Price of High‐quality Daycare and Female Employment

Using local variation between municipalities, I analyze the degree to which the price of high‐quality publicly subsidized childcare affects female employment following maternity leave. Importantly, prices are income dependent and thus likely endogenous, yet by exploiting information on minimum income compensation during non‐employment, I bypass this problem. The results show that the price negatively affects employment. A price increase of €1 per month decreases employment by 0.08%, which corresponds to a price elasticity of −0.17. These effects prevail during the first 12 months after childbirth. I also find that availability of childcare increases employment.     

Cooperation In R&D With Spillovers And Delegation Of Sales ∗

Cooperation in several phases of the innovation process is viewed by antitrust authorities with suspicion. They face the dilemma between providing the right incentives for the appro-priability of returns to R&D and the risks of diminishing product market competition. The current legislation in the European Union and the United States gives special treatment to cooperation in R&D and the joint exploitation of results (extended cooperation).

We study several collusive regimes for a class of examples in which vertical relations are explicitly introduced. Regarding antitrust policy implications we fmd that: a) there is an ana-lytical justification to a ‘rule of reason’ treatment for extended cooperation in research joint ventures and, b) individual exemptions, though restrictive of competition, might be welfare improving.     

Signalling,Disclosure And The Implications Of Financial Structure For Uk Corporate R&D ∗

This paper investigates the impact of R&D disclosure and finance variables on the level of R&D expenditures. The question addressed is: what is the impact of changes in disclosure requirements on the relationship between R&D expenditure and the financing of firms? The question is motivated by the possible signalling role that elective disclosure may have had prior to changes in accounting practices to ensure R&D disclosure.     

Establishment Level Earnings,Technology And The Growth Of Inequality: Evidence From Britain

It is often argued that technical change is responsible for the increase in wage inequality in Britain and the United States in the 1980s and 1990s. In this paper we examine this argument using data from individuals and establishments. It is found that the presence of micro-electronic technologies in workplaces is associated with higher earnings, especially for skilled workers. Decompositions suggest that technical change could have been a cause of the increase in skills premium for highly skilled workers. Nevertheless, our view is that the correlation between wages and plant-level technology is mainly driven by the effect of high wages on the propensity to introduce new technologies rather than vice versa. This view is supported by simultaneous models of the wage-technology relationship.     

DETERMINANTS OF WOMEN'S MICROENTERPRISE SUCCESS IN AHMEDABAD,INDIA: EMPOWERMENT AND ECONOMICS

Abstract

Microenterprise success is often evaluated solely in terms of economic outcomes. These evaluations do not recognize how opportunities for success may differ across groups and contexts, and disregard the importance of power and control as factors in success. This article investigates the determinants of a two-dimensional concept of microenterprise success for women in Ahmedabad, India, by analyzing data from a 1998 study of home-based garment producers. Growing economic success for these garment producers decreased empowerment outcomes, which suggests that evaluating both economic and empowerment outcomes and their interactions is important to understanding the process of achieving success. Improving the economic outcomes of women's enterprises via better training and access to markets, credit, and capital equipment does not necessarily facilitate women's empowerment. Microenterprise scholars and practitioners must focus on improving women's status within their homes, so they may contribute to and benefit from the decisions made about how to use their resources.     

WHERE ARE THE WOMEN? GENDER,LABOR, AND DISCOURSE IN THE NOIDA EXPORT PROCESSING ZONE AND DELHI

Abstract

Export processing zones (EPZs) are like islands of globalization. Much of the literature on EPZs and export-oriented industries (EOIs) notes a preponderance of women who are constructed as “cheap,” “nimble fingered,” and “docile” labor. This literature is dominated by socialist feminist thinkers, and this paper argues that there is a need to incorporate the insights of postmodern feminist thinkers. The article focuses on the role that language, discourse, and subjectivity play in the gendering process in handmade jewelry production in the Noida Export Processing Zone (NEPZ) and in the ranch production units related by common ownership in Delhi, India. It thus gives “voices” to women and men, and brings out their agency in structuring the labor market. The study confirms that gender division of labor is a product of discursive and material practices that are reproduced through discourses into which different actors invest, and that feed into the gendered subjective identities of these actors.     

The incremental time costs of children: An analysis of children's impact on adult time use in Australia

Abstract

Raising children takes both time and money. Scholars have sought convincing ways to capture the costs of children, but even when these estimates include indirect costs, such as mothers' foregone earnings, they fall short of the true time costs involved. This paper uses data from the 1997 Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Time Use Survey to study how the allocation of time differs across households with varying numbers and ages of children and how households with children differ from those without children. It also examines the intra household division of time resources, showing how childcare, related unpaid work, and the total market and non-market workloads compare for a couple in the same household. It includes secondary activity in an analysis of total parental time commitments to give a more accurate picture of the time cost of children than is possible on the basis of analyzing “primary” activities alone.     

Altruism in individual and joint-giving decisions: What's gender got to do with it?

Abstract

This paper uses dictator experiments to examine gender differences in altruistic behavior in the United States when decisions are made individually and jointly. In anonymous individual giving to charity, women give substantially more than men, and in paired settings, mixed-sex groups give the most while all male pairs give the least. Evidence supports social information and negotiation effects as participants change giving toward that of their partners. Social image effects are found only in mixed-sex groups, indicating a gender-based component to the value of the social signal sent. Although men and women appear to have similar influence, the positive social image effect pushes giving in mixed-sex pairs above the sum of the members' individual gifts because the less altruistic partners (usually men) adjust their giving upward more than the more altruistic partners (usually women) reduce giving. Therefore, increasing women's participation in traditionally male spheres of decision making may result in more altruistic economic behavior.     

Editorial

This paper presents an overview of issues for future research. as identified by the papers appearing in the Special Issue on Innovation in Telecommunications. To this end. we elaborate upon the emergence of a new innovation regime in telecommunications, discuss the performance and sustainability of this new innovation regime, and reflect upon institutional choices for the regime and accompanying policy options. Further research on innovation in telecommunications is advocated, taking up a broad range of issues, including long-term industrial evolution and sustainability concerns in a wide sense.     

Analysing The Evolution Of Industry: The Relevance Of The Telecommunications Industry

This paper analyses the fundamental forces involved in the evolution of the telecommunications industry. It is suggested that there are five major forces that together drive the evolution of this industry: specialisation, competition, financial markets. endogenous consumer demand and permeable industry boundaries. An important research task is to further elaborate on the boundaries of not only the industry but of the industrial system taken as a whole.