nep-tre New Economics Papers
on Transport Economics
Issue of 2017‒02‒19
six papers chosen by
Erik Teodoor Verhoef
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

  1. There And Back Again: Women's Marginal Commuting Costs By Stockton, Isabel; Bergemann, Annette; Brunow, Stephan
  2. Cost-benefit analysis of transport improvements in the presence of spillovers, matching and an income tax By Eliasson , Jonas; Fosgerau, Mogens
  3. Scanning and Imaging Shipping Containers Overseas: Costs and Alternatives By Congressional Budget Office
  4. Time-Induced Stress Effect on Financial Decision Making in Real Markets: The Case of Traffic Congestion By Gelman, Sergey; Kliger, Doron
  5. How do police use race in traffic stops and searches? Tests based on observability of race By Ritter, Joseph A.
  6. Gravity, Distance, and International Trade By Baier, Scott; Kerr, Amanda; Yotov, Yoto

  1. By: Stockton, Isabel; Bergemann, Annette; Brunow, Stephan
    Abstract: We use a partial-equilibrium model of job search with non-wage job attributes to estimate female workers' marginal willingness to pay to reduce commuting distance in Germany. This issue not only has implications for congestion policy, spatial planning and transport infrastructure provision, but is also relevant to our understanding of gender differences in labour market biographies in a more general sense. Gender differences in willingness to pay for job attributes could contribute significantly to observed disparities in a number of labour market behaviours and outcomes, such as participation, labour supply, wages and job mobility. Our analysis makes particular reference to heterogeneity by regional structure and local labour market conditions, and outlines ways of incorporating other types of heterogeneity into the analysis. Using a Cox model on a large administrative dataset, we find a marginal willingness to pay of e0.15 of women workers to reduce commuting distance by one kilometre.
    Keywords: Commuting, marginal willingness to pay for job attributes, on-the-job search, Cox relative risk model, partial likelihood estimation, gender and parenthood in job search models, heterogeneity in job mobility
    JEL: C41 J61 J16
    Date: 2016
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc16:145919&r=tre
  2. By: Eliasson , Jonas (KTH); Fosgerau, Mogens (Technical University of Denmark)
    Abstract: This paper addresses the problem of measuring the welfare benefits of a transport improvement. We formulate and analyze a rich spatial model that allows for spillovers, matching and income tax, in a setting with multiple work and residential locations and very general worker heterogeneity. The conventional consumer surplus captures part of the benefits and is calculated based on predictions of changes in travel demand and transport costs. The issue is to determine which socalled wider impacts to add to this. We find that adding the change in total output as a wider impact leads to doublecounting of benefits. The output change due to spillovers should be added, while the output change due to matching is already partly included in the consumer surplus. These results are useful for applied costbenefit analysis of transport policies.
    Keywords: Agglomeration; Spillovers; Matching; Cost benefit analysis; Transport policy.
    JEL: R40
    Date: 2017–02–07
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:ctswps:2017_003&r=tre
  3. By: Congressional Budget Office
    Abstract: Each year, about 12 million shipping containers enter U.S. ports. In 2007, the Congress mandated that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) use both radiation detectors and imaging systems to scan and image each container before it is loaded onto a U.S.-bound ship. CBO estimates that complying with the law would cost $12 billion to $32 billion over 10 years. Boosting the number of containers imaged at U.S. ports instead would cost considerably less.
    JEL: F10 H56 R41 R48
    Date: 2016–06–02
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cbo:report:514781&r=tre
  4. By: Gelman, Sergey; Kliger, Doron
    Abstract: We study the role of stress induced by time constraints on investors’ decision making. The need to perform contemporaneous tasks and external interference such as arriving unexpectedly late to work, might exacerbate acute stress and its impact on decision making. Accumulated laboratory research suggests that time stress may impact financial decisions, mainly in the loss domain. We contribute to the literature studying this issue in real financial markets, as the real markets distinguish themselves from laboratory experiments through repeated situations, aggregation of outcomes and extremely high monetary stakes. We use data on traffic congestion, weather conditions and derivative prices. Our main dependent variable is the slope of the implied volatility function (IVF) of options on RTS futures (cf. Bollen and Whaley, 2004) at the left-hand side of the volatility smile. We find that, controlling for relevant factors, this slope at open of the main trading session is higher subsequent to morning traffic jams, suggesting that investors under stress assign higher weights to extreme loss scenarios.
    JEL: G02 G13 G14
    Date: 2016
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc16:145915&r=tre
  5. By: Ritter, Joseph A.
    Abstract: Preprint of forthcoming: Journal of Economic Behavior Organization DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2017.02 .005
    Keywords: racial bias, traffic stop, search, discrimination, police, Public Economics, J15, K14, K42,
    Date: 2017–02
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:umaemp:253354&r=tre
  6. By: Baier, Scott (Clemson University); Kerr, Amanda (Clemson University); Yotov, Yoto (School of Economics)
    Abstract: We review and interpret the main theoretical developments in the gravity literature from its very early, a-theoretical applications to the latest structural contributions. We also discuss challenges and implement methods to estimate empirical gravity equations. We finish with a presentation and examples of numerical simulations with the structural gravity model. Throughout the analysis we attempt to emphasize the links and importance of transportation costs for the trade literature and we outline avenues where we believe interdisciplinary contributions between the international trade and transportation economics fields will be most valuable.
    Keywords: Structural Gravity; Estimation; Simulation; Transportation Costs
    JEL: F10 F11 F14 F17 R40
    Date: 2017–02–12
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ris:drxlwp:2017_005&r=tre

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