Does the measurement of intra-industry trade matter?

Does the Measurement of Intra-Industry Trade Matter? — This paper discusses different methods of capturing the main aspects of the Chamberlin-Heckscher-Ohlin-Samuelson model. Of particular interest are the distinction between horizontal and vertical intra-industry trade, the adjustment of aggregation biases, and the definition of inter- and intra-industry specialization at product level. The main findings are that it is important to disentangle horizontal and vertical intra-industry trade, and to consider specialization patterns within refined product groups. Moreover, there is a nonlinear relationship between intra-industry trade and economies of scale that may explain contradictory results in the literature.     

Landlords and farmers: implications of disparities in bargaining power for tenancy in agriculture

The equilibrium allocation of owner operated and rental land in the agricultural sector is examined given risk averse agents, risky returns and asset price risk. The model is extended to account for disparities in bargaining power among landlords and farmers. In the absence of disparities, the competitive equilibrium allocation satisfies the general conditions for optimal risk sharing with an adjustment factor similar to the optimal hedge ratio. Differences in bargaining power result in deviations from the optimal risk sharing conditions. Numerical simulations of tenancy structure are conducted for a developed agricultural economy exposed to various forms of risk. Estimates of parameter values representing the riskiness of returns and asset prices in this study are based on vector auto regressive techniques. The simulations show that a substantial reduction of the rental ratio is obtained in a situation where farmers are equally or more risk averse than landlords. Consequently, the results indicate that the importance of the tenancy institution as a risk sharing mechanism is severely mitigated in the presence of asset price risk, risky returns, relatively risk averse farmers and disparities in bargaining power.     

The Disciplinary Effect of the Single Market on Swedish Firms

In the 1980s it became increasingly clear that the European Community market was still segmented by national borders because of non-tariff barriers to trade. A major objective of the Single Market Program in 1992 was to remove these barriers, thereby enforcing intra-union competition. In this paper, a panel of Swedish firm-level data is used to evaluate whether domestic market power has been curtailed as a consequence of the SMP and of the Swedish membership in the European Union in 1995. Evidence of increased competition emerges, as price-cost margins have declined in industries with high non-tariff barriers prior to 1992. JEL Classification Numbers: F15, L11, C33     

Efficient but getting wet feet: A not-entirely-frivolous note on the side-effects of growth-promoting institutions

Using data covering 38 countries across the 1965-2005 period, this paper shows that former British colonies tend to exhibit higher levels of carbon dioxide emission than other countries.     

Why and how to compete through sustainability: a review and outline of trends influencing firm and network-level transformation

International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal - This article reviews and discusses how to compete with sustainability by reviewing the literature about sustainability, business models,...     

Assigning Refugees to Landlords in Sweden: Efficient,Stable, and Maximum Matchings*

In this paper, we investigate the problem of finding housing for refugees once they have been granted asylum. In particular, we demonstrate that market design can play an important role in a partial solution to the problem. More specifically, we investigate a specific matching system, and we propose an easy-to-implement mechanism that finds an efficient, stable, and maximum matching. Such a matching guarantees that housing is efficiently provided to a maximum number of refugees, and that no refugee prefers another specific landlord to their current match when, at the same time, that specific landlord prefers that refugee to their own current match.     

Demographic determinants of incident experience and risk perception: do high-risk groups accurately perceive themselves as high-risk?

This paper analyzes demographic determinants of incident experience and risk perception, as well as the relationship between the two, for eight different risk domains. Analyses were conducted by merging the results of a Swedish population-based survey, which includes approximately 15,000 individuals, with demographic and socio-economic register data. Being male was associated with higher incident experience yet a lower risk perception for nearly all risk domains. Lower socioeconomic status was associated with higher incident experience for falls, and being a victim of violence but lower incident experience for road traffic accidents. Lower socioeconomic status was also associated with higher risk perception for falls. On aggregate, ranking the different domains, respondents’ risk perception was in almost perfect correspondence to the ranking of actual incident experience, with the exception that the risk of being a victim of violence is ranked higher than indicated by actual incident experience. On a demographic group level, men and highly educated respondents perceive their risks to be lower than what is expected considering their actual incident experience.     

Political Stock Markets and Unreliable Polls

A political stock market (PSM) clearly beat the polls in predicting the outcome of a Swedish referendum on whether or not Sweden should join the European Union. In fact, polls were unable to make such predictions since the number of undecided respondents always far exceeded the observed YES/NO margin. However, an obstacle to PSMs serving as a superior forecasting instrument is that they can be sensitive to price distortions - by interest groups that may wish to effectuate, and pay for, such distortions - or forecast competitions tied to PSM trade gains, the latter of which was tested here.