Gender disparities: a medical detoxification program

Significant gaps exist in health care regarding gender in the United States. Health status, social roles, culturally patterned behavior and access to health care can be influenced by gender. Women have been the primary users of health care and minority women usually have received poorer quality care than Non-Hispanic White (NHW) females. The objectives of this study were to identify gender, racial and ethnic disparities in access to substance abuse treatment in a Texas hospital. Secondary data collected on 1,309 subjects who underwent detoxification were studied. Gender, race/ethnicity, drug of abuse, relapse and financial classification were included in the analysis. Results indicate Hispanic females and Non-Hispanic Black (NHB) females were about 5 and 3.5 more likely than NHW females to use Medicaid services respectively (p < .05). NHW and NHB males were more likely to use Medicare than females (p < .05). NHB and Hispanic females were 5.8 and 2.1 times more likely to receive care for abuse of cocaine when compared to NHW females respectively (p < .05). Hispanic females were 2.3 times more likely to relapse than Non-Hispanic females, and uninsured NHB females were 7.1 times at a higher risk to abuse multiple drugs compare to NHW females (p < .05). Socio-economic factors, lower labor force participation rates, and less financial independence can explain females utilizing more often Medicaid regardless of their race/ethnicity. These results can be also explained by aggressive case management utilization, socio cultural barriers and/or discriminatory practices, both intentional and unintentional.     

The information in the high-yield bond spread for the business cycle: evidence and some implications

The market for high-yield (below-investment-grade) corporatebonds developed in the middle 1980s. We show that, since thistime, the high-yield spread has had significant explanatorypower for the business cycle. We interpret this finding as possiblysymptomatic of financial factors at work in the business cycle,along the lines suggested by the financial accelerator. We alsoshow that over this period the high-yield spread outperformsother leading financial indicators, including the term spread,the paper-bill spread, and the Federal Funds rate. We conjecturethat changes in the conduct of monetary policy over time mayaccount for the reduced informativeness of these alternativeindicators, all of which are tied closely to monetary policy.     

Are U.S. stock prices mean reverting? Some new tests using fractional integration models with overlapping data and structural breaks

Using recently developed econometric models of fractional integration with overlapping data, this study examines the time series properties of real monthly U.S. stock returns over the period 1871–2003. Using 1-month and overlapping, long-horizon stock returns of 12, 24, and 36 months, we find that real U.S. stock returns are covariance stationary for this period before and after allowing for the presence of structural breaks. Our results imply that the permanent (random walk) component of stock prices overwhelms any temporary (mean reverting) component, producing a fractional d-value for returns indistinguishable from zero. We highlight the limitations of standard ACF models of overlapping returns, and suggest that the previously observed pattern of increasingly negative autocorrelations is largely an artifact of short-term ARMA dynamics. We confirm the result of Souza (J Time Ser Anal 28:701–722, 2007) that, holding the bandwidth constant, overlapping (and nonoverlapping) temporal aggregation should not affect semiparametric, frequency domain d-estimates such as the GPH and feasible exact local Whittle.     

A reexamination of the value of tax options

This article reexamines the value of tax trading when the taxrate on long-term realizations is less than that on short-termrealizations. In particular, the value of the option to realizelong-term capital gains and repurchase stock in order to increaseone's tax basis and restart the option to realize future lossesshort term is examined empirically. Our estimate of the incrementalvalue of restarting, which is based on the results of simulationsof several alternative tax trading policies over a large numberof independent return sequences, is generally much smaller thanthat reported by Constantinides (1984). The incremental valueof restarting is shown to depend critically on the particularpattern of realized returns and the assumed tax treatment ofunrealized capital gains at the end of the simulation period.The effects of stock price volatility, transaction costs, portfoliooffset rules, and realization cutoff levels on the value oftax trading are also investigated.     

Trends,Cycles and Convergence in U.S. Regional House Prices

In this study we present a statistical analysis of the time series properties of the geographic regions in the OFHEO U.S. house price database. The time period for our study is first quarter 1975 through second quarter 2005. We perform an unobserved components, structural time series analysis of nine regional indexes and two super-regional factors and fit a classic “smooth trend plus cycle” model. We then apply bivariate unit root tests for absolute and relative convergence of the regions and factors, allowing for the possibility of a structural break. We find the two super-regions have slightly different patterns of trends and cycles until the early to mid-1990s, when a common pattern of strong and sustained price appreciation is seen. The evidence for regional convergence is mixed, with little for the first super-regional factor and some examples of relative convergence within the second factor. Thus support for a simple error correction model for regional house prices in our study is mixed.