|
on Urban and Real Estate Economics |
| By: | Zarina Adilkhanova (NAC Analytica, Nazarbayev University) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the effect of spatial agglomeration on firms' total factor productivity in Kazakhstan using panel data from 2009 to 2017. We employ a two-stage estimation strategy and control for endogeneity biases by making use of the GMM approach. The results suggest that productivity increases with clustering: a 10% increase in the number of employees of the neighboring firms inside the same industry increases firm-level productivity by 1.36%, while a 10% increase in the employment in other industries enhance firm performance by 1.95%. The productivity gains are higher at the 2-digit regional level rather than at the 9-digit sub-regional level of geographical aggregation, implying that the denser geography increases firms' performance more than in the observed geography. |
| Keywords: | Agglomeration economies; Total Factor Productivity; Spatial Concentration; Clusters |
| JEL: | C23 R10 R11 R12 R15 |
| Date: | 2020–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ajx:wpaper:14&r=all |
| By: | Donghoon Lee; Joseph Tracy |
| Abstract: | Efforts in the spring of 2020 to contain the spread of COVID-19 resulted in a sharp contraction in U.S. economic growth and an unprecedented, rapid rise in unemployment. While the first wave of the pandemic slowed the spring housing market, home sales rebounded sharply over the rest of the year, with strong gains in house prices. Given the rising house prices and continuing high unemployment, concerns arose that COVID-19 may have negatively affected first-time homebuyers. Using a new and more accurate measure of first-time homebuyers, we find that these buyers have not been adversely affected by the pandemic. At the same time, gains from lower mortgage rates have gone to existing homeowners and not to households purchasing their first home. |
| Keywords: | first time home buyer; mortgage; pandemic; COVID-19 |
| JEL: | D13 R31 |
| Date: | 2021–04–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fednls:90806&r=all |
| By: | Bhatt, Vipul; Kishor, N. Kundan |
| Abstract: | In this paper we examine house price synchronization in 15 global cities using real house price data from 1995:Q1-2020:Q2. We find that although there is evidence for bilateral positive phase synchronization, there is no evidence for an integrated global housing market for our sample of cities. Using a hierarchical clustering approach, we identify three clusters of cities with similar housing price cycles that are not solely determined by geographic proximity. We interpret this finding as suggestive of a rather segmented housing market for the global cities in our sample. Using a dynamic factor model with time-varying stochastic volatility we decompose a city's real housing price growth into a global component, a cluster-based component, and an idiosyncratic component. For most cities in our sample, the global component plays a minor role, whereas the cluster-based factor explains a large fraction of the observed variation in real house price growth with its contribution peaking during the Great Recession of 2007-09 |
| Keywords: | Global Housing Market, House Price Synchronization, Cluster Analysis, Dynamic Factor Model |
| JEL: | C38 E32 F36 F44 R30 |
| Date: | 2021–04–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:107175&r=all |
| By: | Zhentong Lu; Sisi Zhang; Jian Hong |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the impact of home purchase restrictions on China's housing market. We estimate a structural model of household preference for housing, real estate developers’ pricing decisions, and equilibrium market outcome in five large cities. By comparing the estimation results from pre- and post-policy intervention, we find that after home purchase restrictions are implemented, overall housing demand in most cities becomes weaker and less price elastic; meanwhile, real estate developers face higher holding costs and thus are willing to lower prices and sell more quickly. Counterfactual analyses show that in some cities, alternative policy designs that cause less structural change of demand could improve consumer welfare and social welfare better than the implemented policy. |
| Keywords: | Housing; Market structure and pricing |
| JEL: | R31 R38 O18 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bca:bocawp:21-18&r=all |
| By: | Keim-Klärner, Sylvia; Bernard, Josef; Bischof, Susann; van Dülmen, Christoph; Klärner, Andreas; Steinführer, Annett |
| Abstract: | The aim of this Working Paper is to introduce a conceptual model and study design for researching social disadvantage in rural peripheries, focusing on the interplay of social disadvantage and spatial disadvantage. The paper presents the theoretical concepts, understandings, and definitions, as well as the research design we draw on in the international research project 'Social disadvantage in rural peripheries in Czechia and eastern Germany: opportunity structures and individual agency in a comparative perspective.' The project investigates the multifaceted relationships between social disadvantage, local and regional opportunity structures, and individual agency in rural peripheries in Czechia and eastern Germany from a comparative perspective. It focuses on two sets of research questions. The first set concerns the quantitative patterns of social disadvantage and spatial disadvantage in rural areas. The second set asks about the impact of opportunity structures as part of the residential context on particularly disadvantaged groups in four case study regions. The project applies theories of peripheralization and rural restructuring, and considers social networks and individual agency. Area-level secondary data and accessibility analyses and qualitative case studies, including ego-centered network analyses and GPS mapping of time-space activity patterns, are used. |
| Keywords: | Social disadvantage,peripheralization,rural areas,rural peripheries,rural restructuring,opportunity structure,social networks,agency |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:jhtiwp:170&r=all |
| By: | Calum Robertson; Sylvain Dejean; Raphaël Suire2 |
| Abstract: | Short-term rental platforms, led by Airbnb, have disrupted the tourism accommodation industry over the last decade. This disruption has sometimes come along with unwanted long lasting effects on the urban dynamics of cities, and it has encouraged policy-makers to intervene. However, little is known about how effective such interventions are. This paper empirically evaluates the impact Bordeaux’s regulation has had on STR activity through both a Differences-in-differences and a spatial discontinuity design. We find that regulation has had a reductive effect of over 316 rented days per month per district on average. This equates to over half of a pre-regulation standard deviation and 27 thousand nights spent per month in STRs across the city. However, the city’s attempts to limit activity stemming from commercial listings yields mixed results as compliant home-sharing listings also seem to have modified their behaviour. Additionally, analysis at the city border points towards the existence of potential spillover effects on the suburbs, further paving the way for discussion about the effectiveness of one-size-fits-all STR policy design. |
| Keywords: | Short-term rental, Airbnb, Regulation, Tourism, Housing, Spatial Discontinuity, Differences-in-differences |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:egu:wpaper:2114&r=all |
| By: | Anja M. Hahn; Konstantin A. Kholodilin; Sofie R. Waltl |
