The impact of research in countryside recreation policy development

This article illustrates the use made of recreation research in the Countryside Commission. It explains some of the different methods employed, describes the main results and shows the impact they have on policy development.

Research has been of key importance to the Commission during its recent review of recreation policies and the main directions of the emerging policies are highlighted.     

Urbanization and food imports in sub-Saharan Africa

The Granger statistical test of causality was used to examine the relationship between total food imports and urbanization and between food aid and urbanization. Urbanization appears to have caused total food imports to increase in 13 of the 24 countries. Food imports appear to be a cause of urbanization in three countries. Food aid, however, apparently was a cause of urbanization in 16 of the 24 countries used in the analysis.     

The effects of discussion and question wording on self and proxy reports of behavioral frequencies

Marketing research surveys often rely on one person to report about the consumption and purchase behavior of other household members. We report the results of an experiment examining how the level of discussion among household members and the wording of a recall question affect the accuracy of reports about the frequency of another household member’s behavior. The findings suggest two important implications. First, asking respondents for a count versus an estimate of the behavior affects both the level of reporting for others as well as the accuracy of such reports. Second, screening potential respondents on their level of discussion on a topic with their partner or family member may help reduce reporting error.     

Gains to Research in the Presence of Intellectual Property Rights and Research Subsidies

The influx of private investment into crop research, which has accompanied the establishment of intellectual property rights (IPRs) and the introduction of biotechnology, suggests high rates of return. However, the empirical analysis of the canola research sector shows a decline in the total net return to research during a period of increased investment, indicating that net marginal returns to research have been negative. The indication of immiserizing research suggests that the combined effect of IPRs and public incentives has driven the quantity of research beyond the socially optimal level.     

A comparison of the power of some tests for heteroskedasticity in the general linear model

An exact parametric test against heteroskedasticity in the general linear model is proposed. Its power is compared with that of the test proposed by Goldfeld and Quandt and with the BLUS test. Under a variety of circumstances all three tests are found to be of compare power.The proposed test is similar to the BLUS test but is based on easily computed recursive residuals and it is believed that the flexibility and computational simplicity of the new test makes it attractive as a practical procedure.     

DEA of financial statements data: The U.S. computer industry

DEA (data envelopment analysis) is a technique for determining the efficiencyfrontier (the envelope) to the inputs and outputs of a collection of individual corporations or other productive units. DEA is here employed to estimate the intertemporal productive efficiency of U.S. computer manufactures, using financial data brought from earnings statements and balance sheets. The results indicate that a few corporations, including Apple Computer Inc., Compaq Computer Corp., and Seagate Technology were able to stay at the productivity efficiency frontier throughout the time period investigated. But not all successful corporations did; sometimes subefficiency (=disequilibrium) actually goes together with very rapid growth. A new Malmquist type productivity index is calculated for each corporation, measuring shifts of the estimated intertemporal efficiency frontier.     

Do Conglomerate Firms Allocate Resources Inefficiently Across Industries? Theory and Evidence

We develop a profit-maximizing neoclassical model of optimal firm size and growth across different industries based on differences in industry fundamentals and firm productivity. In the model, a conglomerate discount is consistent with profit maximization. The model predicts how conglomerate firms will allocate resources across divisions over the business cycle and how their responses to industry shocks will differ from those of single-segment firms. Using plant level data, we find that growth and investment of conglomerate and single-segment firms is related to fundamental industry factors and individual segment level productivity. The majority of conglomerate firms exhibit growth across industry segments that is consistent with optimal behavior.     

The relationship between budget deficits and capital inflows: Further econometric evidence

This research note examines the impact of federal deficits on U.S. capital inflows. Expanding on the previous work of Bahmani-Oskooee and Payesteh (1994), we employ the relatively new maximum likelihood procedure developed byJohansen (1988) andjohansen andJuselius (1990) to do cointegration tests. The results find a long run relationship between budget deficits and capital inflows. In addition, findings from error-correlation modeling reveal that short-run disequilibria in financial markets are corrected very rapidly, suggesting that these markets are efficient.     

Optimal estimation under nonstandard conditions

We analyze optimality properties of maximum likelihood (ML) and other estimators when the problem does not necessarily fall within the locally asymptotically normal (LAN) class, therefore covering cases that are excluded from conventional LAN theory such as unit root nonstationary time series. The classical Hájek–Le Cam optimality theory is adapted to cover this situation. We show that the expectation of certain monotone “bowl-shaped” functions of the squared estimation error are minimized by the ML estimator in locally asymptotically quadratic situations, which often occur in nonstationary time series analysis when the LAN property fails. Moreover, we demonstrate a direct connection between the (Bayesian property of) asymptotic normality of the posterior and the classical optimality properties of ML estimators.