analyzing the welfare impacts of full line forcing contracts theoretical investigations have examined both anti competitive and efficiency inducing rationales for vertical bundling making empirical evidence important to understanding its welfare implications we use an extensive dataset on full line forcing contracts between movie distributors and video retailers to empirically measure the impact of vertical bundling on welfare we identify and measure three primary effects of full line forcing contracts market coverage leverage and efficiency we find that bundling increases market coverage and efficiency but has little impact on one distributor s gaining leverage over another as a result we estimate that full line forcing contracts increased consumer and producer surplus in this application

sustainable management of waste to energy facilities abstract in 1995 porter and van der linde defined pollution as a manifestation of economic waste currently incorrect information and conflicting theories among scientists hinder the diffusion of sustainable practices in waste management 1 new industrial market research reports highlight that the value of the global waste incineration market has increased in recent years 1 3 billion dollars from 2008 to 2012 and this sector will continue to grow 6 8 billion dollars from 2012 to 2022 2 the paper focuses on the italian situation on which urgent actions are required because more than 50 of waste is landfilled 3 the correct environmental management increases the financial performance because waste investments offer both environmental and economic benefits the problem to solve is related to both waste management and high levels of recycling where an unsorted fraction of waste will remain based on a thorough review of the topic a national waste management plan nwmp for energy recovery is herein proposed for evaluating all the aspects of sustainability of waste to energy wte plants the reduction of greenhouse gases ghgs with respect to landfill the estimation of financial net present value fnpv and the economic net present value enpv and finally the estimation of new employment opportunity

great expectations the subjective well being of rural urban migrants in china summary this paper is among the first to link the literatures on migration and on subjective well being in developing countries it poses the question why do rural urban migrant households settled in urban china have an average happiness score lower than rural households three basic hypotheses are examined migrants had false expectations about their future urban conditions or about their future urban aspirations or about their future selves estimated happiness functions and decomposition analyses based on a 2002 national household survey indicate that certain features of migrant conditions make for unhappiness and that their high aspirations in relation to achievement influenced by their new reference groups also make for unhappiness although the possibility of selection bias among migrants cannot be ruled out it is apparently difficult for migrants to form unbiased expectations about life in a new and different world

impact of single versus multiple policy options on the economic feasibility of biogas energy production swine and dairy operations in nova scotia abstract the economic feasibility of on farm biogas energy production was investigated for swine and dairy operations under nova scotia canada farming conditions using net present value npv internal rate of return irr and payback period pp economic decision criteria in addition the effects of selected environmental and green energy policy schemes on co generation of on farm biogas energy production and other co benefits from anaerobic digestion of livestock manure were investigated cost efficiencies arising from economies of scale for on farm anaerobic biogas production were found for swine farms and less so for dairy production systems without incentive schemes on farm biogas energy production was not economically feasible across the farm size ranges studied except for 600 and 800 sow operations among single policy schemes investigated green energy credit policy schemes generated the highest financial returns compared to cost share and low interest loan schemes combinations of multiple policies that included cost share and green energy credit incentive schemes generated the most improvement in financial feasibility of on farm biogas energy production for both swine and dairy operations

consumption and happiness we examine the relationship between relative consumption and happiness using panel data for china an important developing country we find that consumption has a positive effect on happiness an

a panel data model for subjective information on household income growth abstract subjective expectations about future income changes are analyzed using household panel data the models used are extensions of existing binary choice panel data models to the case of ordered response we consider static models with random and fixed individual effects we also look at a dynamic random effects model which includes a measure for permanent and transitory income we find that income change expectations strongly depend on realized income changes in the past those whose income fell are more pessimistic than others while those whose income rose are more optimistic expected income changes are also significantly affected by employment status family composition permanent income and past expectations expectations are then compared to the head of household s ex post perception of the realized income change for the same period the main finding is that rational expectations are rejected and that in particular households whose income has decreased in the past underestimate their future income growth

aviation policy past and present for 25 years airline deregulation has been a symbol of the trend toward less expansive government the move from economic regulation to deregulation has delivered on its efficiency promises and there have been significant benefits to consumers in terms of lower prices and more convenient schedules however airline competition especially at hub airports remains imperfect the nature of these imperfections is explained better by models of oligopolistic behavior than by the contestability theory paradoxically for this industry the terrorist attack of september 11 2001 has ushered in an expanded role of government in aviation policy this expanded role does not reinstate government intervention in airline economic decisions rather it provides financial stabilization of the industry in the short run and long term structural change in aviation security

