| 1. |
- Ahlerup, Pelle, 1977
(författare)
-
Essays on Conflict, Institutions, and Ethnic Diversity
- 2009
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The thesis consists of five self-contained papers. Paper 1: Social Capital vs Institutions in the Growth Process Is social capital a substitute or a complement to formal institutions for achieving economic growth? Research on the impacts of social capital and formal institutions on economic development have so far mainly emerged as two distinct elds. In the social capital literature, trust, networks, social norms, and associational activity are believed to be central aspects of successful economies. Although micro studies suggest that social capital has a larger e¤ect on economic performance when formal institutions are weak, this has not been conrmed at the macro level. In the institutional literature, it is emphasized how formal institutions such as those regulating the strength of property rights, the constraints against the executive, and the power of courts, are fundamental determinants of long-run growth (North 1990, Acemoglu et al. 2001). These studies, however, never attempt to quantify the e¤ect of informal institutions such as inter- personal trust. Based on the micro evidence, we outline an investment game between a producer and a lender in an incomplete-contracts setting. The key insight from the model is that social capital may have its greatest positive impact on the total monetary surplus from the game (economic growth) at lower levels of institutional development, and that the positive impact eventually vanishes if institutions become strong enough. This basic prediction about substitution nds support in a cross-country growth regression the marginal impact of our proxy for social capital (interpersonal trust) decreases with the quality of formal institutions. This implies that attempts at building social capital create, if successful, a pro-growth potential for countries with bad institutions. Paper 2: The Roots of Ethnic Diversity The level of ethnic diversity is believed to have consequences for economic and political development. Accepting this observation naturally leads to the question: Why are some countries more ethnically fractionalized than others? For instance, why is the probability that two randomly chosen individuals belong to di¤erent ethnic groups roughly 93 percent in Uganda but only 0.2 percent in South Korea? In the paper, we explore the two main hypotheses regarding the formation of ethnic identities. The constructivistview is that ethnic identications are socially constructed phenomenon appearing during modernity (Gellner 1983, Tilly 1992). The evolutionary view contends that ethnic divisions have deep roots in history and ecology and should be analyzed in an evolutionary framework. Ethnic identification is here regarded as a x natural and evolutionarily successful behavior that has existed throughout history. The process of evolution is tied to the geographical context, and in the paper we discuss the implications for ethnic diversity from a number of stylized ecological facts. We develop a formal model where ethnic groups endogenously emerge among periph- eral populations in response to an insu¢ cient supply of public goods. A key prediction is that the current level of ethnic fractionalization in a given area should be positively correlated with the antiquity of human settlement. Our empirical analysis introduces the historical duration of human settlements for all countries in the world. The dating is based on research in genetics, archeology, climatology and on fossils, as synthesized by primarily Oppenheimer (2003). The theoretical prediction of a positive e¤ect of the historical duration of human settlements on ethnic diversity receives strong empirical support, and there are clear indications that ethnic diversity is higher where geographical conditions have favoured isolation, and lower where early civilization proved more successful, and where the state was stronger during the modern nation-state era. Hence, a genuine understanding of ethnic diversity requires a synthesis of evolutionary and constructivist arguments. Our results have implications for how social scientists investigate the e¤ects of eth- nic diversity. An often employed method for assessing the e¤ect of ethnic diversity on economic and political development has been to treat ethnic diversity as an exogenous determinant. Since a stronger state in the nation-state era is associated with having less ethnic diversity, and there is a positive correlation between indicators of this state strength and several indicators of economic and political development, the negative coe¢ cient on ethnicity obtained in these regressions could reect an omitted variable bias. Paper 3: The Causal E¤ects of Ethnic Diversity: An Instrumental Variables Approach High levels of ethnic diversity have been linked to various poor economic and political outcomes, e.g., lower income levels, poor economic growth, more corruption, and a lower provision of public goods (Easterly and Levine 1997, La Porta et al. 1999). The standard approach in this literature has been to treat ethnic diversity as if it were exogenous to economic development, but that is a misspecication. The historical literature has documented how populations in more developed countries have become more homogenous over time, and increasingly so during the last couple of centuries, through