About 81 per cent of the students said companies should try to work "toward the betterment of society", while 18 per cent thought most of them were already seeking that goal.

Nearly 90 per cent said business leaders should factor social and environmental effects into their business decisions, with 60 per cent saying such an approach could be profitable.

In the aftermath of scandals at Enron and WorldCom, many US business schools have placed a greater emphasis on ethics courses in their programmes of study.

According to the survey, about 78 per cent of MBA students believed classes in corporate social responsib-ility should be part ofthe core curriculum in MBA programmes.

The survey, which was presented at a business school forum at Case Western University in Cleveland, Ohio, also found that MBA students were interested in working in socially responsible jobs.

Nearly 80 per cent ofstudents polled wanted to find socially responsible employment at some point in their careers, according to the survey, while 59 per cent said they would seek such work immediately after graduating from business school.

The survey comes only a month after a separate study published by Duke University's centre for academic integrity found that 56 per cent of MBA students admitted cheating, compared with 47 per cent of graduate students in non-business programmes.

Business schools are highly competitive and have been criticised for fostering a "culture of greed" in MBA programmes.

Best regards,

Aziz

Thesis Workshop Tomorrow

From Professor Filer,

Given the full class schedule this year, the consensus seems to be that the best time for a workshop on thesis writing hints would be on a Saturday. Accordingly, I have chosen Saturday October 21st. We will review the requirements and I will try and provide as many hints as I can accumulated over years of seeing students succeed (and fail) in the process. We will cover scheduling, format, literature searches, how to pick a topic, etc. The ideal participant would be a student who plans on finishing a thesis for 2007 graduation (June, September or December) but all students would benefit. We will start at 11 and run until we are done (before dinner time!) Lunch will be provided. Please confirm participation by return e-mail so we will know how much lunch to obtain.

Regards

Professor Filer

War, Genocide and Economic Growth

Tomorrow's brown bag seminar (Thursday 10/19, 11:30am-1pm in HW 1537) will be given by Nils-Petter Lagerlöf from York University (on leave at Brown) who will present: War and Genocide: Is There a Connection to Transitions From Stagnation to Growth?

Now you know why we're called the Dismal Science. This should be a provocative talk combining both empirical analysis and growth theory. Matt Baker will be the next speaker on 11/2 with his talk on "Technological Progress, Property Rights, and Population Growth: A Structural Model of the Transition to Agriculture."

The entire schedule is online. All BA/MA students warmly invited to attend.
~~ Ingmar and Jonathan

ECO 721 Study Group

After conferring with both students and professors, I have arranged for the conference room (1537 HW) to be available for an ECO721 study group on Wednesday from 1:30-4:30. The study group will not be led/moderated. While we are happy to answer specific questions, your ability to succeed, especially in 722, will be strongly correlated to your ability to study, research, and learn in a more peer-oriented and individual manner. I realize that the time may not be convienent for you, however there are significant limitations on the availability of the conference room this semester.

*It has come to my attention there will be a fire drill at approximately 1:30, you may wish to wait until the drill is completed before beginning your review.

Best Regards,
Ken Lord

Invisible Children / Child labor

On behalf of Americans for Informed Democracy(AID), I am honored to invite you to attend a screening of a groundbreaking documentary called “Invisible Children" . “Invisible Children” is a rough cut documentary made by several young Americans to document the war in Northern Uganda , in which children are being abducted by a rebel army and forced to fight as child soldiers. After the film Professor Partha Deb who had done a research on the same theme of the movie will lead us in a discussion on the topic of child labor. This event will take place on Wednesday, October 11th at 1 pm, Thomas Hunter Room 105 Our plan for this event is to first screen the film, which is 55 minutes long and then have 30-45 minutes of discussion about what we’ve just watched together. Free Snacks will be served.

For more information see http://www.invisiblechildren.com/

Brown Bag Seminar

From Professor Conning

The Hunter Economics Brown Bag Seminar series has started up again. The talks will be held every other Thursday from 11:30am-1pm in the Economics Seminar room. All Hunter BA/MA students are very welcome and encouraged to attend. This semesters talks are focused on public finance (Brunner, Rockoff), macro (Westelius), and some very interesting demographic issues in economic development (Lagerlof, Baker, Kazianga).



Date

Speaker

Oct 5th

Eric Brunner (Quinnipiac College)

Tiebout Choice and Universal School Vouchers

Oct 19th

Nils-Petter Lagerlöf (York U and Brown U)

War and genocide: is there a connection to transitions from stagnation to growth?

Nov 2nd

Matt Baker (Hunter College)

Technological Progress, Property Rights, and Population Growth: A Structural Model of the Transition to Agriculture.

Nov 16th

Jonah Rockoff (GSB, Columbia)
Title to be announced.