the economic lives of the poor in what turned out to be a rhetorical master move the 1990 world development report from the world bank defined the extremely poor people of the world as those who are currently living on no more than 1 per day per person measured at the 1985 purchasing power parity ppp exchange rate in 1993 the poverty line was updated to 1 08 per person per day at the 1993 ppp exchange rate which is the line we use in this paper poverty lines have always existed indeed 1 per day was chosen in part because of its proximity to the poverty lines used by many poor countries 1 however the 1 a day poverty line has come to dominate the conversations about poverty to a remarkable extent

preemptive investment timing this article examines timing and profits in investment timing games where two or more firms vie to make an indivisible one time investment it shows that whether perfect nash equilibrium timing strategies eliminate rents depends on whether it is costly for rivals to threaten preemption credibly where credible threats are costless to make the investor s rents are eliminated by preemptive timing where credible threats are costly to make as where investments are made in steps however the equilibrium is nearly the same as where the investor has no rivals that is rivals have almost no effect on the investor s timing and profit these results have close analogies in the literature on patent races and in contestable market theory

conspicuous consumption and race evidence from south africa abstract a century ago thorstein veblen introduced socially contingent consumption into the economic literature this paper complements the scarce empirical literature by testing his conjecture on south african household data and finds that black and coloured households spend relatively more on visible consumption than comparable white households following the approach of charles et al 2009 this paper explores whether the differences in visible expenditures can be explained with a signaling model of status seeking moreover it is assessed to which extent positional concerns motivate conspicuous consumption although the socially contingent share in visible consumption increases with income different incentives to consume conspicuously seem to explain that at every level of income black households spend relatively more on visible consumption than comparable white households in contrast to the findings of charles et al 2009 where differential spending on conspicuous consumption can be found also within each group separately the model s core hypothesis fails to hold within the group of white south africans

the review of the achieved degree of sustainable development in south eastern europe the use of linear regression method the need for preservation and adequate management of the quality of environment requires the development of new methods and techniques by which the achieved degree of sustainable development can be defined as well as the laws regarding the relationship among its subsystems main objective of research is to point to a strong contradiction between the development of ecological and economic subsystems in order to improve previous research this study suggests the use of linear evaluation by which it is possible to determine the exact degree of contradiction between these two subsystems and to define the regularities as well as the deviations authors present the essential steps that were used conducted by the method of linear regression this research shows a significant negative correlation between ecological and economic subsystem indicators whereas its value r2 0 58 proves the expected contradiction that exists between the two previously mentioned subsystems by observing the sustainable development as a two dimensional system that includes ecological and economic indicators the authors suggest the methodology to modelling the relationship between economic and ecological development as an orthogonal distance between the degree of the current state measured by the relation between economic and ecological indicators of sustainable development and the degree which was obtained in a traditional way the method used in this research proved to be extremely suitable for modelling the relationship between ecological and economic subsystems of sustainable development this research was conducted on a repeated sample of countries of south east europe by including the data for france and germany being two countries on the highest level of development in the european union

financial economic scenario for the microgeneration of electric energy from swine culture originated biogas abstract one of the largest sources of energy available in rural and agro industrial areas is the biomass which is found in the form of vegetal and animal residues such as crop leftovers animal manure energetic plantations and agro industrial effluents such residues may be used by rural producers or agro industries for direct burning aiming to produce heat or biogas in biodigesters swine production generates a large amount of manure that causes environmental issues when not treated properly due to its high levels of methane when it is released in the atmosphere it expressively contributes to the greenhouse effect the co generation of electric energy is still one of the ways to utilize biogas generated from food production apart from generating energy it is also possible to sell carbon credits what provides the producer with higher income the present work aimed to determine the cost of installation as well as the feasibility of biogas based electricity production by studying the scale economy in several scenarios of swine biogas and electric energy production sale or not sale of carbon credits and investment costs with the estimated amortization period one can notice that when carbon credits generate profit production costs decrease and the lpv liquid present value increases energy production only leads to loss when there is no additional income with carbon credits