a combination of deliberate homogenizing e¤orts and endogenous processes (Gellner 1983, Tilly 1992). Recent research has found that ethnic diversity is determined both by historical forces and by geographical factors: Ethnic diversity is higher in countries with a longer duration of human settlement, and in countries that have a naturally fragmented geography, that lie closer to the equator, and that have had low levels of territorial state capacity during the modern era. xi In the paper we discuss how previous studies on ethnic diversity and long-run devel- opment may have obtained biased estimates due to omitted variables, simultaneity, or measurement error, but also that the use of instrumental variables allows us to deal with exactly these problems. Our main instruments capture the historical duration of human settlements, the degree of geographical fragmentation, and the number of years since the date of independence. With these at hand, we nd that high levels ethnic diversity is associated with lower income levels, poor economic growth, more corruption, and poor provision of public goods, and that results obtained in OLS may underestimate the true e¤ects. While previous studies have shown signicant partial correlations between ethnic diversity and economic outcomes, the present paper demonstrates that there indeed are causal e¤ects of ethnic diversity. We also nd that the e¤ects of ethnic diversity and property rights institutions on economic development among former European colonies can be separated from each other. This suggests that countries that have problems due to high levels of ethnic diversity could alleviate these problems by improving the quality of their formal institutions. On a more general level, the results presented in the paper promise that an acceptance of the endogenous nature of ethnic diversity does not preclude meaningful empirical analyses of the long-run e¤ects of ethnic diversity. Paper 4: Nationalism and Government E¤ectiveness Nation-building, which generally refers to a process of unifying the population in a country by constructing a national unity, is believed to have positive e¤ects on aggregate performance, and has been proposed as a possible remedy against problems associated with high levels of ethnic fractionalization (Miguel 2004). However, systematic empirical evidence that the creation of a national unity is a worthwhile policy is still largely absent, and nationalism, an indicator of successful nation-building, has been empirically linked to protectionism and intolerance, which suggests that dismal performance is a more likely outcome. Furthermore, there is an obvious problem with the idea that the unity of a countrys population can be enhanced by encouraging nationalism a national identity is created in relation to other national identities, and for there to be an usthere has to be a them. The paper investigates whether nationalism a¤ects the ability of governments to e¤ec- tively formulate and implement good policies, i.e., government e¤ectiveness, and whether it mitigates the negative e¤ects of ethnic fractionalization, or is associated with less trade openness. We discuss how nationalism may have a positive e¤ects, as it can increase in- group altruism, trustworthiness, and state authority, and how it may have negative e¤ects, as it can breed prejudice, out-group animosity, and skepticism of new ideas, implementa- xii tion techniques, and goods, if these are not of national origin or are not considered to be in line with national traditions. We hypothesize that the positive e¤ects will dominate at low levels of nationalism but that the negative e¤ects will dominate at higher levels of nationalism. The empirical analysis conrms that nationalism has an inverted U-shaped e¤ect on government e¤ectiveness, and also shows that this e¤ect does not capture the inuence of factors such as income, economic growth, democracy, and income inequality. Comfort- ingly, the qualitative result is the same also when we instrument for nationalism, with instruments that represent a number of historical and cultural circumstances. Further- more, nationalism can mitigate the negative e¤ects of ethnic fractionalization in former colonies, but has no clear e¤ect on trade openness. Taken seriously, the results suggest that most countries already have too nationalistic populations, and probably would function better if these sentiments where downplayed. Paper 5: Earthquakes and Civil War There are two diametrically opposing views in the literature on natural disasters and violent conict. According to the rst view, natural dis
|
|
| 2. |
- Belu, Constantin, 1977
(författare)
-
Essays on Efficiency Measurement and Corporate Social Responsibility
- 2009
