changes in human capital and earnings inequality recent evidence from brazil 1 abstract this paper estimates changes in the rates of return to human capital across the earnings distribution using data from over a 10 year period for brazil it uses these estimates to simulate the separate impacts of changes in returns to skills and changes in the supply of skills on earnings inequality evidence points strongly to growing inequality in rates of return to education in brazil this finding suggests that recent macroeconomic and trade reforms have been of most benefit to the skilled rather than the unskilled supporting evidence points to an improved competitiveness in the labour market with workers increasingly rewarded for productivity however although increases in returns to education are more pronounced at the top of the earnings distribution this did not in practice led to increased inequality this is because levels of education and other labour market rewarded endowments have increased and offset the rate of return effect appropriate education policy is therefore an essentia

stochastic convergence in per capita fossil fuel consumption in u s states abstract this study examines the stochastic convergence of per capita fossil fuel consumption across u s states including the district of columbia utilizing lm and rals lm unit root tests with allowance for endogenously determined structural breaks our results indicate that with the exception of nevada the evidence from two break and one break lm and rals lm unit root tests rejects the null hypothesis of a unit root in the relative per capita fossil fuel consumption in the u s this finding indicates the presence of stochastic convergence in relative per capita fossil fuel consumption in the u s states

asset inequality matters an assessment of the world bank s approach to poverty reduction the fight against poverty has been adopted by the multilateral development banks as their principal objective almost three decades after robert mcnamara announced that the world bank s fundamental work was to improve the lives of the poor its new president james wolfensohn has reiterated that poverty reduction is the world bank s principal purpose similarly in 1994 the inter american development bank set social progress and social equity as its central objective the emphasis in the international institutions contrasts with disappointing results in the real world although life expectancy school enrollmuent and other indicators of social wellbeing have improved dramatically across the developing world and although the proportion of the poor has declined in the last few decades the absolute number of poor people in the world has actually increased today about 1 3 billion people in less developed countries still subsist on less than 1 per day world bank 1980 1990 1996 the case of latin america is dramatic while in the 1970 s the number of poor fell it nearly doubled in the 1980 s increasing from about 80 to almost 150 million and in the last few years the number of poor now 33 percent of the total population has failed to fall despite economic recovery birdsall and londofio 1997 the contrast between the multilateral banks goals and these disappointing results suggests the need for a critical reassessment of their approach to poverty reduction in this paper we describe the approach reflected in the work of world bank economists and based on new empirical work assess its relevance for latin america

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

conditional convergence in australia s energy consumption at the sector level abstract we examine the convergence of energy consumption per capita at the sector level in australia over the period 1973 74 to 2013 14 to do so we employ recently developed lm and rals lm unit root tests that accommodate up to two endogenously determined structural breaks we find support for energy consumption per capita convergence for six of seven sectors in australia

the quality of schooling quantity alone is misleading although much research discusses the quantity of schooling as an effective impact on productivity and earnings most such research leaves out the idea of the quality of schooling which may cause biases in the estimated returns to schooling this paper consequently attempts to extend the standard mincerian approach to incorporate school quality as well as quantity it demonstrates how exclusion of quality in the standard procedure may cause biases in the estimated returns to years of schooling probably in the upward direction the paper explores the implications of this extension of the standard model for the case of young brazilian males it shows that the estimate of the private return to years of schooling using the preferred quality inclusive specification is only one half the estimate using the standard procedure indicating substantial upward bias in the standard estimates it further outlines a method for estimating a social return to quality and finds that it exceeds substantially the social return to quantity the paper then shows why this in turn suggests there may be an equity productivity trade off in schooling investments

sunk cost and entry exit decisions under individual transferable quotas why industry restructuring is delayed the paper shows that explicit modelling of sunk cost and a firm s entry exit decision in a traditional deterministic investment model may give an explanation of the slow transition to the optimal fleet structure following the introduction of individual transferable quotas itqs the analysis shows that the annual lease unit price of quota may be in a range where the long run fleet structure will not be attainable at once over time firms with zero gross investment as optimal behavior may leave the industry as the capital decays and over the transition period the optimal fleet structure prevails

changes in returns to education in latin america the role of demand and supply of skills using micro data for the urban areas of argentina brazil chile colombia and mexico the authors document trends in men s returns to education during the 1980s and the 1990s and estimate the role of supply and demand factors in explaining the changes in skill premia they propose a model of demand for skills with three production inputs corresponding to workers with primary secondary and university level education further the authors demonstrate that an unprecedented rise in the supply of workers having completed secondary level education depressed their wages relative to workers with primary level education throughout latin america this supply shift was compounded by a generalized shift in the demand for workers with tertiary education

