Maternal Depression and the Production of Infant Health

Depression is most prevalent among women of childbearing age and among low-income women, and the medical literature shows it to have adverse effects on infant health. Yet maternal depression has been overlooked in economic studies of infant health production. This research incorporates maternal depressive symptoms into a standard infant health production model and estimates both structural and reduced-form birth weight equations using samples of non-Hispanic white and black women from the National Maternal and Infant Health Survey. A byproduct of this research is an empirical investigation into factors associated with maternal depressive symptoms. All results show that depressive symptoms have a negative effect on birth weight and that they may operate through several channels such as smoking and prenatal care.     

Hispanic Self-identification and Birth Weight Outcomes among U.S.- and Foreign-born Blacks

Black infants are more likely to suffer from poor health at birth compared to non-blacks. However, most existing infant health research focuses solely on non-Hispanic blacks and fails to consider the role of ethnic self-identification on infant health disparities. Using 2002 Vital Statistics Natality Data, this paper investigates whether Hispanic ethnicity is related to birth weight among U.S.- and foreign-born black mothers. The results from regression analyses suggest that Hispanic blacks give birth to heavier infants than non-Hispanic blacks. Maternal behaviors such as prenatal care and smoking fail to explain these birth weight differences. However, the observed within-group birth weight differences among blacks are far more modest compared to the black-white birth weight disparities identified in the extant literature. Thus, while it is important to pay attention to within-group differences among blacks, it is still critical to address the needs of black Hispanics with respect to racial disparities in infant health outcomes.     

Parental Education and Child Health: Evidence from China*

This paper examines the effect of parental, household and community character‐istics on the health of children in China. We find that birth order, death of elder siblings, use of prenatal care and alcohol consumption by the mother when pregnant have statistically significant effects on the health of children. Although parental education does not have a significant direct effect on child health, it does affect mothers’ behavior during pregnancy and inflfluences the use of health inputs, indirectly impacting the health of children. The research findings have important implications for both family planning programs and broader social policies in China.     

Developing Social Citizenship？ A Case Study of Education and Health Services in Yantian Village of Guangdong Province

Social policy is an indispensable element of rule and China’s current leadership has moved policy to a more inclusive system based on a notion of citizenship.The extension of social welfare provision is examined through a case study of education and health care in the South China village of Yantian.Yantian lies at the core of the Pearl River Delta,which has become a key link in the global reorganization of manufacturing and production.Consequently,the village is home to some 80 000 migrant workers who complement the 3000 registered inhabitants.A study of education and health-care provision reveals that in terms of equity, registered villagers enjoy significant advantages in seeking welfare resources.Although living in the same village,the two groups inhabit "different worlds." However,provision, while selective,has become more inclusive.The present research suggests that "social citizenship " will precede "political citizenship."     

A survey of cross-sectional and time-series literature on factors affecting child welfare

This paper reviews the literature on the socio-economic determinants of child welfare. Cross-sectional evidence is first analysed. The relevant literature is subdivided into four groups of studies depending on the main factors influencing child welfare: demographic; related to family circumstances; related to health care and sanitation; and economic. The very few time-series studies on this subject are then examined. While the existing literature does not allow definitive conclusions to be drawn on the predominance or relative importance of these four sets of factors, this paper identifies three related research areas for which particularly severe gaps seem to emerge and for which additional investigation appears necessary. These are: over-time studies, studies for low-income, high-mortality countries of Africa, for middle-income countries and for high-income, high-mortality countries, and studies measuring impact on the basis of indicators of welfare other than infant mortality rates.     

Diffusion of Minimally Invasive Procedures across Hospitals and Traits of Fast Adopting Hospitals

The quality and cost of hospital care depends not only on what technologies have been developed, but on how quickly the most promising and cost-effective technologies diffuse across hospitals. Some technologies are high-cost when they are first introduced into the health care system, but improve in cost-effectiveness as doctors use the technologies and innovate. Some such examples are minimally invasive procedures, which have become more common in recent years. We sought to better understand what hospital characteristics are associated with fast adoption of four minimally invasive procedures (appendectomy, lobectomy, hysterectomy and colectomy). Our findings show that a hospital’s adoption of minimally invasive procedures in one type of procedure (e.g., lobectomy) is not predictive of that hospital’s probability of adopting minimally invasive procedures in another procedure type (e.g., zero appendectomies). The only hospital characteristic consistently correlated with adoption for three of the four procedure types was the extent that the hospital’s geographic neighbors had adopted minimally invasive technology for that particular procedure. These findings regarding peer effects fall in line with conclusions about diffusion from the development literature.     

Regional production networks,service offshoring,and productivity in East Asia

Using the Asian International Input–Output Table (1990, 1995, and 2000), this paper explores regional production networks and offshoring of material and service inputs in East Asia. In doing so, offshoring is measured directly from the Table, which has not been used in previous literature regarding this issue. It turns out that East Asian countries source significant shares of inputs within East Asia. In addition to material offshoring, service offshoring in East Asia has become increasingly common in the era of globalization. We also evaluate the effects of this fast growing offshoring on productivity. Our econometric results demonstrate that offshoring exerts a significant and positive impact on total factor productivity in East Asia. Service offshoring, in particular, performs a more significant role than material offshoring.     

