You could find my research projects on this page.
Effects of Political Affiliation on Firm Investment Behavior:
Evidence from an Election Upheaval in Turkey
Job Market Paper in Political Economy, Applied Microeconomics, Data Collection Method
Abstract:
This paper investigates the impact of political affiliation on firms’ investment decisions and market performance, focusing on Turkey between 1998-2008 which includes major 2002 elections. Using a novel dataset collected through scraping stock market yearbooks to bring firm-level investment data and a unique method for identifying political connections via Google searches of board members’ ties to Businessman Associations, the study explores how political alignment affect firms’ investment decisions based on their market capitalization within their sector.
Key findings reveal that large firms tend to initiate investment projects after losing political connections, while smaller firms are more likely to invest when politically aligned with the government. Additionally, political alignment boosts stock market returns, and firms adjust their board composition to strengthen political ties, especially when new firms enter the stock market in their sector.
Skills:
- Quasi-Experiment Design
- Document scraping on Python
- Web scraping with changing IPs in Python
- Panel Data analysis for Causal Inference
- Event study
- Random Forest
- Data Analysis, Cleaning, and Visualization on R-tidyverse
Competing Politically Connectible Firms:
A Quantitative Analysis of Endogenous Innovation and Corruption
3rd Year Paper in Endogenous Growth, Macro Theory, Political Economy, Computational Economics
Abstract:
In this paper, I propose a model of endogenous innovation and political connection of competing firms trying to get monopoly rents in an environment of exogenous political competition. The model endogenizes the TFP growth, corruption through political connections, R&D intensity, and steady-state probabilities of firms’ relative positions dependent on exogenous political parameters. The model results match the documented facts in the politically connected firms literature and give insights into the dynamics of corruption and innovation between competing politically connectable firms.
Skills:
- Economic Modeling
- Endogenous Growth Theory
- Quantitative Analysis
- Scientific Computation on Python
- Dynamic Programming