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Paper 1: Ranking corporations based on sustainable and socially responsible practices. A Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach This study ranks publicly listed corporations based on social and environmental (i.e. sustainable) achievements in relation to financial results, by using a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach with financial performance indicators (return on assets, return on equity and yearly stock return) as inputs and sustainability scores as outputs. The sustainability scores cover a wide range of sustainable practices and were provided by a specialized screening company. Our calculated DEA indices provide a measure of the commitment of firms towards sustainable practices. The main findings are that many companies are positioned well below best practice in their respective industries. Industry sectors that are less scrutinised by the public (e.g. banking) are found to be less competitive in terms of sustainable practices. Paper 2: Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility and Economic Performance This paper studies the link between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and economic performance of companies. Acknowledging the argument that companies might behave socially responsible strategically, i.e. favoring the CSR dimensions that provide competitive advantages, we construct a novel CSR index based on a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model. We argue that this index accounts for CSR achievements from a strategic perspective, and use it to analyze the link between CSR and economic performance expressed by Return on Assets (ROA). When explicitly accounting for strategic behavior of companies, our findings reveal a significant positive relationship between CSR and economic performance. Paper 3: The effect of IT capital on the efficiency of Swedish banks This paper uses a balanced panel of 85 banks during 1999-2003 to analyze the impact of Information Technology (IT) on the technical efficiency of Swedish banks. Employing a stochastic frontier production function that allows for time-varying technical efficiencies shows that the efficiency increased with the amount of employed IT expenditure i.e. IT capital had an exogenous positive effect on the technical efficiency of Swedish banks despite a downward shift in the production frontier, during the period analyzed. Paper 4: Are all DMUs efficient in DEA? DEA meets the vintage model. In this paper I develop a model of capacity expansion that accounts for differences in the productivity of the installed capital due to technical progress exhibited by the ex ante production function. A putty-clay set-up is assumed, meaning flexible input coefficients and substitution possibilities ex ante, but fixed input coefficients ex post. Based on the model, I generate a capacity distribution of DMUs (vintages) for a homogenous industry and perform an efficiency analysis employing data envelopment analysis, a popular non-parametric method for estimating efficiency. The results show that in some circumstances older vintages might appear on the efficiency frontier, unlike some newer vintages that are found to be inefficient, despite benefiting from the advancement of the technology.
|
|
| 3. |
- Boman, Anders, 1976
(författare)
-
Geographic Labour Mobility - Causes and Consequences
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis consists of three self-contained chapters. The first chapter studies the causes of internal migration, the second studies the earnings effects of internal migration, and the third analyses what could be perceived as an effect of mobility but is in fact not. Chapter 1: The Mobility of Immigrants and Natives: Evidence from Internal Migration Following Job Displacement Human capital migration theory presents two conflicting hypotheses on immigrant mobility. One is based on immigrants having less location-specific human capital, reducing the costs of migration and increasing the probability of migration. The other is based on ethnicity: immigrants living in ethnic enclaves have higher costs of leaving the enclave, reducing the probability of migration. This paper disentangles and finds support for both hypotheses using high-quality data on a wide range of human capital, family and labour market variables, as well as on previous migration of essentially all individuals involuntarily displaced due to closures or substantial cutbacks of Swedish workplaces in 1987 and 1988. Chapter 2: Does Migration Pay? Earnings Effects of Geographic Mobility Following Job Displacement Displaced workers are followed for ten years in order to analyse the earnings effects of internal migration. I utilise a large dataset containing all workers in Sweden who were involuntarily displaced from work due to closures or substantial cutbacks of Swedish workplaces in 1987 or 1988. The effects are investigated controlling for human capital, family and labour market characteristics. Substantial gender differences in earnings effects of internal migration are found: men generally have positive effects, while the consequences for women are negative. Chapter 3: They seek it here, they seek it there, they seek it everywhere. But where is employment found? This paper uses a unique possibility to link unemployed individuals’ stated willingness to move with administrative data, giving us the possibility to analyse the effects of mobility on labour market outcome. Furthermore, we can do this not only for those who actually move, but also for non-movers. I find that those who extend their search area in job search geographically do have a higher probability of escaping unemployment. However, this positive effect is not only present for jobs outside the local labour market, as would be expected, but the greatest effect is found on the local labour market. This indicates positive selection; i.e. it is not so much the increased geographic scope per se that increases the likelihood of escaping unemployment, but mainly differences in unobservable characteristics between those who choose to use a larger search area and those who do not.
