Export promotion agencies: Do they work?

The number of national export promotion agencies (EPAs) has tripled over the last two decades. While more countries made them part of their export strategy, studies criticized their efficacy in developing countries. EPAs were retooled, partly in response to these critiques. This paper studies the impact of today's EPAs and their strategies, based on new survey data covering 103 developing and developed countries. Results suggest that on average they have a statistically significant effect on exports. Our identification strategies highlight the importance of EPA services for overcoming foreign trade barriers and solving asymmetric information problems associated with exports of heterogeneous goods. There are also strong diminishing returns, suggesting that as far as EPAs are concerned, small is beautiful.     

Do women prefer women's work?

A new methodology is implemented to determine whether job characteristics can explain why women are concentrated in low-paying, female-dominated occupations. Extensive information on jobs and labour market histories are collected from the 1982 National Longitudinal Survey, Youth Cohort, for women and men characterized by substantial labour market attachment. Significant differences in nonpecuniary job characteristics between the male and female samples are found to exist. Nevertheless, we find no evidence that women differentially favour those job characteristics commonly associated with ‘women's work’.     

Secure implementation in Shapley–Scarf housing markets

This paper considers the object allocation problem introduced by Shapley and Scarf (J Math Econ 1:23–37, 1974). We study secure implementation (Saijo et al. in Theor Econ 2:203–229, 2007), that is, double implementation in dominant strategy and Nash equilibria. We prove that (1) an individually rational solution is securely implementable if and only if it is the no-trade solution, (2) a neutral solution is securely implementable if and only if it is a serial dictatorship, and (3) an efficient solution is securely implementable if and only if it is a sequential dictatorship. Furthermore, we provide a complete characterization of securely implementable solutions in the two-agent case: a solution is securely implementable if and only if it is either a constant solution or a serial dictatorship.     

Do interest rate controls work? Evidence from Kenya

This paper reviews the impact of interest rate controls in Kenya, introduced in September 2016. The intent of the controls was to reduce the cost of borrowing, expand access to credit, and increase the return on savings. However, we find that the law on interest rate controls has had the opposite effect of what was intended. Specifically, it has led to a collapse of credit to micro‐, small‐, and medium‐sized enterprises; shrinking of the loan book of the small banks; and reduced financial intermediation. Because of their adverse effects on bank lending, we estimate that the interest rate controls have reduced economic growth by ¼–¾ percentage points on an annual basis. We also show that interest rate caps reduced the signaling effects of monetary policy. These suggest that (1) the adverse effects could largely be avoided if the ceiling was high enough to facilitate lending to higher‐risk borrowers and (2) alternative policies could be preferable to address concerns about the high cost of credit.     

Do mergers really increase output? Evidence from English hospitals

The English hospital sector underwent a major restructuring program between 2000 and 2008 to centralize activity in fewer and larger hospitals. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the effects of such consolidations on hospital outputs. As mergers occurred in a staggered way, treatment could start and end at every time and treatment duration varied over the years. As every time is a mix of hospital pre-treatment, treatment and post-treatment phases, the canonical difference-in-differences assumption of homogeneous policy effects is not only meaningless but also misleading, raising doubts about the appropriateness of the methods previously used in this literature and consequently the accuracy of its results. We instead adopt a new matching and difference-in-differences approach, the flexible conditional difference-in-differences approach, developed by Dettmann et al. in 2020, more appropriate for causal analysis of treatments characterized by varying start dates and varying treatment duration. Our results suggest that mergers downsize hospital activities, especially the most expensive ones. If the goal of hospital mergers is to gain efficiency by centralization of activity, our findings suggest this restructuring programme is not the most successful policy to pursue. Mergers reduce the scope for competition between hospitals and do not create any incentive for poorly performing hospitals.     

Do patents work? Thickets,trolls and antibiotic resistance

This paper connects ideas from recent literature on the economics of intellectual property (IP) to address the question: Did the strengthening and broadening of IP rights from important patent policy changes in the US promote greater innovation? The analysis rests on the theory of cumulative innovation, which shows that if IP rights on a pioneer invention extend to follow‐on research and impediments to contracting exist, then strengthening patents can actually reduce overall innovation. Recent empirical studies are consistent with the theory: patents can significantly deter follow‐on research in “complex” technology areas where contracting is difficult (computers, electronics, telecommunications) but not in drugs, chemicals and human genes. I outline remedies from court decisions and antitrust policy for addressing inefficiencies from patent trolling, patent thickets and the anti‐commons of fragmented ownership. I then apply the analysis to the antibiotics market, drawing on recent research, to examine how patent and competition policies can be used to improve incentives for drug development in the battle against antibiotic resistance. The literature provides persuasive evidence that the policy changes overreached in broadening and strengthening IP rights and reveals important patent reforms for improving the effectiveness of patent systems in the US and Canada.     

Do national soccer results really impact on the stock market?

This study is a response to Klein et al. (2008), which was highly critical of earlier work by Ashton et al. (2003). This work considering the link between international soccer results and stock market returns was challenged by Klein et al. (2008), who reject the presence and importance of this link. In response, this work provides a reassessment of the link between international soccer results and stock market returns within Ashton et al. (2003). This new analysis extends the original work by using a larger dataset, employing an extended range of tests and allowing for outliers. It is reported that, contrary to the findings of Klein et al. (2008), the link between international soccer results and stock market prices does indeed exist particularly within the sample period 1984–2002 used by Ashton et al. (2003). After extending the dataset to include observations from 2002 until 2009, it is reported that the effect on stock market returns has declined in importance over this period, particularly the impact of wins.     

Do people really want to be nudged towards healthy lifestyles?

This paper assesses Thaler and Sunstein’s claim that policies that nudge individuals towards healthy lifestyles promote the welfare of those individuals, as judged by themselves. I argue that Thaler and Sunstein switch between two different interpretations of that clause. One interpretation gives the clause a wide range of applicability, but drains it of its content as a repudiation of paternalism. The other interpretation makes it more meaningful to say that people want to make the choices they are being nudged towards, but applies to a much narrower range of cases than Thaler and Sunstein have in mind.     

Do productivity and ownership really matter for growth? Firm-level evidence

Using data on Indian state-owned enterprises for 1987–2006, the paper examines the association between productivity, ownership and employment growth. After accounting for various firm level controls, the evidence indicates that firm growth improves primarily through passive learning, whereas higher levels of active learning appear to slow down firm growth, although the magnitude of these effects is economically small. Besides, the analysis suggests that ownership is significantly and non-linearly related to firm growth.