Nov 30th

Harounan Kazianga (Columbia and The World Bank)
The Intra-household Economics of Polygyny: Fertility and Child Mortality in Rural Mali

Dec 14th

Niklas Westelius (Hunter College)



Imperfect Transparency and Optimal Monetary Policy

The website with the papers is available here: http://urban.hunter.cuny.edu/RePEc/seminar/

You might want to mention that Hunter Faculty are also involved in organizing or presenting the seminars in two other series:

The Friday 1pm Labor, Education and Health Seminar and the Tuesday 11:45am Applied Economics Seminar
both held in room 5383 at the Graduate Center. Worth highlighting is a talk by Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz to be held at the Graduate Center
Tuesday Oct 31 (Room C201&C202) entitled "A Modest Proposal for the Reform of the Global Financial System."

I've also made a public Google Calendar that lists the talks from all three series in one place.

Elections

Thank you for your participation in the HCSFE elections on Thursday and Friday. All the necessary paperwork has been completed and submitted to the USG. We really appreciate the time many of you took to stop by the office and vote.

Best Regards,
Ken Lord

HCSFE Elections

In addition to the Friday hours elections and budget input, and because of numerous people informing me of schedule conflicts, HCSFE (The undergrad part) will be effectively holding a two day election on both this Thursday (2:00pm-6:30pm), and this Friday (2:30pm-5:00pm). We need at least a quorum of active members (16) to vote... the process is fairly quick since the three electable positions are uncontested.

We are aware of the encoding problems with some of the videos on the website, including those in the ECO721 section... we are working diligently to re-encode the videos so they work properly, but the process is time consuming (for a 140 minute class, the total time to convert from tape to a raw file, then from a raw file to a properly encoded file is 280 minutes). In our budget request (which only gets to go through the process if we have enough people vote), we have requested a DV camera to streamline the process. I cannot impress upon you enough how important it is to vote on Thursday or friday.... the appropriate voting forms will be available in 1538 HW both days, regardless of time (until 5:00 friday, when they get submitted). It is only with your support that we can utilize the money you already pay in fees so that we can provide you with resources to help you achieve your academic goals.

Best Regards,
Ken Lord

Hunter now has WRDS access (and this is a big deal for you finance people)

Hi guys,

Prof. Filer has informed me that Hunter now has access to the Wharton Research Data Services (WRDS), an on-line portal that gives you access to data from the NYSE, CRSP, Thomson Financial, and many others.

This is the kind of access that firms pay dearly for, so I strongly suggest to students that are seeking to do a finance-centered thesis to either see your thesis advisor or Prof. Filer on how to establish an account.

A few notes:

Dr. Filer holds usually holds two very informative information sessions early in the semeseter: one on applying to Graduate Schools and one outlining hints and procedures for thesis writing. Riva has suggested we could expand the latter to add additional information and he is willing.

The question is timing. This year we have so many classes that I see the
following options:

1) Weekday evenings AFTER 9:30 (there is a class until 9:20 every
night). I would prefer Tuesdays but could do Thursdays

2) Friday Evenings

3) A weekend day - perhaps a longer period on Saturday or Sunday afternoon
for the thesis writing workshop.

Please email me at klord@hunter.cuny.edu , and I will forward the number of people voting for each option along to Dr. Filer this Wednesday afternoon.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HCSFE will be holding elections on September 29th. We will also be making any final alterations to the budget based on the requests of those in attendance. In order for the election to be valid, we need a quorum (16 people in this case), so please be sure to come to 1537 or 1538 between 2:30 and 5:00 to cast your vote. It's ok to be late or leave early if you have other commitments, but it is very important that you make your needs for the semester known.

The HCSFE website http://www.hunterecon.org has been overhauled... the site look is a bit rusty at the moment, and features will be added, but for now, the video and audio recordings (where professors have permitted) are availabe in the "Course Resources" section. Please remember it takes between 5-10 days from the date of the class until we can post it because we have to copy from tape and sync up the audio... hopefully our turnaround time will be much shorter if our budget request for a digital camcorder is approved.

Happy Chilean Independence Day, Lundi du Jeune, Keiro no Hi, and Pitr-Paksha,
Ken

Administrative Meeting

There will be an administrative meeting for the HCSFE on Friday September 15 from 1-3pm. We need as many people as possible to attend, whether you are a BA/MA, an MA, or a BA. We still need more tutors(MA or BA/MA), a VP(BA or BA/MA), and a Treasurer (BA or BA/MA). I know the notice is a bit short, but would greatly appreciate your attendance.

Best Regards,
Ken Lord
klord@hunter.cuny.edu

Updated do-file suggestions from Prof. Colman

Hi folks.

