Overview and details of the sessions of this conference. Please select a date or location to show only sessions at that day or location. Please select a single session for detailed view (with abstracts and downloads if available).
Please note that all times are shown in the time zone of the conference. The current conference time is: 20th May 2024, 08:58:55pm SAST
UCT GSB Academic Conference Center
at Protea Hotel Cape Town Waterfront Breakwater Lodge
Presentations
An Index of Economic Activity by Race for the US Economy
Mboup, Fatima
Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, United States of America
In the US, we observe empirical differences between races across various macroeconomic
variables for the White, Black, Asian, and Hispanic US population. For instance,
the Black unemployment rate in the US is more often than not double than that of
White unemployment rate. In this paper, I treat nine macroeconomic variables as noisy
indicators of economic activity to estimate Economic Activity by Race (EAR) in the
US economy. The noise of the indicators motivates the use of Kalman Filter estimation
to extract a common component from the noisy indicator variables. My index suggests
that there are empirical differences between the Black and White economic activity in
the US, supporting the disparities found between races in racial stratification literature.
Further, my results suggest that an economic shock to White economic activity
is more persistent than an economic shock to Black, Asian, and Hispanic economic
activity due to more heterogeneous sensitivity to various measures of economic well
being.
Female Representation and Financial Inclusion in sub-Saharan Africa: The Role of Institutional Quality
Enchill, Gifty; Agbloyor, Elikplimi; Graham, Michael
University of Stellenbosch Business School
Abstract
This study examines the impact of female representation (Women in Parliament & Women Ministers) on financial inclusion and also accounts for the role of institutions in this relationship using a panel data of 33 sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries during the period 2000 – 2020. The study employs the system Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) technique and quantile regression models. Using a composite index of financial inclusion as well as individual financial inclusion indicators, the findings show that financial inclusion is negatively and significantly driven by female representation given their averages in SSA. Additionally, institutional quality is shown to positively and significantly enhance financial inclusion. However, female representation in conjunction with strong institutional structures drives financial inclusion positively and significantly. Finally, female representation is reported to influence financial inclusion across different economic settings. Based on these findings, this study suggests that governments in SSA should: first, design tailored quota compliance policies to boost the averages of female representation and also build capacity; second institutional structures policy frameworks should be benchmarked against better performing developing regions and also aligned against international best practices and third, integrate mobile money system into financial sectors in order to make it easier to on-board consumers into the formal financial institutions.
1UC Riverside, United States of America; 2Loyola Marymount University, United States of America; 3UC San Diego, United States of America; 4CSU Long Beach, United States of America
Today, computer scientists play a more important role in society and the economy than ever before. More students than ever apply for the computer science (CS) major. University and CS department policies have important implications for who has access to CS and who is able to persevere to degree completion. In this talk, we will present results from a NSF-funded study that examines applications, admissions, and persistence data for the CS major pipeline at one large university under an equity lens. Overall, we show that there are inequities across genders and race at every point in the trajectory toward the major–from applications, to admissions, to completion.
