On the Opportunity Cost of Crop Diversification

Distance functions are increasingly being augmented, with environmental goods treated as conventional outputs. A common approach to evaluate the opportunity cost of providing an environmental good is the exploitation of the distance function's dual relationship to the value function. This implies that the opportunity cost is assumed to be non‐negative. This approach also requires a convex technology set. Focusing on crop diversification for a balanced sample of 44 cereal farms in the East of England for the years 2007–2013, this paper develops a novel opportunity cost measure that does not depend on these strong assumptions. We find that the opportunity cost of crop diversification is negative for most farms.     

Capitalism and freedom?

This essay tests Milton Friedman's conjecture that capitalism is a necessary condition for political freedom. For the decade around 2000 indices of the degree of capitalism and the degree of political freedom are highly correlated and provide plausibility for Friedman's conjecture. In looking at changes over time in the nineteenth century, however, the analysis refutes Friedman's conjecture. These apparently contradictory results are reconciled by showing that both capitalism and freedom are related to such variables as the educational level of the population so that, although not causally tied, they are correlated in a cross-national comparison.     

Toward a Horizonal Theory of Justice: Efficiency,Equity, Rights and Capabilities in a Free Market Economy

The theory of planning horizons and their relation to pricing, conscience and learning has been explored in some detail in terms of efficiency attributes and ecological health (Jennings 2003, Journal of Economic Issues 39:365-373, 2005, 2007a, b, 2008a). This paper addresses the equity implications of planning horizons in terms of the social role and importance of justice, rights and capabilities in a free market economy. From my earlier work, cooperation—not competition—is seen as the means to longer and broader horizons in an efficiency frame, mitigating any alleged tradeoff against equity issues. The impact of longer horizons on fairness and justice in terms of intentions and outcomes along with rights and capabilities still remains unexplored. This paper reviews the normative aspects of planning horizons, showing how ethical and ecological conscience spreads with horizon effects, strengthening goals of fairness and the internalization of social effects. In this setting, capabilities and empowerment are enhanced by respect for human rights, as social conscience spreads through interhorizonal complementarities. The features of a long-horizon world differ from myopic contexts, specifically in the relation of efficiency to other goals. This paper examines that difference in terms of its equity aspects, with regard to social justice and the role of rights and capabilities in economic cultures.     

A note on Heckman-type corrections in models for zero expenditures

In Heien and Wessells (1990), a two-step estimation procedure, that makes use of Heckman-type corrections, is proposed to estimate consumption on household budget surveys. It is shown that this approach, which draws from switching regressions models, leads to inconsistent estimates.     

Economic well-being and poverty among the elderly: An analysis based on a collective consumption model

We apply the collective consumption model of Browning et al. (2010) to analyse economic well-being and poverty among the elderly. The model focuses on individual preferences, a consumption technology that captures the economies of scale of living in a couple, and a sharing rule that governs the intra-household allocation of resources. The model is applied to a time series of Dutch consumption expenditure surveys. Our empirical results indicate substantial economies of scale and a wife's share that is increasing in total expenditures. We further calculated two sets of poverty rates: one based on the collective consumption model and one based on the traditional approach with a standard equivalence scale. Poverty among widowers is underestimated by the traditional approach. The same is true for women (men) in elderly couples for the first (later) time periods in our analysis. Finally, we analysed the impact of becoming a widow(er). Based on cross-sectional evidence, we find that the drop in material well-being following the husband's death is rather substantial for women. For men, the picture is reversed.     

Optimal Hedging Strategies and Interactions between Firms

This paper studies corporate risk management in a context of financial constraints and imperfect competition in the product market. The paper shows that interactions between firms affect their hedging strategies. As a general rule, firms’ hedging demands decrease with the correlation between their internal funds and investment opportunities. Moreover, when a firm’s hedging demand is high in the case where investments are strategic substitutes, its hedging demand is low in the case where investments are strategic complements and vice versa.     

Unit nonresponse errors in income surveys: a case study

A survey on the economic and social conditions of households in the city of Modena was carried out in 2002 and in 2006 (two waves) by the CAPP (Centre for Analyses of Public Policies). In the first wave of 2002, each designated sampling unit (i.e., the family) had three units as reserves. If the first refused to be interviewed, the interviewer contacted the three reserves, one after the other, until obtaining either one respondent or four non-participant units. At the end of the survey four categories of units were distinguished: interviewees, refusals, noncontacts, and unused reserves. All units were matched with their corresponding record in the databases of the Ministry of Finance of 2002 and the Census of 2001. The resulting data set permitted the analysis of unit or total nonresponses. The distribution of fiscal income showed different shapes for the four categories, implying a selective participation of the families. The interviewees yielded a positive bias of about 600?, holding constant other factors. The selection of the significant factors affecting nonresponse was performed via backward elimination in a logit model and with the lasso method. Participation increased as fiscal income and age increased and by education level (secondary school and university degree), while it decreased among entrepreneurs, independent workers, managers, and medium-to-low skilled workers.