market state and civil organizations in latin america beyond the debt crisis the context for rural development abstract the development strategy emerging in latin america implies a sharply redefined balance in the relative roles of the market the state and civil organizations market liberalization has been extensive and intense efforts have been undertaken to make the new rules credible the state has been divested of many productive and regulatory activities but descaling is a reflection of short run stabilization policies and signaling not of long term tendencies since an active state remains strongly in demand civil organizations are assuming active roles as alternative forms to produce and service members and as pressure groups agriculture has gained considerably from the policy reforms together with democratic representation and decentralization of governance this gives renewed opportunities for successful rural development initiatives

understanding heterogeneous preferences in random utility models a latent class approach a finite mixture approach toconditional logit models is developed in whichlatent classes are used to promoteunderstanding of systematic heterogeneity the model is applied to wilderness recreationin which a branded choice experiment involvingchoice of one park from a demand system wasadministered to a sample of recreationists the basis of membership in the classes orsegments in the sample involved attitudinalmeasures of motivations for taking a trip aswell as their stated preferences overwilderness park attributes the econometricanalysis suggested that four classes of peopleexist in the sample using the model toexamine welfare measures of some hypotheticalpolicy changes identified markedly differentwelfare effects than the standard singlesegment model and provided insight into thedifferential impact of alternative policies

qualitative and quantitative evidence on the true local welfare costs of forest conservation in madagascar are discrete choice experiments a valid ex ante tool summary protected areas may impose local welfare costs through the enforcement of use restrictions predicting their welfare impacts before their establishment could help with the design of compensation schemes discrete choice experiments dces are increasingly used for ex ante evaluations but their validity is largely untested in low income settings using a case study of a new redd reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation project in eastern madagascar we explore the validity of dces in two ways i whether the estimates of welfare costs derived from dce are affected by respondents prior experience of conservation ii whether dce results have high theoretical and content validity we surveyed households who have varying degrees of experience of restrictions to swidden agriculture we also qualitatively debriefed a sub sample of respondents to better understand their thought processes latent class analysis shows that dce outcomes vary with conservation experience households more experienced with forest protection are less willing to trade off rights to clear forest for swidden agriculture with any compensatory interventions whereas less experienced households highly favor support for alternative agricultural techniques and a secure right to clear one hectare of forest although the results show apparent non attendance to some attributes e g cash payments qualitative debriefings suggest that respondents infact do expect relatively low or no utility from the given attributes and hence have theoretically valid preferences similarly the dce has generally high content validity although dce can elicit current preferences in this context using ex ante dce to estimate the welfare costs of such a long term intervention requires caution we conclude that it is difficult to robustly estimate compensation in advance of an intervention there is therefore a need to rethink conservation approaches and the feasibility of achieving fair compensations for conservation imposed restrictions

what aspects of formality do workers value evidence from a choice experiment in bangladesh this study uses a choice experiment among 2 000 workers in bangladesh to elicit willingness to pay wtp for job attributes a contract termination notice working hours paid leave and a pension fund using a stated preference method allows calculation of wtp for benefits in this setting despite the lack of data on worker transitions and the fact that many workers are self employed which makes it difficult to use revealed preference methods workers highly value job stability the average worker would be willing to forego a 27 percent increase in income to obtain a 1 year contract relative to no contract or to forego a 12 percent increase to obtain thirty days of termination notice there is substantial heterogeneity in wtp by type of employment and gender women value shorter working hours more than men while government workers place a higher value on contracts than do private sector employees

heterogeneity of preferences for the benefits of environmental stewardship a latent class approach since 2005 environmental stewardship es has been the principal agri environment scheme for england and is the key instrument for the delivery of increased environmental benefits from agricultural landscapes the main objective of this study is to investigate whether or not individuals preferences for the environmental benefits associated with es vary depending on types of landscapes within which these benefits are delivered a latent class model is applied to data obtained from a choice experiment survey of over 1000 respondents sampled across england the results suggest that individuals have heterogenous preferences for the benefits of es though different segments of the population with more homogenous preferences can be identified in particular higher levels of benefit are often associated with the operation of es in landscapes close to where respondents live this leads to the suggestion that in order to maximise the benefits of es its implementation could take this result into account by encouraging greater uptake from farmers whose land is closer to large populations

individual preferences regarding environmental offset and welfare compensation a choice experiment application to an offshore wind farm project this paper uses the choice experiment method to investigate the preferences of local communities with respect to various compensatory measures in connection with a development project a survey was conducted among recreational users of the bay of saint brieuc where an offshore wind farm is currently planned the goal is to identify the preferences of the bay s users with respect to various compensation possibilities monetary compensation investment in publicly owned assets or the ecological restoration two multinomial logit mnl models and a latent class lc model are used to explore the preferences and some sources of heterogeneity within the community the results of this study show that form of compensation is an important determinant of preferences and has an effect on the acceptability towards the compensation principle more precisely results shows that compensation is better accepted if it obeys the principle of strong sustainability which includes ecological restoration for the gain of the population as a whole and which excludes monetary transactions associated with the bribe effect the study also highlights the naturalists specific attitude for who compensation should be determined within a regulatory framework one which imposes compensatory measures related to objectively determined ecological impacts c 2016 published by elsevier b v

personality and economic choices abstract there is substantial variation in individual preferences for public goods yet much of that variation remains poorly understood however simple measures of personality can help to explain economic values and choices in a systematic way in this paper we examine the effects of personality on individual economic choices over public environmental goods based on three datasets from three separate stated preference studies we use a hybrid choice econometric framework to examine the effects of personality on preferences for the status quo changes in environmental quality and costs of investing in environmental improvements we find effects that are consistent across all datasets personality a stable feature of an individual s character that is simple to measure enriches explanations of why the demand for environmental goods varies across people provides an indication of how different people are likely to react to the introduction of environmental policies and explains substantial differences in willingness to pay

reputation and earnings the roles of quality and quantity in academe we examine the determinants of professional reputation does quantity of exposures raise reputation independent of quality does quality of the most important exposure have extra effects on reputation in a very large sample of academic economists there is little evidence that a scholar s most influential work provides any extra enhancement of reputation quality rankings matter more than absolute quality quantity has a zero or even negative effect on proxies for reputation data on salaries however show positive effects of quantity independent of quality we test explanations for the differences between the determinants of reputation and salary jel l14 j31

reconsidering heterogeneity and aggregation issues in environmental valuation a multi attribute approach the economic valuation of complex environmental goods composed of multiple attributes is an expanding field of research in ecological and environmental economics however several issues are still subjects of debate this paper focuses on three of them the linearity of the valuation function in the attributes aggregation criteria for obtaining social values and the heterogeneity of individuals utility functions a methodological approach based on multi attribute utility theory which enables us to contrast the impact of these concerns on the valuation of environmental goods is proposed we employ the methodology to value a protected natural area and from the results obtained we can conclude that the non linearity and the heterogeneity of the individual utility function are relevant aspects of environmental valuation that need to be taken into account when valuing environmental goods

