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291. Banking the Mexican Immigrant Population: Analysis of Profiling Variables

Author:
Paulina Ennis
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for Latin American and Iberian Studies at Columbia University
Abstract:
The aim of this thesis is to provide actionable recommendations for banks to target the Mexican immigrant market. To achieve this, I analyze survey data collected from the Mexican immigrant population to amplify a subject commonly seen from a sociological viewpoint – the immigrants' use of bank accounts with the objective of accumulating money to send home. Specifically, the objective of this paper is to answer the following questions: Does having a bank account entail larger amounts of savings sent to Mexico at the end of the migration spell? What is the profile of a bank account user within the Mexican migrant population? What does this mean in terms of targeting the Mexican migrant market?
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Migration
Political Geography:
Latin America and Mexico

292. Challenges and Realities of Water Management of Megacities: The Case of Mexico City Metropolitan Area

Author:
Cecilia Tortajada
Publication Date:
10-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University
Abstract:
Megacities—characterized as metropolitan areas of 10 million or more inhabitants—have become an important focus in terms of water provisions, sanitation services and the related impact of urban development on natural resources. While basic needs of residents of smaller cities are very similar, the emphasis placed on mega cities lies in the fact that these massive urban conglomerates have grown to almost unmanageable dimensions. This, in turn, has made water provision and sanitation services to the entire population a bleak, if not unachievable, task. In most megacities of the developing world, clean water is both scarce and expensive to produce. Large sectors of the population in such densely populated urban areas do not have access to potable water, and even larger sectors of the population do not have access to sanitation. Non-revenue water—water that is produced and enters the distribution system but that is never billed to consumers because it is lost due to leakages or illegal connections—is up to 30 to 40 percent. Infrastructure is either scarce, becoming complex or deteriorating. In addition, water supplies are largely underpriced and necessary investments are estimated to reach billions of dollars. However, as complex as these matters are, the real challenges in terms of water provision point in another direction. The main problem in urban concentrations, which is further heightened in megacities, is the lack of appropriate management, adequate institutions and sustainable planning to address these challenges beyond short-term approaches.
Topic:
Water
Political Geography:
Mexico

293. Citizenship in the Making

Author:
Gustavo Gordillo
Publication Date:
06-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
A retrospective analysis of the legality of the 2006 election and Lopez Obrador's presidency in Mexico.
Topic:
Civil Society, Globalization, Government, and International Affairs
Political Geography:
Mexico

294. Nafta toward a Common Currency: An Economic Feasibility Study

Author:
Kelly Hugger
Publication Date:
07-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Department of Economics and Business, Colorado College
Abstract:
The recent emergence of the Euro, combined with the completion of a decade of North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has sparked interest in adopting a common currency for North America. This study examines the likelihood that Canada, Mexico, and the United States will adopt a common currency under fixed exchange rate regimes. The benefits and costs of a common currency are explored using the theory of optimum currency areas (OCA). Empirical research focuses on several variables including intra-regional and intra-industry trade, trade openness, gross domestic product, inflation rates, interest rates, economic growth rates, business cycle synchronization, factor mobility, fiscal policy and monetary policy coordination. The analysis also presents a comparative analysis of NAFTA with Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) nations on different economic criteria. Finally, correlation and regression analysis further explores the likelihood that members of NAFTA will economically integrate. Though this research concludes that it is economically feasible for NAFTA members to move towards a common currency, this venture depends on the political readiness of the nations.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance, Regional Cooperation, Treaties and Agreements, and Monetary Policy
Political Geography:
United States, Canada, North America, and Mexico

295. Book Review: Kenneth F. Greene, Why Dominant Parties Lose: Mexico's Democratization in Comparative Perspective

Author:
Jorge I. Domínguez
Publication Date:
09-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
How do dominant parties win in hybrid political regimes, that is, authoritarian regimes that permit significant political competition? Why do they ever lose? Mexico and Taiwan had, and Singapore and Malaysia still do, long-lived and comparatively low-repression political systems featuring elections free enough that opposition parties form and seriously contest the incumbents.
Political Geography:
Malaysia, Taiwan, Mexico, and Singapore

