Does health insurance decrease health expenditure risk in developing countries? The case of China

This article studies the impact of health insurance on individual out‐of‐pocket health expenditures in China. Using China Health and Nutrition Survey data between 1991 and 2006, we apply two‐part and sample selection models to address issues caused by censored data and selection on unobservables. We find that, although the probability of accessing health care increases with the availability of health insurance, the level of out‐of‐pocket health expenditure decreases. Our results from a selection model with instrumental variables suggest that having health insurance reduces the expected out‐of‐pocket health expenditure of an individual by 29.42% unconditionally. Meanwhile, conditional on being subjected to positive health expenditure, health insurance helps reduce out‐of‐pocket spending by 44.38%. This beneficial effect of health insurance weakens over time, which may be attributable to increases in the coinsurance rates of health insurances in China.     

Pension systems and intragenenerational redistribution when labor supply is endogenous

In models with exogenous labor supply, a reallocation of fundsfrom a wage-related pension to a basic pension affects inequalitythrough changes in the pension paid, redistributing resourcesfrom the rich to the poor. We show that in a model with endogenouslabor supply, another effect is present: indeed changes of thebenefit formula have an impact on the labor/leisure choice.This effect goes in the opposite direction of the standard effectthat is also present in models with exogenous labor supply andit could be quite relevant, also depending on the differentassumptions on the working of the labor market. In particular,under specific assumptions on the utility and the productionfunctions, inequality is unaffected by a reallocation of fundstowards the basic pension. However this result changes if aminimum wage is introduced, since in this case inequality turnsout to be reduced.     

What Blows in with the Wind?

The shift toward renewable forms of energy for electricity generation in the electricity generation industry has clear implications for the spatial distribution of generating plant. Traditional forms of generation are typically located close to the load or population centers, while wind‐ and solar‐powered generation must be located where the energy source is found. In the case of wind, this has meant significant new investment in wind plant in primarily rural areas that have been in secular economic decline. This article investigates the localized economic impacts of the rapid increase in wind power capacity at the county level in Texas. Unlike input‐output impact analysis that relies primarily on levels of inputs to estimate gross impacts, we use traditional econometric methods to estimate net localized impacts in terms of employment, personal income, property tax base, and key public school expenditure levels. While we find evidence that both direct and indirect employment impacts are modest, significant increases in per capita income accompany wind power development. County and school property tax rolls also realize important benefits from the local siting of utility scale wind power, although peculiarities in Texas school funding shift localized property tax benefits to the state.     

Sabotage versus Discouragement: Which Dominates Post Promotion Tournament Behavior?

We explore the behavior of losers of promotion tournaments after the tournament is concluded. We do so with an experiment in which we vary the design of the promotion tournament to determine how tournament design affects post tournament effort. Our design allows us to discriminate between two possible reasons tournaments might lead to decreased work effort among the tournament losers: strategic sabotage and a worker becoming discouraged by the tournament outcome. We examine behavior after the tournament and find evidence suggesting that bad tournament design can lead to workers being discouraged. This discouragement effect is strong for low ability workers but not for high ability workers. Conversely, we do find evidence that some high ability workers engage in strategic sabotage but the incidence does not vary with the design of the promotion tournament and the incidence of it is low.     

Targeting Teaching Lecture Capture Learning: Do Students Perform Better Compared to Face‐to‐Face Classes?

Online learning has become more prevalent in colleges and universities as new technology is introduced. One such technology is lecture capture, which allows a live lecture to be recorded and packaged with classroom media and delivered online to many more students than a traditional face‐to‐face class. This article studies the selection process and educational outcome differences between students enrolled in a lecture capture and a face‐to‐face course in economic principles. Students could select either course format, both with the same instructor and course requirements, without capacity restrictions. We find that students’ attitudes toward online learning are the chief determinant of their choice of class over demographics, opportunity cost measures, or past online experiences. Additionally, our findings suggest that lecture capture students perform as well as those who take a face‐to‐face course when not accounting for self‐selection. When selection is taken into account, lecture capture is not significantly worse than face‐to‐face.     

State bloc versus individual delegate voting at the constitutional convention: Did it make a difference?

Voting at the 1787 Constitutional Convention followed the procedure of requiring state votes to be determined by the majority vote of each state's present delegates, and the outcome of the vote to be decided by majority vote of the states. In establishing the new legislature, the adopted Constitution set rules such that a simple majority of all present representatives would determine the outcome of each legislative vote. We investigate how Convention vote outcomes might have changed if this voting rule was in place for the Convention. Using spatial models on 398 separate roll calls, we identify which vote outcomes would have differed under individual delegate voting. Analysis suggests only 16 of the vote outcomes would have changed but those that were predicted to change included considering unequal representation in the Senate (i.e., similar to representation in the House) and requiring two‐thirds (rather than three‐fourths) of states to ratify constitutional amendments.     

Bank market power, economic growth and financial stability: Evidence from Asian banks

This paper examines whether Asian banks are still prone to moral hazard in the aftermath of the 1997 Asian crisis. Using a sample of commercial banks from 12 Asian countries during the 2001–2007 period, our empirical findings highlight that greater market power in the banking market results in higher instability. Although banks are better capitalized in less competitive markets their default risk remains higher. A deeper investigation however shows that such behaviour is dependent on the economic environment. Higher economic growth contributes to neutralize greater risk taking and higher instability in less competitive markets.     

Was Malthus right? The relationship between population and real wages in Italian history, 1320 to 1870

In this article we investigate the relation between population and real wages in the Italian economy during the period 1320–1870. The main result is that the positive check is strong and statistically significant but the other equilibrating mechanism in the Malthusian model – the preventive check – based on the positive relationship between fertility and real wages does not operate in pre-industrial Italy. In contrast to the Malthusian hypothesis, we find a negative feedback from wage to population. The empirical result is clearly consistent with the theoretical framework of the “old age security motive”. We show, with a simple overlapping-generation model, that by allowing for substitution in a pre-industrial economy between child quantity and other assets (such as new seeds, better soybean quality, and new cultivation and irrigation methods) fertility may be negatively affected whenever income rises.     

Separating uncertainty from heterogeneity in life cycle earnings

This paper develops and applies a method for decomposing crosssection variability of earnings into components that are forecastableat the time students decide to go to college (heterogeneity)and components that are unforecastable. About 60% of variabilityin returns to schooling is forecastable. This has importantimplications for using measured variability to price risk andpredict college attendance.