viewpoint replication in economics this examination of the role and potential for replication in economics points out the paucity of both pure replication checking on others published papers using their data and scientific replication using data representing different populations in one s own work or in a comment several controversies in empirical economics are used to illustrate how and how not to behave when replicating others work the incentives for replication are examined and proposals aimed at journal editors and authors are advanced that might stimulate an activity that most economists applaud but few perform

perceptions versus objective measures of environmental quality in combined revealed and stated preference models of environmental valuation abstract this study examines perceptions and objective attribute measures in discrete choice models of recreation site choice behavior these forms of attribute measurement are examined in individual and combined revealed preference stated preference models our results suggest that the model based on perceptions slightly outperforms the models based on objective attribute measures however issues such as the definition of the choice set and the measurement of welfare present significant challenges when using perceptions data

managing tourism in the galapagos islands through price incentives a choice experiment approach abstract this study analyzes nature based tourism in ecuador s galapagos national park which faces great risks of invasive species due to visitor contacts the analysis uses visitors preference data to evaluate the potential impacts of various pricing strategies on revenues data come from choice experiment surveys conducted in 2009 regarding four characteristics of a tour to the galapagos length of stay depth of experience in the islands ecosystem level of protective measures taken against invasive species and price we found that the typical tourist would be willing to pay 2 5 times more for a tour with high level of protection against invasive species than for a tour with the current level of protection and otherwise similar characteristics the mean marginal willingness to pay for a tour with an in depth natural experience is 1 8 times more than for a similar tour providing only an overview of the galapagos ecosystem further we determined that differences in elasticity of demand between long and short tours suggest that a pricing strategy may be used to encourage tourists to take longer tours without affecting total revenue such a pricing strategy would decrease the number of unique island visitor contacts per year thereby reducing the threat to the islands unique ecosystem

activities in models of recreational demand scholars have taken divergent approaches to incorporating on site activities into their empirical specifications of site choice models we provide a framework for assessing this methodological heterogeneity through a model that explicitly allows individuals to choose both on site activities and site attributes this model not only conditions the marginal value of site attributes on the choice of an activity but also explicitly recovers the marginal rates of substitution across activities this eliminates previously unrecognized biases in the welfare analysis of changes in site attributes we test hypotheses generated by our model by comparing rival models of demand for access to beaches in costa rica

the state of the art of environmental valuation with discrete choice experiments abstract this paper provides with a review of the state of the art of environmental valuation with discrete choice experiments dces the growing body of literature on this field serves to emphasize the increasing role that dces are playing in environmental decision making in the last decade the paper attempts to cover the full process of undertaking a choice experiment including survey and experimental design econometric analysis of choice data and welfare analysis the research on this field is found to be intense although many challenges are put forward e g choice task complexity and cognitive effort experimental design preference and scale heterogeneity endogeneity or model uncertainty reviewing the state of the art of dces serves to draw attention to the main challenges that this methodological approach will need to overcome in the coming years and to identify the frontiers in discrete choice analysis

towards an economics of awards awards are a widespread phenomenon they cater to the fundamental desire for social recognition and serve as a valuable incentive to influence behaviour the study of awards such as medals prizes and titles has in recent years gained momentum in economics complementing the longstanding focus on material incentives to evaluate the effectiveness of awards as a motivator is difficult as the effect of awards must be separated from the fact that awards are meant to be given to the best we show how research on awards has advanced over the last couple of years thus providing points of departure for future work

preferences for site and environmental functions when selecting forthcoming national parks abstract a political decision to establish the first ever national parks in denmark allowed us to examine if people hold preferences regarding which site to be designated as national park separate from the preferences for its environmental functions to this end we designed a choice experiment representing the national park alternatives by the possible site and the possible improvements in environmental functions results revealed that respondents have strong preferences for the establishment of a national park per se furthermore there are significant differences in taste parameters for the different sites which cannot be explained by respondents valuing the different functions differently across sites instead we explain the results with differences in regional and cultural preferences we also performed a balanced split sample test of anchoring effects and found clear evidence of this we included a zero bidder screening question prior to the choice set part of the survey instrument to improve wtp estimation

protecting eden markets or government abstract the majority of species classified as threatened endangered or vulnerable by the iucn are to be found in government controlled parks and legally protected areas in developing countries dissatisfaction with the public sector s record in protecting endangered species has prompted calls for the use of market based instruments and other economic incentives to promote more effective environmental outcomes in this paper we examine whether greater reliance on market based incentives would result in improved environmental outcomes in national parks we address this issue by extending the literature on optimal contracts to the case of a renewable resource we identify conditions under which private ownership or control of a national park induces more less efficient management of protected areas the paper concludes with a discussion of the limitations of the analysis and the implications of these results for the conservation of biodiversity

combining ecological and recreational aspects in national park management a choice experiment application increasing pressure to diversify development of national parks emphasizes the need for new and relevant information for park management decisions in this paper we use choice experiment to value different tradeoffs that evolved in park development scenarios specifically we examine which kind of development profiles are worth considering and which paths not to follow we focus on biodiversity and recreational services provided by oulanka national park in finland which represents a popular recreation site attracting a large number of visitors the increase of biodiversity was the most highly valued feature by the respondent national park visitors thus our results show that the protection of biodiversity and recreational and tourism use of national parks can cause conflicting welfare effects if managed in inappropriate ways increasing the number of visitors expanding present resting places constructing new resting places and an intense increase in information boards especially if combined with shrinking biodiversity are welfare reducing managerial actions in national parks

random coefficient models for stated preference surveys abstract this paper combines the use of random coefficient discrete choice models that allow for correlated errors in the form of unobserved preference heterogeneity with an investigation of the reliability and usefulness of rankings data for the data we examine we find significant unobserved preference heterogeneity in the rankings which violates the underlying assumptions of the rank ordered logit model further directly modeling unobserved preference heterogeneity results in significant improvement in the precision of the parameter estimates and in estimated willingness to pay wtp the reliability and usefulness of rankings data should be re examined with econometric models not subject to the independence of irrelevant alternatives iia

government action social capital and development reviewing the evidence on synergy abstract instead of assuming a zero sum relationship between government involvement and private cooperative efforts the five preceding articles argue for the possibility of state society synergy that active government and mobilized communities can enhance each others developmental efforts this article draws on these articles to explore the forms and sources of state society synergy i argue that synergy usually combines complementarity with embeddedness and is most easily fostered in societies characterized by egalitarian social structures ard robust coherent state bureaucracies i also argue however that synergy is constructable even in the more adverse circumstances typical of third world countries

aging and productivity among economists economists productivity over their careers and as measured by publication in leading journals declines very sharply with age there is no difference by age in the probability that an article submitted to a leading journal will be accepted rates of declining productivity are no greater among the very top publishers than among others and the probability of acceptance is increasingly related to the author s quality rather than the author s age