This posting is primarily for those currently taking microeconometrics. Here are updated do-files with the corrected paths:

(keep in mind that the don't come through well on the blog, so enter your dictionary file accordingly)

Dictionary file:

infile dictionary {
_lrecl(560)
_column(5) str10 hhid %10s "Household ID"
_column(15) str2 perno %2s "Person number"
_column(25) sex %1f "Sex"
_column(27) age %2f "Age"
_column(43) race1 %1f "Race"
_column(46) hispanic1 %2f "Hispanic origin"
_column(61) poverty %1f "Poverty status"
_column(67) family_size %1f "Family size"
_column(68) family_comp %1f "Family composition"
_column(70) health %1f "Perceived health status"
_column(71) act_limit %1f "Activity limitation"
_column(98) restrict_days %2f "Restricted activity days"
_column(182) region %1f "Region"
_column(201) wt %9f "Insurance sample weight"
_column(337) strata %4f "Strata"
_column(341) psu %1f "Primary sampling unit"
_column(410) medicaid1 %1f "Medicaid status"
}

Do-file:

clear
capture log close
set more off
set mem 40m

local insdct ""C:\Classes\Fall 2006\Hunter\Microeconometrics\NHIS\nhis95ins.dct""
local insdat ""C:\Classes\Fall 2006\Hunter\Microeconometrics\NHIS\HEALTHIN.DAT""
local insdta ""C:\Classes\Fall 2006\Hunter\Microeconometrics\NHIS\healthin.dta""

infile using `insdct', using(`insdat')

keep if age<18

/*
other variables needed:
age, sex, race, family size, family composition,
region, perceived health status, limitation of activity,
restricted activity days, and restricted activity days squared
*/

gen female=sex==2

/* customary race and ethnicity categories are non-hispanic white,
non-hispanic black, non-hispanic other, and hispanic
*/

/* We have to be sure that the race categories include everyone,
and do not overlap, so we create a new variable, race2, and then
create dummies */

gen race2=1 if race1==1 & hispanic1==10
replace race2=2 if race1==2 & hispanic1==10 & race2==.
replace race2=3 if race1==3 & hispanic1==10 & race2==.
replace race2=4 if hispanic1 !=10 & race2==.

gen nhwhite=race2==1
gen nhblack=race2==2
gen nhother=race2==3
gen hispanic=race2==4

gen poor=1 if poverty==2
replace poor=0 if poverty==1

gen northeast=region==1
gen midwest=region==2
gen south=region==3
gen west=region==4

gen health_excel=health==1 if health!=6
gen health_vgood=health==2 if health!=6
gen health_good=health==3 if health!=6
gen health_fair=health==4 if health!=6
gen health_poor=health==5 if health!=6

TA position for graduate microeconomics

Hi guys,

There's a high volume of students in this year's grad micro course, and as a result, the department is looking to hire a graduate TA to facilitate homework sessions.

Obviously, only those that have taken and done well in Eco 701 need apply. Preference will be given to those students that are not already TAing for another class.

Those interested should e-mail Prof. Filer at rfiler@hunter.cuny.edu.

Resources for those thinking about their thesis

I know quite a good amount of time can be spent trying to discover whether or not your hypothesis is testable with available data... hopefully a few of these links can help.

http://www.stat-usa.gov/ (Good Macro Data)
https://www.esa.doc.gov/ (mostly just an aggregator for other data sites)
http://www.census.gov/ (be aware much of this data requires special
tools to get into nice forms, but the tools are free at
http://www.census.gov/main/www/access.html )
subsequently, if you need data from 1980 and/or 1990, go
to http://ftp.census.gov/ )
http://www.bts.gov/ (Good transportation data)
http://www.bls.gov/data/home.htm (Labor Statistics)
http://ntlsearch.bts.gov/tris/index.do (Integrated transportation
database, great for finding data from early 1900s, also
contains research in progress TRB)
http://www.destatis.de/e_home.htm (German Statistics)
http://www.statcan.ca/menu-en.htm (Canadian Statistics)

Additionally, if you search the blog, there are numerous other great data resources with which you can work.

Best Regards, and Happy New Semester!
Ken Lord

PS- we are still in need of tutors for 200, 300, and 400 level courses, even if you can only guarantee an hour or two a week, please email me at klord@hunter.cuny.edu with your availability, and which classes you would be most comfortable tutoring in.

Macro Lectures have been posted

Hi guys,

Eric Mingione has once again worked his magic and posted audio recordings of Prof. Thurston's lectures. You can access them at the hunter econ site.

Best of luck.

Bear Stearns Economist to speak this Wednesday

Prof. Tim Kearney, adjunct faculty for the Hunter MA program, will be discussing the role that an economist plays in a large investment bank. He should know - he's a senior economist and managing director at Bear Stearns & Company.