|
|
| 4. |
- Erlandzon, Karl, 1977
(författare)
-
Retirement Planning: Portfolio Choice for Long-Term Investors
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis consists of four papers. Common to the first three papers is the framework for analysis; a life-cycle model of a borrowing-constrained individual's consumption- and portfolio choices in the presence of uncertain labour income. The income process, taxes and pension systems are also realistically calibrated. The first paper investigates some welfare effects of forced saving through a mandatory pension scheme. Pension benefits stem from both a defined benefit and a notionally defined contribution part, the latter indexed to stochastic aggregate labour income. It is shown that, early in life, individuals attribute little value to their pension savings. Furthermore, for individuals in mid-life, the welfare loss associated with the dependency between pension returns and labour income growth is estimated to 1.2% of annual consumption. The second paper investigates the diversification demand of an individual faced with the alternative, through an individual account in a mandatory pension scheme, of exchanging aggregate labour income risk for equity exposure. It is shown that, depending on age and exchange premium, individuals will be either buyers or sellers of such swaps, and that inter-generational risk sharing can therefore be achieved. The third paper explores the recent transition from defined benefit to defined contribution for white-collar workers in Sweden. The main result is that individuals with the characteristic of a low expected pre-retirement income relative to average income during working life and high variance in earnings are winners (typically, men with university degree in the private sector), and that those with the opposite characteristic (typically, women with university degree in the public sector) would be losers. The aim of the fourth and final paper is to determine whether there is a home bias among the newly established Swedish National Pension Funds. Estimation errors in historical estimates of return moments make traditional analysis of the home bias puzzle work poorly. Therefore, this paper takes another approach by using the information available to the fund. The results demonstrate a significant bias towards domestic equities that cannot be explained by informational advantage or any other risk and return based explanation.
|
|
| 5. |
- Hansson, Gustav, 1977
(författare)
-
Essays on Social Distance, Institutions, and Economic Growth
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Paper 1: Country Size and the Rule of Law: Resuscitating Montesquieu In this paper, we demonstrate that there is a robust negative relationship between the size of country territory and a measure of the rule of law for a large cross-section of countries. We outline a theoretical framework featuring two main reasons for this regularity; firstly that institutional quality often has the character of a local public good that is imperfectly spread across space from the core of the country to the hinterland, and secondly that a large territory usually is accompanied by valuable rents and a lack of openness that both tend to distort property rights institutions. Our empirical analysis further shows some evidence that whether the capital is centrally or peripherally located within the country matters for the average level of rule of law. Paper 2: Nationalism and Government Effectiveness The literature on nation-building and nationalism suggests that nation-building affects economic and political performance, mitigates the problems associated with ethnic heterogeneity, but that nationalism, an indicator of successful nation-building, is linked to dismal performance via protectionism and intolerance. This paper shows that there is a nonlinear association between nationalism and government effectiveness, that nationalism leaves no imprint on the effects of ethnic heterogeneity but may be a positive force in former colonies, and that actual trade flows are independent of the level of nationalism in the population. Paper 3: Same Same but Different? A Comparison of Institutional Models In the growing literature on the creation of institutions, the theories emphasizing colonial and legal origin, religious affiliation, Western European influence, and settler mortality, have been especially influential. The influence of these studies rests heavily on empirical modeling, which, since the theories are obviously closely related, might actually capture the same primary mechanism. It is therefore unclear whether the empirical relationships found are the same or if they are different. Therefore, this paper takes the empirical models seriously and discriminates amongst the existing models by using modeling selection criteria, tests of encompassing, and modeling selection. Paper 4: Where Did All the Investments Go? New Evidence on Equipment Investment and Economic Growth Equipment investment is one of the very few variables claimed to be robustly related to economic growth. This paper examines new empirical evidence on the robustness of this relation. Firstly, the main result from DeLong and Summers (1991) is extended and tested. Secondly, the investment growth nexus is examined in a panel data setting. Thirdly, the paper relates the investment-growth relationship to recent findings on investment prices and economic development. The results repeatedly refute that there is a strong robust correlation between investment and income growth.