the relationship between gdp and electricity consumption in 10 asian countries the purpose of this study is to estimate the relationships between gdp and electricity consumption in 10 newly industrializing and developing asian countries using both single data sets and panel data procedures the empirical results from single data set indicate that the causality directions in the 10 asian countries are mixed while there is a uni directional short run causality running from economic growth to electricity consumption and a bi directional long run causality between electricity consumption and economic growth if the panel data procedure is implemented these empirical findings imply that electricity conservation policies through both rationalizing the electricity supply efficiency improvement to avoid the wastage of electricity and managing demand side to reduce the electricity consumption without affecting the end user benefits could be initiated without adverse effect on economic growth the findings on the long run relationship indicate that a sufficiently large supply of electricity can ensure that a higher level of economic growth

household energy consumption versus income and relative standard of living a panel approach our fundamental premise is that energy consumption at the household level is a key indicator of standard of living we employ state of the art panel cointegration techniques to evaluate the nature of the relationship between income measures and energy consumption measures for seven east indian ocean countries the general finding is that income and household electricity consumption are not cointegrated given this finding we conclude that standard of living measures that rely on income measures and do not include household level energy consumption information will necessarily miss important indications of both levels and changes of standard of living

meat consumption and production analysis of efficiency sufficiency and consistency of global trends abstract the sustainability challenges that the food system is facing are ever increasing the traditional approach to monitoring these changes considers economic societal and environmental sustainability a strong case has been made however that a fourth dimension ethical should also be considered conventionally two main strategies have been used to assess the improvements in sustainability efficiency and sufficiency efficiency is usually linked with technological improvements and sufficiency is connected with a reduction in production or consumption we introduce a third strategy to the analysis namely consistency that is related mainly to the ethical dimension of sustainability trends of the indicators related to the three strategies are calculated on both a global and regional scale from 1962 to 2009 efficiency measured as land requirement for animal products has increased by about 13 percent globally sufficiency measured as the amount of meat consumed has declined by 91 percent and consistency measured as the number of animals slaughtered has declined by 264 percent in addition convergence analysis emphasizes that industrialized and developing countries are moving towards similar patterns of animal products consumption such results suggest that measures should be taken to develop a food system that is not only efficient but also ethically just

openness and wage inequality in developing countries the latin american challenge to east asian conventional wisdom the experience of east asia in the 1960s and 1970s supports the theory that greater openness to trade tends to narrow the wage gap between skilled and unskilled workers in developing countries in latin america since the mid 1980s however increased openness has widened wage differentials this conflict of evidence is probably not the result of differences between east asia and latin america instead the conflict is probably the result of differences between the 1960s and the 1980s specifically the entry of china into the world market and perhaps the advent of new technology biased against unskilled workers

the impact of electricity supply on economic growth in sri lanka abstract yang energy econ 22 2000 309 has found a bi directional causal relationship between gross domestic product and electricity consumption in taiwan roc this study applies yang s model to examine the impact of electricity supply on economic growth in sri lanka morimoto and hope an extended cba model of hydro projects in sri lanka 2001 have found that the expected increase in economic output due to increased electricity supply parameter eo plays a crucial role in their cost benefit analysis model this study shows that the application of yang s regression analysis is one possible approach to estimate a better range for the parameter eo the estimated figure is that an extra output of rs 88 000 137 000 us1120 1740 for every 1 mw h increase in electricity supply

convergence in per capita energy use among oecd countries abstract unlike previous studies which mainly focus on the integration properties of energy consumption and production this study examines the convergence of per capita energy use among 25 oecd countries over the period 1960 to 2010 in particular newly developed lm and rals lm unit root tests with allowance for two endogenously determined structural breaks are employed the results indicate significant support for per capita energy use convergence among oecd countries

the impact of primary schooling on economic development a review of the evidence abstract the contribution of primary schooling to economic development is greater than has conventionally been percieved this review of recent research shows that primary schooling increases labour productivity in both urban and rural sectors and that the economic returns to such investment are typically high in addition it reduces fertility improves health and nutrition and promotes other behavioural and attitudinal changes which are helpful to economic development investment strategies which give primary schooling an important place would be more conducive of growth with equity than many alternatives priorities for government and donor policies are indicated as are those for future research

switching costs price sensitivity and health plan choice we investigate the extent to which sensitivity to health plan premiums differs across individuals according to characteristics related to the cost of switching plans our results indicate substantial variation in price sensitivity related to expected health care costs younger healthier employees are between two and four times more sensitive to price than employees who are older and who have been recently hospitalized or diagnosed with cancer we also find evidence of status quo bias estimated premium elasticities are significantly higher for new hires than for incumbent employees simulations combining our results with actuarial data illustrate the cost implications of risk related differences in price elasticity

a club convergence analysis of per capita energy consumption across australian regions and sectors we examine convergence in per capita energy consumption across nine sectors and seven states and territories in australia over the period 19902016 using the phillips sul club convergence approach we find evidence of multiple convergence clubs for aggregate energy consumption per capita and for energy consumption per capita in eight of the nine sectors with full club convergence in the case of electricity the presence of multiple equilibria for most sectors reflect that states with similar features in terms of climate economic activities and population size among others tend to exhibit similar energy consumption patterns our results highlight the need to tailor policies designed to reduce energy consumption in specific sectors to the consumption convergence paths unique to particular clusters of states