disentangling the effects of policy and payment consequentiality and risk attitudes on stated preferences abstract incentivizing respondents to truthfully reveal their preferences in stated preference surveys requires that they believe their survey responses can influence decisions related to the outcome in question policy consequentiality and that they will have to bear their share of the coercive cost if the outcome is implemented payment consequentiality we investigate the effects of these two aspects of perceived consequentiality on stated preferences in a field survey concerning renewable energy development in poland we find that beliefs in policy and payment consequentiality strengthen the respondents interest in having the project implemented however policy consequentiality decreases and payment consequentiality increases their sensitivity to the project cost which respectively increases and decreases their willingness to pay for the project we conclude that the two aspects of consequentiality should be addressed separately additionally we inquire the theoretically speculated links between the respondents perceptions of policy and payment consequentiality and their risk attitudes and we find no significant relationship

effect of government quality grade labels on consumer demand for pork chops in the short and long run abstract despite ample evidence of pork quality variability at present there are few signals that would incentivize growers to produce higher quality pork using split sample choice experiment data from a nationwide online survey of u s pork chop eaters this research determines changes in pork chop demand in response to a potential change in u s government policy that would introduce a new pork quality grading system based on color scores our simulations include novel short run projections in which the conditional and latent class logit models are inverted to yield inverse demand curves the inverse demand curves are used to calculate equilibrium prices and pork revenue given a fixed supply of different pork qualities we supplement these calculations with a more traditional long run analysis in which prices are fixed and quantities of different qualities adjust compared to the status quo control of no quality grades we find that two grading systems based on alternative nomenclatures select choice prime vs good better best both have the potential to increase pork chop sales and revenue to the pork industry however we also find that if only the highest quality is labeled revenue could fall as the increase in demand for the higher quality is offset by the fall in demand for the lower qualities results also highlight important heterogeneity in consumer preferences and although sensory studies strongly suggest redder pork chops are more highly preferred there remains a non trivial share of consumers who prefer whiter pork even after quality grade labeling overall this study offers several insights that can help inform labeling and quality grading policies

a repeated nested logit model of atlantic salmon fishing participation and site choice for atlantic salmon fishing are modeled in the context of a repeated three level nested logit model consumer s surplus measures are derived for different levels of species availability in the penobscot river the most important salmon river in new england for comparison six other travel cost models are estimated these include restrictive cases of the nested logit model a partial demand model and two single site demand models comparisons across these models indicate the importance of modeling the participation decision including income effects and of adopting a nested logit structure rather than a single level logit structure

the choice theory approach to market research this paper surveys economic choice theory stressing developments that permit use of data from psychometric and conjoint experiments to produce market demand forecasts alternatives to the widely used multinomial logit model are summarized and a new method for estimating multinomial probits is described an integration of choice models with attitudinal scaling and perceptual mapping within a latent variable system is described estimation of such systems under either random effects or fixed effects descriptions of heterogeneity across individuals is discussed issues in the use of choice models to describe responses from conjoint experiments are presented new regression diagnostic tests for the consistency of multinomial logit representations are discussed

production technology option value the case of rbst in michigan agricultural producers are increasingly required to adjust production practices to satisfy retailer and ultimately consumer preferences this article highlights the option value that underlies decisions related to production technologies using the case of michigan dairy farmers and recombinant bovine somatotropin rbst welfare impacts were calculated for dairy producers when milk production systems which allowed the use of rbst were eliminated from the producer choice set those dairy producers using rbst just before its elimination realized a higher welfare loss than those not using the technology however significant welfare impacts were found for all dairy producers indicating that all producers valued the option to use this production technology

valuing smart meters abstract this paper assesses to what extent consumers are willing to make use of the features and capabilities offered by smart meters via a choice experiment households are offered the choice between a set of smart meters described by six attributes impact on the comfort and privacy level functionality visibility cost savings and investment outlay we estimate a main effects conditional logit model and a main effects random parameter logit model including interactions with socio demographic characteristics the results show that households have heterogeneous preferences for some attributes but not for others the estimates are used to assess marginal willingness to pay values from a policy perspective our findings suggest that sufficient effort should be devoted to designing the smart metering devices and to informing households without careful preparation a mandatory or voluntary roll out of smart meters risks to be unsuccessful because device characteristics do not meet consumer needs

farmers willingness to contract switchgrass as a cellulosic bioenergy crop in kansas farmers adoption of cellulosic biofuel feedstock enterprises plays an important role in the future of agriculture and the renewable fuels industry however no set markets currently exist for bioenergy feedstocks outside of very localized geographic locations and farmers may be reluctant to produce the feedstocks without contracts that help mitigate uncertainty and risk this study examines farmers willingness to grow switchgrass under contract using a stated choice approach data were collected using an enumerated survey of kansas farmers and analyzed using latent class logistic regression models farmers whose primary enterprise is livestock are less inclined to grow switchgrass shorter contracts greater harvest flexibility crop insurance and cost share assistance increase the likelihood that farmers will grow switchgrass for bioenergy production

designing a payments for ecosystem services pes program to reduce deforestation in tanzania an assessment of payment approaches abstract payments for ecosystem services pes programs aim to improve environmental outcomes by providing direct incentives to land managers for the provision of ecosystem services participation in pes programs is voluntary so effective program design requires careful consideration of farmers preferences this study quantifies such preferences using a choice experiment the study site is the east usambara mountains tanzania an internationally recognized biodiversity hotspot we assess preferences for four payment approaches constant and variable annual cash payments to individual farmers a constant annual cash payment to a village fund on behalf of farmers and an upfront manure fertilizer payment we find that the manure fertilizer payment was statistically significant in motivating farmer participation while the group payment was non significant in addition the relationship between the likelihood of participation and the stringency of conditionality is surprisingly non linear in a test of external validity average willingness to accept wta values are found to be similar to the average opportunity cost of maintaining land uses consistent with conservation objectives

the effect of mail in utility rebates on willingness to pay for energy star textregistered certified refrigerators the number and variety of governmental programs designed to promote energy efficiency have increased over time examples include mandatory minimum efficiency standards subsidies for more energy efficient goods and services and consumer labels such as the united states environmental protection agency s energy star textregistered while there has been considerable research on the effects of these programs in isolation there has been less of a focus on joint effects or interactions between programs this study examines how the offer of a mail in rebate influences consumer willingness to pay for an energy star certified refrigerator data used for this study were collected from an online survey containing a hypothetical choice experiment conducted in the united states in 2009 results suggest that the offer of a rebate induces uncertainty about the quality of energy star certified refrigerators and thus could actually reduce willingness to pay for such refrigerators

structural change power politics and community organizations in africa challenging the patterns puzzles and paradoxes abstract this paper explores two phenomena shaping processes of local institutional and organizational change in rural africa the first is the complexity of institutional layering and dissonance in which local organizations and institutions in rural africa coexist the second is the paradox often found in state local relations in africa central governments encourage local communities to take on responsibilities which the center cannot manage should significant organizational strength emerge at the local level however central powers often move expeditiously to destroy it illustrative material comes primarily from kenya and zimbabwe and selectively from several other countries we ask what new structures are emerging and what old ones are being adapted to new functions we argue that local organizations are critical for addressing ecological decline and restoring the productivity and sustainability of rural africa both localities and national governments have much to gain if the capacities of local organizations can become themselves a valued resource in the resource scarce setting comprising much of rural africa