The presentation will be this Wednesday, May 10th from 1:00 to 2:00 in the econ conference room (HW 1537)

Hope to see you there.

Graduate Classes for the Fall

From Prof. Filer:

Here is the schedule for the fall. The college should post it officially including course registration codes soon. Please see the end of the e-mail for important registration instructions.

Eco 701 Microeconomic Theory Tuesday 17:30 - 19:20 Professor Baker

Professor Baker is a new full-time hire. He is currently teaching at the U.S. Naval Academy. You can see his web page at: http://www.usna.edu/Users/econ/mbaker/


Eco 721 Economic Statistics

Section 1 Thursday 17:30 - 19:20 Professor Deb

Section 2 Wednesday 17:30 - 19:20 Professor Williams

Professor Williams is a full-time member of the Math and Statistics Department. He is a former senior official at the Gallop Poll.

Eco 724 Microeconometrics Monday 19:30 - 21:20 Professor Colman

Professor Colman has a Ph.D. from the CUNY Graduate Center and is currently a full-time faculty member at Pace University. His overall rating on Rate My Professors is 4.1

Eco 735 Urban Economics Monday 17:30 - 19:20 Professor Treffeisen

Professor Treffeisen has a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley and currently works for the New York City Independent Budget Office. He has previously been a full-time faculty member at the European University Institute in Florence and the University of Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona.

Eco 740 International Economics Tuesday 19:30 - 21:20 Professor Conning

Eco 760 Financial Economics Thursday 19:30 - 21:20 Professor Kearney

Professor Kearney has a Ph.D. from the CUNY Graduate Center and currently works at Bear Stearns. Two of you have rated his class this semester at Rate My Professors, with an average of 5.0.

Eco 765 Game Theory and Information Wednesday 19:30 - 21:45 Professor Shay

Professor Shay is a full-time member of the Math and Statistics Department.

IMPORTANT RULES AND PROCEDURES

1. All courses require permission of the graduate Advisor (me!). Permissions will be entered in batches on a first come - first served basis.
2. To request permission to register for a course, you MUST send me an e-mail at rfiler@hunter.cuny.edu and include your ID number. I am happy to discuss your program with you during office hours (or anytime I am in the department) but only e-mailed requests for registration permission WITH ID NUMBERS will be processed.
3. Given that we are offering more courses than we normally do, registration limits will be strictly enforced. Do not go by what you see on E-SIMS. I will have the official count of permissions given. If the class is full, you will be put on a waiting list in the order your request was received.
4. All students who have not registered for requested classes by August 15th will have their permissions REVOKED so that places may be opened for those on the waiting list and non-matriculated students This is a new procedure required by the fact that some of you requested seats for popular classes this spring and then did not register, resulting in some of your colleagues being denied places.

As always, the blog will have the required texts posted before classes begin. Stay tuned in. Same bat time, same bat channel.

Employment Opportunity

Hello everyone,

Prof. Filer circulated an e-mail announcing job openings for a firm where two of our graduate alumni hold positions. Here is the firm's self-description:

"o3 Technology Solutions LLC, provides a competitive edge for many of the most demanding and influential financial institutions by delivering pragmatic domain and technology consulting expertise in support of derivative trading, risk management and capital market solutions from the leading application vendors."

It sounds IT-intensive, but they are looking for soon-to-be MA grads. The e-mail is too lengthy to post, but if you did not receive the initial correspondence, let me know, and I'll forward it to you.

Tavneet Suri talk moved to May 1

From Profs. Conning and Nyman:

Dear Everyone,

Change of schedule: We have moved Tavneet Suri's brown bag seminar to
Monday May 1. Therefore there will be NO SEMINAR ON MONDAY April 24th as
previously announced.

The talk details are now as follows:

MONDAY MAY 1 at 11:30AM-1PM
Tavneet Suri (Yale/MIT Sloan)
"Selection and Comparative Advantage in Technology Adoption"

Papers and schedule at: http://urban.hunter.cuny.edu/RePEc/seminar/

Jonathan and Ingmar

Project Help Group Update

***UPDATE***- I will not be in on Wednesday at all, or Thursday until the evening, as I'm a bit under the weather; however, someone will be there to unlock the TA lounge both days, and the snacks, soda, and tea are still there.

The Project Help Groups will be meeting from 10-5 monday, and approximately 10am-8pm the other days (It may thin out as it gets later, but I will stay to try to help those people who work during the day). We have scheduled the conference room starting at 9am all 5 days, but it takes me two hours to get there, so all I can promise is that I will be there to unlock it between 9-10am.

Other notes:
The group is for people who are having technical problems, e.g. "is this a good instrument," "do I need this dummy variable,""I have holes in my data about energy usage in some countries," "I'm having issues with stat-transfer,""I'm not sure if running the regression this way is testing for exactly what I'm trying to test for," etc..