Measuring the Impact of Socio-Economic Factors on School Efficiency in Australia

This paper examines the productive efficiency of government schools in New South Wales (NSW) in Australia. The study uses a technical inefficiency effects model applied to a unique three-year panel dataset containing 1235 primary and 371 secondary schools in NSW. A stochastic frontier production function and an inefficiency effects function that control for school socioeconomic and environmental factors are estimated. The dataset contains information on various school inputs, school expenditures by major functional area, parental socioeconomic characteristics, student characteristics, and standardized test scores. We examine the degree to which school and non-school educational inputs influence student achievement scores and find that, overall, primary schools are 88.6% and secondary schools 96.4% efficient. The index describing community socio-educational advantage has the most significant influence on students’ achievement scores.     

关于地方政府债务风险预警研究的文献综述

地方政府债务风险问题已经成为中国近来最受关注的问题之一,风险预警研究则成为风险可控与债务管理最关键的一道防线.通过选择多个角度梳理有关文献,总结归纳经验方法,结合中国实情确定未来研究方向.风险预警模型的发展路径经历了“简单指标-综合指标”的趋势,且综合指标的分类、选择及赋权方法多样;研究方法也从一般化的建模理论到特例经验分析.中国地方政府债务问题因为其分税制改革历程的特殊性、官员激励方式不完善以及其他特有因素影响,需要结合信息透明度发展与更成熟的风险预警模型进行研究,接受更严格的管理与综合治理.     

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE IMPACT OF TUTORIALS ON THE PERFORMANCE OF ECONOMICS STUDENTS

The deteriorating performance of first-year economics students has become a concern at many South African universities. Addressing the issue requires an understanding of the factors influencing students' success. Studies analysing academic performance use the education production function approach. This approach identifies inputs that are crucial to learning and to achieving certain outputs. Factors that have been investigated in other studies include the impact of lecture attendance on performance, school-leaving exam (matriculation) results, particularly performance in mathematics, and the gender and age of students.
This study adds to existing local empirical research by analysing the impact of the tutorial programme as an input. The case study investigates the tutorial programme for first-year economics students at Stellenbosch University using quantitative analysis. Results confirm what previous studies have found, namely that lecture attendance, gender, and matriculation results contribute positively to the performance of first-year economics students. The main finding of the paper is that tutorial attendance also contributes positively to academic performance.     

Social capital as correlate,antecedent, and consequence of health service demand in China

Amid increasing interest in how social relationships play an important role in health and health behavior, it remains unclear whether social activities and social capital in general benefit individuals' health literacy and in turn affect their health care consumption. More specifically, this article proposes a research hypothesis to address the question: Do individuals who are strongly tied to other individuals within the social networks become more health conscious or literate and hence use more health services? This paper extends prior research on social support, health literacy and health care utilization to investigate the association between social interaction and health service demand. Using the China Health and Nutrition Survey, the paper provides cross-sectional evidence that people who are socially active and connected with their friends made more visits to health care providers. It also finds that people of male gender, being single, having more years of education, and no health insurance coverage tend to avoid seeking health services. The quasi-experimental study, which examines the events that exogenously intensified social interactions in some but not all Chinese provinces, indicates that social capital is more an antecedent than a consequence of health service needs.     

FDI知识溢出、自主R&D投入与内资高技术企业创新能力——基于中国高技术产业分行业动态面板数据模型的检验

基于知识生产函数,利用 1995～2008 年中国高技术产业 17 个细分行业的面板数据,本文研究了 FDI 知识溢出和自主 R&D 投入对内资企业创新能力的影响.研究表明,内资企业自主 R&D 投入是形成其创新能力的最主要因素;外资企业 R&D 活动对内资企业产生了一定的知识溢出效应,在一定程度上推动了内资企业创新能...     

HOW EXPOSED IS THE SOUTH AFRICAN ECONOMY TO INTERNATIONAL TRADE?

Following the policies implemented during the 1990s, the South African economy has become more globalised. This is particularly the case as far as international trade is concerned. The implementation of trade reforms, in some cases faster than WTO commitments, has increased the exposure of the South African economy to international trade. Trade in intermediate inputs increases the external orientation of an industry and hence increases the economy's exposure to trade. This in effect means that the economy is more open to external trade shocks than is conveyed by the traditional openness measure which considers only the trade in final products. This paper uses a measure proposed by Campa and Goldberg (1997) to estimate the exposure to trade and finds that around 79 per cent of output in 2000 was accounted for by industries that became more exposed to international trade. Further, domestic production has become more reliant on imported inputs with around 60 per cent of South Africa's GDP being accounted for by industries with a negative external orientation (i.e. industries where imported input costs exceeded export revenue). In addition, it was also found that those sectors that became more externally oriented had lower inflation rates and higher growth rates than the other sectors in the economy for the period under analysis. The extent to which the increased exposure to international trade facilitated these developments remains topical for further research.     