| Abstract: | In 2020, Berlin enacted a rigorous rent-control policy: the “Mietendeckel” (rent freeze), aiming to stop rapidly growing rental prices. We evaluate this newly enacted but old-fashionably designed policy by analyzing its immediate supply-side effects. Using a rich pool of rent advertisements reporting asking rents and comprehensive dwelling characteristics, we perform hedonic-style Difference-in-Difference analyses comparing trajectories of dwellings inside and outside the policy’s scope. We find no immediate effect upon announcement of the policy. Yet advertised rents drop significantly upon the policy’s enactment. Additionally, we document a substitution effect affecting the rental markets of Berlin’s (unregulated) satellite city Potsdam and adjacent smaller municipalities. On top, the supplemental quantity analyses reveal a stark reduction of the number of advertised rental units hampering a successful housing search for newcomers, (young) first-time renters and tenants aiming for a different housing opportunity. |
| Keywords: | First-Generation Rent Control; Berlin; Rent Freeze; Urban Policy; Rent Price; Supply Disruptions |
| JEL: | C43 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:irs:cepswp:2021-03&r=all |
| By: | Paul Carrillo (George Washington University); Jonathan Rothbaum (U.S. Census Bureau) |
| Abstract: | Urban areas in the U.S. have experienced important changes in racial/ethnic distributions over the last two decades. In the average urban area today black-white racial integration has increased by 10.6 percent between 1990 and 2010. Changes in racial and ethnic distributions and gentrification are often associated with changes in residents’ demographic characteristics, such as income, education and age. This paper applies a non-parametric spatial decomposition technique using complete (restricted-use) microdata files from the 1990 Decennial Long Form Census and 2008-2012 American Community Surveys to assess what portion of the changes in racial distributions can be attributed to changes in individual characteristics. We find that that, on average, a little over a third of the observed increase in integration can be accounted for by changes in observed individual characteristics. |
| Keywords: | Counterfactual Distribution; Decomposition; Spatial Econometrics |
| JEL: | C14 R23 R30 |
| Date: | 2021–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gwi:wpaper:2021-11&r=all |
| By: | Jean-Philippe Meloche; François Vaillancourt (University of Toronto) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates how Canadian cities are using the revenue sources their provincial laws enable them to use. Drawing on data from both Statistics Canada and municipal financial statements for the largest city in each of the 10 provinces, the authors examine municipal spending and assess how much money was obtained from most of their sources of revenue. In general, most of the financing tools available to the Canadian cities studied yield very low levels of revenue. The authors also considered whether new revenue sources granted to municipalities by their provincial governments really contribute to the diversification of their revenues and found that adding more tools for municipal financing does not seem to contribute to the diversification of revenues. Rather, diversification is mainly driven by balancing revenues between property tax (the major revenue source for all the cities) and user charges. Furthermore, the data suggest that the relationship between diversity and the ability to raise more revenues is not uniform among this group of cities. The authors conclude that giving more revenue sources to municipalities does not automatically result in more diversified revenues or in more services. The sample is too small, however, to generalize or confirm these results. The authors note the difficulty of finding and using comparable data on the finances of Canadian cities and suggest that efforts to remedy this data gap might lead to greater ease in comparing cities. |
| Keywords: | municipal finance, current spending, capital spending, tax revenue, property tax, transfers |
| JEL: | H71 H72 H74 H77 R51 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mfg:wpaper:52&r=all |
| By: | Andrea Ascani (Gran Sasso Science Institute); Alessandra Faggian (Gran Sasso Science Institute); Sandro Montresor (Gran Sasso Science Institute); Alessandro Palma (Gran Sasso Science Institute) |
| Abstract: | This article aims at investigating the interplay between the local spread of COVID-19 and the patterns of individual mobility. Conceptually, we connect the debate on the resilience to the perturbation caused by COVID-19 with the literature on spatial labour markets. By looking at very granular flows of Facebook users moving within and across Italian labour market areas (LMAs), we analyse whether their heterogeneous internal mobility has had a significant impact on excess mortality, thus testing whether, and under which circumstances, LMAs have actually behaved as self-containing local systems or have rather exported/imported people (and possibly) infections to/from other labour markets. We further extend the analysis by exploring how individual mobility plays different roles depending on the typology of LMAs considered. Specifically, we focus on LMAs hosting industrial districts, which are characterised by a thicker local labour market and denser business and social interactions, as well as LMAs with a high presence of “essential sectors†, i.e. activities not affected by the COVID-19 containment measures taken by the Italian government at the onset of the crisis. |
| Keywords: | labour market, mobility, COVID-19, resilience, Facebook |
| JEL: | R10 R12 R23 J61 I18 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ahy:wpaper:wp12&r=all |
| By: | Javier Barbero (European Commission - JRC); Giovanni Mandras (European Commission - JRC); Ernesto Rodríguez-Crespo (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid); Andrés Rodríguez-Pose (London School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | The quality of government and institutions is crucial in determining the socio-economic impact of policies. The European Commission is increasingly underlining the value of good governance and, in 2010, the Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy (DG REGIO) started funding research to gather data on the regional quality of government in collaboration with the University of Gothenburg. The analysis reported here presents, for the first time, evidence on the impact of government quality on regional trade flows in the European Union. The returns to trade depend on the quality of government, meaning that the implementation of place-based territorial policies becomes relevant to maximise economic growth, regional development and the gains from trade. |
| Keywords: | quality of government, institutions, regional policy, gravity model of trade, structural estimation, rhomolo |
| JEL: | E2 F15 R10 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ipt:iptwpa:jrc124475&r=all |
| By: | Daniel Straulino; Juan C. Saldarriaga; Jairo A. G\'omez; Juan C. Duque; Neave O'Clery |