non hbox co _2 co 2 generating energy shares in the world cross country differences and polarization the aim of this paper is to examine the spatial distribution of non hbox co 2 generating energy sources in the world for the period 1990 2009 paying special attention to the evolution of cross country disparities to this end after carrying out a classical convergence analysis a more thorough investigation of the entire distribution is presented by examining its external shape the intra distribution dynamics and the long run equilibrium distribution this analysis reveals the existence of a weak rather insignificant convergence process and that large cross country differences are likely to persist in the long run next as polarization indicators are a proper way of appraising potential conflict in international environmental negotiations we test whether or not the distribution dynamics concurs with the presence of polarization our results indicate that two poles can be clearly differentiated one with high and other with low non hbox co 2 generating energy shares in view of these findings and to ensure a fair transition to a sustainable energy system the paper calls for the development of an ambitious clean energy agenda especially in countries with low non hbox co 2 generating energy shares

rent capture in a rights based fishery abstract the paper compares four methods of rent capture in a fishery managed with individual transferable quotas using simulations from a unit profit function some theoretical properties of a quota rental charge profit charge lump sum charge and an ad valorem royalty are examined and then compared in simulations in terms of the distribution of profits distortions to the fishery the relative burden on fishers and flexibility to adjust to changes in the fishery

illegal landings an aggregate catch self reporting mechanism to solve the problem of illegal landings this article proposes a new tax mechanism based on the regulator s own aggregate catch estimates and ex ante self reports of planned catch by fishermen we show that the mechanism avoids illegal landings while ensuring nearly optimal exploitation and generating nearly correct entry and exit incentives finally we simulate the mechanism for the danish cod fishery in kattegat to obtain a rough indicator of the size of the tax it turns out that the average tax payment as a percentage of profit is surprisingly low

divergence in technical efficiency of electric utilities evidence from the sapp abstract this paper investigates the convergence pattern of technical efficiency of the south africa power pool sapp utilities over the period april 2003 march 2010 by means of parametric and non parametric techniques technical efficiency scores are computed via both stochastic frontier analysis and data envelopment analysis mixed results are obtained from the neoclassical convergence approaches in addition distribution dynamics methods reveal some evidence of club formation and this result is supported with the occurrence of divergence taken as a whole technical efficiency is found to diverge among the utilities operating in the power pool

private property and economic efficiency a study of a common pool resource abstract the british columbia halibut fishery provides a natural experiment of the effects of privatizing the commons using firm level data from the fishery 2 years before private harvesting rights were introduced the year they were implemented and 3 years afterward a stochastic frontier is estimated to test for changes in technical allocative and economic efficiency the study indicates that 1 the short run efficiency gains from privatization may take several years to materialize and can be compromised by restrictions on transferability duration and divisibility of the property right 2 substantial long run gains in efficiency can be jeopardized by preexisting regulations and the bundling of the property right to the capital stock and 3 the gains from privatization are not just in terms of cost efficiency but include important benefits in revenue and product form

productivity change under an individual transferable quota management system this is a scanned version of a published article the author 2012 published by oxford university press on behalf of the agricultural and applied economics association the original can be found at http www aaea org publications ajae to the best of our knowledge one or more authors of this paper were federal employees when contributing to this work

public inputs and child schooling in brazil household data from a one percent sample of the 1970 brazilian census are used to analyze the effect of public inputs i e the supply of schooling on children s school attainment in brazil the household data are combined with measures of school availability and quality derived directly from the same census data the measures are based on the number and education of schoolteachers in each of 169 different areas of the country elasticities of demand with respect to these public inputs are estimated these elasticities are high in both rural and urban areas in urban areas the positive effect of public inputs is greater for children from households with poorer and less educated parents in rural areas the positive effect of public inputs is greater if anything for children from households that are relatively better off at least compared to other rural households

electricity consumption and economic growth a time series experience for 17 african countries abstract while the availability of electricity by itself is not a panacea for the economic and social problems facing africa the supply of electricity is nevertheless believed to be a necessary requirement for africa s economic and social development this paper tests the long run and causal relationship between electricity consumption per capita and real gross domestic product gdp per capita for 17 african countries for the period 1971 2001 using a newly developed cointegration test proposed by pesaran et al 2001 and using a modified version of the granger causality test due to toda and yamamoto 1995 the advantage of using these two approaches is that they both avoid the pre testing bias associated with conventional unit root and cointegration tests the empirical evidence shows that there was a long run relationship between electricity consumption per capita and real gdp per capita for only 9 countries and granger causality for only 12 countries for 6 countries there was a positive uni directional causality running from real gdp per capita to electricity consumption per capita an opposite causality for 3 countries and bi directional causality for the remaining 3 countries the result should however be interpreted with care as electricity consumption accounts for less than 4 of total energy consumption in africa and only grid supplied electricity is taken into account

