Computer knowledge and earnings: evidence for Australia

This paper uses data on wage and salary workers in Australia in 1993 to examine the relation between computer knowledge and earnings. A unique feature of the data set that is used is detailed information on the types and levels of computer skills possessed by individual workers. The main objectives of the study are to contribute to understanding the magnitude and sources of the relation between computer knowledge and earnings. Similar to existing research it is found that there is a large and significant return to computer knowledge, but that the magnitude of the return is substantially reduced in regressions that include detailed occupation controls. Using the detailed information on workers’ computer skills the main finding is that earnings are significantly positively related to the number of types of skills and average level of skills possessed by a worker.     

A New Class of Revealed Comparative Advantage Indexes

Open Economies Review - This paper draws upon a critical analysis of the three RCA indexes in Vollrath (1991) to propose a new class of RCA indexes. The baseline RCA index in this new class rests...     

Fiscal fragmentation and crime control: Is there an efficiency-equity tradeoff?

International Tax and Public Finance - This article investigates the effects of fiscal fragmentation on aggregate crime rates and the spatial disparities in crime rates among counties in a...     

Work and social well-being: the impact of employment conditions on quality of life

This paper aims to extend our understanding of the impact of management practises and employment conditions in the contemporary workplace on the broader social realm. The study provides an analytic account of how these employment conditions impact on the social well-being of a representative sample of individuals and households. We assess the propensity of working arrangements that are manifested in various high performance work systems either to enhance or to diminish quality of life. The paper indicates that certain management practises and employment conditions have impacts that extend beyond the workplace and influence the broader well-being of individuals and families.     

Exploring customer online reviews for new product development: The case of identifying reinforcers in the cosmetic industry

This study analyzes online customer reviews in order to investigate customers' preferences regarding cosmetic products. Based on the marketing firm theory, this research explores the possibility of enhancing the bilateral contingent relationships between the customer and the marketing firm within the cosmetics domain. Hence, this study applies market-search concepts by extracting customer reviews and employing text analytics to identify reinforcers and factors in cosmetic products, which customers are expecting, and their sentiments towards them. Our results suggest that some reinforcers are shared among all customers, but some vary among the different customer segments based on their age and skin tone.     

Chinese Consumer Market: Continual Emergence of New Business Patterns

In 2020,the Chinese consumer market will further face the challenge of the weakening demographic dividend and flow dividend.Although the consumer industry is still growing steadily overall,the industry has entered a new stage of stock competition,demand differentiation and accelerated innovation.     

Is Democracy a Normal Good? Evidence from Democratic Movements

A frequent assertion of economists and political scientists is that democracy is a normal good, or that higher incomes lead citizens to “desire” more democracy. This assertion, however, has been difficult to test directly. I introduce a data set of democratic movements, and use it to address the relationship between income and the demand for democracy. Logit analysis of the estimated probability that a democratic movement occurs in an authoritarian country suggests that this probability is increasing in income per capita up to a level of approximately $5000. Unlike previous results, this does not suggest that all countries will become democratic once they pass some income threshold.     

Cannabis, Alcohol and Cigarettes: Substitutes or Complements?

This paper uses individual level data from the National Drug Strategy Household Surveys to estimate the price responsiveness of participation in cannabis, alcohol and cigarette use. In addition to own price effects, we estimate cross price effects and the impact of decriminalizing cannabis use. We find that participation is responsive to own prices. There is some evidence that cannabis is a substitute for alcohol and a complement to cigarettes, and that alcohol and cigarettes are complements. The liberalization of cannabis laws in South Australia may have led to a temporary increase in cannabis use among the over-30 age group.