Disentangling the demand function from the production function for local public services: The case of public safety

In this paper we develop a theoretical framework and an econometric model which allow us to separate the effect of income and other socioeconomic variables on the demand for publicly provided goods from their effect on the price of those goods. We apply our approach in a study of expenditures for police protection in a cross-section of 73 U.S. cities and counties. Our results suggest that studies of public expenditures which fail to incorporate community characteristics in production and cost functions can yield very misleading results.     

Personalist Economics: Moral Convictions,Economic Realities,And Social Action

We examine the relationship between the administrative enforcement of environmental regulation, ethnic heterogeneity, and other community characteristics in New Jersey and New York. We find that the percentage of non-white population in a community is positively related with administrative penalties imposed on violators. However, penalties are lower in more ethnically diverse communities. This result may be due to the fact that these communities are less likely to coordinate to create solidarity across ethnic groups and demand stronger enforcement.     

What are the determinants of hiring? The importance of product market demand and search frictions

In this article, we study the importance of product market demand and search frictions for hiring. We use a search-matching model with imperfect competition in the product market to derive an equation for total hiring in a local labour market, and estimate it on Swedish panel data. If product markets are imperfectly competitive, product demand shocks should have a direct effect on employment for given levels of prices and wages. Our main finding is that product demand has such a direct effect on hiring. This highlights the importance of taking imperfect competition in the product market into account in studies of employment dynamics and hiring. We also find that, for given levels of prices, wages, and product demand, the number of unemployed workers in a local labour market has a positive effect on hiring, suggesting that search frictions matter. Quantitatively, product demand shocks seem to be more important for understanding the variation in hiring than shocks to the number of unemployed workers.     

TRUE HOUSEHOLD EQUIVALENCE SCALES AND CHARACTERISTICS OF THE POOR IN THE UNITED STATES

In this paper we deal with the question of which measures of economic well-being are adequate to identify those groups of households in the U.S. whose economic conditions justify public concern and assistance. We derive a utility based measure of economic well-being from the estimation of a complete set of consumer demand equations. The demand system is Lluch's Extended Linear Expenditure System (Lluch, 1973). Household characteristics are incorporated using the scaling method proposed by Barten (1966). Using the welfare indicator derived, we study the composition of the poorest part of the population, using data from the 1972–73 Consumer Expenditure Survey. We compare our results with those obtained using various other welfare indicators, including the official U.S. poverty line. We show that using different family composition adjustments significantly and systematically affects just who are considered to be at the bottom of the welfare distribution. We finally suggest that program designers therefore can improve their target efficiency by carefully selecting from among the acceptable indices of welfare when defining program eligibility.     

U.S. OIL DEMAND AND CONSERVATION

Recent history has lent casual support to three popular theories about U.S. oil demand: (i) U.S. oil consumption is very insensitive to changing oil prices, (ii) non-price conservation has reduced U.S. oil demand, and (Hi) U.S. oil consumption falls more when oil prices rise than it rises when oil prices fall. Together, these theories suggest that one could hold oil consumption constant without much economic sacrifice. The authors' econometric evidence does not support these theories. This evidence indicates that U.S. oil consumption is fairly responsive to price changes over the long run, but with a considerable lag. Sharp oil price increases—or an equivalent policy action—would be needed to hold oil consumption constant during the 1990s.     

Estimation of Minimum Market Threshold for Retail Commercial Sectors

Understanding the ability of a local market to support a particular type of establishment is a prerequisite to designing effective development strategies. While several factors contribute to the vitality of the local retail market, the most fundamental factor is the relative size of the market in terms of potential customers. A commonly applied technique to assess the ability of a community to support various business activities is the estimation of demand threshold using simple count data models. However, due to the presence of excessive zeros in the dependent variable, this study uses Hurdle Poisson and Zero Inflated Poisson (ZIP) count data models and estimates demand threshold for twelve retail commercial sectors for 2,201 counties in the U.S. The results show that the demographic characteristics of the county population and its remoteness are significant factors determining the number of establishments in a county. The results from this study may be used by local economic development practitioners and entrepreneurs to retain, promote, and attract retail commercial businesses in the local communities.     

Assessing market power in the U.S. commercial banking industry under deregulation

This study attempts to investigate market power in the U.S. commercial banking industry since the U.S. government began to deregulate the banking sector in the early 1990s using the static Bresnahan–Lau model (SBLM) and dynamic Bresnahan–Lau model with error corrections (DBLEC). In particular, panel unit root and panel cointegration techniques are utilized to examine the dynamic model. The empirical results of the SBLM show that the banking industry is highly competitive. The empirical results of DBLEC also suggest that the commercial banking industry is close to being perfectly competitive in the short run. By contrast, the adjustment speeds of the supply and demand sides towards the long-run equilibrium are quite slow in that market, which implies that the U.S. commercial banks enjoy a certain degree of long-run market power.     