| Abstract: | Knowledge of the spatial organisation of economic activity within a city is key to policy concerns. However, in developing cities with high levels of informality, this information is often unavailable. Recent progress in machine learning together with the availability of street imagery offers an affordable and easily automated solution. Here we propose an algorithm that can detect what we call 'visible firms' using street view imagery. Using Medell\'in, Colombia as a case study, we illustrate how this approach can be used to uncover previously unseen economic activity. Applying spatial analysis to our dataset we detect a polycentric structure with five distinct clusters located in both the established centre and peripheral areas. Comparing the density of visible and registered firms, we find that informal activity concentrates in poor but densely populated areas. Our findings highlight the large gap between what is captured in official data and the reality on the ground. |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2104.04545&r=all |
| By: | Irlacher, Michael; Pennerstorfer, Dieter; Renner, Anna-Theresa; Unger, Florian |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates a theory-guided gravity equation of regional patient ows. In our model, a patient's choice to consult a physician in a particular region depends on a measure of spatial accessibility that accounts for the exact locations of both patients and physicians. Introducing this concept in a spatial economics model, we derive an augmented gravity-type equation and show that our measure of accessibility performs better in explaining patient ows than bilateral distance. We conduct a rich set of counterfactual simulations, illustrating that the effects of physicians' market exits on patient mobility crucially depend on their exact locations. |
| Keywords: | gravity model,patient mobility,spatial accessibility,two-step floating catchmentareas (2SFCA) |
| JEL: | R10 R12 R23 I11 I18 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:cegedp:418&r=all |
| By: | Eric Kramon (George Washington University); Sarah Baird (George Washington University); Joan Hamory (University of Oklahoma); Edward Miguel (University of California, Berkeley) |
| Abstract: | The impact of urban migration on ethnic politics is the subject of long-standing debate. “First-generation†modernization theories predict that urban migration should reduce ethnic identification and increase trust between groups. “Second-generation†modernization perspectives argue the opposite: Urban migration may amplify ethnic identification and reduce trust. We test these competing expectations with a three-wave panel survey following more than 8,000 Kenyans over a 15-year period, providing novel evidence on the impact of urbanmigration. Using individual fixed effects regressions, we show that urban migration leads to reductions in ethnic identification; ethnicity’s importance to the individual diminishes after migrating. Yet urban migration also reduces trust between ethnic groups, and trust in people generally. Urban migrants become less attached to their ethnicity but more suspicious. The results advance the literature on urbanization and politics and have implications for the potential consequences of ongoing urbanization processes around the world. |
| Date: | 2021–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gwi:wpaper:2021-08&r=all |
| By: | Michel Serafinelli; Guido Tabellini |
| Abstract: | Creativity is often highly concentrated in time and space, and across different domains. What explains the formation and decay of clusters of creativity? We match data on notable individuals born in Europe between the XIth and the XIXth century with historical city data. The production and attraction of creative talent is associated with city institutions that protected economic and political freedoms and promoted local autonomy. Instead, indicators of local economic conditions such as city size and real wages, do not predict creative clusters. We also show that famous creatives are spatially concentrated and clustered across disciplines, that their spatial mobility has remained stable over the centuries, and that creative clusters are persistent but less than population. |
| Keywords: | innovation, agglomeration, political institutions, immigration, gravity, human capital |
| JEL: | R10 O10 J61 J24 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_8973&r=all |
| By: | Ellen Goldring; Mollie Rubin; Mariesa Herrmann |
| Abstract: | This report provides insights about the growing presence of assistant principals based on a synthesis of 20 years of research, along with new analyses. Existing evidence suggests the role is overlooked, although assistant principals are important for advancing equity and school outcomes. |
| Keywords: | assistant principal, vice principal, schools, student achievement, diversity, equity |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:d3863c4e8d95454c96a3ec0ddc5059b6&r=all |
| By: | Rohan Best (Department of Economics, Macquarie University); Paul J. Burke (Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University); Rabindra Nepal (School of Business, Faculty of Business and Law, University of Wollongong); Zac Reynolds (Department of Economics, Macquarie University) |
| Abstract: | Hedonic models of housing prices face the risk of omitted variable bias due to the challenge of controlling for all relevant property attributes. The level of household financial assets is a key but underexplored control that may help to account for some of these difficult-to-observe property characteristics. Using large Australian household surveys, we find that controlling for household financial assets reduces the observed effect of having solar photovoltaic panels on housing prices. The elasticity of housing price with respect to solar capacity is 0.09 for households with solar panels. Controlling for financial assets may be of use in other studies seeking to estimate the effect of home additions on housing prices. |
| Date: | 2021–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:een:ccepwp:2105&r=all |
| By: | William Gatt; Germano Ruisi (Central Bank of Malta) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we propose a SVAR identification strategy to disentangle two housing demand shocks and their ensuing effect on consumption. This builds on the literature studying the role of the collateral and housing wealth effects on household behaviour. A mix of zero and sign restrictions allows us to disentangle domestic and foreign housing demand shocks, which capture different motivations for owning or using real estate by residents and foreign workers respectively. Using Maltese data over the period 2000Q1–2019Q4 we find that both housing demand shocks generate an increase in consumption, in line with the theoretical predictions from micro founded models with financial frictions. While a domestic housing demand shock drives consumption via both the collateral and housing wealth channels, a foreign housing demand shock operates mainly via the latter. Moreover, these shocks account for about 40% of the fluctuations in house prices and consumption in the long run. We show that from a historical perspective they match well with the dynamics of foreign worker growth and a selection of events that are associated with activity in the housing market. |
| JEL: | C11 C32 G51 R21 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mlt:wpaper:0720&r=all |
| By: | Mikael Khan; Olga Bilyk; Matthew Ackman |
| Abstract: | Exceptional strength in the housing market during the pandemic is underpinning Canada’s economic recovery. However, two key vulnerabilities—housing market imbalances and elevated household indebtedness—have intensified. |
| Keywords: | Coronavirus disease (COVID-19); Credit and credit aggregates; Financial stability; Housing; Recent economic and financial developments; Sectoral balance sheet |
| JEL: | D14 D8 D84 E5 G2 G21 G28 R2 R21 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bca:bocsan:21-4&r=all |
| By: | Giuseppe Albanese (Banca d'Italia); Guglielmo Barone (Università di Bologna); Guido DeBlasio (Banca d'Italia) |