|
|
| 6. |
- Lampi, Elina, 1967
(författare)
-
Individual Preferences, Choices, and Risk Perceptions - survey based evidence
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Paper 1 investigates how birth order and having siblings affect positional concerns in terms of success at work and of income. We find that only-children are the most positional, but that number of siblings increases the concern for their position among those who grew up together with siblings. Furthermore, people whose parents often compared them with their siblings have stronger positional concerns in general. Paper 2 analyzes whether an introduction of an entrance fee affects visitor composition at a Swedish state-funded museum, namely the Museum of World Culture. We conducted two surveys in order to collect information about the visitors’ socio-economic backgrounds, one before and one after the introduction of the entrance fee. While the entrance was still free, we asked visitors about their willingness to pay (WTP) for a visit, using the Contingent Valuation (CV) method. The results of the CV survey show that several target group visitors that the museum wishes to reach are less likely to visit the museum even at a very low fee level. By comparing the CV results and the observed post-introduction change in visitor composition, we conclude that CV does predict a majority of the changes successfully. In Paper 3 we use a choice experiment to study whether Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator preferences regarding improvements in environmental quality differ from citizen preferences. The EPA administrators were asked to choose the alternatives they would recommend as a policy, while the citizens were asked to act as private persons. We find that the attribute rankings and the WTP levels for particular attributes differ between the two groups. We also find that ecological sustainability is more important for the administrators than the preferences of ordinary people regarding changes in environmental quality. Paper 4 analyzes the marginal willingness to pay (MWTP) for changes in noise levels related to changes in the volume of take-offs and landings at a city airport in Stockholm, by using a choice experiment. When estimating MWTP for different times of the day and days of the week, we find that these vary with temporal dimensions: mornings and evenings have higher values. Paper 5 investigates whether women have correct perceptions about the age-related risk of female infertility, whether the perceptions of the personal and the general risk in the own age group differ, and if so, which factors can explain the difference. The results show that women overestimate the general risks for women older than 34, and that mothers in general have a too optimistic picture of their own fertility while non-mothers do not. Paper 6 analyzes from which channels of information women get information about the general risks of age-related female infertility and how the different channels of information affect women’s risk perceptions. We find that media reaches women of all ages, while only about one-fourth have received information from the health care system. Furthermore, information from friends and relatives makes women more likely to overestimate the risks. Since women are most interested in receiving information from the health care system, we argue that system authorities should inform women earlier than what is being done today.
|
|
| 7. |
- Mitrut, Andreea, 1977
(författare)
-
Four Essays on Interhousehold Transfers and Institutions in Post-Communist Romania
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis consists of four essays related to different social and economic aspects in postcommunist Romania: Paper 1: In many developing and transitional countries, inter-household transfers in general and gifts in particular are sizable and very important. We use unique Romanian data that enables us to isolate pure gifts from other kinds of private transfers. We find that social norms are important for explaining the occurrence of gifts. However, we find different motives for gifts to the rich and the poor. Middle- and high-income households are part of reciprocal networks and receive more the higher their incomes and the more they give to others. The poor may be excluded from reciprocal networks, but they still receive, since there is a social duty to give. Paper 2: This paper investigates the determinants of formal group membership and informal network participation. We are particularly interested in the effect of heterogeneity, be it in terms of inequality or ethnicity. We find that inequality has a negative effect on formal group membership. Also, we find that inequality acts differently on poor and rich people: when inequality increases, it is the relatively poor persons who do not participate in groups and informal networks. Finally, we explore separately the determinants in different types of formal groups, and we find that in ethnically fragmented communities there is a lower participation in groups that involve close social interactions. Paper 3: Using Romanian survey data we investigate the determinants of individual life satisfaction, with an emphasis on the role of public and private transfers received. A possible concern is that these transfers are unlikely to be exogenous to life satisfaction. We use a recursive simultaneous equations model to account both for this potential problem and for the fact that public transfers are themselves endogenous in the private transfer equation. We find that public and private transfers received do not matter for overall life satisfaction, whereas we find a crowding out effect of private transfers by the public ones. However, we find that people are happier when giving private transfers. Paper 4: Tragic images of Romanian institutionalized children shocked Western audiences when broadcasted for the first time in the early 1990s, immediately after the fall of Ceausescu. We use a unique census that covers all institutionalized children in 1997, and find that institutionalized children are significantly less likely to be enrolled in school compared to their non-institutionalized same-age peers. We identify a special group of institutionalized children: the social orphans, i.e., children who have living parents but have no contact with them. We find that among healthy children, those in permanent institutional care, i.e. social orphans and orphans, are significantly less likely to be enrolled in school than noninstitutionalized children, while if we only look at children who suffer from a severe medical problem, we do not find significant differences between the two groups. That is probably because both groups are at high risk of poor education.