Transition programs for internationally educated nurses: what can the United States learn from the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada?

It is critical to conduct competency assessments of internationally educated nurses (IENs) to ensure public safety, as well as uphold accountability to nursing as a regulated profession. Transition programs are needed because of the required proficiency of the working language, as well as differences in nursing education, national health care systems, nursing practice and culture, etc. Transition programs in the United States are grossly under-developed because of lack of recognition of their importance, lack of funding and standardization, and decentralized regulation in nursing. United States can learn from the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada regarding how to best transition IENs. Its current hit-and-miss approach is inadequate and inconsistent with the emerging global trend to systematically deal with the transitional challenges of IENs at the national level.     

Are U.S. growth and value stocks similarly integrated with the world markets? A test across business cycles

Utilizing the bivariate GARCH-in-mean methodology, this study examines the strength of global risk premia using 10 major foreign stock markets with two style-based, large-cap U.S. index funds and S&P500, for the period 1993–2014. We incorporated seven U.S. business cycles. The foreign risk premium was found to be significantly strong for both growth and value stocks, and the S&P500 index, indicating that U.S. integration within global market is strong and persistent over the past 20 years. We report distinct risk characteristics owing to global linkages, for the two style-based U.S. funds over different business cycles. The foreign risk premium for growth stocks is mostly positive and especially high during contractions; in contrast, the value stocks demand more premiums during expansions. The growth and value linkages with foreign countries also vary quite substantially over the business cycles. A possible sign of convergence is the decreasing difference between value and growth foreign risk premiums, post-2001, perhaps indicative of greater domestic and global market integration. Our results support a solid, continuing trend of U.S. integration within global markets, with an influential role of business cycles.     

IS EMPLOYMENT DISCRIMINATION BASED ON TOBACCO USE EFFICIENT?

Numerous employers in over 20 U.S. states currently discriminate legally against smokers in their hiring policies. We analyze the cost of being a smoker, measured in annual hospital days, and compare this with the cost of being a former smoker, the cost of being obese, and the cost of a variety of other medical conditions, relative to the cost of being a never smoker, using three large recent surveys each having in excess of one hundred thousand observations. The paper also explores the cost of former smokers as determined by the number of years since quitting. Smokers as a whole are not found to be the most costly employees. Furthermore, health costs vary dramatically among smokers of different duration and intensity. As a consequence, our results question the efficiency of such discrimination. (JEL I10, I18, J71, J7)     

Exploring the manipulation toolkit: the failure of Doral Financial Corporation

The 2015 bankruptcy of Doral Financial Corporation, once ‘the best’ U.S. bank according to U.S. Banker, is the largest since April 2010. The bankruptcy concludes years of management manipulation and efforts to recover. SEC investigation revealed fraud related to Doral’s valuation of interest only strips (IOs). We show that Doral management’s misconduct also includes reckless hiring, over investing, insiders trading, and opportunistic stock splits. Investigating the full range of Doral management’s misconduct reveals new tactics that managers use to pool with good firms and aids our understanding of the economic impact of managerial misconduct.     

The demand for pay service on cable television

A probability model is developed for consumer choice among three television programming options, free over-the-air television, basic cable television service, and pay cable serve which consists of basic service plus a single channel of premium entertainment programming. Estimating equations for the demand for pay service are derived from the probability model and then estimated by applying regression techniques to data from a large sample of U.S. cable systems. The estimated parameters of the demand equation show that the demand for pay service is affected by the prices charged for both basic and pay service, by demographic characteristics of the households served by a cable system, and by the quality of programming offered on both basic and pay services. The demand estimates suggest that the introduction of pay service has substantially enhanced the likelihood of profitable operation for cable systems in major television markets.     

Improving estimates of job matching efficiency with different measures of unemployment

Traditional measures of unemployment can mask important changes in the labor market across time. We therefore use broader definitions of unemployment to estimate time-varying job-matching efficiency rates that are consistent with vacancies and hiring activity data for the U.S. Our efficiency rates are then modelled along with employment data to study their dynamic, non-linear relationship. We find that including marginally attached workers and part-time workers for economic reasons helps explain the changes in employment patterns observed after the global financial crisis. This finding emphasizes the importance of accounting for labor underutilization, particularly during the latest economic recovery.     

The effect of case management on U.S. hospitals

This quantitative research study assesses the organizational characteristics, market factors, and profitability of U.S. hospitals operating with a case management model. These results have managerial implications associated with individual hospital performance, implications for nursing leadership, and policy implications on resource allocation.     

