Economy
The Maui County Comprehensive Affordable Housing Plan: Understanding its Pros and Cons and Ideas for How to Improve it
By Carl Bonham and Sumner La Croix A team of 19 planners, engineers, data and policy analysts, attorneys, and community development professionals has developed a comprehensive plan for the development of affordable housing in Maui County. The Maui County Comprehensive Affordable Housing Plan is a major step forward in developing coherent strategies to address Maui […]
Read MoreUHERO Annual Report: Response to COVID-19
By the end of 2020, The University of Hawai‘i Economic Research Organization (UHERO) received $1.2 million in private support to fund critical economic research, and help Hawai‘i on the path to recovery. Donors include HCF, Bank of Hawai‘i Foundation, Kamehameha Schools, First Hawaiian Bank Foundation, DGM Group, Hawaiian Electric Industries Charitable Foundation, Hawai‘i Medical Service […]
Read MoreHawaii Needs to Focus on Developing Good Governance in Managing Tourism
By Paul Brewbaker, Frank Haas, and James Mak In order to develop and apply policies for tourism in destinations, there is usually a requirement for knowledge, thought, the application of power, resources and rules, and also coordination and cooperation among numerous actors. Together, these are the key features of governance. Bill BramwellSheffield Hallem UniversityUK At the […]
Read MoreThe Efficacy of Hawaii COVID-19 Business Mandates
By Ruben Juarez, Alika Maunakea, May Okihiro, and Carl Bonham Despite the national attention around COVID-19 vaccination mandates for businesses, including President Biden’s recent announcement, the actual impacts on vaccination uptake have yet to be reported. In September, two counties in Hawaii implemented mandates for employees in select businesses to be either vaccinated or enroll […]
Read MoreUHERO Forecast for the State of Hawaii: Delta wave swamps tourism, but return to recovery expected
Hawaii’s recovery has experienced a setback with the recent surge in COVID-19. Record virus numbers and preventive policy responses have caused an abrupt tourism pullback and are signalling a near-term decline in overall economic activity. While the Delta wave may now have turned the corner, we are in for a period of weakness before growth […]
Read MoreSurvey on COVID-19 Business Mandates
The University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization (UHERO) in partnership with the Pacific Alliance Against COVID-19 (PAAC), the City and County of Honolulu (OneOahu), and other partners are conducting a brief 10-minute survey for business managers and owners to understand the impacts of the new health and safety policies consistent with federal law and testing requirements […]
Read MoreThe unintended consequences of increasing returns to scale in geographical economics
Increasing returns to scale is the basis for many powerful results in economics and economic geography. But the limitations of assumptions about returns to scale in economic growth theories are often ignored when applied to geography. This leads to an unintentional bias favoring scale and mistaken conclusions about geography, scale and growth. Alternatively, this bias […]
Read MoreAustralia’s Forgotten Copper Mining Boom: Understanding How South Australia Avoided Dutch Disease, 1843–1850
Abstract: Great Britain established the new colony of South Australia (SA) in 1834, and migration from Britain to the colony began in 1836. After seven turbulent years, the discovery of two large deposits of copper at Kapunda (1843–4) and Burra (1844–5) renewed the colony’s economic prospects. Over the 1845–50 period, SA supplied roughly 9 per […]
Read MoreBlog: COVID-19 Mandates: Recommendations for Hawaiʻi Businesses
By Ruben Juarez, Alika Maunakea, May Okihiro, and Carl Bonham Faced with the largest increase in cases since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Hawaii needs effective solutions that would reduce the number of cases disproportionately ravaging communities in the state. In August 2021, the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization and the Pacific Alliance […]
Read More