The demand for minor league baseball

Conclusions Overall our model explains 80 percent of the variation in attendance at minor league baseball games for 27 teams over the 1973–77 seasons. This is a remarkable proportion of the variance to be explained by a pooled cross-section-time-series model with 86 observations. Demmert's model explained 58 percent of the variation in per capita attendance in major league baseball over the 1951–69 period and Noll's model explained 69 percent of the variation in absolute attendance at major league baseball games during 1970–71. The F-ratio indicates that our overall model is statistically significant.Our empirical estimation of the demand for minor league baseball attendance supports the general hypotheses one derives from the theory of consumer demand. As expected, the quantity demanded is negatively related to price; the elasticity of demand is less than one. Per capita income has little effect on attendance, but the quality and excitement of play seem to be important to fans. Surprisingly, winning has no effect on attendance. Promotional efforts appear to be effective in generating attendance, but paid advertising seems to be wholly ineffective.The authors received helpful comments on an earlier draft from Al Finegan, Robert Hays, Ira Horowitz, Larry Nelson and an anonymous referee. A less technical report on the subject of this article has been published inBusiness (January–February, 1980) by the same authors.     

Racial discrimination and long-term contracts in major league baseball

The preponderance of studies on salary determination for major league baseball players suggests that significant pay differences do not exist between races. The possibility exists, however, that salary discrimination may be disguised by a racially biased distribution of long-term contracts. This study suggests that nonwhites are not victimized by long-term contract discrimination, which is consistent with the findings of others on pay discrimination in major league baseball.     

Team promotion in early major league baseball and the origin of the closed sports league

I argue that a quasi team-promotion system similar to European professional sports leagues once existed in the US, contrary to common perceptions. The first American pro team sport was baseball. From the creation of the first major league in 1876 to the early 1890s, entry was common, occurring primarily by the “promotion” of clubs in operation the previous season. The informal system ended abruptly after an 1892 merger that formed the prototype closed monopoly sports league. Empirical analysis indicates that the cessation of entry reduced competitive balance, and that in their initial year promoted teams outperformed new start-ups. While historians have recognized the elimination of between-league competition as an underlying motive for the monopoly merger, the simultaneous elimination of club entry and competition for league membership has gone virtually unnoticed.     

Elasticity of demand for relative petroleum inventory in the short run

To better understand petroleum markets, the authors established the importance of the deviation of inventory levels away from a normal level, where the normal level is comprised of seasonal movement and a general trend. Since supply and demand for petroleum are less elastic to price in the short run than is inventory, it is this deviation or relative inventory level that plays the role of absorbing unexpected shifts in demand and supply. They demonstrated theoretically that the demand for relative inventory must be negatively related to price. They estimated the relative inventory levels and associated short-run price elasticity for several OECD countries and groups of countries, and found that short-run price elasticity of demand for relative inventory is negative and statistically significant, supporting the theoretical arguments.This work is partially sponsored by the Office of Strategic Petroleum Reserve, U.S. Department of Energy, and was presented at the Fifty-Second International Atlantic Economic Conference, Paris, France, March 2002.     

Managers,specific human capital,and firm productivity in major league baseball

Recent research on the role of managers in firms concentrates on the relationship between compensation and individual performance, which links managerial skills and firm production only indirectly. In this paper, two related analyses test this link directly by examining how the experience of major league baseball managers affects both team and individual player performance. Grouped-data probit estimates indicate that, with team skills held constant, the probability of winning depends on the baseball-specific human capital of the manager. Further estimates, using the first-stage managerial attributes, also indicate that individual player performance improves when traded to "better-trained" managers.     

A generalized economic-uneconomic boundary for short run product and cost curves

Conclusions It has been found that for any production function homogeneous of degreem, the tangency point between theLRAPL curve and theSRAPL curve will provide a demarcation between those points that are economic, and hence relevant, and those that are uneconomic and hence irrelevant. As a special case, for a linear homogeneous function, the intersection ofSRAPL withSRMPL also coincides with this boundary.     

The behavior of flexible exchange rates in the short run — A systematic investigation

Zusammenfassung Das Verhalten flexibler Wechselkurse auf kurze Sicht - Eine systematische Untersuchung. - In diesem Aufsatz wird das kurzfristige Verhalten der Wechselkurse w?hrend der gegenw?rtigen Periode flexibler Kurse empirisch untersucht, und zwar mit Hilfe der monatlichen Kurse (in Schweizer Franken) für den amerikanischen Dollar, die deutsche Mark, das britische Pfund, den franz?sischen Franken und die italienische Lira. Als Bestimmungsgründe für Wechselkurse werden Geldmengen, Realeinkommen, nominale und reale Zinss?tze sowie die bilateralen Handelsbilanzen herangezogen. Zun?chst ergibt sich, da\ die Wechselkurse Zufallspfaden folgen. Zweitens bedeuten Ver?nderungen der nominalen Kurse fast immer auch Ver?nderungen der realen Kurse. Drittens konnte trotz ausgiebiger Anstrengungen eine gro\e Zahl von im allgemeinen für wichtig gehaltenen Variablen die Wechselkursbewegungen nicht erkl?ren. Diese Ergebnisse bedeuten, da\ unerwartete Schwankungen der realen Wechselkurse die bei weitem wichtigste Ursache von Wechselkurs?nderungen sind. Bisher war es aber nicht m?glich, deren systematische Bestimmungsgründe zu identifizieren.

