A child health production function estimated from longitudinal data. Cebu Study Team

Collaborating researchers used a multi equation model to analyze 3080 mother-infant pairs living on the island of Cebu in the central Philippines and to estimate a child health production function. The econometric methods used eliminated obstacles such as heterogeneity and endogeneity of significant explanatory factors. They also maximized the longitudinal quality of the data. The results showed that morbidity in 1 period reduced infant weight in following periods. For example, diarrhea and febrile respiratory infection reduced growth in the time period following the illnesses. Further effects of some contributing factors were great near birth not diminished with age. For example, breast feeding promoted growth and protected against infection, especially diarrhea and febrile respiratory infection, more substantially near birth than it did later. Further, in urban areas, preventive health care positively affected growth independently of its indirect influence on reducing respiratory infection. Yet it had little effect on diarrhea. Diarrhea had a strong adverse effect on growth. Exposure of the infant to enteric pathogens had the greatest influence on production of diarrhea. In urban areas, exposure included water supply contamination, exposure to feces, a more pathogenic diet, and community crowding. In rural areas, however, exposure included community crowding and increased rainfall which presumably washed feces into the water supply. Household crowding in both urban and rural areas and irritation from smoke in urban areas only tended to bring about febrile respiratory infection.     

Directional heterogeneity of environmental disamenities: the impact of crematory operations on adjacent residential values

A hedonic study of residential house sales in Rawlins, Wyoming, was conducted to estimate the impact of an environmental shock from a new point source upon adjacent residential property values. We use a unique data base of house sale prices and associated house attributes, including structural and neighbourhood characteristics and geographic distances and directions from the source of the shock, atmospheric emissions from a new crematory. Our data spans 27 months of house sales: 7 months before, and 20 months after the startup of crematory operations. Results indicate that proximity, measured both in terms of direction and distance from the crematory, imparts a statistically significant negative impact on average house sale prices–an increase of 0.3 to 3.6% of average sale price for every one-tenth mile increase up to one-half mile in distance away from the crematory, but depending on direction from the crematory. This distance benefit increases somewhat with calendar time only for houses located west of the crematory.     

Detecting policy effects with wage rigidity and instability – evidence on the Taiwan labour market

With stagnant wages and growing productivity, a widening gap is becoming prevalent in global labour markets. The relationship between wages and productivity has become indeterminate, especially after the 2008 financial crisis. This article presents the phenomenon for why salary rarely follows up with productivity after an economy recovers. By using the GMM method, this study shows the interaction among wage, productivity and tightness, in which we illustrate the Taiwan labour market as an example to show how hiring system changes press wages away from an efficient allocation, causing instability and market failure. Surveying 35 labour markets for different industries, we reveal that the situation in the labour markets has drastically changed since 2008. We find that this resulted in a severe problem when the Taiwan firms got used to policies like ‘22K’, ‘fix-term contract’ and ‘unpaid leave’ programmes. These plans negatively impacted the economy and raised market failure with instability.     

Risk perception by industrial radiographers: Hungary and the UK compared

Perceptions of risks from two groups of industrial radiographers, one from Hungary, (n = 45) and from the United Kingdom, (n = 29) were compared by the psychometric method. The comparison was made because both groups were at risk for high doses of ionizing radiation. We found the groups had similar demographic profiles but poor socio-economic conditions of Hungarians were associated with higher levels of emotional distress. Correlation HU-UK for personal and general risks were at a significant level for topics that included lifestyle and radiation risks. Perceptions of risks from radiation were small except for large personal risk from East European nuclear power plants. Knowledge of radiation risk intranationally was correlated positively with personal risk for UK radiographers and negatively for Hungarians. However, average overall risk perceptions from the same topic list for all radiographers did not differ significantly from a group (n = 1461) of UK citizens, though radiographer's risks from radiation were considerably greater. As a new lifesaving intervention it was proposed that radiation risk reduction could be achieved by genetic testing.     

Fisher Ideal Indexes in the National Income and Product Accounts

The mastery of the spreadsheet technique has become almost universal in economics departments. The authors explain, step-by-step, how the spreadsheet can be used as an instructional aid to teach basic microeconomic concepts.     

How does managed care do it?

Integrating the health services and insurance industries, as health maintenance organizations (HMOs) do, could lower expenditure by reducing either the quantity of services or unit price or both. We compare the treatment of heart disease in HMOs and traditional insurance plans using two datasets from Massachusetts. The nature of these health problems should minimize selection. HMOs have 30% to 40% lower expenditures than traditional plans. Both actual treatments and health outcomes differ little; virtually all the difference in spending comes from lower unit prices. Managed care may yield substantial increases in measured productivity relative to traditional insurance.     

Economic globalization and the change of electoral rules

This paper takes up an argument from Ronald Rogowski about the “natural affinity” between trade and an electoral system with proportional representation. We draw on literature on the historical determinants of electoral system choice to advance the general argument that trade integration and PR are related because the adoption of PR helps to secure gains from trade. Our specific model of electoral rule changes in the age of globalization predicts that the likelihood of electoral rule change towards more proportionality increases with levels of trade integration in the world economy. The theoretical model draws on a micro model of the distributive effects of increased economic integration. Because more proportional systems are more credibly able to commit to compensate the losers of globalization processes, there will be increased demand to change the electoral system towards more proportionality under economic circumstances that increase the costs of maintaining a closed economy. In accordance with our model, our empirical tests find a positive association between (a) trade integration and the proportionality of the electoral system, (b) proportionality and social spending, and (c) global integration levels and the probability of electoral rules changes that render voting rules more proportional.