consumer rationality and the status quo received microeconomic theory presumes rational consumers maximize utility over all commodity bundles recent analysis however suggests that a consumer s status quo may limit economic rationality bias consumer decisions and induce serious errors in survey based valuations of public and private goods using regression and choice theoretic frameworks we investigate the existence of status quo effects in the consumer valuation of a particular unpriced product the reliability of residential electrical service such valuations have become important in electric utility resource planning and rate making we find substantial status quo effects which must be addressed in welfare comparisons regarding electric service reliability

skill premium labor supply and changes in the structure of wages in latin america earnings inequality declined rapidly in argentina brazil and chile during the 2000s a reduction in the experience premium is a fundamental driver of declines in upper tail 90 50 inequality while a decline in the education premium is the primary determinant of the evolution of lower tail 50 10 inequality relative labor supply is important for explaining changes in the skill premiums relative demand trends favored high skilled workers during the 1990s shifting in favor of low skilled workers during the 2000s changes in the minimum wage and more importantly commodity led terms of trade improvements are key factors behind these relative skill demand trends

electricity consumption and economic growth in china abstract this paper applies the error correction model to examine the causal relationship between electricity consumption and real gdp for china during 1971 2000 our estimation results indicate that real gdp and electricity consumption for china are cointegrated and there is unidirectional granger causality running from electricity consumption to real gdp but not vice versa in order to overcome the constraints on electricity consumption the chinese government has to speed up the nation wide interconnection of power networks to upgrade urban and rural distribution grids and to accelerate rural electrification

paying for pollution permits and charges tradeable emission permits are becoming an increasingly important instrument for controlling emissions for a variety of reasons emission permits are often allocated gratis conferring a windfall gain on the first generation of permit holders this paper examines how a regulator may capture this rent four different methods of rent capture profit output and input charges and an emission permit rental charge are compared with respect to their effects on efficiency and the relative burden placed on cleaner and dirtier firms in addition to generating revenue for the regulator certain charges coupled with emission permits may result in a better instrument than permits alone

a note on the causal relationship between energy and gdp in taiwan abstract this paper re examines the causality between energy consumption and gdp by using updated taiwan data for the period 1954 1997 as a secondary contribution we investigate the causal relationship between gdp and the aggregate as well as several disaggregate categories of energy consumption including coal oil natural gas and electricity applying granger s technique we find bidirectional causality between total energy consumption and gdp we find further that different directions of cause exist between gdp and various kinds of energy consumption

is there convergence in per capita renewable energy consumption across u s states evidence from lm and rals lm unit root tests with breaks abstract given the federal and state policy initiatives to curb fossil fuel consumption and expand the use of renewable energy sources in the u s this study investigates the convergence properties of per capita renewable energy consumption across u s states including the district of columbia in addition to cross sectional tests of and convergence our study employs lm and rals lm unit root tests with endogenously determined structural breaks to test for stochastic convergence traditional cross sectional tests indicate that both and convergence of per capita renewable energy consumption exists across u s states moreover our results also provides clear support for stochastic convergence of per capita renewable energy consumption for a majority of u s states including the district of columbia once allowance is made for structural breaks

a new data set measuring income inequality this article presents a new data set on inequality in the distribution of income the authors explain the criteria they applied in selecting data on gini coefficients and on individual quintile groups income shares comparison of the new data set with existing compilations reveals that the data assembled here represent an improvement in quality and a significant expansion in coverage although differences in the definition of the underlying data might still affect inter temporal and international comparability based on this new data set the authors do not find a systematic link between growth and changes in aggregate inequality they do find a strong positive relationship between growth and reduction of poverty

latin america s social policy challenge education social insurance redistribution abstract long regarded as a region beset by macroeconomic instability high inflation and excessive poverty and inequality latin america has undergone a major transformation over the last 20 years the region has seen improved macroeconomic management and substantial and sustained reductions in poverty and inequality in this paper we argue that social policy including human capital and education social insurance and redistribution need special attention if achievements of the last two decades are to be sustained and amplified starting in the mid 1990s many governments in the region introduced a variety of programs including noncontributory pensions and health insurance and cash transfers targeted to the poor social spending in latin america increased sharply these policies have been widely praised and we believe they have resulted in substantial improvements in the lives of the poor in the region however a more nuanced view shows some worrisome trends moving forward we believe it is nec

marketable emission permits efficiency profitability and substitutability research on marketable emission rights as a mechanism for controlling pollutants in the environment has intensified in recent years the resurgence of interest in this mechanism is in no small measure due to the 1990 amendments of the u s clean air act which introduced the most comprehensive tradeable permit scheme to date for s02 emissions canada is also flirting with the possibility of following suit with for instance the government of ontario now allowing ontario hydro to conduct some limited emissions trading across its plants nera 1992 however the literature often ignores two basic questions how permits are allocated and what substances should be covered by the permits there are two ways of allocating pollution permits by selling them e g by auction or by giving them away the advantages of auctions are that they can generate sizeable revenues for the regulator and they conform to the widely endorsed principle of polluter pays a frequently cited problem with auctions however is that they impose immediate financial burdens on emitting firms in the absence of perfect capital markets these burdens erect a formidable entry barrier to new and existing firms thus permits are usually freely distributed on the basis of historical market share however by allocating permits gratis policy makers are ignoring both the important polluter pays principle as well as an important source of revenue generation for example should emission permits be used to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions in accordance with recent canadian government proclamations the total value of these permits in ontario alone could be as much as c 300 million nera 1992 in this paper we examine the effects on efficiency and the burden imposed on heterogeneous firms from rent capture when permits are allocated gratis