|
|
| 8. |
- Qin, Ping, 1976
(författare)
-
Risk, Relative Standing and Property Rights: Rural Household Decision-Making in China
- 2009
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Paper 1 examines the concern for relative standing among rural households in China. We used a survey-experimental method to measure to what extent poor Chinese farmers care about their relative income and found that the respondents cared to a high degree. Compared to previous studies in developed countries, the concern for relative standing seems to be equally strong among rural households in China. This should be seen in the light of the rapid change China has undergone, with high growth, increased inequality, and the highest urban-rural income ratio in the world. Thus, the rural population, which is lagging behind, is suffering not only from the low absolute income but also from low relative income. Paper 2 studies risky decision-making in a high-stakes experiment with couples in rural China. In the experiment, spouses chose between risky lotteries, first separately and then jointly. We are particularly interested in the (socio-demographic) factors determining (i) the similarity of spouses’ individual decisions and (ii) women’s influence on couples’ joint decisions. We find that spouses in richer households have more similar individual risk preferences. The couple’s joint decision is largely influenced by the husband, but women with higher income, more years of education, and communist party membership have a significantly stronger influence on the joint decision. Paper 3 investigates farmers’ preferences for various property rights attributes of a forestland contract. We find that farmers are highly concerned with what types of rights a contract provides. Reducing perceived risks of contract termination and introducing a priority right in renewal of an old contract significantly increase farmers’ marginal willingness to pay (MWTP) for a forest contract. An extended waiting time for rights to harvest the forest reduces a farmer’s perceived value of a contract. We also investigate whether accounting for the fact that farmers ignore one or more attributes when answering stated preference questions affects the MWTP, and find it to be systematically lower in the model where we consider that respondents ignore attributes. Paper 4 assesses the impact of tenure types, property rights, and harvest quota regulation on farmer investment behavior in Chinese collective forests. We investigate the issue using household survey data from Fujian province. The results indicate that investment incentives increase due to the tenure reform. In the reform property rights are gradually established, and confirmed to the individual farmers via a contract. However, some issues remain. Farmers still perceive some tenure arrangements to be more uncertain, which discourage them to undertake plot investments. The harvest quota regulation, introduced for stock conservation purposes, acts as a disincentive in forestry management and development. These evidences imply that there could be even further improvement in investment incentives, if some of these constraints were relaxed through a policy reform.