BRING YOUR STUDENT ID- While we have reserved the room, security may be checking student IDs on the way in. Also be aware that the bookstore has shortened hours and the cafeteria is closed. (There will only be snack foods and soda at the conference room).

When you show up for the group, you should have most of your data... this means you should understand your hypothesis thoroughly, and have at least a ballpark estimate of what variables you will need. If there is some data you know you need, but are having difficulty actually finding it, we will be glad to try to help. Nobody expects you to be done with your project, and everyone expects that at some point you will probably discover a need to add some additional variables to cut down or get rid of endogenaity in your u term. Due to everyone elses high workload, please do not come unprepared, very few people, if any, will have the time to actually read your entire proposal, and of those, nobody will have the time to tell you with any degree of precision exactly how you should go about executing your entire proposal (which is something that should be in your proposal anyway). I apologize if this seems brusque, but I've received several requests for help over the last two days that indicate at least a few of you who are planning on going to these sessions need to first see Professor Deb about your final proposal as laid out in homework 3.

MA Internship Opportunity

Please e-mail Prof. Filer with your resume if you're interested:

The Human Development Report Office (HDRO) of the United Nations Development programme (UNDP) is hiring for a short-term, part-time position. As one of its outputs HDRO produces the Human Development Report, UNDP's flagship publication and one of most read reports from the UN system. The statistical tables published in the Report are one of the visible parts and the information in them is carefully verified.The position involves taking part in this verification process, checking the statistical tables and other materials against source material. The position requires meticulous attention to detail, the ability to take initiative and work independently, as well as solid understanding of development statistics. Preferably, the candidate has done some coursework in statistics or economics.The position is part-time (10-20 hours per week, flexible hours) for two to three months beginning mid-April.

A Few More Tips

I've gotten a few questions about how to use it, so here goes:

The new CIA world factbook for 2006 is out and available (in zip file)at
http://www2.cia.gov/factbook2006.zip

You can obtain 2002-2005 versions simply by using www2.cia.gov/factbook(yearyouwant).zip

When you do a search from the index of any of the downloaded factbooks, it automatically takes you (via the internet) to the 2006 data. If what you are looking for is field data (e.g. population by country, or GDP by country), simply look at the four digit field ID, go to wherever your copy is stored locally, go into the fields folder, and open the file with the matching ID number. Remember to read notations in the fields, especially with regard to your 2006 numbers, be sure to use the GDP measured in PPP if you are comparing with previous years measured in PPP unless you've done the legwork and are converting everything into OER. Also, be careful when copy-pasting entire fields, countries come and go, and sometimes change names. I don't know if this applies to anyone here, but also keep an eye out (depending on how far back your data goes) with regard to the population and economy of Hong Kong and Taiwan with relation to their inclusion in statistics for China.

Monday April 10, Economics Seminar on Civil Conflict in Nepal

From Professor Jonathan Conning:

Hi everyone,

This is just a reminder, Monday's talk by Karen Macours should be interesting to anybody interested in development and political economy, and given how Nepal has been in the news lately, it's a timely topic:

Karen Macours from Johns Hopkins/SAIS, Washington DC

http://urban.hunter.cuny.edu/RePEc/seminar/Nepal_civilconflict_apr606.pdf

Abstract:

This paper investigates the relationship between relative deprivation and the escalation of the civil conflict in Nepal. Poverty in Nepal increased substantially between 1995 and 2003, which seems puzzling given the political instability and the rise and strengthening of the insurgency. We hypothesize that increasing differences in welfare among different groups - i.e., relative deprivation as opposed to absolute deprivation - can help explain this puzzle. The hypothesis is tested with data from 2 national-representative household surveys, matched with information regarding mass abductions by the Maoists, obtained from an extensive search of newspaper articles. The identification strategy relies on the fact that the months following finalization of the second round of data collection were characterized by a strengthening of the insurgency and a geographical escalation of the conflict. The paper shows that households with relatively large land holdings have gained disproportionally from recent growth, resulting in relative deprivation of the (near) landless. Recruiting by Maoists through abduction of young people is found to be more important in districts where inequality between the landed and the landless had increased.

As usual the seminar schedule is at: http://urban.hunter.cuny.edu/RePEc/seminar/

Thanks

Hunter now has access to the Social Sciences Citation Index

Here's how to access it:

1. Go to the Hunter library website, and select Databases.
2. Select the 'Web of Science' database.
   
3. Use your Hunter e-mail system ID to log-in.
4. Social Sciences is one of three indexes that you can choose to search
   

Keep in mind that Hunter has only paid for three people to be simultaneously logged-in to the database.