| Abstract: | This paper assesses the causal impact of a prominent place-based policy - the EU cohesion policy - on income distribution in the receiving areas by studying a severe contraction of financing, which took place in the Italian region of Molise starting from 2008. We focus on the Gini Index at the municipality level and leverage a spatial difference-in-discontinuity empirical design. We show that local income distribution becomes more equal in the municipalities exposed to the shrinkage of EU funds, relative to untreated units located on the other side of the geographical border that identifies the generosity of aid regimes. The decrease in the Gini coefficient is due to the move of top earners to the center of the distribution. The reduction in the Gini index is confirmed even if we resort to a region-level analysis, in which the causal effect of the end of the policy is assessed by means of the synthetic control method. |
| Keywords: | place-based policy, income distribution |
| JEL: | R58 D31 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ahy:wpaper:wp15&r=all |
| By: | Martina Aronica (Università di Palermo); Alessandra Faggian (Gran Sasso Science Institute); Debora Insolda (Università di Palermo); Davide Piacentino (Università di Palermo) |
| Abstract: | Despite the increase of doctoral studies, PhD holders face many obstacles in finding non-academic jobs matching their competencies. This paper explores this phenomenon under three angles: overeducation, overskilling and satisfaction. While considering a rich set of determinants, we particularly focus on the role of migration. Spatial mobility may represent not only a way to favour the education-job match at an aggregate level, but also a way to get a stronger motivation in searching a suitable job at an individual level. Looking at the case of Italy, we find a positive effect of migration on the education-job matching. We also find two evident gaps. The first between domestic and foreign labour markets and the second between genders. |
| Keywords: | PhD degree, education-job mismatching, human capital migration, Italian regions |
| JEL: | I21 J24 J61 R23 |
| Date: | 2020–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ahy:wpaper:wp10&r=all |
| By: | Asatryan, Zareh; Baskaran, Thushyanthan; Birkholz, Carlo; Hufschmidt, Patrick |
| Abstract: | We study the economic implications of mineral resource activity for non-mining regions at the grid-level across the African continent. We find that capital cities benefit from mineral resource activity anywhere in the country. Leaders' birth regions also benefit, but only in autocratic regimes. Generic non-mining regions, on the other hand, are worse off. These results suggest that regional redistribution of resource rents in Africa is primarily undertaken to the benefit of capital cities and leaders' birth regions. In contrast, non-mining regions do not appear to be sufficiently compensated for the negative spillovers they may face due to mining activity elsewhere in the country. |
| Keywords: | Mineral resources,spillovers,spatiality,luminosity,favoritism,democracy,Africa |
| JEL: | H77 O13 R12 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:zewdip:21032&r=all |
| By: | Brian Micallef; Nathaniel Debono (Central Bank of Malta) |
| Abstract: | In recent years the housing market in Malta has been characterised by significant demand and supply developments reflecting strong economic and population growth. While the determinants of house prices in Malta have long been studied and documented, much less is known about private sector rents, partly due to the absence of official statistics on this sector. This paper uses information from the Estate Agency Rent Survey to construct a proxy for private sector rents in Malta. Using this index, a specification for private sector rents is specified using an error-correction modelling approach and added to the housing block in STREAM. Consistent with theoretical expectations, a one-to-one relationship between rents and house prices is confirmed in the long-run. Short-run dynamics are affected by past developments in rents, the foreign population, the number of tourist nights stayed in private accommodation and the housing stock per household. The housing block in STREAM is modified to accommodate for the inclusion of the rents equation, with the specifications for house prices and dwelling investment modelled following a stock-flow framework in line with Gatt et al. (2018). A simulation using STREAM illustrates the impact on the main macroeconomic variables following a hypothetical 10% increase in real housing investment. |
| JEL: | R21 R31 E37 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mlt:wpaper:0320&r=all |
| By: | Dogu Tan Araci (Prosus); Murat Demirci (Department of Economics, Koç University); Murat Guray Kirdar (Department of Economics, Bogazici University) |
| Abstract: | We examine how the impact of refugees on natives’ labor market outcomes varies by the development level of hosting areas, which has important implications for the optimal allocation of refugees across regions and countries. For this purpose, in the context of the largest refugee group in the world in a single country, Syrian refugees in Turkey, we exploit the significant variation in the development level across regions of Turkey, several of which host a substantial number of refugees. We find that the impact of refugees on natives’ labor market outcomes becomes significantly less adverse as regional development level rises. For instance, the negative effects of the refugee shock on employment and labor force participation of women observed at the mean level of development vanish at high levels of development. Moreover, while the impact of the refugees on employment of men is negative for the least developed regions, it is positive for highly developed regions. Our findings imply that developed regions and countries are in a better position in terms of protecting their local population from the adverse effects of refugees in the labor market. |
| Keywords: | refugees, optimal refugee allocation, labor market impact, development level, employment and wages of men and women. |
| JEL: | J61 O15 F22 R23 R58 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:koc:wpaper:2102&r=all |
| By: | Reuben Ellul |
| Abstract: | The rental housing market in Malta has changed fundamentally in recent years. This market, along with the wider property market, has experienced somewhat of a rebirth over recent years, with a surge in job-rich economic activity that could be fulfilled with foreign workers given domestic demographic developments, and new trends in tourism, leading to an increase in both units available for rent, and rental incomes. Taken together, these changes have happened over a comparatively short period of time and have attracted a lot of interest. This study uses a novel dataset of properties advertised for long-term rent in Malta between January 2019 and December 2019, and looks at the composition, characteristics and implication of these listings. It discusses the distribution of the housing stock advertised for long-term rentals, and looks at some price metrics for characteristics. Finally, using an extended dataset until June 2020, this paper looks at the proportion of properties experiencing positive and negative advertised price changes. |
| JEL: | C23 O18 R31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mlt:ppaper:0220&r=all |
| By: | NISHIOKA Shuichiro; OKUBO Toshihiro; TANAKA Mari |
