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LSU Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School
2010
Productivity growth of US states
Bibhudutta Panda
Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College,
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Panda, Bibhudutta, "Productivity growth of US states" (2010). LSU Doctoral Dissertations. 2119.
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, PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH OF US STATES
A Dissertation
Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the
Louisiana State University and
Agricultural and Mechanical College
in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
in
The Department of Economics
by
Bibhudutta Panda
B.A., Utkal University, Bhubaneswar, India, 2000
M.A., Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune, India, 2002
M.Phil., Delhi University, Delhi, India, 2004
M.S., Louisiana State University, USA, 2006
December 2010
,Dedicated to Maa Vaishno Devi and my parents.
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, Acknowledgments
I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my advisor, Dr. Areendam Chanda
for patiently guiding me through this rigorous academic process. My association with him
has been the most fortunate and cherished experience of my entire academic journey. His
encouragement, optimism and involvement have been a constant source of inspiration for
me and have made me believe in myself. Without his continuous support, this dissertation
would not have been possible.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my committee member, Dr. Sudipta
Sarangi for his constant support and encouragement. I have immensely benefited from my
discussions with him. I am also deeply indebted to my other committee members, Dr.
Douglas McMillin and Dr. Bulent Unel for their insightful comments and guidance. I am
extremely grateful to Dr. Eric Hillebrand, Dr. Munechika Katayama, Dr. Faik Koray, Dr.
Naci Mocan and Dr. Robert Newman for their much needed and appreciated advice, and
help. I am also thankful to Mary Jo Neathery for taking care of all the professional details
during my graduate studies.
I am thankful to Justin for all his painstaking comments on my dissertation and I have
truly enjoyed my discussions with him. I would like to thank my colleagues Ana, Beatrice,
Colin, Dan, Duha, Subaran and Radu for their much needed support, appreciation and
warm friendship. I would like to thank my dear friends, Prabuddha and Rachna specially
for sharing my complaints, stress and happiness. Their friendship has been a solid pillar
of support in all these years. I am also thankful to my friends, Dr. Hemant Chowdhary,
Padmanava, Puneeta and Shatrughan for being around me in so many meaningful ways.
My parents, Sahadev and Sradha Manjari Panda, have been my inspirations. I am
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