measuring the well being of the poor using income and consumption we examine the relative merits of consumption and income as measures of the material well being of the poor consumption offers several advantages over income because consumption is a more direct measure of well being than income and is less subject to underreporting bias measurement problems with income are problematic for analyses of changes in well being of the poor because the biases appear to have changed over time and are correlated with government policies on the other hand income is often easier to report and is available for much larger samples providing greater power to test hypotheses we begin by considering the conceptual and pragmatic reasons why consumption might be better or worse than income then we employ several empirical strategies to examine the quality of income and consumption data first we compare income and consumption reports for those with few resources as well as their assets and liabilities to examine measurement errors and under reporting second we examine other evidence on the internal consistency of reports of low income or consumption third we compare how well micro data in standard datasets weight up to match aggregates for classes of income and consumption that are especially important for low resource families fourth we validate income and consumption measures by comparing them to other measures of hardship or material well being although the evidence tends to favor consumption measures our analyses suggest that both measures should be used to assess the material well being of the poor

us consumers willingness to pay for green electricity abstract we analyze us consumers demand for environmental attributes of deregulated residential electricity services using results from a survey designed to elicit consumers willingness to pay for such attributes and using results from a hedonic analysis of actual price premiums charged for green electricity in several deregulated markets survey results suggest that many population segments are willing to pay for decreased air emissions even if there is no alteration in fuel source furthermore several groups are willing to pay significantly more when emissions reductions stem from increased reliance upon renewable fuels the hedonic analysis suggests that several product features not considered in the survey help explain real price premiums including fuel mix from newly created renewable generation capacity green e certification brand name and state of offer while survey and hedonic results are not easily compared due to limitations of the survey both point to similar values for key environmental attributes though the survey results are likely to overstate actual willingness to pay in sum the results suggest that consumer driven purchases can in part support the future of renewable generation capacity in the united states though reliance upon other policy alternatives may be needed if energy prices spike

when information dominates comparison abstract we propose a micro econometric evaluation of the relation between life satisfaction and income distribution using a balanced panel survey of the russian population russian longitudinal monitoring survey rlms running from 1994 to 2000 covering 4685 individuals we show that in the context of the very volatile russian environment hirschman s q j econ 87 1973 544 tunnel effect conjecture seems to be confirmed variables reflecting income distribution do not influence satisfaction through social comparisons individuals rather seem to use their informational content in order to form their expectations the reference group s income thereby exerts a positive influence on individual satisfaction which contrasts with other studies on the subject inequality indices do not affect individual welfare

increasing income inequality external habits and self reported happiness a large literature has documented an increase in income equality in the united states over the past several decades see for example david h autor lawrence f katz and melissa s kearney 2006 at the same time real aggregate income has risen markedly and most socioeconomic groups have experienced at least some rise in real purchasing power standard models of consumption which typically assume that an individual s utility is based only on her own consumption would predict that these gains have led to higher levels of happiness for all groups albeit with greater increases for some more than others economists have long recognized however that an individual s utility may depend not only on the level of her own consumption but also on how that level compares with the consumption of others if preferences are characterized by such external habits then the observed widening of the income distribution may have implications for the happiness of different groups that go beyond those associated with the changes in their respective incomes this study combines data from two sources to document the evolution of reported levels of happiness for different socioeconomic groups over the past 25 years and to explore whether those levels have been affected by the changing relative position of these groups within the habit persistence and the macroeconomy

happiness and job satisfaction in urban china a comparative study of two generations of migrants and urban locals this study investigates determinants of happiness and job satisfaction of urban locals first generation migrants and new generation migrants in china s urban workforce we present evidence to suggest that new generation migrants are less satisfied with their jobs and lives than first generation migrants despite having higher income this finding is consistent with aspirations rising faster than income in china s fast growing urban economy

life satisfaction in urban china components and determinants survey data from urban china in 2002 show levels of life satisfaction to be low but not exceptionally so by international comparison many of the determinants of life satisfaction in urban china appear comparable to those for people in other countries these include inter alia unemployment income marriage sex health and age communist party membership and political participation raise life satisfaction people appear fairly satisfied with economic growth and low inflation and this contributes to their overall life satisfaction there is dissatisfaction over pollution but this like job insecurity does not appear to impact on life satisfaction

the use of full line forcing contracts in the video rental industry bundling is at the forefront of many policy debates as new technologies allow firms to implement more complex bundling arrangements realistic analyses of bundling particularly between suppliers and retailers require detailed data on both supply arrangements and consumer demand we analyze firms use of bundling as a vertical restraint known as full line forcing using extensive supply and demand data from the video rental industry our model captures key details of the market that determine firms contractual choices and sheds light on the implications of these decisions the empirical approach provides a model for how to analyze bundling when detailed data are available jel d86 l14 l81 l82