| Abstract: | Since the burst of the bubble economy in the early 1990s, the stock and real estate prices collapsed in Japan. Among financial institutions, city banks were impacted the most. As a result, city banks reduced lending markedly, whereas regional banks kept credit flowing to borrowers. We use the plant-level data from the manufacturing sector to examine how regional differences in the share of city banks influenced plant survival. Using the historic share of city banks for each prefecture, we show that survival rates of plants in the mid-1990s were significantly lower in the prefectures with a high share of city banks. However, prefectures that underwent aggressive restructuring of city banks saw no improvements in employment and the prevalence of zombies as well as the reduction of regional markups and productivity. |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eti:dpaper:21021&r=all |
| By: | Mattie Landman; Sanna Ojanper\"a; Stephen Kinsella; Neave O'Clery |
| Abstract: | Despite the key role of multinational enterprises (MNEs) in both international markets and domestic economies, there is no consensus on whether or how they positively impact their host economy. In particular, do MNEs foster the creation of new domestic firms through knowledge spillovers? In this study, we look at the impact of the presence of related MNE industries on the entry and exit of domestic export industries in Irish regions before, during, and after the 2008 financial crisis. Specifically, we are interested in whether the presence of MNEs in a region results in knowledge spillovers and the creation of new domestic export activities in related sectors. To quantify how related an industry is to a region's current export basket we deploy an existing cohesion variable, closeness, that measures the relatedness of a new industry to existing industries within a region. We also introduce a new variable, strategic closeness, which captures not only the relatedness of industries within a region but their own connectivity or embeddedness. We use a dataset containing all government-supported export firms in Ireland between 2006-2018. We find that the presence of related MNE industries is associated with the entry of new domestic activity, suggesting that Irish regions benefited from domestic-MNE linkages. However this relationship was temporarily lost after the financial crisis and only recently re-established, with domestic entry dependent on the presence of highly embedded MNE sectors. Furthermore, we find that related MNEs help protect domestic industries against exit after the crisis and thereby play a role in enhancing regional resilience. |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2104.05754&r=all |
| By: | Muñoz, Pablo; Prem, Mounu |
| Abstract: | We study whether differences in management can explain variation in productivity and how more effective managers can be recruited in absence of high-powered incentives. To investigate this, we first extend the canonical teacher value-added model to account for school principals, and we document substantial variation in their ability to improve students’ learning. Teachers’ survey responses and quasi-experimental designs based on changes in school management validate our measure of principal effectiveness. Then, we leverage the timing of adoption of a civil service reform and show that despite having relatively rigid wages, public schools were able to attract more effective managers after increasing the competitiveness and transparency of their personnel selection process. |
| Date: | 2021–04–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fgv:epgewp:824&r=all |
| By: | Martin Hoesli (Swiss Finance Institute, University of Geneva [Switzerland], University of Aberdeen); Richard Malle (LIRSA - Laboratoire interdisciplinaire de recherche en sciences de l'action - CNAM - Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers [CNAM]) |
| Abstract: | The article analyzes the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on commercial real estate prices. We start by highlighting caveats to bear in mind when referring to direct real estate indices. We then analyze the behavior of commercial real estate prices during the pandemic, emphasizing differences across property types. For that purpose, we use data for both direct and listed real estate. We further discuss changes in the main factors affecting commercial real estate pricing. The article then turns to discussing the likely trajectory of commercial real estate prices in the future. We report that retail and hospitality properties and to a lesser extent office buildings have been affected the most by Covid-19. The other sectors, in particular the residential and industrial sectors, have shown more resilience. We maintain that the future trajectory of real estate prices will vary across sectors and that the type and location of assets will become increasingly important in their valuation. |
| Keywords: | Commercial real estate prices,Covid-19,Pandemic,Office,Retail,Hospitality |
| Date: | 2021–03–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-03186131&r=all |
| By: | Aracı, Doğu Tan (Prosus); Demirci, Murat (Koc University); Kirdar, Murat G. (Bogazici University) |
| Abstract: | We examine how the impact of refugees on natives' labor market outcomes varies by the development level of hosting areas, which has important implications for the optimal allocation of refugees across regions and countries. For this purpose, in the context of the largest refugee group in the world in a single country, Syrian refugees in Turkey, we exploit the significant variation in the development level across regions of Turkey, several of which host a substantial number of refugees. We find that the impact of refugees on natives' labor market outcomes becomes significantly less adverse as regional development level rises. For instance, the negative effects of the refugee shock on employment and labor force participation of women observed at the mean level of development vanish at high levels of development. Moreover, while the impact of the refugees on employment of men is negative for the least developed regions, it is positive for highly developed regions. Our findings imply that developed regions and countries are in a better position in terms of protecting their local population from the adverse effects of refugees in the labor market. |
| Keywords: | refugees, optimal refugee allocation, labor market impact, development level, employment and wages of men and women |
| JEL: | J61 O15 F22 R23 R58 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14267&r=all |
| By: | Jérôme Adda (Bocconi University, BIDSA and IGIER); Christian Dustmann (University College London and Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration); Joseph-Simon Görlach (Bocconi University, BIDSA, CReAM, IGIER and LEAP) |
| Abstract: | This paper develops and estimates a dynamic model where individuals differ in ability and location preference to evaluate the mechanisms that affect the evolution of immigrants’ careers in conjunction with their re-migration plans. Our analysis highlights a novel form of selective return migration where those who plan to stay longer invest more into skill acquisition, with important implications for the assessment of immigrants’ career paths and the estimation of their earnings profiles. Our study also explains the willingness of immigrants to accept jobs at wages that seem unacceptable to natives. Finally, our model provides important insight for the design of migration policies, showing that policies which initially restrict residence or condition residence on achievement shape not only immigrants’ career profiles through their impact on human capital investment but also determine the selection of arrivals and leavers. |