using choice experiments to investigate the policy relevance of heterogeneity in farmer agri environmental contract preferences agri environmental contracts are used to provide incentives for nature management on private land in e g the european union the aim of this article is to investigate preference heterogeneity for agri environmental contracts among farmers in order to discuss potential policy improvements utilising heterogeneity we used a choice experiment to elicit farmers stated preferences for afforestation contracts four attributes are investigated purpose of afforestation option of cancelling the contract monitoring and compensation level all attributes present a potential conflict between farmers and authorities interests which emphasises the importance of knowing how to handle these interests a random parameter logit model shows that having the option to cancel the contract decreases farmers required compensation level and monitoring increases it furthermore farmers are willing to accept a lower compensation when the aim is to protect biodiversity and ground water relative to recreation latent class models with class probability variables reveal discrete heterogeneity and support a division into four groups with divergent preferences for example a group of farmers who already have forest areas does not find the option of cancelling the contract important whereas another group relying on the farm for income requires higher compensation the findings indicate potential for efficiency gains from targeting the contracts

modeling disinterest and dislike a bounded bayesian mixed logit model of the uk market for gm food mixed logit models represent a powerful discrete choice analytical model but require assumptions about the functional form of the parameter distributions the use of unbounded distributions such as the normal distribution may be regarded as unsuitable where theory indicates that all are negatively affected by increases in an attribute such as price bounded distributions such as the triangular and log normal are unable to model the case where a section of the population is indifferent towards an attribute while the remainder are negatively disposed toward it train and sonnier s bounded mixed logit model accommodates these features and is employed in this paper a censored normal and johnson s s b distribution are used to model preferences in the uk for food attributes including price and gm technology bi modal distributions are identified regarding gm food some are unlikely to ever consume it some are close to indifference and willing to consume at relatively small discounts while the remainder are fairly unresponsive to further price reductions

changing customary marine resource management practice and institutions the case of sasi lola in the kei islands indonesia summary sasi the spatial and temporal closure of fields forests reefs and fishing grounds is a conspicuous feature of many moluccan societies despite increasing domestic and international awareness and praise of what is considered by many analysts to be an exemplary indigenous resource conservation tradition the practice is in decline in many parts of the thousand island province and in many villages has disappeared altogether this study examines the practice of managing trochus niloticus topshell harvests in ohoirenan a village on the eastern coast of kei besar in the district of southeast maluku trochus is one of the most important sources of cash income for kei villagers and until recently for the district government as well since 1987 trochus has been classified as a protected species in indonesia and regulations have been issued to regulate the cultivation harvest and transport of this and other protected species this article briefly introduces kei customary law and property relations followed by a description of sasi and its application to reef habitats and trochus harvests examining a territorial conflict between ohoirenan and a neighboring village and more recent contention arising from government eaorts to protect the species the article explores issues of society nature and state society relations as pertain to natural resource management in indonesia sasi continues to function as an exemplary common property resource cpr management institution in ohoirenan assuring equitable distribution of the benefits deriving from controlled extraction of a local resource but erratic and uneven enforcement of one size fits all centralized conservation policy and law combined with collusion and self interest on the part of various parties combine to threaten both the resource and the institutions that have successfully and sustainably managed it in this region within the context of a centralized state led natural resource management system the national species protection precludes the establishment of sensible mutually beneficial co management regimes that could serve the interests and employ the inherent knowledge and capabilities of local communities traders and government agents 2000 published by elsevier science ltd all rights reserved

evaluating water policy scenarios against the priorities of the rural poor summary a stated choice method evaluates how well water policy responds to the preferences of the rural poor in south africa household priorities to experimental scenarios of water resource and water services attributes are investigated in two communities with poor water access in a semi arid zone results identify improved water accessibility as the most important intervention for social welfare gains particularly benefiting female water collectors a latent class specification reveals two sub groups with different weighted preferences this specification reinforces the primacy of domestic water access and also identifies a smaller but significant group with preferences for water availability for kitchen garden irrigation

effects on welfare measures of alternative means of accounting for preference heterogeneity in recreational demand models multiattribute revealed preference data are used to investigate heterogeneity in a sample of kayakers for a panel of whitewater sites in ireland this article focuses on a comparison of preference heterogeneity using a random parameter logit model with correlated tastes and a latent class model in terms of the implications for welfare measures of environmental quality and site access changes recreationalists skill levels are found to affect preferences in both approaches statistics for the estimated distribution of welfare changes for the average respondent are computed for changes in site attributes but contrary to previous work these are found to be of similar magnitude

preference falsification policy continuity and collective conservatism through a model that distinguishes between privately held and publicly declared preferences and between private and public beliefs this paper explains why a society might c ling to its past choices all four variables are endogenous to the mo del following the introduction of a measure of collective conservati sm the paper turns to the determinants and consequences of feedback from society s choices to its members private beliefs and preference s the theory is applied to the persistence of india s caste system t o explain why the lowest castes have been among the system s most com mitted supporters copyright 1987 by royal economic society

fuzzy logic and preference uncertainty in non market valuation in seeking to value environmental amenities and public goods individuals often have trouble trading off the vague good or amenity against a monetary measure valuation in these circumstances can best be described as fuzzy in terms of the amenity being valued perceptions of property rights and the numbers chosen to reflect values in this paper we apply fuzzy logic to contingent valuation employing a fuzzy clustering approach for incorporating preference uncertainty obtained from a follow up certainty confidence question we develop a fuzzy random utility maximization frum framework where the perceived utility of each individual is fuzzy in the sense that an individual s utility belongs to each cluster to some degree the model is then applied to a swedish survey that elicited residents willingness to pay for enhanced forest conservation and to a canadian survey of agricultural landowners that elicited their willingness to accept compensation for a tree planting program both the wtp and wta measures we obtain using the fuzzy approach are well below those obtained using standard probability methods based on goodness of fit measures and monte carlo experimentation a case can be made for using a fuzzy preference approach for modeling preference uncertainty as opposed to incorporating respondent uncertainty within the random utility maximization framework

a semiparametric smooth coefficient estimator for recreation demand we introduce a semiparametric smooth coefficient estimator for recreation demand data that allows more flexible modeling of preference heterogeneity we show that our sample of visitors each has an individual statistically significant price coefficient estimate leading to clearly nonparametric consumer surplus and willingness to pay wtp distributions we also show mean wtp estimates that are different in economically meaningful ways for every demographic variable we have for our sample of beach visitors this flexibility is valuable for future researchers who can include any variables of interest beyond the standard demographic variables we have included here and the richer results price elasticities consumer surplus and wtp estimates are valuable to planners and policymakers who can easily see how all these estimates vary with characteristics of the population of interest

respondent experience and contingent valuation of environmental goods abstract respondent experience i e a respondent s information set has long been suspected to influence contingent valuation estimates of environmental values we assess the influence of experience by explicitly modeling the relationship between respondent experience and both fitted individual resource values and the conditional variance of these estimated values using three different joint specifications for experience and wtp normal censored normal poisson censored normal and zero inflated poisson censored normal we find discrete jumps in resource values as experience increases from zero and that more experienced respondents have smaller conditional variances simulation of arbitrary levels of experience allows standardization of the amount of information when developing welfare estimates