heterogeneous economic returns to post secondary degrees evidence from chile we analyze the economic returns to post secondary degrees in chile we posit a schooling decision model with unobserved ability degree specific tuition costs and earnings we use administrative records to carry out our empirical analysis our results show positive average returns to post secondary education especially for five year degrees however we also uncover significant heterogeneity we document how unobserved characteristics ability determine the economic benefits of first and second best choices even leading to negative returns to post secondary degrees our findings illustrate the importance of allowing for heterogeneous treatment effects and individuals choices when examining the returns to education

disaggregated industrial energy consumption and gdp the case of shanghai 1952 1999 abstract this paper investigates the causal relationship between various kinds of industrial energy consumption and gdp in shanghai for the period 1952 1999 using a modified version of the granger 1969 causality test proposed by toda and yamamoto j econ 66 1995 225 the empirical evidence from disaggregated energy series seems to suggest that there was a uni directional granger causality running from coal coke electricity and total energy consumption to real gdp but no granger causality running in any direction between oil consumption and real gdp

convergence in energy consumption per capita among asean countries abstract we test for convergence in energy consumption per capita among asean countries over the period 1971 to 2011 using the panel kpss stationarity test and panel lagrange multiplier lm unit root test the results for the panel stationarity and unit root tests with structural breaks find support for energy convergence in asean

income distribution factor endowments and trade openness abstract this paper studies the empirical links among factor endowments trade and personal income distribution by using panel data we show that land and capital intensive countries have a less equal income distribution while skill intensive countries have a more equal income distribution we also show that the effects of trade openness on inequality depend on factor endowments in a way consistent with several recent case studies but not with the simple hecksher ohlin framework our results are robust to the division of the sample according to level of income the inclusion of different regressors the use of different measures of trade openness and of relative factor abundance and tests for possible problems of endogeneity

oil field unitization contractual failure in the presence of imperfect information an empirical analysis of the impact of transaction costs on contracting shows that imperfect in formation can seriously limit the effectiveness of private contracting the case under study is the widespread failure of private crude oil producing firms to use us oil fields to reduce rent dissipation rent dissipation follows as multiple firms compete for migratory oil in common oil pools unitization is the obvious private contractual solution to rent dissipation the authors argue that despite large net gains from unitization imperfect information and information asymmetries among the negotiating parties regarding lease values prevents consensus on unit shares as a result contracts are often not completed or only fragmented units are completed 9 references 1 figure 4 tables

electricity consumption in g7 countries a panel cointegration analysis of residential demand elasticities this article applies recently developed panel unit root and panel cointegration techniques to estimate the long run and short run income and price elasticities for residential demand for electricity in g7 countries the panel results indicate that in the long run residential demand for electricity is price elastic and income inelastic the study concludes that from an environmental perspective there is potential to use pricing policies in the g7 countries to curtail residential electricity demand and thus curb carbon emissions in the long run

cointegration and causality between electricity consumption and gdp empirical evidence from malawi abstract the granger causality gc and error correction ecm techniques were applied on 1970 1999 data for malawi to examine cointegration and causality between electricity consumption kwh and respectively overall gdp agricultural gdp agdp and non agricultural gdp ngdp cointegration was established between kwh and respectively gdp and ngdp but not with agdp the gc results detect bi directional causality between kwh and gdp suggesting that kwh and gdp are jointly determined but one way causality running from ngdp to kwh the ecm results detect causality running one way from gdp also from ngdp to kwh suggesting that a permanent rise in gdp may cause a permanent growth in electricity consumption

the causal relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth in the asean countries abstract this paper investigates the causal relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth among the association of south east asian nations asean 4 members namely indonesia malaysia singapore and thailand using modern time series techniques for the period 1971 2002 the results indicate that there is a bi directional causality between electricity consumption and economic growth in malaysia and singapore this means that an increase in electricity consumption directly affects economic growth and that economic growth also stimulates further electricity consumption in the two countries however uni directional causality runs from economic growth to electricity consumption in indonesia and thailand without any feedback effect thus electricity conservation policies can be initiated without deteriorating economic side effects in the two countries

electricity consumption and economic growth evidence from korea abstract this paper investigates the short and long run causality issues between electricity consumption and economic growth in korea by using the co integration and error correction models it employs annual data covering the period 1970 2002 the overall results show that there exists bi directional causality between electricity consumption and economic growth this means that an increase in electricity consumption directly affects economic growth and that economic growth also stimulates further electricity consumption