| Keywords: | International migration, human capital, expectations |
| JEL: | F22 J24 J61 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:2111&r=all |
| By: | Augusto Cerqua (Sapienza Università di Roma); Chiara Ferrante (Sapienza Università di Roma); Marco Letta (Sapienza Università di Roma) |
| Abstract: | The recent literature on the determinants of populism has highlighted the role of long-term trends of progressive isolation and prolonged economic stagnation in engendering discontent and, in turn, demand for political change. We investigate, instead, the potential of unanticipated local shocks in shaping the ‘geography of discontent’. Using comprehensive data at a fine spatial scale and a comparative natural experiment approach, we document that the occurrence of two destructive earthquakes in Italy resulted in sharply diverging electoral outcomes: while the 2012 Emilia quake did not alter voting behaviour, the 2009 L’Aquila earthquake paved the way for an impressive and persistent surge in right-wing populism in the most affected areas. Such heterogeneous patterns mainly originate from a stark contrast in post-disaster reconstruction processes and shifts in institutional trust. Our findings are consistent with the idea that not only “places that don’t matter†, but also “places that don’t recover†, can become populist hotbeds. |
| Keywords: | elections, populism, discontent, natural disasters, earthquakes |
| JEL: | D72 H12 Q54 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ahy:wpaper:wp14&r=all |
| By: | Datta, Sandip (City Montessori School); Kingdon, Geeta G. (University College London) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the widespread perception in India that the country has an acute teacher shortage of about one million teachers in public elementary schools, a view repeated in India's National Education Policy 2020. Using official DISE data, we show that there is hardly any net teacher deficit in the country since there is roughly the same number of surplus teachers as the number of teacher vacancies. Secondly, we show that measuring teacher requirements after removing the estimated fake students from enrolment data greatly reduces the required number of teachers and increases the number of surplus teachers, yielding an estimated net surplus of about 342,000 teachers. Thirdly, we show that if we both remove fake enrolment and also make a suggested hypothetical change to the teacher allocation rule to adjust for the phenomenon of emptying public schools (which has slashed the national median public-school size to a mere 64 students), the estimated net teacher surplus is about 764,000 teachers. Fourthly, we highlight that if government does fresh recruitment to fill the supposed nearly one-million vacancies, the already modest national mean pupil-teacher-ratio (PTR) of 22.8 would fall to 15.9, at a permanent fiscal cost of nearly Rupees 48,000 crore (USD 6.6 billion) per year in 2017-18 prices, which is higher than the individual GDPs of 56 countries in that year. The paper also highlights the volume of schools with extreme PTRs, and estimates the cost of teacher absence, pupil absence and fake enrolments. Overall, the paper highlights the major economic efficiencies that can result from an evidence-based approach to education policy making. |
| Keywords: | public elementary schools, pupil-teacher-ratios, teacher surpluses, fake enrolment, teacher absence, student absence, India |
| JEL: | I20 I21 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14251&r=all |
| By: | Haykaz Igityan (Monetary Policy Department, Central Bank of Armenia); Hasmik Kartashyan (Monetary Policy Department, Central Bank of Armenia) |
| Abstract: | This paper develops VAR model for Armenia with housing price and estimates the impact of housing price on GDP growth and inflation. Passthrough results show, that 1% increase in real housing price creates from 0.03 to 0.09% inflation and increases GDP by around 0.25% in the long run. Paper then discusses simple housing decision model and incorporates it into DSGE framework. Households are allowed to divide their disposable housing stock into private consumption and lend out to firms for commercial purposes. Having borrowing constraint in the model enables to generate both borrowing and housing cycles. Balance sheet channel allows to explain the empirically observed estimates of the effects of housing prices on the Armenian economy. According to the theoretical model’s results, the long-run response of inflation to the real housing price increase as a result of housing market’s specific shocks is estimated to lie in the interval of 0.045-0.118%, which is very close to empirical estimates. Moreover, model estimated commercial housing preference cycle is consistent with historical events of the Armenian economy. |
| Keywords: | Commercial and personal housing, Real estate, Housing price, DSGE model, Borrowing constraint, Bayesian Estimation |
| JEL: | E31 E44 E52 R21 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ara:wpaper:016&r=all |
| By: | Andrés Rodríguez-Pose (London School of Economics); Chiara Burlina (Gran Sasso Science Institute) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the uneven geography of COVID-19-related excess mortality during the first wave of the pandemic in Europe, before assessing the factors behind the geographical differences in impact. The analysis of 206 regions across 23 European countries reveals a distinct COVID-19 geography. Excess deaths were concentrated in a limited number of regions — expected deaths exceeded 20% in just 16 regions — with more than 40% of the regions considered experiencing no excess mortality during the first six months of 2020. Highly connected regions, in colder and dryer climates, with high air pollution levels, and relatively poorly endowed health systems witnessed the highest incidence of excess mortality. Institutional factors also played an important role. The first wave hit regions with a combination of weak and declining formal institutional quality and fragile informal institutions hardest. Low and declining national government effectiveness, together with a limited capacity to reach out across societal divides, and a frequent tendency to meet with friends and family were powerful drivers of regional excess mortality |
| Keywords: | COVID-19, pandemic, institutions, regions, Europe |
| JEL: | H75 O43 R58 |
| Date: | 2020–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ahy:wpaper:wp9&r=all |
| By: | Olaiya, Taiwo |
| Abstract: | Studies on the promise that federalism holds in terms of constituting political order by way of devolutionary mechanism in a plural society and the seemingly elusive management of diversity in African federal states are in the legions. However, scanty attention has been devoted to the ethnicity cog constraining the management of diversity in spite of the promising roles of federalism in the federal states of Africa. The article examines the dominant political and socio-cultural realities that shape the management of diversity in African federal states. Four mutually reinforcing factors— uncritical state-making, political entrepreneurship and elitist power plays, ethno-regional nationalisms, and prebendal politics— undermining federal practices and, ultimately, exacerbating the management of diversity are reported. The article also considers relevant empiricism and critical conceptual questions that emerge from ethnicity in Africa. Empirical illustrations are restricted to Nigeria and Ethiopia: Africa’s appreciably largest federations. |
| Date: | 2021–03–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:osfxxx:wt3nf&r=all |