THE IMPACT OF OIL PRICE SHOCKS ON THE U.S. STOCK MARKET*

It is shown that the reaction of U.S. real stock returns to an oil price shock differs greatly depending on whether the change in the price of oil is driven by demand or supply shocks in the oil market. The demand and supply shocks driving the global crude oil market jointly account for 22% of the long‐run variation in U.S. real stock returns. The responses of industry‐specific U.S. stock returns to demand and supply shocks in the crude oil market are consistent with accounts of the transmission of oil price shocks that emphasize the reduction in domestic final demand.     

Technology transfer in United States universities

This paper examines the role of offices of technology transfer (OTT) in 12 U.S. universities in 1998 in commercializing research results in the form of patents, licenses, and start-ups of new companies. We study the organization and place of OTTs within the university structure, the process of technology transfer, and the staffing and funding of the office. Data were collected through a mail questionnaire followed up through telephone interviews. We also conducted a statistical analysis of data for 170 U.S. universities, hospitals, and research institutes for the period 1991–1996. Our findings suggest that technology transfer from universities to the commercial sector needs to be understood in its broader context. The primary purpose of a technology transfer program is for the university to assist its researchers in disseminating research results for the public good. Success in this endeavor is only partially reflected in income generated for the university or the number of business start-ups. The degree of success depends not only on the nature of the interface between the university and the business community but also on the receptivity in the surrounding community as well as the culture, organization, and incentives within the universities themselves.     

Labour Productivity: A Comparative Analysis of the European Union and United States, 1994–2007

This article confirms that labour productivity in the European economies has continued to slow down in recent years. U.S. productivity growth has been higher than in the EU, but only since 2001. At the same time, both economies have modified previous employment performance: EU employment growth is now higher than in U.S. This article proposes that productivity growth be explained by demand dynamics, and investment in particular, not forgetting the influence of employment, along with other factors such as new technologies.     

BILATERAL TRADE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA: IMPLICATIONS OF THE FREE TRADE AGREEMENT

This study's primary objective is to evaluate empirically the economic effects of the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement (FTA). The paper emphasizes bilateral trade flows of agricultural and industrial products between the United States and Canada, given that the FTA removes tariff and non-tariff barriers. It evaluates the FTA's impact on the two countries' trade with third countries. The paper specifies a traditional log-linear trade model consisting of import demand and export supply equations for both agricultural and industrial products. It uses quarterly time-series U.S. and Canadian trade data for 1972–1985.
The study uses the two-stage least-squares estimator to estimate the models. The models had R coefficients ranging from 0.78 to 0.99, indicating that the models' explanatory variables explain most causes of variations in the dependent variable. This study reveals that U.S. imports of agricultural and industrial products from Canada were more sensitive than were Canadian imports not only to import and domestic prices but also to world prices. This is because Canadian consumers have less domestic substitutes than do their U.S. counterparts. Also, Canada has a smaller internal market than does the United States. The study estimates that U.S. imports from Canada will increase $2.8 billion while Canadian imports from the United States will increase $1.2 billion. The impact on the two countries' trade with third-party countries will be insignificant.     

美国医疗保健模式及其改革

由于倡导自由市场经济的文化和社会背景,美国是唯一没有实行全国统一的医疗保障制度的发达国家。本文对美国医疗保险制度、美国医院的管理运行机制、美国医疗保险付费方式的沿革进行了系统的介绍,并梳理了美国医疗保健管理模式的特点与问题,结合奥巴马政府医疗保健改革要点,对我国医疗保健体系改革提出了几点建议。     

DRIFTING APART: CANADIAN AND U.S. LABOR MARKETS

Canadian and U.S. unemployment rates moved together within a narrow margin from 1961 to the mid-1970s. Since then, Canadian rates have exceeded U.S. rates by large margins—at times as much as 3 percentage points. Throughout this period, interest rates in the two countries have been nearly identical. Aggregate demand stimulation by government deficits has been greater in Canada than in the U.S., and the trade surplus in Canada has added to demand while the trade deficit in the U.S. has subtracted from demand. Therefore, it seems that conventional Keynesian arguments cannot explain the recent differences in unemployment rates.
Differences in labor market developments, however, can do so. During a period when real wages rose 35 percent in Canada, they fell 5 percent in the U.S. Since the recession of 1981, U.S. wages have dropped while Canadian wages have remained constant. Differences in labor productivity do not account for these developments. A strong case exists for the argument that the different paths of unemployment rates are due to different paths of real wage developments.
It is argued that the causes for these differences in labor market conditions are associated with substantial growth and decreases in unionization rates in Canada and the U.S., respectively. In addition, the unemployment insurance system in Canada is shown to be considerably more generous than that in the U.S.