citations in economics measurement uses and impacts i describe and compare sources of data on citations in economics and the statistics derived from them constructing data sets of the post publication citation histories of articles published in the top five journals in the 1970s and 2000s i examine distributions and life cycles of citations compare citation histories of articles in different subspecialties in economics and present evidence on the history and heterogeneity of those journals impacts and the marginal citation productivity of additional coauthors i use a new data set of the lifetime citation histories of over 1 000 economists from thirty universities to rank economics departments by various measures and demonstrate the importance of intra and interdepartmental heterogeneity in productivity throughout the discussion summarizes earlier work including the impacts of citations on salaries and nonmonetary rewards and how citations reflect judgments about research quality in economics and the importance of economic ideas

public preferences for hydrogen buses comparing interval data ols and quantile regression approaches we use a quantile regression qr approach to analyse contingent valuation estimates of public willingness to pay wtp for the air and noise pollution reductions associated with the introduction of hydrogen buses in london qr results show that variables that were not significant in interval regression or ordinary least squares regression become significant at certain quantiles along the wtp distribution in addition the determinants of wtp at the lower tail of the distribution differ from those at the higher end of the distribution our findings illustrate the usefulness of quantile regression methods for analysing contingent valuation data enhancing our understanding of the determinants of willingness to pay

a probabilistic choice model for market segmentation and elasticity structure marketing scholars commonly characterize market structure by studying the patterns of substitution implied by brand switching though the approach is useful it typically ignores the destabilizing

benefit estimates for landscape improvements sequential bayesian design and respondents rationality in a choice experiment a multi attribute stated preference approach is used to value low and high impact actions on four major landscape components addressed by the rural environment protection scheme in ireland several methodological issues are addressed the use of prior beliefs on the relative magnitudes of parameters standardized description of different levels of landscape improvements via image manipulation software adoption of efficiency increasing sequential experimental design and sensitivity of benefit estimates to inclusion of responses from irrational respondents results suggest that bayesian design updating delivers significant efficiency gains without loss in respondent efficiency and estimates are upward biased when irrational respondents are included

environmental damage evaluation in a willingness to accept scenario a latent class approach based on familiarity in this paper we report on the results of the application of a latent class model that was designed to identify and characterize unobserved preference heterogeneity in the context of a willingness to accept wta framework involving negative environmental externalities stemming from the expansion of the port of valencia we investigated the hypothesis that respondents with greater familiarity with the targeted good and any related environmental damage would demand more compensation that is they would have a significantly higher wta based on respondents familiarity with the port of valencia and their pre existing knowledge about the negative consequences of its potential expansion three clusters based on six indicators are identified results show that contrary to what might be expected familiarity with a public good does not in all cases have a significant effect on stated wta

addressing preference heterogeneity multiple scales and attribute attendance with a correlated finite mixing model of tap water choice unobserved heterogeneity of error scale in choice models is a recent extension of the better investigated issue of heterogeneity of taste intensity it is achieved by fitting choice panel data with specifications that simultaneously handle inter personal variation in scale and taste the aim is to separate differences in preference intensities across respondents from differences in the degree of consistency in choice behaviour or preference discrimination while accounting for correlation between the two another recent substantive issue in choice data analysis is attribute non attendance we develop a finite mixing model to address simultaneously the three issues above we empirically prove the concept on stated preference data related to tap water attributes in a study for industry regulation

the inequality of social capital and the reproduction of chronic poverty summary this paper draws on ethnographic research in tanzania to question ideas inherent to mainstream development policy that building social capital can be readily created used or substituted for other missing assets and thereby overcome poverty the poorest experience clusters of interlocking disadvantage that make it highly unlikely that they can draw on social capital to ameliorate their poverty or that increased association and participation at community level is necessarily beneficial to them moreover social relationships collective action and local institutions may structurally reproduce the exclusion of the poorest as such a politically neutral and undersocialized policy focus on strengthening associational life and public participation of the poor is unlikely to lead to their greater inclusion nor to significant poverty alleviation

does one size fit all heterogeneity in the valuation of community forestry programs abstract through the implementation of a choice experiment valuation exercise this study set out to identify the set of community plantation attributes that impact the welfare of potential community forestry program participants we employed a combination of choice models to evaluate the preferences welfare impacts and choice elasticities associated with alternative community forestry programs allowing for different assumptions regarding heterogeneity in line with economic theory increased participation costs reduced the demand for community forestry while increases in expected productivity raised the demand with respect to preferences for the other alternatives considered type of forest area enclosure and type of land upon which the forest was to be situated the results point to significant differences in preferences across the study population suggesting that programs should be tailored to the communities in which the program is to be implemented

market potential for smart growth neighbourhoods in the usa a latent class analysis on heterogeneous preference and choice with data from a 2011 national association of realtors community preference survey we examined individuals preferences and the resulting market potential for smart growth neighbourhoods in the usa using a latent class choice model we discovered four classes of individuals that reveal distinctive behaviours when choosing smart growth neighbourhoods based on the interplay between aspects of community design socioeconomic characteristics and personal attitudes based on these results we estimated the demand for smart growth neighbourhoods given the way they are planned and built by linking the results of the latent class choice to a market diffusion model we were able to evaluate the effectiveness of a proposed smart growth neighbourhood design in inducing less sprawling development

the determinants of econometric society fellows elections we study the results of elections of fellows of the econometric society we aremotivated largely by the question of whether these elections are fair where our de ni tion of fairness is that votes are based solely on the quality of the candidates if so thenconditional on quality other characteristics of the candidates such as geographic locationor subspecialty should not in uence the probability of election we nd that conditionalon a number of measures of the quality of the candidates other characteristics do sig ni cantly predict election for example an australian econometrician is less likely to beelected than a north america based economic theorist this is true whether or not wecontrol for quality measures one might object that even fully informed individuals may differ in their assessment ofquality and that neither the voters nor the authors of this study are fully informed aboutcandidates quality this is true in any study of the impact of ascriptive characteristics onoutcomes we discuss various interpretations of our ndings in the conclusion but readersmust draw their own conclusions about what the results imply about the roles of qualityand fairness in this electoral process 1 the electoral institutionmost members of the economics profession consider election as a fellow as an honor it recognizes prior professional achievements within what are the more technical areasof economics there are roughly 500 living fellows names are placed on the ballot inone of two ways i by the nominating committee of the society or ii by petition ofat least three members who need not be but usually are current fellows the ballotcontains the candidate s name and current af liation a list of at most six publications ashort statement of the candidate s contribution to economics and an indication of whetherthe nomination was by committee or by endorsers and if the latter from 1990 through2000 the names of all the endorsers the ballot deadline is april 30 the electorate dues paying current fellows receive the ballot in early autumn alongwith the nomination form for each candidate mark their ballots and return them tothe society s of ce results are announced in december names on the ballot are inalphabetical order with a different starting point in each annual election voters checkthe names of individuals whom they wish to be elected a candidate is elected who isapproved on at least 30 percent of the ballots returned typically about half the eligiblefellows cast votes losing candidates can be nominated in later years by either of thetwo methods but the process must be undertaken de novo