Project Working Sessions

I'm gauging interest in study groups from April 17-21 for working groups on 722 projects. While you will be working on your projects individually, some collaboration may be helpful if you have questions about what process would be best to accomplish, need help interpreting data, or if you just need another pair of eyes to look over what you are working on. Please contact me via email ( klord@hunter.cuny.edu ) if you are interested. I will be bringing extention cords and a couple of surge protectors so everyones laptop can keep running. Please include what days and hours would be best for you; even if you work during the day, I will do my best to make for some accomodations after regular working hours. Because the space in the conference room is limited, if there is high interest, some people may not be accomodated every day, but every reasonable effort will be made to ensure that everyone gets as much time as possible.

Reminders/FYI: You must have your data cited for HW3, please have the data downloaded to your laptop PRIOR to arriving at a collaborating session, failure to do so will result in slow bandwidth for everyone. Stat-Transfer is available at the social-sciences lab (where we meet), and some of your classmates have it, if you require use of stat-transfer, you should try your very best to utilize the lab, or your friends prior to the collaborating session, unless you are specifically having problems with hammering your data into shape.

Best of luck, and to those of you who actually take vacations, have a fun one,
Ken Lord

Monday Brownbag seminar

From Professor Jonathan Conning:

Hi All,

We are happy to announce that the Department's Monday Brown Bag Seminar Series is back up and running. The series starts this next Monday 27th with a talk by Randall Reback of Barnard on "Teaching to the Rating: School accountability and the Distribution of Student Achievement".

Talks will run from 11:30am - 1pm on Mondays in the Department Seminar room.

The other Monday talks for the semester are:

April 10 KAREN MACOURS (Johns Hopkins/SAIS)

"Relative Deprivation and Civil Conflict in Nepal"

April 24 TAVNEET SURI (Yale University)

"Selection and Comparative Advantage in Technology Adoption"

May 8 LENA EDLUND (Columbia University)

"Women, Wealth, and Mobility" (joint with Wojciech Kopczuk)

Papers and schedule always found at:

http://urban.hunter.cuny.edu/RePEc/seminar/

Hope to see you Monday.

Beers and Bellydancing (Nadav's doing the dancing, that is)

There are big things going on tonight:

First, we'll be giving some of our younger colleagues a crash course in 80's culture - the movie, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, will be shown in the econ conference room starting at 5:00 p.m. Chips, soda, and other things left over from the BA/MA information sessions will be available for consumption. Special thanks to Susree Chakraborty for unearthing this cinematic delight.

Second, it's time to take young Eric Mingione out on the town to celebrate his 23rd birthday. We'll be leaving Hunter to go grab some sushi, where his friends can show their appreciation for the hardest working student in the program.

Third -and not without a little bit sadness- the program's patron saint, Papa Seck, will be saying goodbye as he returns to Senegal. I encourage everyone to come out and give him a big send-off. His gathering will be at the Belgian Bar at 148 W. 4th Street, starting at 9 o'clock. I know I'm speaking for a lot of people when I say that he'll be deeply missed.

Oh yeah....and then we're going out to some of Aziz Kassim's favorite places (hence the title). Lana & Lana is expected to join us.

Macro class recordings available

Thanks to Eric, audio recordings for all of the Macro classes are now available online, and will only be available up until the exam on Monday.

To access the recordings, go to this link.

Second Annual Hayek Lecture at the CUNY Grad Center

This looks interesting. Special thanks to Profs. Thurston and Filer for keeping the Hunter MA students in mind.

Hayek's Challenge
Presented by Bruce J. Caldwell
Rosenthal Professor of Economics, UNC - Greensboro

Thursday, April 7th in the Segal Theatre - 1st Floor, CUNY Grad Center
Starts at 4:30 with a reception to end at 6:30

Macro midterm study group

This Sunday, some of your fellow students will be gathering in the Economics Conference Room to study for the upcoming Macro midterm. Sivie has suggested 2:00 p.m. as the start time.

If you have any questions, e-mail Sivie.

Statalist submitters beware.....

Inside I know I'm just posting this for my own amusement. Below is an excerpt of a conversation thread taken from Statalist.

Jian Zhang submits a question:

Dear STATA users,
I have a question about making a table using STATA.
I couldn't figure out how to make it.
Hope that you could help me.
...then follows his question........

Here's the reply that he receives:

I can't speak for STATA. The program I know is called Stata [emphasis added by me]. Please read the StatalistFAQ before posting to be familiar with the advice given. Specific answers below.

Nick

These must be the FAQs he's referring to:

What is the correct way to pronounce ‘Stata’?

Stata is an invented word. Some pronounce it with a long a as in day (Stay-ta); some pronounce it with a short a as in flat (Sta-ta); and some pronounce it with a long a as in ah (Stah-ta). The correct English pronunciation must remain a mystery, except that personnel of StataCorp use the first of these. Some other languages have stricter rules on pronunciation that will determine this issue for speakers of those languages.

