Internal validity in discrete choice experiments: varying the position of the price attribute

This article presents an analysis of internal validity in discrete choice experiments. Prior studies have analysed the importance of the order of attributes within a multiple choice context, but few have specifically analysed the importance of the location of the price attribute. The internal validity was analysed while considering variations in the position of the price attribute in the choice cards. Results show differences in the estimates of willingness to pay according to the price-location version used: at the beginning, in the middle or at the end of the choice card.     

Interdependent preferential trade agreement memberships: An empirical analysis

The establishment of a new preferential trade agreement (PTA) or the expansion of an existing one alters the incentives of non-members to participate in a PTA. This can lead to a domino effect whereby non-members join an existing PTA. Or it can lead a pair of countries to establish a new PTA. We examine the determinants of why a pair of countries enters a bilateral PTA. Our emphasis is on (a) the impact of pre-existing PTAs and (b) whether this impact is larger when the members of pre-existing PTAs are on average geographically close to the pair of countries. Using data for 145 countries during 1955-2005, we find evidence that pre-existing PTAs increase the probability that a country-pair will enter a bilateral PTA and that this effect diminishes with distance. The analysis makes use of techniques drawn from spatial econometrics.     

Economic returns to industrial research

This paper investigates the relationship between R&D and corporate performance. The study extends previous research by examining the conditions under which firms benefit from R&D; by incorporating in the analysis the varying costs of R&D inputs; and by employing an opportunity-cost approach that estimates the monetary returns to R&D. The findings indicate that industrial research generates revenues that are significantly higher than the returns that other investments yield. The study also resolves previously conflicting results concerning firm size, and offers new insights on the role of technological opportunities that contradict past studies. Although the potential for innovation is greater in high-tech industries, intense R&D competition prevents technologically dynamic firms from enjoying high returns to R&D. By contrast, the results demonstrate that low-tech firms use R&D successfully as part of their strategies, implying that prior research underestimates the importance of R&D for these firms.     

Commodity Prices and the Terms of Trade

On combining national terms-of-trade data for developing countries with world prices of internationally traded primary commodities, it is found that variation in the world prices of three or fewer key exported commodities account for 50% or more of the annual variation in the terms of trade of a typical developing country. A considerable fraction of the variation is specific to a particular commodity and, given that the overall importance of primary commodities differs across developing countries, it is possible to account for much of the heterogeneity across them. It is concluded that commodity price fluctuations should be central features of two related literatures: studies of business cycle transmission across developing and industrialized nations, and empirical work aimed at constructing perpetual claims on developing country incomes as suggested by Shiller in 1995.     

Consumer willingness-to-pay to reduce the probability of retail foodborne pathogen contamination

The US Department of Agriculture applies a cost-of-illness approach to value reductions in morbidity, which may understate the projected benefits from proposed food-safety improvements by ignoring costs such as pain, suffering and worry. We use a national survey with a hypothetical food-choice experiment to estimate a more comprehensive measure of consumer willingness-to-pay for food-safety improvements. Our approach differs from previous evaluations of food-safety improvements because we: (1) provide the respondent with information about the promised change in the probability of pathogen contamination in retail food packages rather than changes in the probability of becoming ill, (2) elicit changes in respondents’ subjective probability of becoming ill, and (3) elicit predicted changes in the quantity demanded for products that have enhanced food-safety properties. We estimate the consumer’s choice between a safety-enhanced and an existing product, the change in subjective probability of contracting foodborne illness associated with the enhanced product and the change-in-demand for the enhanced product in a manner that recognizes the correlation among unobserved elements. The aggregated results suggest benefit estimates that are significantly larger than previous estimates for similar improvements.     

Acquisition of Market Information,Returns to Scale and the Viability of Competitive Equilibrium

In this paper the economies of scale arising from the acquisition of costly information and their implications for the existence of a competitive equilibrium are investigated. As is known, the existence of economies in the scale of production undermines the possibility of a competitive equilibrium. This paper demonstrates that this kind of problem arises when firms face market uncertainty, i.e. in competitive markets, uncertainty about the price of production factors or about the price of output. It is shown that, under these circumstances, firms have incentives to purchase market information, i.e. information capable of reducing price uncertainty. In turn, the acquisition of costly information generates economies of scale that prevent the occurrence of a competitive equilibrium, unless such increasing returns to scale are tamed by the decreasing utility of uncertain returns due to risk aversion, or—in the short run—by increasing marginal costs of production.     

Playing in between: patent brokers in markets for technology

Here we argue that patent brokers do not only stay in between supply and demand of innovation, but play in between executing complex transactions and taking entrepreneurial risk. In doing so, they serve a support function to R&D managers of firms adopting various approaches to technological change. We discuss how economic and sociological theories explain brokerage and its existence. Our qualitative analysis of the current practice of patent brokerage in the United States finds some evidence in support of such arguments, and moreover helps us reach a taxonomy of brokerage. We conclude with our own proposition, suggesting that even in very dense environments, the bridging role of intellectual property intermediaries is that of market makers, who leverage their specific investment to play in between technology demand and supply.     

The role of task meaning on output in groups: Experimental evidence

Previous research has shown a detrimental effect of low task meaning on individual work output. This paper analyzes whether peer settings are able to counteract this negative effect of low task meaning. First, our results confirm that a low level of task meaning decreases individual output when working alone. However, this effect vanishes completely when working in the presence of a peer. Our analysis implies that organizing work in peer settings might be particularly beneficial in work environments with a low level of task meaning.     

The quantitative and qualitative evolution of the social security research

This article examines the evolution of social security research from a theoretical and empirical perspective. This is done through an extensive review and analysis of publications from the Journal of International Social Security Review published by Wiley within a 50-year period (1967–2017). It was observed that at a different period in time, the social security research focused on different national and international issues that invoked different social welfare programs and pension systems approach (public or private) to facilitate the explanation of its final socio-economic impact into different social groups in the same country or region respectively.     

Evaluating corruption under the application of the SOCIO-economic development desgrowth index (Ð-index): the case of Guatemala

Getting a clear sense of the intensity and dynamics of corruption in a society or country is a critical platform for economic growth and development. This paper sets out to bring clarity to the study of corruption through an alternative approach. It examines and demonstrates how corruption can be evaluated by basically hinging it on the socio-economic development deaccumulation that any country can experience in different historical periods. The paper presents the socio-economic development desgrowth index (Ð-index), a new indicator with a complete set of mathematical tools that capture and calculate all the aspects that encompass corruption within a system or country. The paper successfully applied the (Ð-index) to X-ray the successive administrations of Guatemala from 1986 to year 2016 from where we convincingly observed the highs and lows in the corruption dynamics of Guatemala.