Equal opportunity and poverty reduction: How should aid be allocated?

This paper analyzes a model of aid allocation equalizing the opportunity between recipient countries to reach a common poverty reduction goal. We propose a fair and efficient aid allocation based on a multicriteria principle. The model considers structural handicaps in recipient countries in terms of lack of human capital and economic vulnerability, their initial poverty, and the natural gap between the growth rate required to reach a development goal and the observed one. We show that our proposed aid allocation favors poor and vulnerable countries with our multicriteria principle. It substantially differs from the observed allocation. Analyses also shed light on the impact of the donors' aversion to the low natural growth gap in recipient countries on the optimal aid allocation and the marginal efficiency of aid.     

What We Should Know About House Reconstruction Costs?

The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics - This paper presents two important analyses, which have been derived from a rich dataset supplied by an important Property & Casualty...     

Measurement of Formal Convergence of Vietnamese Accounting Standards with IFRS

Convergence refers to the process of narrowing the differences between International Accounting Standards/International Financial Reporting Standards (IAS/IFRS) and country‐specific accounting standards. The purpose of this study is to measure the formal convergence between Vietnamese Accounting Standards (VAS) and IAS/IFRS using a fuzzy‐based approach. We assess the extent of convergence between VAS and IAS/IFRS from the perspective of a single standard, clusters of standards and the standards as a whole. The levels of standards convergence are clustered into four categories: full convergence, substantial convergence, substantial difference and complete difference. Our results indicate that the level of convergence between the two sets of standards only achieves mid‐level convergence. The findings of this study should help policy makers improve VAS to meet international standards.     

Being Innovative While Being Green: An Experimental Inquiry into How Consumers Respond to Eco‐Innovative Product Designs

Eco‐innovations are an effective way for companies to strategically align themselves with customers’ growing environmental concerns. Despite their crucial role, scant research has focused on eco‐innovative product designs. Drawing from the sustainability and innovation literature, this article proposes that in the design of an eco‐innovation, its degree of innovativeness, level of eco‐friendliness, and detachability significantly affect consumers' adoption intentions. This article develops various conceptual models tested through three independent online experiments with U.S. consumers. The findings support the hypotheses and provide useful insights into the underlying mechanisms of how and why consumers respond to eco‐innovative product designs across various high‐tech product categories. Specifically, the results show (1) a positive effect of innovativeness degrees of eco‐innovative attributes on consumers' perceptions of product eco‐friendliness and on their adoption intentions as well as a significant moderating role of consumers' need for cognition (Study 1); (2) a positive influence of eco‐friendliness levels of eco‐innovative attributes on consumer adoption intentions in the case of high‐complexity products but not for low‐complexity products, emphasizing the need to adopt different approaches when developing eco‐innovations to ensure favorable consumer reactions (Study 2); and (3) a significant impact of the detachability of eco‐innovative attributes on consumers' perceptions of trade‐offs between environmental benefits and product functionality and on their intentions to adopt eco‐innovations (Study 3). These findings add to existing theoretical knowledge, provide actionable managerial implications, and identify fruitful avenues for future research.     

The impact of rural roads and irrigation on household welfare: evidence from Vietnam

We measure the impact of road and irrigation projects on the livelihoods of households in the poorest and most remote areas of Vietnam using difference-in-difference estimators. We find that both rural road and irrigation projects help local households improve the access to safe water and welfare measured by a wealth index. The impact of irrigation projects is found to be larger than the impact of road projects. We also find heterogeneous impacts of road and irrigation projects. Households with higher levels of education tend to benefit more from road projects, while households with lower levels of education are likely to benefit more from irrigation projects.     

Corporate governance and risk-taking: Evidence from Japanese firms

This paper examines the influence of corporate governance on the risk taking of Japanese firms. We show that family control and ownership concentration are associated with higher idiosyncratic risk, whereas bank control has the opposite effect. Considering the link between idiosyncratic risk and firm performance, the results provide an economic rationale for the higher (lower) performance of family-controlled firms (bank-controlled firms). The results also explain the higher performance of firms with concentrated ownership by relating their governance structures to the risk-taking strategies that generate greater competitive advantages. Finally, we show that the impact of governance structures on risk taking is stronger after controlling for endogeneity.     