towards a common renewable future the system gmm approach to assess the convergence in renewable energy consumption of eu countries abstract this paper investigates whether the contribution of renewable energy sources to primary energy consumption is characterized by a convergence process across core european union eu countries over the period from 1990 to 2014 the system generalized method of moments gmm methodology is employed for 5 year span panel data of 14 eu members the findings indicate strong evidence for both the absolute unconditional and conditional convergence of renewables share in primary energy consumption across eu 14 countries moreover the control variables namely co2 emissions per gdp fdi inward stock and electricity prices contribute to the speed of convergence hence the implicit rate of conditional convergence is higher than that of absolute convergence the empirical evidence suggests that the energy mixes of core eu members have a tendency to become similar in the long run as the shares of res in primary energy consumption converge to the average level nonetheless it does not necessarily imply that this average would be 20 target which is to be achieved by 2020 according to eu directive 2009 28 ec

labor force participation and earnings determinants for women in the special conditions of developing countries abstract little systematic analysis exists regarding hypothesized special labor market conditions for women in developing countries this study explores such conditions in nicaragua major results are i small children affect participation less than in developed countries due to child care from extended families or while on informal sector jobs and the necessity for poor mothers to work ii schooling and experience have major roles affecting work sector and earnings but the primary school return is half that cited by the world bank iii other human capital variables particularly nutrition have some impact

experiences with individual transferable quotas an overview i introduction rights based management in fisheries is based on the allocation and enforcement of property rights in the form of access and use rights individual transferable quotas itqs allocate the total allowable catch among fishers in the form of individual harvesting rights in contrast to traditional regulations itqs operate on the principle that incentives rather than controls should be used to manage a fishery theoretically if itqs command a positive price fishers will take into account a share of the externality imposed on others provided that they are perceived as an exclusive and durable property right it can be shown analytically that itqs will not maximize the net return in a fishery given the existence of stock or congestion externalities but they should lead to a superior outcome compared to open access boyce 1992 this paper addresses the question of whether itqs have achieved the benefits often attributed to them il experiences with itqs itq programmes have been implemented in a number of fisheries in several countries including canada iceland australia and new zealand these programmes are evaluated to determine whether itqs have led to changes in employment and harvesting shares a reduction in fishing effort or an increase in profitability 1 reduction in fishing effort one of the expected benefits of itqs is that they can reduce the excess capital employed in a fishery depending upon the fishery and the potential opportunities in alternative activities the removal of excess harvesting capacity may involve an adjustment period of several years grafton 1994 provides a listing of the changes in vessel numbers in selected rights based

institutions and behavior experimental evidence on the effects of democracy a novel experiment is used to show that the effect of a policy on the level of cooperation is greater when it is chosen democratically by the subjects than when it is exogenously imposed in contrast to the previous literature our experimental design allows us to control for selection effects e g those who choose the policy may be affected differently by it our finding implies that democratic institutions may affect behavior directly in addition to having effects through the choice of policies our findings have implications for the generalizability of the results of randomized policy interventions

property rights and choice the case of the fishery formal property rights are typically established after considerable waste has occurred despite the effectiveness of such schemes in addressing the inefficiencies of common pool resources adoption can be contentious because of the assignment of wealth and political influence that accompany the transition to exclusive property rights this paper studies how the early involvement of harvesters in policy implementation designed to address the commons inefficiency may foster perceived legitimacy and lessen political opposition to the establishment of individual property rights we demonstrate that it is optimal for a manager facing industry strife and reform delay to allow firms to self select into the property rights regime the strategic interaction of harvesters leads to an equilibrium characterized by the global adoption of property rights thus by providing harvesters with a choice between management systems policy makers can reduce the transaction costs associated with the need to create political consensus while ensuring an outcome similar to the top down implementation of market based management evidence is provided from a recent policy change in maryland fisheries in which the provision of a choice resulted in the overwhelming adoption of individual transferable quotas and the end of the race to fish

transferable quotas enforcement costs and typical firms an empirical application to the norwegian trawler fleet an alternative to traditional regulations of fisheries to avoid rent dissipation is the use of individual transferable quotas itqs where prices in the quota market provide the necessary information to owners of harvest rights to contract with each other however even under such a decentralized regime information on the underlying technology of the fishing vessels is also necessary first since most fisheries consist of many interrelated production processes in order to avoid rent dissipation by discarding wrong output mix etc the structure of production in the multispecies fishery must be known to design a proper quota system second an itq system may create incentives for misreporting by understating the actual catch this may especially be the case where the expected degree of self enforcement is low the paper proposes a way to reduce the information requirements under regulation with asymmetric information by constructing a typical firm and comparing performance for the other vessels to this firm based on the typical firm and if the industry is relatively homogenous the performance and hence catch of any other firm in the industry can be predicted within a certain range further the paper applies this idea to the norwegian trawler fleet to assess the production structure in terms of jointness input output separability and the supply and demand elasticities for the fishing firms this information characterizes the fishery and thus how the quota system may be designed and how to construct a yardstick in order to reduce the enforcement cost under a decentralized regulation of itqs