Health system reform in China: What role for private insurance?

The purpose of the present paper is to show that much of the literature on health economics and on the international experience with different forms of health system organization can be interpreted as supporting the idea that reliance on an unregulated market mechanism for organizing the production and financing of health services is likely to result in major problems both with respect to efficiency and equity. However, reliance on a centralized “command-and-control” model managed by government has also been shown to entail problems in practice. For this reason I argue that the best option at China's current state of development may be a compromise model in which competing private providers are given an important role, both for the production of health services and in the provision of health insurance, but in which the government intervenes (through regulation and direct provision) in such a way as to attain both a high degree of equity of access to health care, and to avoid the most significant forms of “market failure” that would arise in an unregulated private system.     

基于层次分析的共享单车用户满意度影响因素

用户满意度已成为决定共享单车企业竞争力的重要因素。为了给企业提供优化产品和服务的理论依据，有必要探究影响共享单车用户满意度的相关因素及其重要程度。在文献分析和问卷调查的基础上提取关键因素，构建层次结构模型，利用层次分析法综合评估各因素权重排序和品牌差异。结果表明，安全性因素的影响程度最高，单车完好程度、单车寻找难度、骑行舒适度是用户最关心的三个因素。最后基于研究结果为共享单车企业提出四方面建议。     

企业社会资本对跨区域市场进入模式的影响研究：理论框架的建立与研究命题的提出

近年来,社会资本理论已成为研究转型期企业战略管理行为的重要研究视角。企业社会资本的各种因素对企业多元化战略行为方式的选择至关重要。下文基于社会资本理论,通过文献梳理,探讨了转型经济情境下的企业社会资本的四个维度对跨区域市场进入模式的资源承诺和控制程度的影响,建立了社会资本与市场进入模式影响关系的理论框架和研究命题,最后指出了未来进一步研究方向。     

收入分配、医疗资源与人口健康:一个跨国研究

收入分配与人口健康的关系是一个争论已久的问题。本文在总结各种理论假说和以往实证研究的基础上,使用新的、质量较好的跨国面板数据,重新检验了收入分配与人口健康的关系。本文的分析重点有二:一是收入分配对人口健康的滞后影响;二是医疗资源在收入分配与人口健康的相关关系中所起的作用。本文的主要发现是,收入不均对人口健康的确有不利影响,但这种不利影响需要10年或更长的滞后期才能充分显现出来,这种滞后性是以往使用固定效应模型的跨国研究未能检测到收入不均与人口健康具有负相关关系的主要原因。此外,医疗资源(特别是初级医疗资源)人均拥有量对人口健康有积极作用;医疗资源有可能通过某种不可观察固定因素对收入分配与人口健康的关系发生影响。这些发现有助于澄清关于收入分配与人口健康关系的争论,对医疗政策也有重要参考价值。     

The role of services for manufacturing firm exports

Manufacturing firms have been increasingly focusing on services, a trend that is evident in their composition of bought-in input and in-house production. The services intensity of firms may affect their productivity and thereby their competitiveness abroad; services are also instrumental in connecting firms to foreign markets and can help them to differentiate their offerings from those of other firms. However, the relation between services and manufacturing exports has only been partially analysed in the previous literature. This study contributes to the field by discussing the role of services for firms and empirically testing a set of related conjectures. Export intensity is regressed on two services input parameters, applying a fractional model to a rich panel of firms in Sweden in the period 2001–2007. The microeconometric results suggest that, after controlling for covariates and heterogeneity, service inputs affect a firms’ export capabilities: raising the proportion of services in in-house production yields higher export intensity on average. Furthermore, buying-in more services is associated with higher export intensity for firms in some industries. Overall, the study provides new firm-level evidence of the role of services as inputs in manufacturing.     

甘肃城乡老年人身体健康和医疗状况分析

我国总体上已进入老龄化社会,为了客观地对甘肃省城乡老年人口的主要卫生和健康问题作出"诊断",寻求符合现代城乡环境下老年人口健康状况的生活模式和行之有效的城乡老年人健康教育、健康医疗策略,为人口老龄化带来的社会问题提供解决方案,本文对甘肃省14个市州、86个县市区60岁及其以上老年人的主要健康问题及医疗状况进行了研究,并提出了相应对策。     

The Contribution of Economists to Understanding Racial Health Disparities in the US

Much research on the issue of health disparities in the United States has been produced by health services researchers across disciplines, particularly medical care providers, public health workers and sociologists. Many economists have also studied health disparities. This special issue of Atlantic Economic Journal highlights in particular the role of economic scholarship in this important national debate. This article, introducing the special issue, categorizes the contribution of many economists to the literature on health disparity. The literature reviewed ultimately includes 107 articles published between 1998 and 2008. Articles by any of the 932 economists that were members of the American Society of Health Economists in 2006 publishing about racial/ethnic health disparities as found in Medline, articles related to racial/ethnic health disparities published in Health Economics or the Journal of Health Economics or through searches in EconLit were reviewed for inclusion.