Deliverable 6 – Kingston-Bryce FAQ

/in /by

Scenario

As a Project Manager for Kingston-Bryce Limited you have been assigned to create a Frequently Asked Questionnaire (FAQ) document on the methodologies used in project management. Now that the acquisition is almost dine, the Board of Directors for Kingston-Bryce Limited (KBL) wants to document some of the project methodologies and tools for future projects.

Instructions

You will develop a project management methodologies and tools FAQ document in Microsoft Word or Excel that evaluates:

  • various tools used in project management
  • methodologies used in project management

An FAQ document typically provides brief and clear information regarding the subject in question and answer format.

Requirements:

  1. You will include a total of 8 to 12 FAQs in your document.
  2. The FAQ document should give the Board of Directors enough information to understand the various tools and methodologies used in project management.
  3. Make sure to use audience-specific language and professional tone throughout the document.
  4. Clear organization, APA formatting for the references list, and proper grammar, punctuation, and FAQ formatting are required.

Your FAQ should contain a title and a list of questions and answers. They do not need to be numbered, but you should apply formatting to make the questions stand apart.

Applied Econometrics

/in /by

Economics 430–Applied Econometrics

Homework #3 (100 Points)

Instructions: Please answer all of the following questions as best as possible in

groups up to 3 students. If you have any questions please see me immediately. The point

value for each question is in parentheses. This assignment is due March 19th at the

beginning of the class.

1. Are rents influenced by the student population in a college town? Let rent be the

average monthly rent paid on rental units in a college town in the United States. Let

pop denote the total city population, avginc the average city income, and pctstu the

student population as a percentage of the total population. The model is:

log(rent) = β0 + β1log(pop) + β2log(avginc) + β3pctstu+ u. (1)

(a) (5) State the null hypothesis that the size of the student body relative to the

population has no ceteris paribus effect on monthly rents. State the alternative

that there is an effect.

(b) (5) What signs do you expect for β1 and β2? Why?

The estimated equation is:

̂log(rent) = 0.043 (0.844)

+ 0.066 (0.039)

log(pop) + 0.507 (0.081)

log(avginc) + 0.0056 (0.0017)

pctstu

n = 64, R2 = 0.458

(c) (5) What is wrong with the statement: “A 10% increase in population is asso-

ciated with about a 6.6% increase in rent”?

(d) (5) Using the traditional approach, test the hypothesis stated in question (a) at

the 1% level.

(e) (5) Does pctstu have a statistically significant effect on rent?

(f) (10) Test the statistical significance of log(avginc) at the 5% significance level,

by constructing a 95% confidence interval. What do you conclude?

1

 

 

2. Use the data set named DISCRIM to answer this question about discrimination.

There are ZIP-code level data on prices for various items at fast-food restaurants.

The idea is to see whether fast-food restaurants charge higher prices in areas with

larger concentration of blacks. psoda is the price of medium soda, prpblck is the

proportion black, income is the median family income, prppov is the proportion of

population in poverty.

(a) (10) Use OLS to estimate the model

log(psoda) = β0 + β1prpblck + β2log(income) + β3prppov + u, (2)

and report the results in the usual form.

(b) (10) Is β̂1 statistically different from zero at the 5% level against the two-sided

alternative?

(c) (5) What about at the 1% level?

(d) (10) What is the correlation between log(income) and prppov? Is each variable

statistically significant in any case? (use the p-value and compare it to the

significance level to answer this question). Report the two-sided p-values.

(e) (10) To the regression in part (a), add the variable log(hseval), median hous-

ing value. Interpret its coefficient and report the two-sided p-value for H0 :

βlog(hseval) = 0.

(f) (5) In the regression in part (e), what happens to the individual statistical

significance of log(income) and prppov?

(g) (15) In the regression estimated in part (e), are log(income) and prppov jointly

significant at any level, 1%, 5% or 10%? To answer this question, calculate

the F statistic using R2 for the unrestricted and restricted model and use the

rejection rule.

2

Why is the study of economics an important part of social science?

/in /by

Chapter 1and 2

Q1. Why is the study of economics an important part of social science? Give an example from the real world.

Q2. If the real wage rate (adjusted for inflation) declines for jobs for high school graduates, would the true opportunity cost of attending college or spending for higher education decline? Give an example.

Q3. How do you measure the efficiency of resource allocation? Give an example from a real-world application of measuring the efficiency of resource allocation

Q4)

 

Q5. Define and describe the concept of opportunity cost with an example. What would be your opportunity cost for taking online classes to get a degree at the University of Massachusetts Boston (UMB) compared to taking traditional face-to-face classes at UMB or elsewhere? Provide examples in your answers.

Q6. Draw a supply-demand diagram of the market for rental apartments in Boston in the neighborhoods surrounding UMB. Illustrate the effect on monthly rents because of increased public funding from the State of Massachusetts and a simultaneous increase in enrollment capacity for freshman year admission by the university with no increase in tuition and fees. Explain your hypothetically drawn diagram in your own words.

Q7. Suppose the geopolitical tension in the Arab states in the Middle East and Persian Gulf region has severely disrupted oil exports to the United States. Illustrate and explain in your own words the effect on the price of natural gas and the quantity demanded equal to the quantity supplied in the US market because of this decline in the supply of petroleum (fossil fuel) from the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. Hint: please assume that petroleum and natural gas are substitutes.

