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Now showing items 41-60 of 922
An Information Theoretic Approach to Flexible Stochastic Frontier Models
(Department of Economics, 2007)
Parametric stochastic frontier models have a long history in applied production economics, but the class of tractible parametric models is relatively small. Consequently, researchers have recently considered non-parametric alternatives...
The Welfare Caseload, Economics Growth and Welfare-to-Work Policies: An Analysis of Five Urban Areas
(Department of Economics, 2000)
This paper uses quarterly data on AFDC (later TANF) recipients in five major urban areas to examine the relative importance of policy reform and economic conditions in explaining the dynamics of the welfare caseload and the employment experiences...
Bayesian Estimator of Vector-Autoregressive Model Under the Entropy Loss
(Department of Economics, 2002)
it difficult to compute the Bayesian estimates via standard Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) procedures. The second contribution of the paper concerns MCMC simulation of the Bayesian estimator without using the closed-form expression of the frequentist...
Explaining Public Attitudes on State Legislative Professionalism
(Department of Economics, 2008)
Scholars have long argued that state legislative professionalism, or the provision of staff, legislator salary, and session length, has behavioral incentives for legislators and implications for legislative capacity. Scant ...
Incentives for Sabotage in Vertically Related Industries
(Department of Economics, 2004)
We show that the incentives a vertically integrated supplier may have to disadvantage or "sabotage" the activities of downstream rivals vary with both the type of sabotage and the nature of downstream competition. ...
Alternative Bayesian Estimators for Vector-Autoregressive Models
(Department of Economics, 2002)
This paper compares frequentist risks of several Bayesian estimators of the VAR lag parameters and covariance matrix under alternative priors. With the constant prior on the VAR lag parameters, the asymmetric LINEX estimator for the lag parameters...
Estimating Estate-Specific Price-to-Rent Ratios in Shanghai and Shenzhen: A Bayesian Approach
(Department of Economics, 2010)
in the same estate. We find that the price-to-rent ratios tend to be higher for low-end properties. We discuss economic explanations for the phenomenon and the policy implications....
On the Use of the Inflation Tax when Non-Distortionary Taxes are Available
(Department of Economics, 2000)
If a inflation tax base has been created via a fixed reserve requirement, will a benevolent government use the inflation tax as a (partial) source of revenue even though a non-distortionary revenue source is available? ...
High Corruption Income in Ming and Qing China
(Department of Economics, 2005)
We develop an economic model that explains historical data on government corruption in Ming and Qing China. In our model, officials' extensive powers result in corrupt income matching land's share in output. We estimate corrupt income to be between...
Competing for Customers' Attention: Advertising When Consumers Have Imperfect Memory
(Department of Economics, 2006)
This paper applies the theory of memory for advertising, developed in the consumer behavior literature, to an industrial organization setting to provide insight into advertising strategies in imperfectly competitive markets. There are two firms...
Campaign Finance Laws and Political Efficacy: Evidence From the States
(Department of Economics, 2005)
The decline of political efficacy and trust in the United States is often linked to the rise of money in politics. Both the courts and reform advocates justify restrictions on campaign donations and spending as necessary ...
Exposure Order Effects and Advertising Competition
(Department of Economics, 2008)
This paper applies the theories of exposure order effects, developed in the psychology literature, to an industrial organization model to explore their role in advertising competition. There are two firms and infinitely many identical consumers...
Real and Virtual Competition
(Department of Economics, 2007)
Although the Internet reduces market frictions by making it easier for consumers to obtain information about prices and product offerings, goods sold by electronic firms are not perfect substitutes for otherwise identical ...
The Effects of Campaign Finance Laws on Turnout, 1950-2000
(Department of Economics, 2006)
Scholars have proposed many routes by which campaign finance laws may impact turnout. For instance, laws restricting campaign spending may decrease mobilization, resulting in lower turnout. Alternatively, such laws might ...
Extracting a Common Stochastic Trend: Theory with Some Applications
(Department of Economics, 2008)
This paper investigates the statistical properties of estimators of the parameters and unobserved series for state space models with integrated time series. In particular, we derive the full asymptotic results for maximum likelihood estimation using...
The Impact of Welfare Reform on Leaver Characteristics, Employment and Recidivism
(Department of Economics, 2002)
recidivism comparing cohorts of leavers prior to and after welfare reform. We find that after welfare reform leavers are much more likely to be working, have higher total earnings, work for employers with similar characteristics, and are less likely to return...
The economics of within-field Bt corn refuges
(AgBioForum, 2000)
Farmers who plant Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) corn are obligated to plant a 20% non-Bt corn refuge as part of an Insect Resistance Management program. This paper analyzes the economics of alternative refuge configurations. Ignoring potential...
Is Teacher Pay “Adequate”?
(Department of Economics, 2005)
In school finance lawsuits plaintiffs often claim that pay levels are not sufficient to recruit teachers who can deliver constitutionally-mandated levels of educational services. In this paper I consider several ways in which one might bring...
Selection of Multivariate Stochastic Volatility Models via Bayesian Stochastic Search
(Department of Economics, 2009)
We propose a Bayesian stochastic search approach to selecting restrictions on multivariate regression models where the errors exhibit deterministic or stochastic conditional volatilities. We develop a Markov Chain Monte ...
Crude Oil and Stock Markets: Stability, Instability, and Bubbles
(Department of Economics, 2008)
We analyze the long-run relationship between the world price of crude oil and international stock markets over 1971:1-2008:3 using a cointegrated vector error correction model with additional regressors. Allowing for ...