| By: | Christl, Michael; Bélanger, Alain; Conte, Alessandra; Mazza, Jacopo; Narazani, Edlira |
| Abstract: | The increasing flows of immigrants in Europe over the last decade has generated a range of considerations in the policy agenda of many receiving countries. One of the main considerations for policy makers and public opinions alike is whether immigrants contribute their ”fair” share to their host country tax and welfare system. This paper seeks to answer this question based on an empirical assessment of the net fiscal contributions of immigrants in the 27 EU Member States using EUROMOD, a EU-wide tax-benefit microsimulation model. In addition to the traditional view of the tax-benefit system, we add indirect taxation and in-kind benefits to the analysis of net contributions. Our findings highlight that migrants on average contributed about 250 euro per year more than natives to the welfare state in 2015. However, when we take an average age-specific life-cycle perspective, we find that natives generally show a higher net fiscal contribution than both, intra-EU and extra-EU migrants, while extra-EU migrants contribute on average less than intra-EU migrants. |
| Keywords: | Migration,Microsimulation,Tax-benefit system,EUROMOD |
| JEL: | F22 J15 H2 H5 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:814&r=all |
| By: | William Gatt; Noel Rapa; Luca Brugnolini (Central Bank of Malta) |
| Abstract: | We extend the Central Bank of Malta’s core DSGE model – MEDSEA – with housing and financial frictions to capture the important theoretical links between house prices, credit and consumption. The model features a rich set of features that are inherent to small open economies in a monetary union. We add a borrowing constraint on a subset of households that is contingent on the value of housing wealth and a maximum loan-to-value (LTV) ratio. We also impose capital requirements on the financial intermediary through a minimum capital-to-assets ratio (CAR) constraint. These two requirements form the basis of a typical macroprudential regime in a developed economy. We show how the macroprudential authority can dampen the rise in credit and consumption during a credit boom by using these two policy tools to ‘lean against the wind’. MEDSEA-FIN is therefore tailored to study macro-financial issues related to housing and credit, and the adequate policy responses. |
| JEL: | C54 E44 E58 E60 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mlt:wpaper:0420&r=all |
| By: | Ivar Ekeland; Alfred Galichon |
| Abstract: | This paper exhibits a duality between the theory of Revealed Preference of Afriat and the housing allocation problem of Shapley and Scarf. In particular, it is shown that Afriat's theorem can be interpreted as a second welfare theorem in the housing problem. Using this duality, the revealed preference problem is connected to an optimal assignment problem, and a geometrical characterization of the rationalizability of experiment data is given. This allows in turn to give new indices of rationalizability of the data, and to define weaker notions of rationalizability, in the spirit of Afriat's efficiency index. |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2102.02593&r=all |
| By: | Albert Alex Zevelev |
| Abstract: | Does the ability to pledge an asset as collateral, after purchase, affect its price? This paper identifies the impact of collateral service flows on house prices, exploiting a plausibly exogenous constitutional amendment in Texas which legalized home equity loans in 1998. The law change increased Texas house prices 4%; this is price-based evidence that households are credit-constrained and value home equity loans to facilitate consumption smoothing. Prices rose more in locations with inelastic supply, higher pre-law house prices, higher income, and lower unemployment. These estimates reveal that richer households value the option to pledge their home as collateral more strongly. |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2102.02935&r=all |
| By: | Lea-Maria Löbel; Hannes Kröger; Ana Nanette Tibubos |
| Abstract: | The study of loneliness and social isolation has provided a lot of evidence for differences in the prevalence of the two, depending on the context of individuals. Given different social, legal, and economic differences for migrants and refugees, it has been documented that these groups show elevated levels of both social isolation and loneliness compared to the respective host population. Differences in association between social isolation and loneliness have received less emphasize. We test five competing hypotheses about the different sizes of association between social isolation and loneliness in the groups of migrants, refugees, and the host population in Germany. The hypotheses are informed by the differences in social, legal, and economic circumstances between the groups and their socioeconomic and psychological consequences. Using survey data from a large stratified random sample of the population, including migrants and refugees, we test our five hypotheses using a Bayesian Evaluation of Informative Hypotheses. We find highest relative support for the hypothesis about increased need for social networks and support among refugees, which would be indicated by a higher association of social isolation and loneliness for refugees than for the host and migrant population. However, further investigation of the results show all theory derived hypotheses perform poorly in explaining the major pattern in the data: The association of social isolation and loneliness is lowest for migrants (about 0.25 SD), with similar larger associations for refugees and the host population (about 0.5 SD). We discuss this contradiction of theory and evidence, proposing avenues for future research. |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwsop:diw_sp1124&r=all |
| By: | IKEUCHI Kenta; FUKAO Kyoji; Cristiano PERUGINI |
| Abstract: | In this paper we investigate whether and to what extent the evolution and variability of the college wage gap in Japan can be tracked down to the firm level. To this aim, we use the microdata on workers from the Basic Survey on Wage Structure (BSWS) over the period 2005 to 2018 and link information on individuals, job characteristics and wages to the characteristics of the employer. We focus in particular on establishment size and workforce composition in terms of regular and non-regular employees. We find that increasing establishment size and share of regular workers tend to increase the within-firm wage gap between high- and medium-educated workers, once all observable individual, job and establishment characteristics are controlled for. Our findings corroborate the idea that firm heterogeneity plays a relevant role in shaping wage inequality between education groups and that employer size and share of regular workers are associated with the capacity to attract and keep high-educated employees with unobservable characteristics that justify a wage premium above average market levels. |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eti:dpaper:21022&r=all |
| By: | Piracha, Matloob; Tani, Massimiliano; Tchuente, Guy |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses the remittance behaviour of two cohorts of migrants who entered Australia before and after a policy change implemented in the 1990s, which tightened the entry requirements for a subgroup of applicants. We use a mix of a conditional difference-in-differences and OLS estimator accounting for the presence of interactive fixed-effects to address the challenge of evaluating the impact of policy change using data drawn from two distinct migrant samples, deriving the conditions to obtain a consistent estimator. We show two results: one due to policy change and the other due to change in the composition of migrants. The two results capture different aspects of remittance behaviour. |
