Date of Graduation

12-2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science in Agricultural Economics (MS)

Degree Level

Graduate

Department

Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness

Advisor/Mentor

Thomsen, Michael R.

Committee Member

Nayga, Rodolfo M. Jr.

Second Committee Member

Fang, Di

Third Committee Member

Mitchell, James L.

Keywords

Dollar Stores; Food Deserts; grocery store closures; Rural Food Access

Abstract

With the growing popularity of dollar stores, concerns have surfaced over the potential relationship between dollar stores and the closures of grocery stores. Healthy food accessibility for consumers, particularly those in rural areas, has additionally become of great interest. This thesis aims to investigate the potential relationship of dollar store presence and grocery store closures. Data used included County Business Patterns, Rural Urban Continuum Codes, American Community Survey, and authorized SNAP retailer data. The spatial distance between grocery stores and the number of dollar stores at various radii were calculated. Following the computation of the number of dollar stores surrounding grocery stores, Kaplan Meier curves and Cox proportional hazards models were used for survival analysis of grocery stores. The findings of the models used imply that the presence of dollar stores is not associated with increasing the likelihood of grocery store closures.

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