Occupational diversification as an adaptation to rainfall variability in rural India

Occupational diversification among household members in rural India is investigated as an adaptation strategy against the risks arising from the variability of local rainfall. Nationally representative household‐level survey data are combined with the coefficient of variation of rainfall constructed based on historical rainfall data at the district level. The analysis finds that high rainfall variability has significant negative effects on the agricultural specialization of within‐household occupational choices. This result is reinforced by the finding that improved access to irrigation, education, credit, roads, and postal services, is associated with a lower occupational diversification within families and a greater specialization of household members in agricultural‐related employment.     

Trust,trustworthiness, and traditional Islamic education

This paper examines traditional Islamic school (i.e. madrasah) attendance as a determinant of social attitudes among secondary-schooled adolescents in rural Bangladesh. Although both recognized and traditional madrasah-enrolled adolescents show greater support for charity, we find no evidence that traditional madrasah attendance promotes “trust in others”. Attendance at recognized madrasahs, which use a state-approved curriculum, however, significantly increases social trust. The madrasah–trust connection is not explained by the role of teachers’ attitudes towards trust or professional background. Nor do we find evidence that the absence of an effect of traditional madrasah attendance on social trust is driven by their geographic locations. Given the differences between the two groups in terms of stated social preferences, our analysis warns against the practice of lumping state-recognized madrasahs and traditional madrasahs into one category.     

Can Government Intervention in Childcare be Justified?

Childcare is not like other goods and services. Its inherent nature creates unusual challenges for efficient delivery by the market, while its usage can have social as well as private consequences. Government involvement in childcare may therefore be justified to improve the efficiency of delivery or achieve social objectives, but its effectiveness will depend on whether policy measures can better address the challenges of childcare provision than the market. This article reviews the justification for the recent rapid development of childcare policy in the UK and considers the potential benefits and drawbacks of this growing government intervention.     

The All‐Pay Auction with Nonmonotonic Payoff

I model innovation contests as an all‐pay auction in which it is possible not to achieve successful innovation despite costly R&D investments, and as a result, there is no winner. In such a case, the winning payoff turns out to be nonmonotonic in own bid. I derive the sufficient conditions for the existence of pure strategy equilibria, and fully characterize the nondegenerate mixed strategy equilibrium. In the mixed strategy equilibrium, the support of the low‐value bidder is not continuous, and both the high‐value and the low‐value bidders place an atom in the (distinct) lower bound of their respective support. Under symmetric valuation, both bidders place an atom at zero. These results can explain why one does not observe very low quality innovation in real life, or why even symmetric firms may stay out of an innovation contest.     

FINANCE,DISTRIBUTION AND THE ECONOMIC OBJECTIVE OF FINANCIAL COOPERATIVE INSTITUTIONS

This paper proposes a model where the structure rather than the size of the financial sector explains its influence on income distribution. Because of information asymmetries, a financial sector dominated solely by profit‐maximizing financial intermediaries will increase income and wealth inequality as it gives preferential access to credit for high‐income agents, whereas a diversified inclusive financial sector with alternative models of finance, like cooperatives, will reduce the inequality gap. No full convergence in income distribution can be realized through finance only and there is still a need for redistribution policies. Accordingly, an objective function for cooperative financial institutions should define a desired pricing behaviour that can increase the income of members at a rate higher than the average growth rate of the economy.     

Economies in Transition: How Important Is Trade Openness for Growth?*

We investigate the effect of trade openness on economic growth in transition countries using a transparent statistical methodology that leads to data‐driven case studies. In particular, we employ synthetic control methods in a panel of transition economies and compare GDP growth in treated (that is, open) countries with growth in a convex combination of similar but untreated (that is, closed) countries. We find that trade liberalization tends to have a positive effect on the pattern of real GDP per capita. One of our most robust results shows that making the transition without opening up to trade considerably hampers growth.     

天津市武清区大气O_3、NO_2和CO浓度变化特征研究

文章利用2014年天津市武清区大气污染物臭氧(O_3)、二氧化氮(NO_2)和一氧化碳(CO)的监测数据,分析研究武清区O_3及其前体物NO_2和CO等大气污染物浓度水平和变化特征。结果表明武清区O_3浓度水平呈现明显的季节变化特征。夏季O_3浓度为106μg·m~(-3),冬季浓度为28μg·m~(-3),主要与光化学反应在夏季比较强烈,冬季紫外强度和平均温度均较低,光化学反应较弱有关。2014年武清区大气中NO_2年均值为51μg·m~(-3),CO年均值为1.9 mg·m~(-3),冬季是NO_2和CO浓度最高的季节。     

China's Foreign Aid at a Transitional Stage

By estimating China's foreign aid as a proxy for China's bilateral Official Development Assistance and by analyzing its implementation structure and policy, this paper sheds some light on China's foreign aid activities, which have been at a transitional stage. Based on our estimates, the level of foreign aid in terms of net disbursement has increased sharply since 2004, reaching around US$7.1 billion in 2013. Some measures to strengthen the implementation structure to deal with this expansion have been introduced by the central government; however, this transition process needs more time. To facilitate this process, China is attempting to absorb knowhow on development assistance from multilateral institutions and Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development's Development Assistance Committee countries that are eager to share their knowledge, with the expectation that China will eventually play a major role in international development.     

Neighbors and the evolution of the comparative advantage of nations: Evidence of international knowledge diffusion?

The literature on knowledge diffusion shows that knowledge decays strongly with distance. In this paper we document that the probability that a product is added to a country's export basket is, on average, 65% larger if a neighboring country is a successful exporter of that same product. For existing products, growth of exports in a country is 1.5% higher per annum if it has a neighbor with comparative advantage in these products. While these results could be driven by a common third factor that escapes our controls, they align with our expectations of the localized character of knowledge diffusion.