THE ESTIMATED EFFECT OF CATHOLIC SCHOOLING ON EDUCATIONAL OUTCOMES USING PROPENSITY SCORE MATCHING

This paper examines the effect of attending a Catholic high school on educational outcomes. The statistical analysis is based on data obtained from the US National Educational Longitudinal Study. Using propensity score matching methods to control for selection bias, we find that Catholic schooling improves maths test scores, with stronger effects for males than for females, but appears to have little effect (if any) on reading scores. Catholic schooling also raises high school graduation rates and substantially increases the likelihood of enrolment in a 4‐year college. Use of the difference‐in‐difference method suggests that the effect of Catholic schooling on changes in maths scores is more muted, though still statistically significant.     

Adjustment costs and theory of investment under uncertainty

It is shown that the stochastic investment rule for the price-setting monopolist facing random demand differs from the deterministic rule, due to the presence of the covariance of the marginal utility of profits and the MRTS between capital and labor. For the risk-neutral quantity-setting monopolist, the optimal current investment under random demand is shown to be greater than that under deterministic conditions, given that production technology is of the Cobb-Douglas type with constant returns to scale. When random wages and prices follow first-order autoregressive schemes, the risk-neutral competitive firm's current investment level is shown to be at least equal to that under certainty.     

Identification of the Lorenz curve by Lorenz coefficient

Zusammenfassung Die Identifikation der Lorenzkurve durch Lorenzkoeffizienten. — Der aus der Lorenzkurve abgeleitete Gini-Koeffizient vermittelt einen guten Eindruck von dem Ma\ an Ungleichheit. W?hrend sich jedoch eine Lorenzkurve auf den Gini-Koeffizienten im Verh?ltnis eins zu eins übertragen l?\t, entspricht — in der entgegengesetzten Richtung — ein Gini-Koeffizient mehreren Lorenzkurven. In dieser Untersuchung wird die Lorenzkurve in einzelne Abschnitte aufgeteilt. Dann wird jedem Abschnitt ein gewogener Lorenz-Koeffizient zugeordnet, wodurch es m?glich wird, Lorenzkurven mit identischen Gini-Koeffizienten zu unterscheiden. Die Verbindung zwischen jedem Kurvenpaar kann aufgehoben werden, indem man von Abschnitt zu Abschnitt die jeweiligen Lorenz-Koeffizienten vergleicht. Ein empirisches Beispiel ist in dem Artikel enthalten.

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Résumé L’identification de la courbe de Lorenz par le coefficient de Lorenz. — Le coefficient de Gini dérivé de la courbe de Lorenz exprime un degré considérable de sens intuitif pour la mesure de l’inégalité. La reproduction de la courbe de Lorenz en coefficient de Gini est cependant dans le rapport un à un, celle du coefficient de Gini en courbe de Lorenz un à beaucoup. Cette étude veut partager la courbe de Lorenz en piéces détachées. Un sous-coefficient pondéré de Lorenz est associé avec chaque partie, une méthode qui permet à différencier les courbes de Lorenz avec des coefficients identiques de Gini. Le lien entre chaque paire de courbes peut être détaché si on part d’une comparaison de chaque sous-coefficient de Lorenz de partie à partie. L’auteur fournit une application empirique.

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Resumen Identificación de la curva de Lorenz por medio del coeficiente de Lorenz. — El coeficiente de Gini derivado de la curva de Lorenz transmite sentimientos intuitivos considerables para la medida de desigualdad. Sin embargo, el desdibujamiento de la curva de Lorenz hacia el coeficiente de Gini es uno a uno y el del coeficiente de Gini hacia la curva de Lorenz de uno a muchas veces. En este estudio se divide la curva de Lorenz en partes. Un sub-coeficiente de Lorenz se asocia con cada parte permitiéndonos diferenciar curvas de Lorenz con idénticos coeficientes de Gini. La unión entre cualquier par se puede quebrar procediendo a comparar cada sub-coeficiente de Lorenz de parte en parte. Se presenta una aplicación empírica.

     

Estimating the price deflator for nominal cash balances

A differential money demand equation is used to estimate the weight given to each commodity group in the price index which transforms nominal into real cash balances. The results indicate that food receives the largest weight and that the CPI is a good proxy for the true deflator.