measures of welfare effects in multiproduct industries the case of multispecies individual quota fisheries a framework is developed to measure the welfare effects of individual quota reforms in multiproduct industries using the multimarket welfare measure techniques suggested by just hueth and schmitz 1982 and the concept of virtual price in the production theory literature neary 1995 squires and kirkley 1996 under joint in input production it is shown that quasirent under a single quota can be measured by the producer surplus either in the output market for quota output or in the quota market under multiple quotas the welfare effects of quota policies can be measured in one of the quota markets using inverse derived equilibrium demand curves these results are obtained for a joint in input technology where positive production of at least one of the quota outputs is necessary for the firm to continue to operate application of the inverse derived demand functions for welfare measurement is shown for both transferable and nontransferable quotas

energy demand convergence in apec an empirical analysis this paper empirically examines the cross country convergence of per capita energy and electricity usage in apec a significant economic bloc to this end the study applies conventional panel unit root tests and sequential panel selection model spsm procedure based on the panel kss unit root with a fourier function for robustness analysis the results from conventional unit root test results indicate that per capita energy usage and electricity consumption are converging for all apec countries in line with improving living standards in apec the findings also provide some support for policies to promote energy integration among apec countries according to spsm analysis evidence of energy convergence is found for 15 out of 19 apec countries and evidence of electricity convergence is found for 17 out of 19 apec countries pursuit of policies to achieve energy supply stability can move divergent countries toward convergence

electricity consumption and economic growth in india abstract this paper tries to examine the granger causality between electricity consumption per capita and gross domestic product gdp per capita for india using annual data covering the period 1950 51 to 1996 97 phillips perron tests reveal that both the series after logarithmic transformation are non stationary and individually integrated of order one this study finds the absence of long run equilibrium relationship among the variables but there exists unidirectional granger causality running from economic growth to electricity consumption without any feedback effect so electricity conservation policies can be initiated without deteriorating economic side effects

multi output nonfrontier primal measures of capacity and capacity utilization this article implements an econometric approach for generating primal capacity output and utilization measures for fisheries in situations where regulatory environmental and resource conditions affect catch levels but are not independently identified in the data frontier based capacity models may interpret such impacts as production inefficiency however if such inefficiencies are unlikely to be eliminated the implied potential output increases may be unrealistic we develop a multi output multi input stochastic transformation function framework that permits various assumptions about how output composition may change when operating at full capacity we apply our model to catcher processor vessels in the alaskan pollock fishery

a note on itqs and optimal investment abstract this paper considers the incentives to invest under an itq management regime when labor is rewarded by the so called share system it is shown that the share system is likely to result in overinvestment under itqs labor market power of crew reflected in a high labor share of the catch might correct for this and might even prevent excessive investment when there is competition for a total catch quota

the world per capita electricity consumption distribution signs of convergence abstract considering residential per capita electricity consumption as one of the most suitable economic welfare indicators the aim of this paper is to explore worldwide differences on this variable over the period 1980 2007 the paper adds to the standard practice of and convergence analysis by tracking the external shape and time evolution of the entire distribution applying nonparametric techniques density functions and stochastic kernels to a sample of 98 countries the main finding is that a weak process of electricity consumption convergence has taken place this reduction of disparities is clearly related to at least three issues firstly the rapid economic changes experienced by some developing countries secondly the energy conservation policies implemented by most developed countries following the first oil shock and thirdly the growing awareness on energy issues in rich countries notwithstanding this the ergodic distribution on per capita electricity consumption indicates that large cross country disparities will persist in the long run

