Research

Research Interests

My primary line of research investigates the roles of values, beliefs and preferences in economic, political and social outcomes.  My work in this area considers the roles of language and climate in cultural development, and the role of individualism as a determinant of institutional quality, social policy formation, and economic development.  My work on happiness is primarily concerned with how happiness is influenced by social comparisons, with papers on social status, solidarity, and tunnel effects.

I have been fortunate to have worked with a variety of talented coauthors, including most recently my colleagues M. Fuat Sener and Stephen Schmidt at Union College, Anne Owen, Stephen Wu and Julio Videras of Hamilton College, and Mark Hopkins of Moody’s Analytics.

I have an abiding interest in undergraduate research and have coauthored a number of papers with my students, including Allison Frederick ’10, Jack Mara ’10, Matthew Knauss ’11, Emily LaCroix ’11, Faragis Abdurazokzoda ’14, and Megan Reynolds ’16.

Book

Associate Editor, Princeton Encyclopedia of the World Economy, 2 volumes, edited with R. S. Rajan, K. A. Reinert, and A. Glass, Princeton University Press, February 2009.

Economics of Culture

• “Open Borders for Business? Causes and Consequences of the Regulation of Foreign Entry,” with Claudia Williamson, Southern Economic Journal, forthcoming.
• “Gendered Language and the Educational Gender Gap,” with Megan Reynolds, Economics Letters 168, July 2018, 46-48.
  • Media Coverage:  WAMC’s Academic Minute, July 18, 2018.
• “Immigration and the Rise of the Far-Right Parties in Europe,” (with Sumit Deolo),  ifo DICE Report 15 (4), 2017, 10–15.
• “Culture and the Regulation of Entry,” with Claudia Williamson, Journal of Comparative Economics 44(4), Nov. 2016, 1055–1083.
• “Individual Responsibility and Economic Development: Evidence from Rainfall Data,” Kyklos 69(3), August 2016, 426-470.
  • Media Coverage:  WAMC’s Academic Minute, Nov. 17, 2016, and Marginal Revolution, Sept. 21, 2016.
  • Data:  Davis individual responsibility dataset 2016 (Excel)
• “Language, Culture and Institutions: Evidence from a New Linguistic Dataset,” with Farangis Abdurazokzoda, Journal of Comparative Economics 44(3), August 2016, 541-561.
  • Data:  country-level dataset (Excel) and country pair dataset (Excel)

•  “The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth: An Empirical Investigation,” (with Matthew Knauss) Journal of Socio-Economics 42, Feb. 2013, 43-50.

Working papers:

• “On the Origin of Religious Values,” June 2017.
• “Immigration and the Rise of the Political Right: The Role of Cultural and Economic Concerns Over Immigration,” with Sumit Deole, under review, April 2016.
• “Individualism and Gender Inequality,” with Claudia Williamson and Nabamita Duttta, in process.
• “What Do Religious Women Want?  Religion, Gender and Preferences over Employment,” with Jia Gao, in process.
• “Religion, Differential Trust and the Rule of Law:  Evidence from Rainfall Data,” in process.

Pedagogy and Economics of Education

• “Social Animal House:  The Economic and Academic Consequences of Fraternity Membership,” with Stephen Schmidt and Jack Mara, Contemporary Economic P0licy, forthcoming, 2017.
  • Media Coverage:  Bloomberg View, CNBC, Fox News, Mother Jones, Market Watch, National Affairs, and Real Clear Life, during late Sept. and early Oct. 2017.
• “How to Generate Good Profit Maximization Problems,” Journal of Economic Education 45(3), 183–190, July 2014 (Lead article.)
•  “National Policies, State Response and Community College Outcomes: Testing an Augmented Bennett Hypothesis,” (with Allison Frederick and Steven Schmidt) Economics of Education Review 31, Dec. 2012, 908-917.
•  “Teaching the Economics of Sin” Teaching Ethics 9(2), Spring 2009, 51-58. (Invited article.  Special Issue: Everyday Ethics at Union College.)

Social Status

• “Growth, Inequality and Tunnel Effects:  A Formal Model,” Journal of Happiness Studies, forthcoming.
• “Social Comparisons and Life Satisfaction across Racial and Ethnic Groups: The Effects of Status, Information and Solidarity,” (with Stephen Wu) Social Indicators Research 117, July 2014, pp. 849-869.
  • Media Coverage:   WAMC’s Academic Minute, National Public Ratio, Dec. 2, 2015.
• “Political Economy of Taxation and Growth with a Taste for Status,” under review.

Working papers:

• “The Taste for Status in International Comparison,” with Stephen Wu, in preparation.

Institutions and Economic Growth

•  “Private Patent Enforcement in the Theory of Schumpeterian Growth,” (with Fuat Sener) European Economic Review 56(7), Oct. 2012, 1446-1460.
•  “Intellectual Property Rights, Institutional Quality and Economic Growth” (with Fuat Sener) Journal of International Commerce, Economics and Policy 3(1), 2012, 1240005.  (Invited Article) 
•  “Legal Origin and the Evolution of Environmental Quality,” (with Emily LaCroix) Economics Bulletin 31(4), Oct. 2011, 2968-2974.
•  “Institutional Foundations of Inequality and Growth,” (with Mark Hopkins) Journal of Development Studies 47(7), July 2011, 977–997.
•  “Institutional Flexibility and Economic Growth,” Journal of Comparative Economics 38 (3), September 2010, 306–320.
•  “Do All Countries Follow the Same Growth Process?” (with Ann Owen and Julio Videras) Journal of Economic Growth 14(4), December 2009, 265-286.  (Lead article)
• “Development” In: Reinert and Rajan (Eds.) Princeton Encyclopedia of the World Economy, 2 volumes, Princeton University Press, 2009.
• “Scale Effects in Growth Theory:  A Role for Institutions,” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 66(2), May 2008, 403-419.
• “Technological Progress, Economic Growth.” In:  Darity, William A. (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences.  Farmington Hills, MI:  Macmillan Reference USA.  2008.
• “Development Economics” In: Darity, William A. (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences.  Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA.  2008.
•  “Explaining the Evidence on Inequality and Growth: Informality and Redistribution,” The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics 7(1), (Contributions), Article 7, 2007.
• “Market Transaction Costs in Industrialization and Demographic Transition,” Pacific Economic Review 12(1), Special Section on the Economics of Endogenous Specialization, February 2007, 79-99.  (Invited article)
• “Growing Apart: The Division of Labor and the Breakdown of Informal Institutions,” Journal of Comparative Economics 34(1), March 2006, 75-91.
• “Trade, Growth and Uneven Development: A Critical Survey,” (with William Darity, Jr.) Cambridge Journal of Economics 29(1), January 2005, 141-170. (Invited article)
• “Toward a Unified Transaction Cost Theory of Economic Organization,” Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics159(3), September 2003, 571-93
• “Does the Market Recognize IT-Enabled Competitive Advantage?” (with Bruce Dehning and Theophanis Stratopoulos),Information and Management 40(7), August 2003, 705‑716.
• “The Division of Labor and the Growth of Government,” Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control 27(7), May 2003, 1217-1235.

Working papers:

• “Is Justice Blind?  Evidence from Federal Corruption Convictions,” with KR White, in process.