Sensitive Survey Questions: Measuring Attitudes Regarding Female Genital Cutting Through a List Experiment

Potential bias in survey responses is higher if sensitive outcomes are measured. This study analyses attitudes towards female genital cutting (FGC) in Ethiopia. A list experiment is designed to elicit truthful answers about FGC support and compares these outcomes with the answers given to a direct question. Our results confirm that the average bias is substantial as answers to direct questions underestimate the FGC support by about 10 percentage points. Moreover, our results provide suggestive but not statistically significant evidence that this bias is more pronounced among uneducated women and women targeted by an NGO intervention (not randomly assigned).     

It is not a flat world after all: Tax repatriation costs and cash value

US corporations have accumulated record‐high amounts of cash, and most of it is trapped in foreign accounts. This study tests the hypothesis that the marginal value of cash decreases in the presence of tax repatriation costs, as these costs are a strong indication that part of the cash is trapped abroad. Cash abroad is not readily available to the company because it is subject to an additional layer of tax before it can be used or distributed. Moreover, uncertainty surrounds the potential use of foreign cash, and research documents that firms holding high amounts of cash abroad are likely to invest in negative net present value activities. Finally, possible changes in tax regulation are an additional source of uncertainty. Consequently, foreign cash should be worth less than domestic cash. Using a large sample of US firms drawn from COMPUSTAT during the 1991–2012 period, the analysis suggests that shareholders value an extra dollar of cash at $1.086. However, this result changes dramatically when the change in cash is interacted with the tax cost of repatriating the earnings. That is, the marginal value of cash decreases significantly in the presence of tax repatriation costs, and shareholders discount cash when it is likely to be held abroad. This study contributes to the literature on cash holding by investigating whether tax repatriation costs affect the value of corporate cash. Moreover, the findings show that there are important economic consequences linked to the phenomenon of cash accumulation in foreign countries and therefore provide regulators with a sound foundation on which to take additional actions to require more disclosure of and transparency in the actual location of firms’ cash holdings.     

A model of growth with inherited tastes

This research aims at studying a general equilibrium closed economy with overlapping generations and inherited tastes (aspirations), as in de la Croix (Econ Lett 53(1):89–96, 1996). It shows that the interaction between the intensity of aspirations and the elasticity of substitution of effective consumption affects the qualitative and quantitative long-term dynamics from both local and global perspectives. The related literature is extended by showing that (1) the Neimark–Sacker bifurcation found by de la Croix (1996) does not necessarily give rise to fluctuations and (2) endogenous (long-lasting) fluctuations occur through the emergence of period-doubling bifurcations.     

Modelling the influence of caring for the elderly on migration: estimates and evidence from Indonesia

In a society where children are expected to support the elderly, the ill health of an elderly parent is likely to influence an individual's propensity to migrate. Using data from the Indonesian Family Life Survey, we examine the manner in which the responsibility to care for an elderly parent who is in poor health affects the migration decisions of working-age adults. Our analysis suggests that individuals will be less likely to migrate if they have elderly parents who are in poor health. These findings are robust to specifications using alternative measures of poor health.     

Mapping the antecedents of telework diffusion: firm‐level evidence from Italy

Previous literature has studied telework practices predominantly from the employees' perspective rather than exploring its use at the firm level. With the objective of contributing to reducing this research gap, the relationship between firms' adoption of telework and the firms' technological, organisational and environmental contexts is explored. Data were obtained from a survey conducted between 2005 and 2009 on a sample of 1,134 Italian firms in the Piedmont region. The results show an overall increase in the diffusion of telework primarily attributable to a rise in the adoption of ‘mobile’ work rather than home‐based forms of telework. The results also show that firms that had previously adopted information systems supporting core business processes and knowledge management were more inclined to adopt telework. Telework arrangements were more widely diffused among firms facing a growing and geographically dispersed market demand, and also in the contexts of higher levels of human capital and lower capital intensity.     

Restructuring the Alitalia business model

This paper analyzes the performance of the Italian airline company, Alitalia, after the deregulation in the air transport industry in the European Union. Company performance is analyzed using Tornqvist indices. The evidence shows as Alitalia productivity slowdown has been caused by the company failure to support an increase in input with a supply-oriented strategy.     

How does technological innovation and diffusion affect inter-industry workers’ mobility?

Does technological change amount to accumulation of general, and so transferable, human capital? To approach this question I rely on a theoretical framework in which the “technology distance” between industries reduces inter-industry transferability of workers’ skill. Empirically, I use US panel data on individual intra-industry and inter-industry mobility decisions between 1982 and 1990, a period of rapid technological change in all manufacturing sectors, to estimate a mixed logit econometric specification that does not rely on the IIA assumption. I find support to the main idea that technological innovation and diffusion have different effects on workers’ industrial mobility patterns. “Knowledge spillovers”, differently from “rent spillovers”, indeed boost the chances of workers’ inter-industry mobility. Surprisingly, this is more consistently so in low-tech industries than in high-tech industries. Consistently with the expectations developed in the theoretical framework, in low-tech industries skilled workers respond more sharply to technology diffusion than unskilled workers.     

The Role of Commercial Non-profit Organizations in the Provision of Public Services

In this paper we discuss the role of commercial non-profit firmsin the provision of public services, referring to three casestudies to illustrate the main issues. We consider problemsof corporate governance, including the role of the board ofmembers and the scope for performance-related pay. We discussthe performance of such non-profit firms in terms of qualityand costs, the particular finance problems of these firms andthe implications for risk taking. We also suggest various aspectsof non-profit behaviour in public service provision that presentinteresting avenues for future research.     

Modelling Currency Crises in Emerging Markets: A Dynamic Probit Model with Unobserved Heterogeneity and Autocorrelated Errors*

The paper investigates the causes of currency crises in emerging markets. We estimate the probability of a currency crisis by applying maximum smoothly simulated likelihood to a dynamic LDV model. This approach allows us to take explicit account of the existence of intertemporal links between crises. The results show that currency crises are influenced by real, monetary, debt and global variables. Past banking crises are significant determinants of the probability of currency crises. Moreover, countries that sharply devalued in the past are less prone to experience another currency crisis. We find evidence of unobserved heterogeneity, which may reflect differences in the countries’ institutional/historical background. Finally, the determinants of currency crises differ by type of exchange rate regime.