preference stability and choice consistency in discrete choice experiments we investigate preference stability and respondents levels of choice consistency within discrete choice experiments these are investigated via a discrete choice experiment featuring four information treatments and a retest survey completed 6 months after the first three information treatments concern a novel stem cell food technology with the fourth information treatment featuring a non novel technology we find stable welfare estimates over the three information treatments the use of emotive keywords does not systematically change wtp to avoid the stem cell food technology we find a significant wtp to avoid the non novel technology we find high levels of intertemporal preference stability and choice consistency the determinants of choice consistency are examined two factors are significant a measure of the choice task s complexity entropy and a novel measure of respondents cognitive capability derived within the survey we find a significant selection issue not previously identified in discrete choice experiment test retest studies with those opting to take the retest exhibiting greater choice consistency in the initial survey this suggests that studies which report high levels of test retest choice consistency without accounting for the selection issue are overstating population choice consistency

a latent class approach to investigating demand for genetically modified banana in uganda this study explores consumer acceptance and valuation of a genetically modified gm staple food crop in a developing country prior to its commercialization we focus on the hypothetical introduction of a disease resistant gm banana variety in uganda where bananas are among the most important staple crops a choice experiment is used to investigate consumer preferences for various attributes related to the banana such as bunch size technology producer benefit and price and examine their opinions on gm foodstuff choice data come from 421 banana consuming households randomly selected from three regions of uganda a latent class model is used to investigate the heterogeneity in consumers preferences for selected attributes related to the banana and to profile consumers who are more or less likely to accept gm bananas our results reveal that there is significant heterogeneity in consumer preferences across our sample gm bananas are valued the most by poorer households located in the rural areas of the eastern region these food insecure households would experience the highest benefits i e welfare gains from the commercial release of gm bananas in contrast urban consumers are less accepting of gm bananas and they would experience significant welfare losses if gm banana is released according to our welfare estimates both the total welfare benefits acquired by the gainers and the total welfare losses borne by the losers of this technology are significant and large these results suggest the need for further investigation of the overall welfare effects of the introduction of gm bananas on the ugandan society as a whole

what is discrimination gender in the american economic association 1935 2004 we illustrate problems of measuring discrimination using elections to aea offices with a new econometric technique we find female candidates have a much better than random chance of victory this advantage is either reverse discrimination or reflects beliefs that women are more productive the former interpretation could be explained by an unchanging median voter whose preferences were not satisfied by suppliers of candidates but there was a structural change in voting behavior in the mid 1970s the results suggest it is generally impossible to claim differences in rewards for different groups measure the extent of discrimination or even its direction jel a11 d72 j16

relating environmental attitudes and contingent values how robust are methods for identifying preference heterogeneity we assess the importance and robustness of cluster analysis and latent class analysis as methods to account for unobserved heterogeneity we provide a critique and comparison of both methods in the context of measuring environmental attitudes and a contingent valuation study involving endangered species we find strong evidence of robustness for these methods group characterization and assignment of individuals to groups are similar between methods and willingness to pay estimates are consistent in addition there are significant differences in willingness to pay across environmental attitudinal groups and we find that accounting for unobservable heterogeneity provides a significantly better fitting model

state market civil institutions the case of eastern europe and the soviet republics abstract the transition tasks facing the countries of central and eastern europe are monumental the public sector will play a dominant role during the transition process available evidence suggests that orthodox prescriptions for public sector reform cannot be effectively implemented without an underlying constitution and a legal and regulatory infrastructure lri a well designed constitution and lri instill confidence and policy credibility with perfectly rational expectations and confidence in the constitution and lri the sequence of reforms matters little future reforms are perfectly anticipated today and agents act as though the reforms will occur with certainty short of such confidence reforms need to be simultaneously pursued on many fronts the most important activity is to redefine the role of the state setting a constitution that clearly defines and secures basic political civil and economic freedoms and designing an lri that creates a fertile environment for a vibrant market economy

testing the influence of substitute sites in nature valuation by using spatial discounting factors this paper investigates the effect of nearby nature substitute sites on preferences for nature restoration contrary to prior studies we use a respondent centric approach to control for substitute sites we assess each respondent specific spatial context by computing densities of nature substitute sites within various ranges from each respondent s home this approach considers the use and non use values of nature together data from three similar discrete choice experiments carried out in flanders belgium are compared different spatial discounting factors are tested to explore how the substitution effect behaves with regard to distance latent class analyses are performed to account for preference heterogeneity among respondents we observe divergent behaviours across groups of respondents the distance to substitutes affects how respondents gauge substitute sites we find a significant influence of the squared average buffer distance but this effect varies in sign across case studies and classes of respondents our results demonstrate that individual specific gis data can significantly improve the representation of the spatial context and the transferability of value functions however the roles played by preference heterogeneity and nature perception on respondents capacity to value nature still deserves further attention in future research

estimating the willingness to pay for reliable electricity supply a choice experiment study abstract this research examines households willingness to pay wtp for an improved electricity service households stated wtp is estimated using the choice experiment ce method the data used in the estimations come from 350 in person interviews conducted during the period 5 22 august 2008 in north cyprus compensating variation cv estimates for a zero outage scenario are calculated using the parameter estimates from the mixed logit ml model these are 6 65 ytl turkish lira per month 3 02 usd for summer and 25 83 ytl per month 11 74 usd for winter in order to avoid the cost of outages households are willing to incur a 3 6 and a 13 9 increase in their monthly electricity bill for summer and winter respectively the wtp per hour unserved is 0 28 ytl 0 13 usd for summer and 1 08 ytl 0 49 usd for winter a preliminary cost benefit analysis indicates that the annualized economic benefits are approximately 42 7 million ytl 19 4 million usd for the residential sector this would justify an investment in additional generation capacity of approximately 268 mw which is far more than that which is needed to eliminate the service reliability problem

heterogeneity in preferences for woody biomass energy in the us mountain west abstract millions of acres of public forest in the us mountain west are substantially degraded and are in need of restoration mechanized restoration treatments can improve forest health and reduce the likelihood of severe wildfire these treatments produce some timber and substantial amounts of forest residues that can be used to generate renewable energy and displace fossil fuels using the choice modeling method this study investigates social preferences for generation of energy with woody biomass produced by restoration treatments on public forests in the mountain west both multinomial logit and latent class logit lcl models are fit to the data and used to estimate marginal willingness to pay mwtp for increased amounts of woody biomass energy generation and important associated co benefits and costs positive and statistically significant mwtp is found for the number of homes powered with wood the extent of healthy forests avoiding increases in the number of large wildfires and local air quality significant heterogeneity was found in respondent preferences for the attributes the heterogeneity can be explained in part by sociodemographic and attitudinal characteristics of respondents the lcl revealed four classes of respondents with distinct preferences revealing conflicting viewpoints toward forest management for woody biomass energy generation