296. Pathways to Prosperity in the Americas

Author:
Donna E. Shalala, Ph.D. and Charles E. Cobb
Publication Date:
09-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Council of American Ambassadors
Abstract:
It is critical that Florida and the United States provide bipartisan support for the 12 Western Hemisphere countries that have formed the alliance called "Pathways to Prosperity in the Americas." These 12 countries that previously have negotiated trade agreements are: Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Peru and the United States.
Political Geography:
United States, America, Canada, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Honduras, Costa Rica, Chile, Peru, Guatemala, Florida, El Salvador, and Panama

297. Can America Still Lead in the Global Economy?

Author:
Lael Brainard and David Lipton
Publication Date:
08-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
From the vantage point of 2008, some of the most memorable initiatives of U.S. international economic leadership—the Paris and Louvre Accords, the support for Poland and Russia after the fall of communism, the Uruguay Round, and the Mexican Financing Loan—seem like quaint reminders of a simpler time. In the coming years, the exercise of international economic leadership will surely prove more complex than in the past. The very success of the American vision of a global spread of vibrant and competitive markets has created a huge, rapidly integrating private economy of trade and finance much less amenable to guidance, let alone control, by governments. Unlike in diplomacy and defense, where non state actors are growing in importance but still a side show, in inter- national economics, households, corporations, labor unions, and non-profits are now the dominant players in most parts of the world. While they respond to national laws and policies, their interests are varied and their operations often span borders.
Topic:
Economics, International Political Economy, International Trade and Finance, and Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Paris, Poland, Uruguay, and Mexico

298. Emerging Market Business Cycles with Remittance Fluctuations

Author:
Ceyhun Bora Durdu and Serdar Sayan
Publication Date:
09-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Abstract:
This paper analyzes the implications of remittance fluctuations for various macroeconomic variables and Sudden Stops. The paper employs a quantitative two-sector model of a small open economy with financial frictions calibrated to Mexican and Turkish economies, two major recipients, whose remittance receipts feature opposite cyclical characteristics. We find that remittances dampen the business cycles in Mexico, whereas they amplify the cycles in Turkey. Their quantitative effects in the long run, approximated by the stochastic steady state are mild. In the short run, however, remittances have quantitatively large impacts on the economy, when the economy is borrowing constrained. This is because agents in the economy cannot adjust their precautionary wealth to sudden tightening in credit, hence, fluctuations in remittances get magnified through an endogenous debt-deflation mechanism. Our findings suggest that procyclical (or countercyclical) remittances can play a significant deepening (or mitigating) role for Sudden Stops.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, and Credit
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, Asia, North America, and Mexico

299. The Implications of Service Offshoring for Metropolitan Economies

Author:
Howard Wial and Robert Atkinson
Publication Date:
02-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
In the months running up to the 2004 election the issue of off- shoring—the movement of jobs from the United States to other nations—seemed to be on the front pages of newspapers every day. Some of the concern was about the loss of manufacturing jobs to lower-wage countries such as China and Mexico, a process that had been going on for decades. The offshoring of service jobs, though, was something new. Service workers—including college- educated professionals—who previously thought their jobs immune to foreign competition began to worry about this new source of job in security. Policymakers concerned about the American standard of living wondered whether service offshoring would eliminate the United States' advantage in high technology industries.
Topic:
Demographics, Economics, Government, and Poverty
Political Geography:
United States, China, and Mexico

300. Creating Competition: Patronage Politics and the PRI's Demise

Author:
Kenneth F. Greene
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Why do dominant parties persist in power for decades and under what conditions do challengers expand enough to beat them at the polls, thus transforming these systems into fully competitive democracies with turnover? Unlike in one - party regimes, the world's sixteen dominant party systems feature meaningful electoral competition; however, dominant parties have persisted despite enough social cleavages, permissive electoral institutions, negative retrospective evaluations of the incumbent's performance, and sufficient ideological space for challengers to occupy. I craft a resource theory of single - dominance that focuses on the incumbent's ability to divert public resources for partisan use. Using formal theory, I show how asymmetric resources and costs of participation force challengers to form as non - centrist and under - competitive parties. Only when these asymmetries decline do opposition parties expand. I test the theory's predictions using survey data of party elites in Mexico. I also extend the argument to Malaysia and Italy using aggregate data.
Topic:
Corruption, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe, Malaysia, Asia, Italy, and Mexico