|
on Cultural Economics |
| By: | de la Rica, Sara (University of the Basque Country); Ortega, Francesc (Universitat Pompeu Fabra) |
| Abstract: | This paper compares the economic and cultural gaps of the largest foreign-born ethnic minorities in Spain: Latinos, Eastern Europeans, Moroccans and individuals from Other Muslim countries. We focus on several outcomes: the gender education gap, early marriage, inter-ethnic marriage, fertility, female employment, command of Spanish, and social participation. Our results suggest that Latinos are the group with patterns of behavior closest to those of natives, followed by Eastern Europeans. In several dimensions, such as the marriage penalty for females, Moroccans and individuals from Other Muslim countries are the groups with larger gaps relative to natives. Our results also show large improvements in the educational attainment of younger Moroccan cohorts, which is an important determinant of the outcomes we have analyzed. |
| Keywords: | immigration, cultural gaps, ethnicity, assimilation |
| JEL: | J15 J61 F22 |
| Date: | 2009–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp4115&r=cul |
| By: | Fletcher, Erin (University of Colorado, Boulder); Iyigun, Murat (University of Colorado, Boulder) |
| Abstract: | Ethnic and religious fractionalization have important effects on economic growth and development, but their role in internal violent conflicts has been found to be negligible and statistically insignificant. These findings have been invoked in refutation of the Huntington hypothesis, according to which differences of ethnic, religious and cultural identities are the ultimate determinants of conflict. However, fractionalization in all its demographic forms is endogenous in the long run. In this paper, we empirically investigate the impact of violent conflicts on ethno-religious fractionalization. The data involve 953 conflicts that took place in 52 countries in Europe, Africa and the Middle East between 1400 CE and 1900 CE. Besides a variety of violent confrontations ranging from riots, revolts and power wars between secular sovereigns, the data cover religiously motivated confrontations. We document that countries in which Muslim on Christian wars unfolded more frequently are significantly more religiously homogenous today. In contrast, those places where Protestant versus Catholic confrontations occurred or Jewish pogroms took place are more fractionalized, both ethnically and religiously. And the longer were the duration of all such conflicts and violence, the less fractionalized countries are today. These results reveal that the demographic structure of countries in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa still bear the traces of a multitude of ecclesiastical and cultural clashes that occurred throughout the course of history. They also suggest that endogeneity could render the relationship between fractionalization and the propensity of internal conflict statistically insignificant. Finally, instrumenting for conflicts with some geographic attributes and accounting for the endogeneity of fractionalization with respect to ecclesiastical conflicts shows that religous fractionalization likely has negative effects on economic growth. |
| Keywords: | conflict, religion, institutions, economic development |
| JEL: | C72 D74 N33 N43 O10 |
| Date: | 2009–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp4116&r=cul |
| By: | Davis, Lee N.; Davis, Jerome; Hoisl, Karin |
| Abstract: | This paper seeks to understand the intriguing but only sparsely explored phenomenon of “leisure time invention,” where the main underlying idea for the new product or process occurs when the inventor is away from the workplace. We add to previous research by focussing on the inventive creativity of the individual researcher, and reassessing the image of researchers inventing during unpaid time – who have often been dispatched as “hobbyists”. Based on the responses from a survey of over 3,000 German inventors, we tested hypotheses on the conditions under which leisure time invention is likely to arise. Results suggest that the incidence of leisure time invention is positively related to exposure to a variety of knowledge inputs – but, surprisingly, not to the quality of prior inventive output. Leisure time inventions are more frequently observed in conceptual-based technologies than in science-based technologies, in smaller R&D projects, and in externally financed R&D projects. |
| Keywords: | Leisure Time; Inventiveness; Organizational Creativity |
| JEL: | O31 O32 O34 J22 |
| Date: | 2009–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lmu:msmdpa:10457&r=cul |