estimating distributions of willingness to pay for heterogeneous populations random parameters logit models have emerged as a standard approach in estimating public preferences for a range of goods and services however to simplify calculation of welfare measures the marginal utility of income is often assumed to be constant across the population we show that by shifting distributional assumptions from marginal utilities to the welfare measures themselves a random parameters version of a censored logistic regression model cameron 1988 yields distributions of welfare measures more directly and without imposing any unnecessary assumption on the marginal utility of income we develop the theoretical framework for the model and apply it to contingent choice survey data for siting a noxious facility in rhode island in this application our proposed model and random parameters logit yield similar mean willingness to pay but welfare measures are more readily interpretable in the proposed model

are citizens willing to pay for agricultural multifunctionality agricultural multifunctionality is the recognition of the joint exercise of economic environmental and social functions by the agricultural sector in order to make the concept operative for the design of public policies it is necessary to estimate the social demand for such functions the main objective of this article is to present an empirical application in this sense for this purpose we have adopted the agricultural system of cereal steppes in tierra de campos in spain as a case study the economic valuation technique used is the choice experiment the results suggest the existence of a significant demand for the different functions although the demand is heterogeneous depending on the socioeconomic characteristics of the individuals surveyed

tourists preferences for congestion residents welfare and the ecosystems in a national park the management of national parks and natural areas often faces a balance between the residents welfare the tourist activity and the pressure on ecosystems this paper assesses the benefits for a set of policies designed to address tourist congestion the increase in the welfare of the local populations and the improvements in the ecosystem services coral reefs mangroves dry forests and coastal and sandy ecosystems we utilize a discrete choice experiment approach with the consideration of potential heterogeneity results show that there are three segments of visitors with different preferences for the proposed policies those tourists with higher values for the environmental policies and welfare of the local communities also share a preference for a lower level of congestion at the natural areas the results have implications for managing natural areas at tourist destinations

moral hazard and nonmarket institutions dysfunctional crowding out or peer monitoring the authors examine a situation in which insurance is characterized by moral hazard when market insurance is provided supplementary mutual assistance between family and friends unobservable to market insurers will occur when nonmarket insurers have no better information than market insurers the mutual assistance not only crowds out market insurance but is also harmful and therefore dysfunctional alternatively when nonmarket insurers can observe each other s effort perfectly mutual assistance is beneficial these results point to the potential importance of peer monitoring mechanisms in mitigating moral hazard copyright 1991 by american economic association

determinants of demand for recreational walking trails in ireland abstract the purpose of this work is to explore how recreational walkers marginal willingness to pay for or travel to irish trails is affected by trail attributes we use principal components data reduction z score data normalization and ols regression analyses on two stated preference datasets covering 302 irish and foreign visitors and recreational experts across 15 sites in ireland between 2005 and 2010 findings reveal that endowment and infrastructure attributes emerge as primary influences affecting demand in particular flat or valley endowed trails and infrastructure including signage amenities and maps or leaflets positively affect demand additionally robustness checks suggest farmer access agreements may also be important on the other hand we find that mountain or hill forest and coastal or lake trails as well as income seem to be negatively associated with demand finally we are able to use these in sample results to extrapolate demand for a set of new relatively unimproved trails in an out of sample demand prediction exercise

embracing model uncertainty strategies for response pooling and model averaging econometricians modeling stated preference sp data and most other types of data are confronted with the uncomfortable reality that our knowledge of the true model is limited with only certain variables suggested by the application at hand and general classes of functional forms and error structures suggested by the literature accepting our limited knowledge we pursue strategies for analyzing sp data that are more robust to uncertainties in our knowledge of the true model these include non parametric and parametric likelihood based tests of pooling responses from different elicitation formats and a frequentist based model averaging approach for estimating willingness to pay functions we argue that these strategies lead to increased econometric integrity and empower the ultimate users of models such as policy decision makers and even juries to better assess the robustness of the results we apply these approaches to an sp survey of saltwater angling in alaska which utilized split sample rankings and ratings elicitation methods while an important goal of our paper is to develop practicable modeling strategies that will ultimately lead to more robust conclusions and more confidence by the users of sp results an equally important goal is to engender a critical discussion of how we can make the analysis of sp data more robust

demand effects in stated preference surveys abstract we argue that demand effects in stated preference studies are understudied by demand effects we mean anything in the survey that unintentionally influences respondents beliefs about appropriate behavior which in turn might affect their responses in the survey we implement two methods for measuring and implicitly reducing the influence of demand effects the first approach random selection of good to be valued does not have any effect on respondent behavior the second approach a demand script and a control question with feedback has a sizable and statistically significant effect on respondent behavior in particular estimated marginal willingness to pay for improvements in water quality are substantially around 50 percent lower than a control treatment we attribute this decrease to a reduced demand effect our results suggest that stated preference methods tend to lead to biased willingness to pay estimates due to demand effects but that the bias can be reduced using simple measures

combining attitudinal statements with choice experiments to analyze preference heterogeneity for functional dairy products abstract in this article we employ a discrete choice experiment to examine preferences for functional dairy product attributes and willingness to pay estimates for consumers in germany we estimate preference heterogeneity by linking stated preference choice data not only to socioeconomic characteristics but also to attitudinal statements in a latent class framework the empirical results indicate the existence of class specific preference heterogeneity based on the consumers attitude towards functional foods emphasizing the importance of attitudinal data in explaining consumers choice behavior our estimates demonstrate that within a class consumers preferences are in accordance with their responses to attitudinal statements that is functional food skeptics prefer non functional dairy products while functional food advocates have a negative preference for non functional dairy products the findings also show that all consumers place high value on dairy products enriched with known functional ingredients such as omega 3 fatty acids

on mandatory labeling of animal welfare attributes this paper assesses us resident support for mandatory labeling of animal welfare information on pork and egg products and outlines policy considerations for assessment prior to implementing any mandatory labeling policies regarding animal welfare practices results suggest consumers support mandatory labeling indicating use of gestation crates stalls and laying hen cages estimates suggest consumers would be willing to pay about 20 higher pork and egg prices to obtain this production practice information demographic and latent perception drivers of this support are highlighted multiple issues that warrant consideration prior to imposing mandatory labeling are discussed revealing lines of corresponding future research

do protest responses to a contingent valuation question and a choice experiment differ it is suggested that the number of protest responses in stated preference surveys depends inter alia on the valuation method used choice experiments ce are said to generate a lower number of protest responses than contingent valuation cv however no comparison of both methods with respect to protest responses has been conducted to date we used both ce and cv in a survey on forest biodiversity in two german regions protest beliefs were measured for all respondents irrespective of whether they were willing to pay or not the results show no clear pattern of differences between ce and cv regarding protest beliefs and protest responses using an attitude scale based on respondents protest beliefs we see a significant negative effect of this attitude on willingness to pay in both methods however in one of the two study regions the effect is weaker in ce than in cv

the incentives of private companies to invest in protected area certificates how coalitions can improve ecosystem sustainability abstract since the early 80 s the global demand on nature has exceeded the earth s capacity to reduce the overuse of the very resources on which human life depends protected areas have been developed worldwide typically national states ngos and charities have funded protected areas with limited investment from private companies this paper analyzes one option to increase private investment an international market for protected area certificates following a cost benefit analysis a three stage coalition game is developed the corporate dependency on ecosystems is modeled through the ecological footprint by implementing instruments such as side payments membership restriction and non compliance penalties the model shows that corporate environmental agreements reduce the individual cost of ecological protection and enhance social welfare the findings are supported by a sensitivity analysis conducted for the german tourism sector in zanzibar

