The Rise and Fall of Exceptional Australian Incomes Since 1800

We gauge how productivity and factor endowments shaped the rise and fall of Australia's exceptional incomes using new measures of total factor productivity (TFP), which include natural resource inputs, in an accounting of income growth. Further, we explore the drivers of TFP growth. Pastoralism and mining had negative TFP externalities, and we incorporate these findings into a unified accounting of incomes, which distinguishes the roles of endowments and productivity. Nevertheless, TFP growth played an important role in promoting exceptional incomes between 1842 and 1890. Our findings favour a more balanced interpretation of Australian growth that has roles for natural resources, labour participation, and productivity.     

International Involvement and Production Efficiency among Startup Firms

The economic theory of small firms often requires a reasoning process distinct from those typically used for large multinational enterprises (MNEs), since small firms typically do not possess the resources MNEs commonly employ to outperform similar domestic firms. In the current analysis, we argue that new small firms with international sales can better predict their revenue stream than can comparably aged firms with only domestic sales, and, as a result, international selling firms have higher levels of technical productive efficiency. We employ 7829 firm-year observations from the 2007 to 2011 years of the Kauffman Firm Survey microdata sample in our analysis. A stochastic frontier model empirically supports the result that technical productive efficiency is positively related to the foreign sales ratio. These results hold after controlling for multiple relevant owner and firm characteristics, as well as accounting for potential endogeneity concerns.     

Going multilateral? Financial markets' access and the League of Nations loans, 1923–8

Why are international financial institutions important? This article reassesses the role of the loans issued with the support of the League of Nations. These long‐term loans constituted the financial basis of the League's strategy to restore the productive basis of countries in central and eastern Europe in the aftermath of the First World War. In this article, it is argued that the League's loans accomplished the task for which they were conceived because they allowed countries in financial distress to access capital markets. The League adopted an innovative system of funds management and monitoring that ensured the compliance of borrowing countries with its programmes. Empirical evidence is provided to show that financial markets had a positive view of the League's role as an external, multilateral agent, solving the credibility problem of borrowing countries and allowing them to engage in economic and institutional reforms. This success was achieved despite the League's own lack of lending resources. It is also demonstrated that this multilateral solution performed better than the bilateral arrangements adopted by other governments in eastern Europe because of its lower borrowing and transaction costs.     

The contribution of genetics to milk composition: evidence from Spain

This article focuses on the role that genetic progress may play in improving milk quality. Despite important genetic advances in dairy production, the absence of genetic records in farm management databases has precluded empirical production models from explicitly accounting for differences in genetics across herds. The influence of genetics on milk composition is analyzed by splitting milk production into protein, fat, and other components. The article explores some modeling issues associated with the specification of the effect of genetics in this multi‐output technology framework. In particular, genetic indexes are considered as allocable inputs and the remaining inputs as nonallocable. Our results show that genetics have a significant impact on milk composition. In particular, we find that farmers’ income increases by 6.6% when genetic indexes are augmented by one sample standard deviation.     

Consumer valuation of safety‐labeled free‐range chicken: results of a field experiment in Hanoi

This article presents results of a field experiment designed to assess willingness to pay for safely produced free‐range chicken in Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam. Improved safety of chicken production and trading is suggested as an important component of avian influenza control strategy, which aims to address the direct costs of avian influenza as well as the global public health externality. However, consumer demand for safely produced free‐range chicken is unknown. Products that have credible food labeling are not common in traditional markets where the majority of free‐range chicken is purchased. Valuing characteristics of products sold in informal markets is a major challenge that our experiment overcomes. As part of the experiment, we provided several vendors from these markets with safety‐labeled free‐range chicken. Consumer valuation of safety labeling was elicited through having experiment participants, who were representative of potential consumers, select between discount coupons for either safety‐labeled chicken or regular chicken. Results indicate that consumers will pay at least $0.50, or a 10–15% premium, per chicken purchase for safety labeling, which emphasizes safe production, processing, and transport conditions. This premium is smaller than the premium currently paid for traditional chicken varieties that are considered to be tastier. Consumers with more education have higher valuation of safety labeling. Hence, safety labeling for high‐quality free‐range chicken can play a role in controlling livestock disease and improving public health.     

Challenges for land system science

While considerable progress has been made in understanding land use change, land system science continues to face a number of grand challenges. This paper discusses these challenges with a focus on empirical land system studies, land system modelling and the analysis of future visions of land system change. Contemporary landscapes are contingent outcomes of past and present patterns, processes and decisions. Thus, empirical analysis of past and present land-use change has an important role in providing insights into the socio-economic and ecological processes that shape land use transitions. This is especially important with respect to gradual versus rapid land system dynamics and in understanding changes in land use intensity. Combining the strengths of empirical analysis with multi-scale modelling will lead to new insights into the processes driving land system change. New modelling methods that combine complex systems thinking at a local level with macro-level economic analysis of the land system would reconcile the multi-scale dynamics currently encapsulated in bottom-up and top-down modelling approaches. Developments in land use futures analysis could focus on integrating explorative scenarios that reflect possible outcomes with normative visions that identify desired outcomes. Such an approach would benefit from the broad and in-depth involvement of stakeholders in order to link scientific findings to political and societal decision-making culminating in a set of key choices and consequences. Land system models have an important role in supporting future land use policy, but model outputs require scientific interpretation rather than being presented as predictions. The future of land system science is strongly dependent on the research community's capacity to bring together the elements of research discussed in the paper, via empirical data collection and analysis of observed processes, computer simulation across scale levels and futures analysis of alternative, normative visions through stakeholder engagement.     

An Evaluation of the Actuarial structure of manitoba crop Insurance Program and its Implications

Very little research has been done in evaluating the basic principles and assumptions of the actuarial structure for premium ratemaking in crop insurance programs. Therefore, the objectives of this study are: (a) to examine the Pearson probability distribution of actual crop yields as compared with an application of normal-curve theory to crop yields as compared with an application of normal-curve theory to crop yield distributions and in turn to crop insurance ratemaking which was suggested by Botts and Boles in 1958 [1]; (b) to evaluate the pure premium rates derived from estimated Pearson probability distributions for wheat yields in 14 crop districts of the province of Manitoba; and to establish an experience rating system for the crop insurance program based upon the estimated Pearson distribution of actual crop yields on the individual farm.