Motivations to grow energy crops: the role of crop and contract attributes

Perennial energy crops are a promising source of bioenergy whose production involves production risks, long‐term commitment of land and need for crop‐specific investments without the coverage of crop insurance potentially available for conventional crops. We conduct a choice experiment in five states in the Midwestern and South‐central regions of the U.S. to examine the effect of crop‐contract attributes on the joint discrete‐continuous choice decisions to adopt an energy crop and convert acres to it from a status quo use, while controlling for the effect of various farmers’ risk and time preferences, sociodemographic characteristics, and availability of crop insurance for conventional crops. We find robust evidence that high discount rates, high upfront establishment costs and need for crop‐specific investments create disincentives for adoption and allocation of land to energy crop production. The effects of riskiness of returns and risk aversion are less robust across specifications. The effect of conventional crop insurance on the energy crop adoption decision differs across types of insurance; in particular, farmers with revenue insurance are statistically significantly less likely to adopt an energy crop. Our results have implications for the design of effective contracts and policy incentives to induce the production of energy crops.     

Preferences and Willingness to Pay for Green Hotel Attributes in Tourist Choice Behavior: The Case of Taiwan

Although many companies in the hotel industry aim to pursue more sustainable and socially responsible practices, the present literature shows mixed results with regard to tourist reactions to such moves, especially for the service quality perception impacted by implemented green practices and the willingness to pay more for such actions. Unlike previous research examining tourists’ preferences for separate green hotel attributes, this study identifies the determinants of tourists’ choice of green hotel attributes. Additionally, the study measures the willingness to pay (WTP) for such services, in the context of the Taiwanese market, using the stated preference of combined green hotel attribute scenarios. A multinomial logit (MNL) model is employed to estimate the relative influence of behavioral and facility attributes on choice behavior. Furthermore, the study examines determinants influencing respondents’ choice of green hotel attributes. A latent variable class model (LVCM) approach is applied in the estimation of the unobserved heterogeneity, and a total of 390 valid respondents were used in the analysis. The empirical MNL results indicate that while tourists prefer luxury rooms and the provision of personal toiletries, they are also willing to accept reduced service quality. Additionally, sex, income, and age have significant influences on tourist choice behavior. The results of the LVCM model demonstrate that respondents with high levels of the green consumption trait are more likely to choose hotels that have a greater number of environmentally friendly attributes. The implicit amount that tourists are willing to pay for room quality is around US$13, for the provision of personal toiletries is about US$22, and for service quality is US$12, but they also require a discount of approximately US$11 in order to accept the common practices of green hotels. This study is useful in providing the hotel industry and government with quantitative information that can be used to develop and implement better green hotel policies.     

浅谈“数学模型实验”课程教学

对"数学模型实验"课程的教学模式进行了探讨,介绍了"数学模型实验"的教学内容、教学方法及考核方式,分析了目前该课程教学存在的问题并给出了相应的对策,最后探讨了该课程未来的发展方向。     

Teaching the Minimum Wage in Econ 101 in Light of the New Economics of the Minimum Wage

The author argues that the recent controversy over the effect of the minimum wage on employment offers an opportunity for teaching introductory economics. Research findings on the minimum wage could be used to motivate alternative models of the labor market, such as monopsony and search models, and to teach students how economists test hypotheses with data.     

加强实验教学,培养学生实验技能和综合素质

为了提高学生的动手能力,启迪学生严谨科学的思维方法,培养学生的创新意识和实践能力,我们在植物生理生化实验教学中进行了努力的探索。通过加强实验教学,学生具备了更强的科学研究的实验技能,学生的综合素质也有较大的提高,教学效果得到社会、学校和学生的认同,较好地完成了实验教学的主要任务。     

Temporal stability of preferences and willingness to pay for natural areas in choice experiments: A test–retest

The main objective of this paper is to test the temporal stability of stated preferences and willingness to pay (WTP) values from a Choice Experiment (CE) in a test–retest. The same group of participants was asked the same choice tasks in an internet-based CE, conducted twice with a time interval of one year without interviewer interference. We examine choice consistency at individual choice task level and transferability of the underlying indirect utility function and associated WTP values. The results show that choices are consistent in 57 percent of the choice occasions. Comparison of the choice models over time shows that the estimated preference and scale parameters are significantly different, suggesting that choice behaviour changed between the two surveys. Differences between marginal WTP estimates for individual choice attributes are statistically significant only at the 10 percent level. However, we show that this can result in significantly different WTP values for policy scenarios. The instability of estimated mean WTP values for different policy scenarios asks for caution when including WTP values in cost-benefit analysis.     

规范大学物理实验教学环节的思考与实践

本文从大学物理实验预习、实验操作、实验结果检查、实验报告撰写等方面,介绍了我校在规范大学物理实验教学环节方面的一些思考与实践。     

汽车柴油发动机可靠性试验的重要性和必要性

文章针对当前汽车柴油发动机产品在可靠性方面存在的主要问题,结合国家试验标准,通过列举某台国产汽车柴油机可靠性试验中出现的故障情况及排除措施,纠正此类可靠性试验保养操作中的常见误区,阐明进行汽车柴油机可靠性试验的重要性和必要性。