Q8. Suppose the government passed a new legislation for stricter safety and fuel efficiency conditions on the manufacture of new automobiles. Draw a demand and supply diagram and then illustrate and briefly explain the effect of such legislation on the equilibrium price and the quantity of newly manufactured vehicles vis-à-vis the market for used vehicles (draw two different diagrams for new and used vehicles).

Q9. Suppose the ticket prices for next year’s Super Bowl were announced a year ahead at a range from $1,000 to $25,000, with rates in between for all categories of seats for the stadium. Without any prior information regarding what teams will play, briefly explain why these price ranges do not reflect the true market price of Super Bowl tickets. Do you expect to see the actual market prices much higher, lower, or exactly the same? Why?

Q10. Ed Sheeran, a British pop and rock singer, was scheduled to perform a concert on September 14, 2018, at 7 p.m. at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Massachusetts. The ticket price ranges are from $62 to $8,668. Based on your knowledge of the D and S model for the music entertainment market, briefly explain whether these price ranges truly reflect the market prices. Why or why not?

 

Chapter 3 and 4

Q1. While defining the concept of market efficiency, briefly describe the theoretical basis for measuring efficiency under a perfectly competitive market.

Q2. What are the sources of market failure? Provide a real-world example.

Q3. What is the rationale for government intervention in economic and market activities?

Q4. Briefly describe the causes of the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Q5. What is Keynesian economics? How did it combat the Great Depression of the 1930s?

Q6. Based on the concepts of the law of demand and the law of supply in microeconomics, explain the difference between changes in quantity demanded (and/or changes in quantity supplied) and changes in demand (and/or changes in supply). Provide a real-world example and draw a graph. Provide an explanation for the graph. No specific data is required for drawing the graph.

Q7. How do you distinguish between the concepts of the D and S functions in microeconomics and the concepts of the AD and AS functions in macroeconomics? Why they are different?

Q8. Briefly explain how the problem with information asymmetry caused the financial collapse on Wall Street and financial trouble in the health-care service industry. Provide an example for each of these cases.

Q9. From your own real-life experience, provide an example of adverse selection and its possible moral hazard. How would it be possible to avoid or at least minimize the problem of adverse selection and moral hazard?

Q10. Make a list of the pros and cons of the individual mandate of Obamacare.

The role that technology and data play in the policy

/in /by

The Invisible Hand Can Park Your Car

In many cities, finding an available parking spot on the street seems about as likely as winning the lottery. But if local governments relied more on the price system, they might be able to achieve a more efficient allocation of this scarce resource.

A Meter So Expensive, It Creates Parking Spots

By Michael Cooper and Jo Craven McGinty

San Francisco—The maddening quest for street parking is not just a tribulation for drivers, but a trial for cities. As much as a third of the traffic in some areas has been attributed to drivers circling as they hunt for spaces. The wearying tradition takes a toll in lost time, polluted air and, when drivers despair, double-parked cars that clog traffic even more.

But San Francisco is trying to shorten the hunt with an ambitious experiment that aims to make sure that there is always at least one empty parking spot available on every block that has meters. The program, which uses new technology and the law of supply and demand, raises the price of parking on the city’s most crowded blocks and lowers it on its emptiest blocks. While the new prices are still being phased in—the most expensive spots have risen to $4.50 an hour, but could reach $6—preliminary data suggests that the change may be having a positive effect in some areas.

Change can already be seen on a stretch of Drumm Street downtown near the Embarcadero and the popular restaurants at the Ferry Building. Last summer it was nearly impossible to find spots there. But after the city gradually raised the price of parking to $4.50 an hour from $3.50, high-tech sensors embedded in the street showed that spots were available a little more often—leaving a welcome space the other day for the silver Toyota Corolla driven by Victor Chew, a salesman for a commercial dishwasher company who frequently parks in the area.

“There are more spots available now,” said Mr. Chew, 48. “Now I don’t have to walk half a mile.”

San Francisco’s parking experiment is the latest major attempt to improve the uneasy relationship between cities and the internal combustion engine—a century-long saga that has seen cities build highways and tear them down, widen streets and narrow them, and make more parking available at some times and discourage it at others, all to try to make their downtowns accessible but not too congested.

The program here is being closely watched by cities around the country. With the help of a federal grant, San Francisco installed parking sensors and new meters at roughly a quarter of its 26,800 metered spots to track when and where cars are parked. And beginning last summer, the city began tweaking its prices every two months—giving it the option of raising them 25 cents an hour, or lowering them by as much as 50 cents—in the hope of leaving each block with at least one available spot. The city also has cut prices at many of the garages and parking lots it manages, to lure cars off the street….

The program is the biggest test yet of the theories of Donald Shoup, a professor of urban planning at the University of California, Los Angeles. His 2005 book, “The High Cost of Free Parking,” made him something of a cult figure to city planners—a Facebook group, The Shoupistas, has more than a thousand members. “I think the basic idea is that we will see a lot of benefits if we get the price of curbside parking right, which is the lowest price a city can charge and still have one or two vacant spaces available on every block,” he said.

But raising prices is rarely popular. A chapter in Mr. Shoup’s book opens with a quote from George Costanza, the “Seinfeld” character: “My father didn’t pay for parking, my mother, my brother, nobody. It’s like going to a prostitute. Why should I pay when, if I apply myself, maybe I can get it for free?” Some San Francisco neighborhoods recently objected to a proposal to install meters on streets where parking is now free. And raising prices in the most desirable areas raises concerns that it will make them less accessible to the poor.