property rights regimes in complex fishery management systems a choice experiment application the tonle sap wetland fishery was previously divided into 3 different management zones for conservation open access fishing and private fishing rights to the private fishing zone involved auctions for exclusive rights to temporarily designated plots this paper aims to explore the auction based system by investigating how this fishery management system affects different groups of small scale fishermen and how different characteristics of the fishing lots affect the bidding a choice experiment approach was used to model fishermen s choices in a hypothetical auction market by offering fishermen the choice between purchasing different potential fishing lots and a no purchase option implying fishing only in the communal fishing grounds the preferred latent class model with two segments of fishermen showed that the bidding behavior of the more privileged group out competes the other group irrespective of the lot characteristics this result suggests that it is unlikely that the redesign of the auction system itself would be an effective way of securing access to fishing resources for the two observed groups of fishermen this implies that open access fishing grounds and or other regulations may also be needed in future management as they serve an important role for the poorer segments

a latent class approach to tourists length of stay abstract in this paper a conditional demand function is estimated for the length of stay at a tourist destination the microeconomic model specifies the demand for the length of stay conditional on the remaining holiday characteristics that the tourist has chosen the destination type of accommodation etc the empirical model uses a latent class truncated poisson regression which acknowledges the existence of groups or segments of demand with different preferences in the case under study a distinction is made between two segments with a preference for either a longer or shorter holiday the statistical model also resolves a problem of multimodality acknowledged in previous analyses to be one of the main characteristics of this variable

valuing wetland attributes an application of choice experiments abstract the interest for wetlands is increasing not only because of the possibility of a cost efficient uptake of nutrients but also because wetlands can be designed to provide other services what values that are supplied depend largely on the design there are numerous different design options and different actors may promote different alternatives whether we want to design a wetland for nutrient retention alone or one that also serves other interests policy makers need information about the value of different options conducting a choice experiment we are able to identify attributes that increase and decrease citizens perceived value of wetlands using a random parameter model we find that biodiversity and walking facilities are the two greatest contributors to welfare while a fenced waterline and introduction of crayfish decrease welfare

a latent class approach to modeling endogenous spatial sorting in zonal recreation demand models a method for incorporating unobserved heterogeneity into aggregate count data frameworks is presented and used to control for endogenous spatial sorting in zonal recreation models the method is based on latent class analysis which has become a popular tool for analyzing heterogeneous preferences with individual data but has not yet been applied to aggregate count data the method is tested using data on backcountry hikers for a southern california study site and performs well for relatively small numbers of classes the latent class model produces substantially smaller welfare estimates compared to a constrained version that assumes homogeneity throughout the population

the evolution of the scientific productivity of highly productive economists this paper studies the evolution of research productivity of a sample of economists working in the best 81 departments in the world in 2007 the main novelty is that in so far as a productivity distribution can be identified with an income distribution we measure productivity mobility in a dynamic context using an indicator inspired in an income mobility index suggested by fields 2010 for a two period world productivity is measured in terms of publications weighted by the citation impact of the journals where each article is published in the periodical literature we study the evolution of average productivity productivity inequality the extent of rank reversals and productivity mobility for seven cohorts as well as the population as a whole we offer new evidence confirming previous results about the heterogeneity of the evolution of productivity for top and other researchers however the major result is that contrary to what was expected for our sample of very highly productive scholars the effect of rank reversals between the two periods on overall productivity mobility offsets the effect of an increase in productivity inequality from the first to the second period in the youngest five out of seven cohorts jel a11 a12 b41 d63 i32

a joint latent class model combining likert scale preference statements with choice data to harvest preference heterogeneity in addition to choice questions revealed and stated choices preference surveys typically include other questions that provide information about preferences preference statement data include questions on the importance of different attributes of a good or the extent of agreement with a particular statement the intent of this paper is to model and jointly estimate preference heterogeneity using stated preference choice data and preference statement data the starting point for this analysis is the belief that the individual has preferences and both his her choices and preference statements are manifestations of those preferences our modeling contribution is linking the choice data and preference statement data in a latent class framework estimation is straightforward using the e m algorithm even though our model has hundreds of preference parameters our estimates demonstrate that 1 within a preference class the importance anglers associate with different green bay site characteristics is in accordance with their responses to the preference statements 2 estimated across class utility parameters for fishing green bay are affected by the preference statement data 3 estimated across class preference statement response probabilities are affected by the inclusion of the choice data and 4 both data sets influence the number of classes and the probability of belonging to a class as a function of the individual s type

measuring birdwatchers preferences a case for using online networks and mixed mode surveys abstract this paper reports findings derived from a study of birdwatchers in the azores the subject was birdwatchers preferences for given management actions designed to improve the attractiveness of bird watching sites in the absence of official statistics on this market segment use was made of a mixed mode survey incorporating both on site and off site surveys and the use of on line social networks and communications tools the variable willingness to stay more time at the site was used as a welfare measure it has the advantage that it can be used to demonstrate the significant returns of eco tourism to local communities two findings emerge first tourists practicing wildlife viewing and nature based activities are less worried about infrastructures and care more about biodiversity and habitat quality and second the research technique appears to be successful when surveying seasonal recreation communities that are small and socially cohesive

the political feasibility of rural poverty reduction abstract policies oriented at the reduction of rural poverty will only be introduced if politically feasible computable general equilibrium and multimarket models have been widely used to measure the complex economic and welfare effects of these policies based on the body of theoretical and empirical knowledge on the determinants of influence by groups in civil society and on the role of the state in policy making an index of the political feasibility of policy outcomes is constructed use of this index with data from india and ecuador allows to identify a number of promising avenues to politically feasible reforms in particular by choosing policies that induce the emergence of supportive coalitions dominated by the nonpoor the general equilibrium effects and the leakages of antipoverty instruments are key in inducing emergence of these coalitions

recreation demand models with taste differences over people we estimate random parameter logit models of anglers choice of fishing site the models generalize logit by allowing coefficients to vary randomly over anglers rather than being fixed the models do not exhibit the restrictive independence from irrelevant alternatives property of logit and can represent any substitution pattern estimation explicitly accounts for the fact that the variation in coefficients over anglers induces correlation in unobserved utility over trips by the same angler willingness to pay for improved fish stock and the value to anglers of specific sites are calculated from the models and compared with the estimates obtained from a standard logit model

between state markets and households a neoinstitutional analysis of local organizations and institutions abstract the current and foreseeable trend toward a diminished role of the state in most economic activities including rural development activities offers new opportunities for local organizations and institutions lois at the same time many of the problems and shortcomings to which states and their activities have been vulnerable are also potentially applicable to lois to be successful in themselves as well as in fostering rural economic development rural lois and their activities must be carefully designed and appropriately integrated with markets other lois and the state this paper reviews the relevant literature on conditions for success and then goes on to derive from this review including some relevant experience some suggestions for policy and practice