Chasing Data: Sources of Data for the Study of Gambling Economics

The last decade has seen significant deregulation in the betting and gaming sector in many developed countries. This deregulation, coupled with technology‐led product innovation, has seen a renewed interest in the drivers of the demand for gambling and the prevalence of excessive gambling. The necessity for governments to track the social impacts of the gambling has led to an increased need for high‐quality data and this article will review the variety of empirical resources available to researchers. I also discuss innovations in measures or scales employed to quantify excessive gambling and addiction.     

Is neo-Walrasian macroeconom(etr)ics a dead end? An assessment of recent criticisms of DSGE models

After the 2008 “new Great Crisis,” it is widely recognized that mainstream macroeconom(etr)ics—the last result of Lucas’s anti-Keynesian revolution of the 1980s, which tried to give macroeconomics sound neo‐Walrasian microeconomic bases —has failed to anticipate and then appraise the crisis. Has this crisis revealed a failure of this macroeconom(etr)ics as a scientific theory? Mainstream macroeconomists defend their models on the basis of their alleged superiority in terms of clarity and coherence. The thesis of this article is that this claim about superiority is false. The study argues that the reasons for the failure of mainstream macroeconom(etr)ics—in particular its poor predictive performance and interpretative weakness—reside in the implications of the neo-Walrasian legacy and the problems connected with the implementation of that program.     

Do return migrants transfer political norms to their origin country? Evidence from Mali

This paper explores the link between return migration and political outcomes in the origin country, using the case study of Mali. We use electoral and census data at the locality level to investigate the role of return migration on participation rates and electoral competitiveness. First, we run OLS and IV estimations for the 2009 municipal election, controlling for current emigration and using historical and distance variables as instruments for return migration and current emigration. Second, we build a panel dataset combining the 1998 and 2009 censuses and the electoral results for the municipal ballots of those two years to control for the potential time-invariant unobservable characteristics of the localities. We find a positive impact of the stock of return migrants on participation rates and on electoral competitiveness, which mainly stems from returnees from non-African countries. Finally, we show that the impact of returnees on turnout goes beyond their own participation, and that they affect more electoral outcomes in areas where non-migrants are poorly educated, which we interpret as evidence of a diffusion of political norms from returnees to non-migrants.     

Religion and cooperation in a public goods experiment

We test whether religion affects adult subjects' decisions in a repeated public goods experiment. Contribution levels are not influenced by religious affiliation or participation. However, the decline with repetition is smaller among religious subjects, suggesting that religion may sustain cooperation.     

Behavioral Factors in Equity Allocation Decisions: A Large-Scale Experimental Study With Context

Traditional models of rational behavior struggle to explain how individuals allocate their money over a variety of financial instruments, including annuities, the stock market, and risk-free bonds. This study uses a large and diverse data set from an investment experiment that is rich in context and captures some important features of actual financial decision making. The focus of the article is to build on the literature documenting behavioral explanations for investment choices by studying the equity allocation decision across different financial tools. The authors find evidence that risk aversion, inertia, and excessive extrapolation are associated with investment behavior even when it is clear that return rates are independent across decision-making periods. Further, subjects have an asymmetric response to positive versus negative returns. In addition to having a novel experimental design, the authors also examine behavior before and after the recent financial crisis. The authors find that the financial crisis indirectly affects the first-stage annuity take-up rate in the experiments vis-à-vis a higher average level of risk aversion after the start of the crisis.     

Moving purchasing & supply management beyond a cost-focused identity

Practitioners and researchers recognize that purchasing and supply management (PSM) contributes value to business performance beyond reported cost reductions, though capturing and evaluating such contributions is often challenging. The goal of this research is to understand roadblocks impeding the recognition of PSM's contributions beyond cost reduction, and suggest potential solutions to these challenges. Social identity theory offers a conceptual framework to study PSM's self-identity and how it is perceived by others in the organization. Gaining acceptance for value-added metrics is critical to move perceptions of PSM's contribution beyond cost reduction and achieve its full potential. Social identity theory is used as a lens to assess the data and develop propositions. Using a qualitative interview method, the researchers identified important roadblocks hindering PSM's attainment of a broader value-based perception. PSM's identity is closely linked to cost-savings by itself, other functions and upper management. These perceptions are further reinforced by PSM through excessive cost reporting metrics. We provide two suggested solutions for PSM to expand its recognition beyond cost savings: 1) PSM must change its narrative and associated self-identity; and 2) PSM needs to develop metrics that are meaningful across multiple areas of the business.     

A Note on Ad Valorem and Per Unit Taxation in an Oligopoly Model

This note shows that per unit taxation welfare dominates ad valorem taxation in an oligopoly model, when the number of consumers is sufficiently high compared to the number of oligopolists. It aims to provide an alternative perspective to existing literature arguing instead the dominance of ad valorem over per unit taxation in oligopoly frameworks. Our result is obtained in a simple example which uses a strategic market game formulation to study strategic behavior at a general equilibrium level.