What is the correct way to write ‘Stata’?

Stata is an invented word, not an acronym, and should not appear with all letters capitalized: please write ‘Stata’, not ‘STATA’.

Fred's FAQ:

Are you kidding me?

The results are in.......or (egads! you nerds!)......

Here are the results of the survey given out in the Grad Macroeconomics and Econometrics classes:

Note: Preferences were indicated by respondents on a scale of 1 to 6 ( 1 being most desirable and 6 being least). Events are then listed by rank of preference from lowest to highest mean score.

n=31

(1) A PhD-level tutor
Mean score: 2.7

(2) Picnic in Central Park
Mean score: 2.9

(3) Dinner and Drinks at the end of the semester
Mean score: 3.3

(4) Bowling
Mean score: 3.7

(5) Six Flags Trip
Mean Score: 3.8

(6) Pool Party
Mean score: 4.6

Look to the blog within a few weeks - Eric and I will keep you posted about arranging for the tutor. Have questions about my methodology? We can discuss it over a couple of beers.

More data sources on the web

It looks like the mother lode. I tripped across it looking for income data by ZIP code.

http://www.ciser.cornell.edu/ASPs/datasource.asp

Corruption and Asymmetry of Information Resources

I know several of you are still having difficulty narrowing down your project ideas, for those of you considering either a focus on corruption and asymmetry of information, or focusing on a different field, and challenging prior assertions based on the effects of asymmetric information or graft, the following may be good resources for you.

http://transparency.org/policy_and_research/surveys_indices
http://www.corisweb.org/

Be mindful that when getting data about some of the places that have larger problems with corruption that the data acquired should be reviewed with some skepticism.

Best Regards,
Ken

Trade Statistics Sources

I know several of you have been thinking of doing papers on Trade and Development, while this is not my specialty, The following links may be beneficial to you if you've been having trouble finding general trade, finance, and development statistics. When using these, also keep in mind that if you just contact the appropriate UN office via email, they will direct you to the proper library, and most of the UN libraries, especially ESCAP have librarians that can help you locate the proper data sets for your purposes. UNCTAD keeps most of their publications in the front office (2 UN Plaza, 1120), but only in paper form. Remember to bring valid photo ID.

http://www.unctad.org/Templates/Page.asp?intItemID=1888&lang=1
http://unstats.un.org/unsd/ *

If you aren't familiar with nations that might come up in the course of your studies, or you have a suspicion there may be some social or political event behind a statistical abnormality, the CIA world factbook is a good place to start, and a handy tool that you might wish to have for a variety of other reasons. It can be found (and used online, or downloaded) at:

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

*COMTRADE will limit you to 1000 records unless you are using it from the UN Library, or you are a subscriber.

**Many of the PDF documents you can download online are unlocked, meaning you can copy/paste from them into the data editor of your choice, then convert them to stata, or if you find a way to do it efficiently, you can copy/paste directly into stata.

For those on the Eco 741 waiting list (Urgent)

From Prof. Filer:

I have been listing Econ 741 as CLOSED based on the number of registration permissions I entered. However, as of today not everyone who obtained permission has registered and there are students on the waiting list.

If you obtained permission for econ 741 and have not registered, you MUST either register or confirm your intention to do so by the end of the day TOMORROW (Wednesday). Otherwise your permission will be revoked. (If you have a permission and do not intend to use it, please let me know.)

If you have been denied permission due to the section being closed but are still interested in the class, please reconfirm your interest by the end of the day Wednesday.

Thank You

Randy Filer

Prof. Thurston's E-Res Website

It does require a password. If you need it, e-mail me.

http://queens.docutek.com/eres/coursepage.aspx?cid=295

ICPSR Link Added

For those of you looking for social/political survey data, a permanent link has been added for the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research in the righthand column of this page. New sources will be added as they become available.

Economics Department Seminars

The following presentations will be held from 11:30 to 1 in the Economics Department conference room (HW 1538 - on the 15th Floor). Please note that the dates for the talks range from January 30th to February 16th.

