Education and family health care spending

Michael Grossman's seminal work on the demand for health extended the concept of a household production function to the commodity “good health.” In this framework, education represents an “environmental variable” that enhances the monetary returns to investments in health through the use of time and medical care in health production. Using data from the 2004 to 2012 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS), we examine the association between parental education and family health care spending in single-mother and two-parent families. We estimate one- and two-part expenditure models for total family health care spending, for specific components of such spending, and also examine the impact of parental education on selected measures of family health. Controlling for family income and health insurance status, we find consistent evidence that parental education beyond 12 years of schooling is associated with increases in family health care spending and with reductions in the likelihood of adverse health conditions.     

THE FUNDING OF TRADITIONAL ORGANISED CRIME IN RUSSIA

The changed economic and political situation in Russia since the 1990s brought about a qualitative transformation of Russian organised crime, particularly in organisational and behavioural patterns. In particular, a pronounced shift from violent crime towards economic crime is being observed. Criminals try to establish and exercise control over legitimate businesses via corrupt politicians, local authorities and/or law enforcement officials. A tendency towards the consolidation of criminal groups within given territories is also discernible, whilst there are signs of increased interregional integration among different criminal organisations.     

ON FINITE DIMENSIONAL REALIZATIONS OF TWO-COUNTRY INTEREST RATE MODELS

This paper explores how consistent two-dimensional families of forward rate curves can be constructed on an international market. Applying the approach in Björk and Christenssen (1999) and Björk and Svensson (2001) , we study when a system of inherently infinite dimensional domestic and foreign forward rate processes in a two-country economy with spot (forward) exchange rate possesses finite dimensional realizations. In the system with the forward exchange rate, the forward interest rate equations are supplemented by a third infinite dimensional stochastic differential equation representing the forward exchange rate dynamics. We construct and fit consistent families to observed Euro and USD yields as well as the forward (spot) EUR/USD exchange rate.     

One‐Stop Shopping Behavior,Buyer Power and Upstream Merger Incentives

We analyze how consumer preferences for one‐stop shopping affect the (Nash) bargaining relationships between a retailer and its suppliers. One‐stop shopping preferences create ‘demand complementarities’ among otherwise independent products which lead to two opposing effects on upstream merger incentives: first a standard double mark‐up problem and second a bargaining effect. The former creates merger incentives while the later induces suppliers to bargain separately. When buyer power becomes large enough, then suppliers stay separated which raises final good prices. We also show that our result can be obtained when wholesale prices are determined in a non‐cooperative game and under two‐part tariffs.     

Can social spending cushion the inequality effect of globalization?

This paper examines whether social spending cushions the effect of globalization on within‐country inequality. Using information on disposable and market income inequality and data on overall social spending, and health and education spending from the ILO and the World Bank/WHO, we analyze whether social spending moderates the association between economic globalization and inequality. The results confirm that economic globalization—especially economic flows—associates with higher income inequality, an effect driven by non‐OECD countries. Health spending is strongly associated with lower inequality, but we find no robust evidence that any kind of social spending negatively moderates the association between economic globalization and inequality.     

Individual versus companion visitors' willingness-to-pay for the theater tickets: The case of Perm opera

Business-like approaches are applied more and more widely in nonprofit organization contexts, and theaters are no exception. Revenue generation, customer segmentation, and personalized marketing are becoming the key managerial concerns. Our study focuses on two relevant aspects of theater attendees' behavior. We examine visitors' willingness-to-pay (WTP) for theater seats (to derive revenue drivers), and its difference between two segments – single and couple visitors (to uncover the social motivation effect). These aspects taken together have never been previously studied in the nonprofit marketing context. We model WTP using the actual purchase data from Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre in Russia. Unlike most marketing studies which use stated preference for WTP evaluation, we employ the revealed preference approach. The results verify that single and couple visitors may be treated as separate segments, allowing for personalized promotion and other marketing decisions.     

Risk assessment for uncertain cash flows: model ambiguity, discounting ambiguity, and the role of bubbles

We study the risk assessment of uncertain cash flows in terms of dynamic convex risk measures for processes as introduced in Cheridito et al. (Electron. J. Probab. 11(3):57–106, 2006). These risk measures take into account not only the amounts but also the timing of a cash flow. We discuss their robust representation in terms of suitably penalised probability measures on the optional σ-field. This yields an explicit analysis both of model and discounting ambiguity. We focus on supermartingale criteria for time consistency. In particular, we show how “bubbles” may appear in the dynamic penalisation, and how they cause a breakdown of asymptotic safety of the risk assessment procedure.     

Challenges for a broadband service strategy in rural areas: A Romanian case study

Broadband network deployment plays an important part in the strategic policies in Europe to promote growth and innovation in all sectors of the economy in addition to social and territorial cohesion. In compliance with existing community policies, Romanian strategies in this field seek to provide the necessary support for broadband connectivity in rural areas. The goal of this study is to define a rural end-user profile to plan the most appropriate broadband service strategy from both a technical and a marketing perspective. Our empirical research involves an exploratory survey conducted in rural areas in northwestern Romania (n=1040 respondents). The findings reveal low levels of customer satisfaction and users more interested in data transfer than voice or video applications. Given this rural user profile, simulations of network traffic were conducted. The simulation results suggest that WLANs are the most suitable solution for the “last mile” broadband segment.     

Towards a General Theory of Good-Deal Bounds*

We consider an incomplete market in the form of a multidimensional Markovian factor model, driven by a general marked point process (representing discrete jump events), as well as by a standard multidimensional Wiener process. Within this framework, we study arbitrage-free good-deal pricing bounds for derivative assets, thereby extending the results by Cochrane and Saá Requejo (2000) to the point process case, while, at the same time, obtaining a radical simplification of the theory. To illustrate, we present numerical results for the classic Merton jump-diffusion model. As a by-product of the general theory, we derive extended Hansen-Jagannathan bounds for the Sharpe Ratio process in the point process setting. *We gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Jan Wallander and Tom Hedelius foundation. We thank Anders Forsgren, Krister Svanberg, and Jan Kallsen for a number of very helpful comments. We are very grateful to Mathias Stolpe for providing us with the optimization code used in our numerical example. A number of very helpful comments from the editor and an anonymous referee has greatly improved the paper.     

Consumer foresight,customer data,and investment in targeting technology

We analyze competing firms’ incentives to adopt a technology that allows making refined targeted offers to returning customers. Consumer foresight is crucial for firms’ decisions. Although our setup is symmetric, when consumers are myopic, the unique equilibrium is asymmetric in firms’ technology adoption decisions. Contrary to conventional wisdom, consumers may be better off being myopic than sophisticated. Light privacy policy may benefit consumers if it reduces the costs of handling customer data and avoids strict obligations on firms to inform consumers about data use, which would erode investment incentives into targeting technology.