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Resumen El comportamiento de tipos de cambio flexibles a corto plazo - Una investigación sistemática. — En este trabajo se examina empíricamente el comportamiento a corto plazo de tipos de cambio durante el reciente período de cambios flexibles, utilizando el precio mensual en francos suizos del dólar USA, del marco alemán, del franco francés, de la libra esterlina y de la lira italiana. Como determinantes del tipo de cambio se consideran la oferta monetaria, el ingreso real, la tasa de interés nominal y real, como también el saldo del comercio bilateral. Se demuestra, primero, que los tipos de cambio siguen un ?random walk?; segundo, que las variaciones de las tasas nominales casi siempre son correspondidas por las tasas reales; tercero que a pesar del rastreo extensivo realizado un gran conjunto de variables generalmente consideradas importantes no resulta capaz de explicar los movimientos de los tipos de cambio. Esto implica que las fluctuaciones inesperadas de los tipos de cambio constituyen la razón más importante para las variaciones del tipo de cambio. No ha sido posible aún, empero, identificar a las determinantes sistemáticas subyacentes.

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Resumé Le développement des taux de change flexibles en court terme - Une investigation systématique. - Dans cet article les auteurs examinent empiriquement le développement des taux de change à court terme pour la période récente des taux de change flexibles en utilisant des cours mensuels en francs suisse pour le dollar E.U., le mark allemand, le livre anglais, le franc fran?ais et le lire italien. Les déterminants des taux de change considérés sont les masses monétaires, les revenus réels, les taux d’intérêt nominaux et réels aussi bien que les balances commerciales bilatérales. Ils démontrent premièrement que les taux de change suivent des voies aléatoires; deuxièmement, les changements en taux nominaux sont presque totalement aussi des changements en taux réels; troisièmement, malgré d’une procédure de recherche étendue beaucoup de variables qui généralement sont considérées comme importantes ne peuvent pas expliquer les mouvements des taux de change. Ces résultats impliquent que les fluctuations inattendues en taux de change réels sont la plus importante source des variations en taux de change. Jusqu’à maintenant il était, cependant, impossible d’identifier leurs déterminants systématiques.

     

An integration of short run neokeynesian analysis and growth theory

Summary The paper provides a synthesis of short run Neo-Keynesian theory and long run growth models. The general approach is illustrated with the analysis of the short run and long run effect of changes in government spending when government budget deficits and surpluses are bond-financed. Such pure fiscal policy actions are shown to have long run effects on real variables even in a full employment model. The stability properties of the model turn out to depend crucially on the speed of adjustment of inflationary expectations.This paper is based on my Ph.D. DissertationTemporary Equilibrium and Long-Run Equilibrium. The advice and help of James Tobin, Gary Smith and Katsuhito Iwai are gratefully acknowledged. I have also benefitted from discussions with Gregory Chow. The detailed and wide-ranging comments of Dr. Th. C. M. J. van de Klundert and Dr. S. K. Kuipers on earlier drafts of this paper were most valuable, both as regards substance and form.Assistant Professor of Economics and International Affairs, Princeton University.     

The postbellum demand for cotton revisited

The literature offers both supply-side and cotton demand-side explanations for the reduced level and growth of income in the postbellum South. Demand-side evidence begins with a single-equation relationship regressing the price of cotton on quantity and a trend term, although subsequent researchers have critiqued the economic significance of the supposed slowed growth in demand. Using a system of simultaneous equations, which allows for correction both for autocorrelation in the error terms and correlation of the error terms across equations, we find cotton demand to be unit elastic from 1865--1866 to 1894--1895 and that it grew between 1.1% and 2.8% a year.     

