Demographic change,human capital accumulation and R&D‐based growth

Employing an overlapping generations model of R&D‐based growth with endogenous fertility and education decisions, we examine how demographic changes induced by an increase in life expectancy influence the long‐run growth rate of the economy. We demonstrate that life expectancy, when relatively low (high), positively (negatively) affects economic growth. This paper also compares the growth implications of child education subsidy policies (i.e., policies for enhancing basic education) and child rearing subsidy policies (i.e., pro‐natal policies) and demonstrate that while the child education subsidies consistently foster economic growth, child rearing subsidies may negatively affect economic growth.     

Throwing It All Away: Exploring Affluent Consumers’ Attitudes Toward Wasting Edible Food

The skewed allocation of food across the world population is a major concern, as the result is that some of us live in abundant supply while others spend their life in constant scarcity. While researchers have studied a variety of issues related to the amounts of food being wasted, or the waste of edible food across consumers with different demographic characteristics, less is known about the drivers of attitudes toward food waste. Based on survey data from a sample of affluent Norwegian consumers, we test how subjective food knowledge, environmental concern, age, and income are related to consumer attitudes toward wasting edible food. We find that all variables except income drive consumer attitudes. Implications for theory and public policy are offered.     

Incentive Travel: A View from the Top

Meetings, incentives, conventions, and exhibitions are an important segment of the hospitality and tourism industry. The extant study focuses on the incentives or incentive travel. While incentive travel has existed for decades it is a relatively under-researched sub-field of hospitality. The goal of this article is to examine the current state of incentive travel, how it has changed over the past few years, and how it is likely to change in the future. Rather than examine every aspect of incentive travel, this research only looks at “buyers” of incentive travel rather than users or recipients and obtains data only from top-level corporate executives. Thus, the results are of the highest level and highest caliber. It was found that companies have been using incentive travel for decades and find it to be an effective employee motivator and as an incentive to sell product. It also builds morale and relationships.     

Long-term effects of labor market conditions on family formation for Japanese youth

This study aims to examine how each cohort’s family formation is affected by labor market conditions experienced in youth in Japan. Although the deterioration in youth employment opportunities has often been blamed for Japan’s declining fertility rate, the effect of slack labor market conditions on fertility is theoretically unclear. We estimate the effects of regional labor market conditions at entry to the labor market and contemporaneous conditions on fertility, controlling for nation-wide year effects and prefecture fixed effects, and find the following. First, high school-educated women who experienced a recession while entering the labor market are less likely to have children. In contrast, a recession rather increases fertility among college-educated women. When summed up, the aggregate impact of labor market conditions experienced in youth on fertility is weak. Second, the unemployment rate at entry to the labor market is positively correlated with the probability of having two or more children conditionally on having at least one child. Third, the contemporaneous unemployment rate is negatively correlated with marriage of women in the local labor market, although the correlation is weak and concentrated on the less educated group.     

The influence of indoor air on personal exposure to volatile organic compounds and its risk estimation

This paper summarizes the results of personal exposure monitoring and estimates the risk from exposure to 18 volatile organic compounds compared with health criteria set by the US Environmental Protection Agency. In study 1, personal exposure levels and outdoor air concentrations were compared, and in study 2, personal exposure levels and the corresponding indoor air concentrations were compared. From these studies, it was concluded that personal exposure to volatile organic compounds depended markedly on indoor air quality and that handling of compounds increased personal exposure markedly. Risk estimations indicated that chloroform in tap water, benzene from cigarette smoke and p -dichlorobenzene from household insecticide needed caution.     

Comparative analysis of health care costs in Japan and the United States: a simulation of productivity and savings behavior

Japan and the United States, though contrastive in terms of the percentage of the elderly in their population and the ratio of their health care costs to GDP, both face soaring medical expenditures. Sato et al. [Health Care Systems in Japan and the United States: A Simulation Studies and Policy Analysis. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Hingham, MA] developed a model to solve this problem by increasing the productivity of the non-health care sector. This study has applied that model to estimate national savings, and compared these savings with estimated health care costs. The results show that in order for savings to exceed expenditures the US needs to have a higher savings rate and a higher interest rate than Japan.     

The Minimum Wage Law and Teenage Crime: Evidence From the US

What is the effect of minimum wage regulation on youth crime? Masanori Hashimoto, of Ohio State University, argues that in the USA the evidence suggests that the minimum wage causes both unemployment and teenage crime.     

Dynamics of quote and deal prices in the foreign exchange market

We empirically investigate price fluctuations of yen-dollar exchange rate using the high-frequency data recorded in the electronic broking system for seven-year period. The distribution of quote price changes has symmetric fat-tails approximated by a power law; however, that of deal price is asymmetrical. The autocorrelation function and diffusion of price changes indicate that quote price exhibits anti-correlation feature in short time scale, whereas deal price is essentially uncorrelated. The bid-ask spread shows power-law distribution and long range temporal correlations similar to that observed in absoute price changes.