contracting problems and regulation the case of the fishery the inefficiencies of common property fisheries are of continuing concern to economists the early work by scott gordon 1954 and anthony scott 1955 outlined the problem and later studies by james crutchfield and giulio pontecorvo 1969 and frederick bell 1972 provided empirical estimates of the losses that result those studies were followed by the dynamic models of colin clark 1976 and james quirk and vernon smith 1970 of optimal harvest rates and the use of corrective taxes or quotas to achieve them but in spite of a large and growing literature and the persuasiveness of the outlined efficiency criteria most fisheries retain common property aspects with overcapitalization and excessive labor input why those conditions persist and the failure of the regulatory response to them are the issues addressed in this paper we examine a number of fisheries but focus on the texas shrimp industry which is one of the nation s most valuable fisheries for a single species and which shares the common property characteristics observed elsewhere it is considered overcapitalized and catch per unit of effort is falling 2 examination of the fishery reveals the many margins along which rent dissipation occurs and the nature of the regulations necessary for controlling fishing effort to avoid those losses the regulatory environment in texas is complicated by conflict within the fishery between inshore and offshore fishermen the latter assert that bay shrimping reduces the number of shrimp that successfully migrate to the gulf the inshore fishery is highlighted by another issue the recent resettlement of some 30 45 000 vietnamese refugees including many fishermen along the texas coast marine advisory service paul starr their entry has been met by hostility and violence from existing shrimpers who recognize that they are in an environment characterized by the absence of property rights bay shrimpers have lobbied the texas legislature for broad limits on new entrants yet ironically the sale of additional boats by individual shrimpers to the vietnamese has facilitated entry of the refugees into the fishery regulations in the texas shrimp and other fisheries are incomplete leaving many options for rent dissipation uncontrolled because of high contracting costs among fishermen and political factors that mold government actions contracting costs are high among heterogeneous fishermen who vary principally with regard to fishing skill 3 montana state university and texas a m university respectively we benefitted from comments by terry anderson raymond c battalio gardner brown oscar burt micha gisser wade griffin john r moroney anthony d scott peter temin and participants in workshops at texas a m university and the university of washington research assistance was provided by scott barnhart and phil mizzi funding was provided by sea grant texas a m university throughout this paper we use the terms common property and open access interchangeably here the terms describe a situation where no property rights group or individual exist s for the resource 2catch per unit of effort in the inshore texas gulf and federal gulf waters is presented for 1963 77 by w l griffin c g tydlacka and w e grant they show catch per unit of effort generally falling in inshore and offshore waters while catch per unit of effort fluctuates from year to year it falls from approximately 360 kg shrimp per unit of effort to 220 kg from 1963 to 1977 the common property nature of the fishery is reflected in the following statistics since 1975 the number of vessels has grown by 23 percent nelson swartz for fish houses the record of entry is similar between 1970 a d 1977 the number of firms grew from 259 to 287 though during that period many left the industry as others entered the number of fish houses was calculated from license data supplied by the texas parks and wildlife department the record of entry by fish houses suggests that monopsony as discussed by colin clark and gordon munro is absent in the fishery 3there may be minor differences in labor leisure choices and capital but our statistical evidence and discussions with fishermen indicate that catch variations are largely due to skill government regulations in the texas bays restrict capital and our empirical evidence shows boats to be relatively homogeneous

economic policy changes and wage differentials in latin america abstract this article presents estimates of the impact of changes in liberalization policies on wage differentials by schooling level using a new high quality data set for 18 latin american countries for 1977 98 the method controls for all fixed and time varying country characteristics some of which may affect the policies themselves the results indicate that liberalizing policy changes overall have had a short run disequalizing effect of expanding wage differentials although this effect tends to fade away over time this disequalizing effect is due to the strong impact of domestic financial market reform capital account liberalization and tax reform however privatization contributed to narrowing wage differentials and increasing trade openness had no significant effect on wage differentials technological progress rather than trade flows appears to be a channel through which policy changes are affecting inequality

resource rent in individual quota fisheries traditional fisheries management schemes generate incentives for vessels to maximize catch resulting in rent dissipation and overcapacity individual vessel quota management schemes change the incentives to maximize profit and have the potential to generate resource rent and reduce capacity an interesting question is whether it is the changed incentives due to individual quota or the capacity reduction due to transferability of individual quota that is most important in generating rent in this study a cost function approach is used to model and measure rent generated and potential rent in a fishery managed with individual vessel quotas

the effects of education and family planning programs on fertility in indonesia abstract numerous studies indicate that female education is a major determinant of fertility and that the estimated effects are large relative to other variables including family planning program variables there are however two serious deficiencies in the research relating educational attainment to fertility that could give rise to invalid inferences first many public programs including health and family planning programs may influence a woman s decisions about education and these indirect programmatic effects might be large second nearly all existing studies of the impacts of education on fertility assume that a woman s educational attainment is exogenous education could be serving as a proxy for such unobservable determinants as ability motivation and parental background as these factors most likely are important determinants of a woman s educational attainment we use the 1993 indonesian family life survey to compare the estimated impacts of education on fertility from a simple model tha

return on capital and management reforms in norway s fisheries individual transferrable quotas itqs are used in norway s fisheries but only partly and with restrictions on transferability this paper examines how this has affected return on capital the return on boat capital in three of four fisheries examined has increased since itqs were introduced a part of this increase is due to an increase in value of fish landings but accounting for that still leaves room for increases due to itqs return on total capital including quota value has either stagnated or fallen this is consistent with the rate of return in itq fisheries being comparable with other industries in the long run jel q22 q28

what you don t know can hurt you or at least mislead you family behaviors unobserved heterogeneities and the determinants and impacts of human resources over the life cycle what one does not know in the form of unobserved heterogeneity can mislead one in empirical estimates a simple model of intrahousehold allocations illustrates the possible importance of unobserved factors such as abilities in determining human resources and their impacts the author reviews over forty years of studies primarily from latin america and the caribbean but also from elsewhere to illustrate the substantial empirical importance of unobserved heterogeneity with regard to preferences and intrahousehold allocations schooling returns school quality early life nutrition and program evaluation