Oil price shocks and the current account: An analysis of short run adjustment measures

Zusammenfassung ?lpreisschocks und Leistungsbilanz: Eine Analyse der kurzfristigen AnpassungsmaΒnahmen. — Der Aufsatz befa?t sich mit einer groΒen Gruppe von Entwicklungsl?ndern, die kein Roh?l f?rdern und die zur Finanzierung ihrer Leistungsbilanzdefizite haupts?chlich auf internationale Beh?rden oder eigene Reserven angewiesen sind. Unglücklicherweise hatten viele dieser L?nder bereits eine schwache Reserveposition, als die letzte Welle von ?lpreiserh?hungen begann, was auf den ?lpreisschock von 1973/74 und die anschlieΒende weltweite Rezession zurückzuführen ist. Deshalb verwenden wir hier ein Modell, in dem keine Kapitalmobilit?t, aber feste Wechselkurse vorausgesetzt werden. AuΒerdem wird angenommen, daΒ das betreffende Land für importierte Fertigwaren Preisnehmer ist, dagegen auf seinem Exportmarkt eine gewisse Monopolstellung besitzt. Untersucht werden die Auswirkungen eines ?lpreisschocks auf Produktion, Preise, Investitionen und Leistungsbilanz, auΒerdem verschiedene MaΒnahmen zur Anpassung der Leistungsbilanz (Geld-, Wechselkurs- und Handelspolitik) sowohl unter der Annahme flexibler als auch starrer Reall?hne.

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Résumé Chocs de prix pétrolier et la balance des paiements courants: une analyse des mesures d’ajustements à court terme. — L’article s’occupe d’un grand nombre des PVD non-pétrole qui principalement dépendent d’agences officielles ou de leurs réserves comme source de financer des déficits dans leurs balances des paiements courants. Malheureusement, beaucoup de ces pays avaient eu peu de réserves au commencement de la période récente des chocs de prix pétrolier comme résultat des événements de 1973/74 et de la suivante récession mondiale. En conséquence, l’auteur ne suppose aucune mobilité de capital, mais un régime des taux de change fixes. Il suppose de plus que le pays ne peut pas influencer le prix pour les produits finis importés, mais qu’il a quelque pouvoir de monopole sur ses marchés d’exportations. Les conséquences directes d’un choc de prix pétrolier sur la production, les prix, l’investissement et la balance des paiements courants sont analysés aussi bien que plusieurs mesures d’ajuster cette balance (la politique monétaire et commerciale et la politique du taux de change) en supposant que des salaires réels soient flexibles ou rigides.

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Resumen Shocks de precios del petroleo y la cuenta corriente: un análisis de medidas de ajuste de corto plazo. — El artfculo se ocupa de un amplio grupo de paises en desarrollo no productores de petróleo que dependen de agencias oficiales o rèservas propias como fuente de financiamiento para dèficits de cuenta corriente. Desafortunadamente, muchos de estos paises ingresaron al periodo corriente de shocks del petroleo con una dèbil posici?n de rèservas, como resultado de los acontecimientos de 1973/74 y la recesión mundial sobreviniente. Por lo tanto, en el modelo nosotros suponemos que no hay movilidad de capital, pero un règimen cambiario fijo, y que el pais adopta los precios en el mercado de bienes finales importados, pero tiene algún poder monopólico en su mercado de exportación. Se analizan los efectos de impacto de un shock del petróleo sobre el producto, precios, inversiones y cuenta corriente como tambièn varias medidas de ajuste de cuenta corriente (politica monetaria, politica cambiaria y polftica comercial) bajo el supuesto de salarios reaies flexibles y rigidos.

     

The determinants of the demand of the demand for public education in China

我国关于公共产品的研究集中在供给方面,对公共产品需求的研究还相对较少.本文作者从需求角度,通过可行的计量分析,利用横截面数据,研究了人均教育支出与相关因素之间的关系.     

The demand for money in the Netherlands revisited

Summary This article presents an analysis of demand for money in The Netherlands, both at the aggregate level and the sectoral level. Special attention is devoted to the distinction between short and long run demand. Deviations of the long-run relationships are modelled by means of the error correction mechanism. The elasticities for aggregate demand are consistent with the findings for the money demand by the household and business sectors and correspond reasonably well with those derived from other studies. The estimated equations describe the rise in theM1- andM2-ratio in the 1980s in a satisfactory way, although forM2 from 1987 onwards there is a discrepancy between actual and fitted values. The disaggregated analysis shows that the behaviour of the business sector seems to be responsible for this.The authors are indebted to Professor S.K. Kuipers for his comments on an earlier draft.     

The demand for labor in Caribbean community MDCs

This article presents a comparative analysis of labor market demand in the three major economies of the Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM) in the period since 1970. The regression analysis indicates that the manufacturing sectors in Barbados and Jamaica were more responsive to changing domestic and international market conditions than the agricultural sectors, or than the Trinidad & Tobago manufacturing sector. Other important conclusions based on specifications at the aggregate level are that the real wage explained labor demand only in Jamaica, and that there was a secular increase in the demand for labor in both Jamaica and Trinidad & Tobago, even after wages and output were controlled for. Taken in conjunction with the other findings for Trinidad & Tobago, we conclude that there is a need to focus on other sectors as important employers of labor in the period under analysis.