Human Capital in Appalachia: An Analysis of Vulnerability, Resilience, and Skills in Preparation of a Greener Economy

This thesis constructs a novel resilience index and a comparative advantage measure of professional skills to enhance our understanding of economic resilience in Appalachian counties that are vulnerable to the transition to a greener economy. The index-based results indicate that resilience is clustered throughout the region and strongly related to local labor market demand for the skills required to complete non-routine cognitive tasks. Resilient labor markets hold a comparative advantage over their less resilient counterparts in twelve skills. These skills are highly prevalent in growing and emerging occupations and strongly related to resilience in the existing literature on regional economic shocks. This thesis also develops a database that enables future researchers, policymakers, and industry leaders to geospatially analyze skill prevalence at a county level and make informed and proactive decisions in the face of a changing economy.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science

Level thesis:degree_level

masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Agricultural and Applied Economics

Department dc:contributor.department

Agricultural and Applied Economics

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

2022

Author dc:creator

• Pierce, Timothy Samuel

Chair dc:contributor.committeechair

• Chen, Susan Elizabeth

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Gupta, Anubhab
• Alwang, Jeffrey R.

• multidimensional index
• environmental regulation
• work force retraining
• economic clustering
• pollutant industries

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en

Dc Identifier Other

vt_gsexam:35669

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/111772