TIPS and the VIX: Spillovers from Financial Panic to Breakeven Inflation in an Automated,Nonlinear Modeling Framework

This paper examines the determinants of the breakeven inflation rate (BEI) on U.S. Treasury Inflation Protected Securities. After controlling for several measures of liquidity, inflation expectations and inflation uncertainty; financial fear itself (proxied with the Volatility Index or VIX) remains a primary influence on BEI. To delve into the mechanism underlying this association, the VIX is decomposed, using intraday data, into conditional variance and the variance premium capturing risk aversion. Aside from the 2008 crisis, most of the effect emanated from the variance premium. Following the crisis, indicators of bank insolvency risk gain prominence as well. Lastly, an automated nonlinear model finds convex effects of variance, and diminishing returns to insolvency risk and liquidity.     

Sowing Seeds of Displacement: Gentrification and Food Justice in Oakland,CA

Green gentrification is the process through which the elimination of hazardous conditions or the development of green spaces is mobilized as a strategy to draw in affluent new residents and capital projects. Based on observations and interviews in Oakland, California, we argue that food justice organizations seeking to promote access to healthy food in low-income communities can unwittingly create spaces that foster this process. Despite a desire to serve long-term residents, activists embody a hip green aesthetic that is palatable to affluent whites and can be appropriated by urban boosters to promote the neighborhood. We use this process as a lens to theorize links between food and green gentrification, highlighting the importance of food to cities’ efforts to brand themselves as ripe for redevelopment, and understand green gentrification as a racialized process tied to cultural foodways. We also attend to the practical stakes for food justice activism, arguing that a clear understanding of green gentrification and food justice activists’ unwitting role in it can help the latter to attempt to mitigate their culpability and seek to develop broad inclusive strategies for locally led development without displacement.     

Composing Urban Orders from Rubbish Electronics: Cityness and the Site Multiple

What do cities look like when rubbish electronics are the vehicle with which they are explored? This article is an experiment designed to offer a response to that question, and in doing so to productively intervene in the conversation about ‘cityness', ‘metrocentricity' and ‘subaltern urbanism'. We intervene by following flows of rubbish electronics and the action that enacts them as waste and value, drawing on fieldwork in Dhaka, Singapore, Accra and Canada's Greater Golden Horseshoe. Our intervention is an experiment in writing an urban geography of rubbish electronics as a site multiple. We show how following the circulation of rubbish electronics offers a manyfolded synopsis of cities: urban enclaves of high finance and the information economy are also industrial waste producers. Peri‐urban industrial zones are also managers of brands, legal liability and corporate public relations. Cities off the map are also urban innovation systems, while waste is rekindled as value and accumulated as poison. Thereby we suggest how a sensitivity to the site multiple may be a helpful way of grappling with shifting ontology and the performativity of our research practices in urban studies.     

Performance persistence in entrepreneurship

This paper presents evidence of performance persistence in entrepreneurship. We show that entrepreneurs with a track record of success are much more likely to succeed than first-time entrepreneurs and those who have previously failed. In particular, they exhibit persistence in selecting the right industry and time to start new ventures. Entrepreneurs with demonstrated market timing skill are also more likely to outperform industry peers in their subsequent ventures. This is consistent with the view that if suppliers and customers perceive the entrepreneur to have market timing skill, and is therefore more likely to succeed, they will be more willing to commit resources to the firm. In this way, success breeds success and strengthens performance persistence.     

INTERNATIONAL TRADE AND INDUSTRIAL DYNAMICS*

In this article, industrial evolution is driven by endogenous technology choices of firms, generating a rich environment that includes the possibility of a dramatic shakeout. The likelihood, magnitude, and timing of this shakeout are characterized and depend not only on the size of an innovation but also on cost structure. In this setting, trade liberalization reduces the likelihood of a shakeout, resulting in more stable industrial structures. However, when shakeouts arise in global markets, the distribution of exits can vary widely across countries. Furthermore, conditions exist where a shakeout occurs in a closed economy but not in an open economy.     

Real-world annualized healthcare utilization and expenditures among insured US patients with acute intermittent porphyria (AIP) treated with hemin

Abstract

Background and aims: Patients with acute intermittent porphyria (AIP) may suffer from acute non-specific attacks that often result in hospitalizations or emergency room (ER) visits. Prior to the recent approval of givosiran (November 2019), hemin was the only FDA-approved therapy for AIP attacks in the US. Our aim was to estimate the annual healthcare utilization and expenditures for AIP patients treated with hemin using real-world data.

Methods: Patients with ≥1 hemin claim and confirmed AIP diagnosis – 1 inpatient claim or 2 outpatient claims ≥30 d apart for AIP (2015–2017) or acute porphyria (prior to 2015) – were identified in MarketScan administrative claims dataset between 2007 and 2017. Continuous enrolment for ≥6 months from confirmed diagnosis was required. A secondary analysis (“active disease population”) limited the sample to adult patients with ≥3 attacks or 10 months of prophylactic use of hemin within a 12-month pre-index period. AIP-related care was defined by hemin use during an attack (daily glucose and/or hemin use) or prophylaxis (non-attack hemin use). Outcomes were annualized and expenditures were inflated to 2017.

Results: Across 10 years, patients with a confirmed AIP diagnosis (N?=?8,877) and ≥1 hemin claim (N?=?164) were restricted by ≥6 months continuous follow-up (N?=?139). AIP patients were mostly female (N?=?112; 81%), had median age of 40 and 3 years average follow-up. Annualized average total expenditures for AIP-related care were $113,477. Annualized average all-cause (any diagnosis) hospitalizations were statistically significantly lower for patients treated with hemin prophylaxis vs. acute treatment (1.0 vs. 2.1; p?<?.001). In the secondary analysis (N?=?27), annualized average total expenditures for AIP-related care were higher ($187,480).

Conclusions: For AIP patients treated with hemin, patients treated for acute attacks may use a greater number of resources compared to patients treated prophylactically.     

The globalization of angel investments: Evidence across countries

This paper examines the role of investments by angel groups across a heterogeneous set of 21 countries with varying entrepreneurship ecosystems. Exploiting quasi-random assignment of deals around the groups’ funding thresholds, we find a positive impact of funding on firm growth, performance, survival, and follow-on fundraising, which is independent of the level of venture activity and entrepreneur-friendliness in the country. However, the maturity of startups that apply for funding (and are ultimately funded) inversely correlates with the entrepreneurship-friendliness of the country. This may reflect self-censoring by early-stage firms that do not expect to receive funding in these environments.     

Measuring the Impact of Child Care Subsidies on the Incomes of Mothers Returning to Work

The cost of child care is one of the greatest financial barriers faced by mothers returning to work. In recognition of this cost, the federal government provides child care subsidies to assist families to meet the cost of child care.
This paper models the use of child care services and the provision of child care subsidies to determine how effective the Australian government child care support programs are in reducing the financial barriers that make returning to work difficult for many mothers. Both childcare assistance and the newer childcare cash rebate are modelled. The impact of these assistance measures is examined for couples and sole parents on different incomes with one or two children in child care.
It was found that child care subsidies are highly progressive and make a substantial contribution to vertical equity by offsetting child care costs related to employment. They also contribute to horizontal equity, by providing greater assistance in meeting child care costs for families with more than one child in care, in recognition of their greater need. Sole parents derived the greatest benefit from child care subsidies, particularly those on low incomes working full-time and with two children in care.