contestability a revisionist view many claims have been made about the significance of the contribution of contestability theory to industrial organizat ion this paper concludes that contestability theory leaves unanswere d questions about the identity of entrants and the source of their re sources a modification to the theory is proposed rather than as a h indrance to potential entry sunk costs are viewed as being of key si gnificance for the disciplining of oligopolists through potential ent ry with the proposed modification the analysis of the costs of mult iproduct firms may be more easily integrated with recent developments in industrial organization copyright 1988 by the london school of economics and political science

dominant firms and their alleged decline abstract by way of a survey of recent literature on the theory of strategic competition this paper focuses on the question of whether dominant firms decline the traditional argument suggesting decline is found to be based on a rather unsatisfactory modelling of dominance and more acceptable conceptualizations suggest that such privileged positions will persist

antitrust and the new industrial economics my assignment here is to assess the implications of recent theoretical work in industrial economics for antitrust in the united states i don t have space enough to present a comprehensive survey of that work nor even to catalog all recent developments with apparent antitrust implications i attempt instead to describe the general character of those implications limiting myself to a few illustrative specifics industrial economics affects antitrust policy in three different ways first it is used in positive analysis aimed at determining whether or not current law has been violated in specific cases and at assessing damages due injured parties second it should be used in evaluating the desirability of relief that might be imposed in particular cases in order to alter structure or conduct if a violation is found finally the tools and results of industrial economics are important inputs in the formulation of general rules of law i argue here that the new industrial economics can contribute a lot to the positive analysis of individual cases but it has much less to say about the desirability of particular relief or of general rules of law a final section briefly examines some implications of this situation

bank competition and financial stability in asia pacific the impact of bank competition on financial stability has been a focus of academic and policy debate over the last two decades and particularly since the 2007 08 global financial crises beck 2008 oecd 2011 under the traditional competition fragility view banks cannot earn monopoly rents in competitive markets and this results in lower profits capital ratios and charter values this makes banks less able to withstand demand or supply side shocks and encourages excessive risk taking marcus 1984 alternatively the competition stability view suggests that competition leads to greater stability a less competitive banking market may lead to more risk taking if the big banks are deemed too important to fail and as such obtain implicit or explicit subsidies via government safety nets mishkin 1999 in addition banks with more market power tend to charge higher loan rates which may induce borrowers to assume greater risk leading to greater default in competitive banking markets loan rates are lower too big to fail issues and safety net subsidies are smaller and this results in a positive link between bank competition and stability boyd and de nicolo 2005 it could also be the case as noted by martinez miera and repullo 2010 that bank competition and stability are linked in a non linear manner and in a similar vein berger et al 2009 argue that competition and concentration may coexist and can simultaneously induce stability or fragility

adaptation to poverty in long run panel data we consider the link between poverty and subjective well being and focus in particular on potential adaptation to poverty we use panel data on almost 45 800 individuals living in germany from 1992 to 2011 to show first that life satisfaction falls with both the incidence and intensity of contemporaneous poverty we then reveal that there is little evidence of adaptation within a poverty spell poverty starts bad and stays bad in terms of subjective well being we cannot identify any causes of poverty entry which are unambiguously associated with adaptation to poverty

review of the economic viability of investing and exploiting biogas electricity plant case study vizelj serbia construction and operation of plants that produce energy from renewable energy sources is the subject for discussion in all the countries that have accepted the sustainable development concept and kyoto protocol as their own development direction enlargement of the renewable energy production is clearly an imperative but only economically viable construction and operation can result in long term sustainability which is initially the goal when deciding upon such investments in line with this goal this paper presents the estimation of the economic viability of constructing and operating biogas electricity plant on the farm vizelj in serbia the timeframe for this estimation is from 2011 until 2020 this paper also presents all parameters which are necessary for performing this estimation respectively analysis of revenues and expenditures projection of economic and financial flow ratio analysis dynamic and static analysis and analysis of sensitivity of the project i e impact of the changes in prices and raw material on the overall performance of the project the observed investment is predicted to be financed from the ebrd s credit line for renewable energy in western balkans while the total investment is estimated at euro 958 000 00 after the performed economic assessment the conclusion is that the observed investment in biogas electricity plant is very acceptable and it can serve as a role model for similar investments in the region