Melina Murren Vosse is a Ph.D. candidate in Finance at the Miami Herbert Business School.
Research Interests
Household Finance
Retail Investors
Investments and Asset Pricing
Selected work
Strength in Differences: How Racial Integration Shapes Household Financial Decision-Making
Using proprietary geocoded data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, I examine whether local racial integration influences financial decision-making. I find that individuals residing in racially integrated communities are more likely to invest in public equity markets after accounting for individual and county-level differences. Exploiting within-individual variation from relocation as well as using Great Migration population shocks as an instrument, I demonstrate that integration has a causal effect on participation. Evidence suggests that racial integration improves local information quality, lowering informational barriers to participation. Moreover, this informational advantage enables integrated investors to achieve superior risk-adjusted performance on their local portfolios.
Contact
University of Miami
Miami Herbert Business School
5250 University Drive
Coral Gables, FL, 33146
Email: mmurren@bus.miami.edu