AIDS,longevity and long-run income

This article studies the long-run impact of HIV/AIDS on per capita income and education. We focus on the disincentive to human capital accumulation given by shorter life span. We work with a continuous time overlapping generations model with education and saving decisions, calibrated for a cross-section of countries. The simulations predict that the most affected countries in Sub-Saharan Africa will be in future, on average, 20% poorer than they would be without AIDS. Schooling will decline in some cases such as Botswana, South Africa and Zambia by more than 40%. The impact of population decline was found to be irrelevant.     

Business cycle affiliations in the context of European integration

We study affiliations for the countries of the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) with Germany and the USA, using various business cycle measures derived from quarterly real GDP. These measures are Hodrick-Prescott and Baxter-King filtered series and annual growth rates. By using rolling contemporaneous and maximum (over a short lead/lag interval) correlations, we document increasing correlations of EMU countries with Germany, with these typically being largest during the 1990s. We also document a strong leading role for the USA in relation to these countries in the period since 1993, thereby correcting the fallacy that the European business cycle was disjointed from the USA for most of the 1990s.     

Accessing antecedents and outcomes of RFID implementation in health care

This research first conceptualizes, develops, and validates four constructs for studying RFID in health care, including Drivers (Internal and External), Implementation Level (Clinical Focus and Administrative Focus), Barriers (Cost Issues, Lack of Understanding, Technical Issues, and Privacy and Security Concerns), and Benefits (Patient Care, Productivity, Security and Safety, Asset Management, and Communication). Data for the study were collected from 88 health care organizations and the measurement scales were validated using structural equation modeling. Second, a framework is developed to discuss the causal relationships among the above mentioned constructs. It is found that Internal Drivers are positively related to Implementation Level, which in turn is positively related to Benefits and Performance. In addition, Barriers are found to be positively related to Implementation Level, which is in contrast to the originally proposed negative relationship. The research also compares perception differences regarding RFID implementation among the non-implementers, future implementers, and current implementers of RFID. It is found that both future implementers and current implementers consider RFID barriers to be lower and benefits to be higher compared to the non-implementers. This paper ends with our research implications, limitations and future research.     

Crime and economic growth: A case study of Manaus,Brazil

Brazil became the seventh largest economy in the world in 2012. In the same year, the country was responsible for 13% of all worldwide murders. Despite the economic advances, crime is increasing over time in the country. This study explores the impact of organized crime on local economies, focusing on the case of Manaus, Brazil, and the emergence of the criminal group Família do Norte (FDN). We employ a synthetic control method to analyze the economic effects of the FDN's presence in Manaus. The findings reveal a significant negative impact on the city's economic growth and prosperity, with Manaus experiencing a 2% per year lower GDP per capita compared to what it would have been without the FDN. Robustness checks confirme this result, showing how organized crime can disrupt the country's economic advances.     

Ways to improve pioneer new ventures' performance in the ICT industry

This paper analyses how marketing capabilities and low cost orientation improve the performance obtained by technology new ventures that enter the market early. In a sample of 104 new ventures of the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) industry, the authors have developed a regression analysis allowing them to demonstrate the direct and indirect effects proposed in the hypotheses. The results obtained show that early entry into the market has a positive influence on new venture performance, as the joint moderator effect of marketing capabilities and low cost orientation is greater than the effect of each variable taken on its own. Furthermore, this study explores if the effects of the analysed factors are different between telecommunications and electronic and computer new ventures. This study shows that marketing capabilities and low cost strategy are complements rather than substitutes in moderating the relationship between entry timing and new venture's performance, especially for the telecommunications new ventures.     

Manufacturing strategy-technology relationship among auto suppliers

Each manufacturing plant has to develop its own path to success based on contingencies and on manufacturing practices links. On the basis of the latter, this paper tests the link between two of the most important manufacturing practices areas, manufacturing strategy (MS) and technology, without addressing causality or their combined effect on performance. This is done by selection fit, i.e. congruency adjustment. However, this paper goes beyond grouping both sets of practices in pairs, by using a more general selection view version, with practices from both sets related multidimensionally and subordinated by regression analysis to test for any congruent pattern. Regression results from a wide-ranging survey of auto supplier plants show that, in general, MS seems to have some kind of impact on technology, and that technology has some kind of influence on MS. In addition, a strong congruency between both practices areas is observed when using correlation. This suggests that when implementing or adjusting MS or technology, the other should also be considered; otherwise they may not operate effectively.     

Raising the bar (7)

This editorial summarises the papers published in issue 13.1 so as to raise the bar in applied spatial economic research and highlight new trends. The first paper adopts a scale neutral approach to investigate the spatial mechanisms that cause regional innovation and growth. The second paper claims that population-weighting when calculating indices of regional inequality might lead to inconsistent outcomes. The third paper estimates the effect of distance between family residence and higher education institution on a student's academic performance, thereby accounting for endogenous regressors. The fourth paper shows an inverted U-shaped relationship between economic development at region of origin and the propensity to migrate using a multilevel approach. The fifth paper provides spatial econometric evidence of price competition between sellers of used books on Amazon.com. The last paper estimates a hedonic housing price equation and parameterizes the spatial weight matrix to determine how far back in time buyers, sellers and realtors are looking at the housing market.     

Technical efficiency with state-contingent production frontiers using maximum entropy estimators

Although the theory of state-contingent production is well-established, the empirical implementation of this approach is still in an infancy stage. The possibility of finding a large number of states of nature, few observations per state and models affected by collinearity have led some researchers to claim the urgent need to develop robust estimation techniques. In this paper, we investigate the performance of some maximum entropy estimators to assess technical efficiency with state-contingent production frontiers. The methodological discussion and the simulation study provided in the paper reveal some of the potential of these estimators. Small mean squared error loss and small differences between the true and the estimated mean of technical efficiency show that the maximum entropy can be a powerful tool in the estimation of state-contingent production frontiers.     

Geographical and cognitive proximity effects on innovation performance in SMEs: a way through knowledge acquisition

This study explores the relative influence of geographical and cognitive proximity to explain innovation performance. This paper deepens the controversy between the significance of both types of proximity, contributing to a better understand their interconnections. The study further analyzes to what extent knowledge acquisition provides a congruent explanation of the effectiveness of innovation in proximity contexts. The paper has tested a structural model based on a sample of 224 Spanish footwear firms. Footwear industry is a mature and traditional industry with a significant presence of the territorial agglomeration of firms all over Spain. Findings suggest both a direct and indirect effect of cognitive proximity on innovation performance. However, an excess of geographical proximity produces spatial lock-in, thus limiting the access to new knowledge and lowering innovations. By contrast, proximity in terms of goals and culture leads firms belonging to a territorial cluster to achieve knowledge acquisition resulting in relevant innovation. Findings suggest that although transferable valuable knowledge exists in clustered contexts firms should adopt a proactive behavior to have access common knowledge and in order to generate effective innovations.