Pavel Prikhodko, Ph.D. Machine Learning

Financial technology (FinTech) relates to the companies that use technology to make financial services more efficient and can be simply described as innovation in financial services. FinTech comes mostly from small startup companies that develop innovative technological solutions in big data, financial management and online payments. In 2014 the United States was the leading FinTech country, with an overall investment value of approximately $3.97 billion. The transaction value in the FinTech market amounted to $523,318 million that year. The digital payments segment accounted for the largest part of this market: over $497 million in 2014. The business finance and consumer finance sectors accounted for $5,773 million and $20,310 million accordingly.

Continue reading FinTech is a revolutionary way for making payments →

Jeffery Green, J.D., Ph.D. (ABD) Political Science

An annual study conducted by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation provides insight into health outcomes at the county level, which often are not captured in statewide health indicators conveying the health status of a state’s population.  From the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation data a number of indicators were incorporated to rank each county’s overall health status. These indicators incorporate measures of population health: risk behavior, such as alcohol and drug consumption and environmental factors, such as food options and the state of the physical environment. The table below displays the 50 unhealthiest counties in the United States ranked by the number of days per month its residents indicated were poor health days. As Figure 1 indicates, the vast majority of the unhealthiest counties in the United States are located in the southern part of the country. When examining this data, one can arrive at some broad assumptions regarding widespread health habits in these counties, which lends some insight into their status as the unhealthiest in the nation. Looking at the top 20 unhealthiest counties when ranked on the measure of reported monthly poor health days[1], the following counties fill out the top 20.

Continue reading Income and Poor Physical Health →

Jeffery Green, J.D., Ph.D. (ABD) Political Science

The question of equitable and adequate school funding resonates throughout a number of debates, implicating the government’s obligation to educate the young, questions of fairness and equality in education and broad debates concerning the distribution of public benefits across regions and locales. This debate became more complex in the wake of the 2008 recession, as austerity measures aimed at offsetting state budget shortfalls diminished K-12 public school funding. Austerity measures coincided with the depletion of Federal stimulus funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) after 2010. Consequently, state funding of K-12-education has continued to decline on a steady trajectory since 2010. Confirming this trend, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) finds that 34 states provided less funding per student for the 2013-14 fiscal year when compared to pre-recession numbers.

Continue reading Education and Funding →

Andrey Kamenov, Ph.D. Probability and Statistics

When exploring U.S. Census Bureau census data, we saw that even within one state, counties may see significantly different changes in local employment numbers.

While we don’t have any personal data, local changes in employment numbers are indicative of the total number of people who have lost their jobs, become employed or even switched careers.

First, we take the variance of employment change in every state, averaged by five major industry sectors.

Continue reading Higher wages mean more stable employment numbers →

Andrey Kamenov, Ph.D. Probability and Statistics

Texas, the largest of the contiguous U.S. states, is also among the top states by newly-issued patents. Of course, there’s no Silicon Valley here – but innovation is certainly not a foreign word to the state’s residents and businesses.

Continue reading Can innovation in Texas compare to California? →