Shamena Anwar, Yale University - Monday, January 30, 2006 - Testing forStatistical Discrimination: Evidence from the Game Show Street smarts http://pantheon.yale.edu/~sya5/jobmarketpaper.pdf

Radha Iyengar, Princeton University, Wednesday, February 1, 2006 - Not Getting Their Due Process: An Evaluation of the Performance of Federal Indigent Defense Counsel http://www.princeton.edu/~riyengar/indigent_defense_v10.pdf

Gunjan Sharma, University of Maryland - Friday, February 3, 2006 -Competing or Collaborating Siblings? Industrial and Trade Policies in India http://glue.umd.edu/~gsharma/1Jan_GSharma_JMPaper.pdf

Henry Schneider, Yale University - Monday, February 6, 2006 - A FieldExperiment to Measure Agency Problems in Auto Repair
http://pantheon.yale.edu/~hss27/Henry%20Schneider%20-%20Auto%20Repair.pdf

Pascaline Dupas, Paris - Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - Relative Risksand the Market for Sex: Teenagers, Sugar Daddies, and HIV in Kenya
http://homepages.nyu.edu/~pd482/Dupas_RelativeRisks.pdf

Claudia Perez-Canals, Columbia University - Thursday, February 9, 2006 -What Explains the Widening Wage Gap? Outsourcing vs. Technology
http://www.columbia.edu/%7Ecc2069/CanalsJobMarket.pdf

Joyce Chen, Harvard University - Wednesday, February 15, 2006 -Identifying Non-Cooperative Behavior Among Spouses: Child Outcomes inMigrant-Sending Households
http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~chen20/papers/non-coop.pdf

Matthew Baker, USNA - Thursday, February 16, 2006 - Marriage,Specialization, and the Customary Gender Division of Labor
http://ideas.repec.org/p/usn/usnawp/1.html

A good example of IV usage

Apropos Prof. Deb's lecture tonight, I was reminded of an article I read over the break that demonstrated good usage of an instrumental variable (religious market density) to isolate the effect of religious participation on income. The link to Jonathan Gruber's paper is http://www.nber.org/papers/w11377. You can download the entire paper by submitting your Hunter e-mail address.

Note, I first learned of this paper through an 'Economics Focus' article in The Economist.

Also, in light of tonight's talk, I'd also like to encourage everyone who finds a good data source to send me an e-mail. We'll begin to compile these sources on the blog.

Required Texts for the Spring Semester

The following are the assigned texts for this Spring's classes. My thanks to all of the professors for their rapid replies.

Econ 703 - Macroeconomics Mondays 5:30 - 7:20 Professor Thurston
No required text. Instead, journal articles will be posted on a to-be-announced website

Econ 722 - Econometrics Thursdays 5:30 - 7:20 Professor Deb
Same books as last semester

Econ 710 - Monetary Theory Tuesdays 7:30 - 920 Professor Thapar
Walsh, Carl. Monetary Theory and Policy. ISBN: 0262232316

Econ 715 - Public Finance Mondays 7:30 - 9:20 Professor Balsam
Anderson, John. Public Finance. ISBN: 0618214496
Oxford University Press. Readings in Public Finance. ISBN: 0195669622
Kozol, Jonathan. Shame of the Nation. ISBN: 1400052440

Econ 730 - Development Economics Wednesdays 7:30 - 9:20 Professor Filer
Ray, Debraj. Development Economics. ISBN: 0691017069

Econ 741 - International Finance Thursdays 7:30 - 9:20 Professor Kearney
Krugman and Obstfeld. International Finance. ISBN: 0321293835

The ISBN links above go directly to the half.com website. This is one of the more popular websites, but I know some people have had issues with them in the past. I only include the links for convenience, not endorsement.

Two announcements

From Prof. Conning:

Hi all,

Just a reminder that this Thursday January 12th is the date of the Eco
701 exam. It will be held at 7:20pm in the usual room. The practice exam
offers a good model of what it might look like.

For those of you who are unable to make it this Thursday because you are traveling or other reasons, the college provides for a MAKEUP EXAM in early February (they set Feb 4-5, but I may make it somewhere around February 7th (you have to take one or the other, you cannot take both!)

I will honor either exam option and, if anything, I actually prefer to grade exams in February (since as it is I will have to grade the January exams on a plane on my way to Tanzania on Friday).

If you prefer the the February option, please email me. Per the instructions from the Dean, you would then be temporarily assigned an INComplete when I submit the other grades, until you makeup with a February exam.

I will try to hold office hours on Wednesday 2-3:30pm and will post confirmation to the website and Blackboard. Sorry I don't have time to write answers to the practice final. Hunter's 'urban' server, which hosts the class website was down, but hopefully it will be up again soon.

Regards,

Jonathan

Opportunity to earn some extra money:

An MA student is needed to proctor an exam this Thursday from 6:20 to 8:20. It is paid, but I don't know how much. Those interested can e-mail Prof. Honig at this address.

Hope everyone had a good holiday,
Fred

Help for Department

From Professor Filer:

Dear MA students:

The department needs to set up a conference call this afternoon to discuss potential new faculty members. Since Professors Deb and Sevak are in India and several others are also away, we would like to do this using Skype. Unfortunately, all the faculty who are experienced Skypers are among those who away. IS there anyone who could set up this call in the dept conference room on Wednesday? If you would be willing to help out, please contact Professor Chernick and me by e-mail ASAP.

Thanks and Happy New Year

Randy Filer