|
|
| 9. |
- Quiroga, Miguel, 1969
(författare)
-
Microeconomic Policy for Development: Essays on Trade and Environment, Poverty and Education
- 2009
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Abstracts This thesis contains three papers analyzing different issues. Paper 1: “Do Countries with Lax Environmental Regulations Have a Comparative Advantage in Polluting Industries?” We study whether lax environmental regulations induce comparative advantages, causing the least-regulated countries to specialize in polluting industries. We seek to improve three areas in the empirical literature based on the Heckscher-Ohlin-Vanek’s factor content of trade, more specifically in Tobey’s (1990) approach: the measurement of environmental endowments, the possible endogeneity due to an omitted variable that has not been considered, and the influence of the industrial level of aggregation. For the econometrical analysis, we use a cross-section of 71 countries to examine the net exports in the most polluting industries in the year 2000. As a result, we find that industrial aggregation matters and we find some evidence in favor of the pollution-haven effect. Paper 2: “Poor Areas or Poor People: Decomposing differences in living standards and poverty” Several studies report large and persistent differences in standards of living and poverty within a country. In this paper, we study whether the observed differences in poverty incidence in urban areas are due to differences in the attributes of the population living in these zones or come from differences in the value of these attributes in the different areas. For this purpose, we apply decomposition analysis. We illustrate the methodology comparing urban areas in 13 Chilean regions for the year 2003. We found that even after controlling for an ample set of household characteristics, differences in the parameters are an important determinant of household income and poverty within a country. Paper 3: “Absenteeism and Time-Inconsistent Behavior. Should we make lecture attendance compulsory?” We investigate the problem of absenteeism in an educational program with timeconsistent and naïve time-inconsistent students and the effect that mandatory attendance has on the behavior and well-being of the students. We observe that time-inconsistent students tend to postpone lecture attendance such that they are more likely to be absent from lectures located in the first part of the term while they later show up in the second part of the course. Absenteeism rates are not necessarily lower for naïve time-inconsistent vis-àvis time-consistent students; nevertheless, the performance of time-inconsistent students is worse in any case. We showed that the well-being of myopic time-inconsistent students could be dramatically reduced because of the shortcoming in their intertemporal preferences. Therefore, it seems as mandatory attendance could benefit these students in the classroom, although there is some possibility of harming the time-consistent. The outcome depends on the distribution of the benefits and costs of lecture attendance along the term, which requires empirical evaluation.
|
|
| 10. |
- Tengstam, Sven, 1971
(författare)
-
Essays on Smallholder Diversification, Industry Location, Debt Relief, and Disability and Utility
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Essay 1 Smallholder Income Diversification in Zambia: The Way Out of Poverty? This paper investigates the relationship between income diversification (combinations of farm income, agricultural wage work, non-agricultural wage work, and own-business income) and income within Zambian smallholder households. Shifting to a higher degree of diversification is found to be associated with getting higher income per laborer. Households in more diversified and urbanized environments are found to be able to diversify more easily. Education opens up opportunities for nonagricultural wage work and, to a smaller extent, to own-business. Diversification into agricultural wage work depends on land shortage, which suggests that it is partly a distress diversification. Households with more market-oriented agricultural production are more likely than others to diversify into business but less likely to enter agricultural wage work. Female-headed households are less likely than others to combine farm income with non-farm wage work. Land, educational, gender and province influence income not only indirectly via choice of activity combination but also directly. Essay 2 What Explains the International Location of Industry? –The Case of Clothing The clothing sector has been a driver of diversification and growth for countries that have graduated into middle income. Using a partial adjustment panel data model for 61 countries 1975-2000, we investigate the global international location of clothing production by using a combination of variables suggested by the Heckscher-Ohlin theory and the New Economic Geography (NEG) theory. Our Blundell-Bond system estimator results confirm that the NEG variables do help explain the location of the clothing industry, and point to that convergence is not as inevitable as sometimes assumed. We find that closeness to various intermediates such as low-cost labor and textile production has strong effects on output. Factor endowments and closeness to the world market have inverted U-shaped effects. This is expected since above a certain level several other sectors benefit even more from closeness and factor endowments, driving resources away from the clothing industry. Essay 3 Debt Relief and Adjustment Effort in a Multi-Period Model This paper shows that if the period following the granting of debt relief is taken into account, debt relief increases adjustment effort (investment), irrespective of whether there is an initial debt overhang or not. Essay 4 Disability and Marginal Utility of Income It is often implicitly assumed that disability generally lowers the marginal utility of income. This paper questions this view. Individuals’ marginal utility of income is estimated in two states – when paralyzed in both legs and when not mobility impaired at all – using experimental choices between hypothetical lotteries where the outcomes include both income and disability status. The median ratio of individuals’ marginal utility of income when paralyzed to when not mobility impaired, R, is estimated at between 1.33 and 2. It is statistically significant higher than one. Individuals with personal experience of paralysis and voters for the Left Block or the Liberal Party are more likely than others to have an R over one. Our results imply that more than full insurance of income losses connected to being disabled is optimal. The results also suggest, in contrast to, e.g. Sen (1997), that given a utilitarian social welfare function, resources should be transferred to, rather than from, disabled people.
|
|