| Keywords: | Immigration,average treatment effect on the treated,difference-in-differences |
| JEL: | C13 F22 F24 J61 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:94r&r=all |
| By: | Isha Rajbhandari (University of Puget Sound); Alessandra Faggian (Gran Sasso Science Institute); Mark Partridge (Ohio State University) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the relationship between oil and gas development and in-migration of workers into boomtowns, taking into account their human capital. Using zero-inflated negative binomial estimation methodology, we find that shale development has differing scale and demand shock impacts on U.S. interregional migration flows. The results demonstrate the heterogeneity of migration responses to shale developments with a disproportionately higher positive effect for medium-high human capital workers with technical degrees or trainings common in the energy industry. Furthermore, labor demand shocks from oil and gas development have a modest association with migration flows, which is contrary to the assumption that natural resource boom is a considerable attraction for migrants. This study highlights the types of human capital gained by oil and gas development areas characterized as being rural and sparsely populated, which can have important implications for the long-run growth and economic resilience of the boomtowns. |
| Keywords: | migration, shale gas boom, human capital |
| JEL: | J23 J24 Q33 R11 R23 |
| Date: | 2020–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ahy:wpaper:wp11&r=all |
| By: | Dar, Manzoor H.; de Janvry, Alain; Emerick, Kyle; Kelley, Erin M.; Sadoulet, Elisabeth |
| Abstract: | Can agents in a social network be induced to obtain information from outside their peer groups? Using a field experiment in rural Bangladesh, we show that demonstration plots in agriculture - a technique where the first users of a new variety cultivate it in a side-by-side comparison with an existing variety - facilitate social learning by inducing conversations and information sharing outside of existing social networks. We compare these improvements in learning with those from seeding new technology with more central farmers in village social networks. The demonstration plots - when cultivated by randomly selected farmers - improve knowledge by just as much as seeding with more central farmers. Moreover, the demonstration plots only induce conversations and facilitate learning for farmers that were unconnected to entry points at baseline. Finally, we combine this diffusion experiment with an impact experiment to show that both demonstration plots and improved seeding transmit information to farmers that are less likely to benefit from the new innovation. |
| Keywords: | Social and Behavioral Sciences |
| Date: | 2019–05–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:agrebk:qt8qx7m4zq&r=all |
| By: | Haaland, Ingar (University of Bergen and CESifo); Roth, Christopher (University of Warwick, briq, CESifo, CEPR, and CAGE) |
| Abstract: | This paper provides representative evidence on beliefs about racial discrimination and examines whether information causally affects support for pro-black policies. Eliciting quantitative beliefs about the extent of hiring discrimination against blacks, we uncover large disagreement about the extent of racial discrimination with particularly pronounced partisan differences. An information treatment leads to a convergence in beliefs about racial discrimination but does not lead to a similar convergence in support of pro-black policies. The results demonstrate that while providing information can substantially reduce disagreement about the extent of racial discrimination, it is not sufficient to reduce disagreement about pro-black policies. |
| Keywords: | Racial Discrimination ; Beliefs ; Pro-Black Policies ; Policy Preferences JEL Classification: C91 ; D83 ; J71 ; J15 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wrk:warwec:1339&r=all |
| By: | Marcén, Miriam; Morales, Marina |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the role of the gender equality culture in cross-country gender commuting gap differences. To avoid inter-relationships between culture, institutions, and economic conditions in a simple cross-country analysis, we adopt the epidemiological approach. We merge data from the American Time Use Survey for the years 2006–2018 on early-arrival first- and second-generation immigrants living in the United States with their corresponding annual country of ancestry’s Gender Gap Index (GGI). Because all these immigrants (with different cultural backgrounds) have grown up under the same laws, institutions, and economic conditions in the US, the gender differences among them in the time devoted to commuting to/from work can be interpreted as evidence of the existence of a cultural impact. Our results show that a culture with more gender equality in the country of ancestry may reduce the gender commuting gap of parents. Specifically, an increase of 1 standard deviation in the GGI increases women’s daily commuting time relative to men by almost 5 minutes, a sizeable effect representing 23 percent of the standard deviation in the gender commuting gap across countries of ancestry. A supplementary analysis provides possible mechanisms through which culture operates and is transmitted, showing the potential existence of horizontal transmission and the importance of the presence of children in commuting. Our results are robust to the use of different subsamples, geographical controls, and selection into employment and telework. |
| Keywords: | Commuting,culture,immigrants,American Time Use Survey |
| JEL: | R41 J16 Z13 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:813&r=all |
| By: | Liza Charroin (UP1 UFR02 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - École d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne); Bernard Fortin (CIRPEE - Centre interuniversitaire sur le risque, les politiques économiques et l'emploi [Montréal] - UQAM - Université du Québec à Montréal = University of Québec in Montréal, CIRANO - Centre interuniversitaire de recherche en analyse des organisations - UQAM - Université du Québec à Montréal = University of Québec in Montréal, IZA - Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit - Institute of Labor Economics); Marie Villeval (GATE Lyon Saint-Étienne - Groupe d'analyse et de théorie économique - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - Université de Lyon - UJM - Université Jean Monnet [Saint-Étienne] - UCBL - Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 - Université de Lyon - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - ENS Lyon - École normale supérieure - Lyon, IZA - Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit - Institute of Labor Economics) |
| Abstract: | If individuals tend to behave like their peers, is it because of conformity, that is, the preference of people to align behavior with the behavior of their peers; homophily, that is, the tendency of people to bond with similar others; or both? We address this question in the context of an ethical dilemma. Using a peer effect model allowing for homophily, we designed a real-effort laboratory experiment in which individuals could misreport their performance to earn more. Our results reveal a preference for conformity and for homophily in the selection of peers, but only among participants who were cheating in isolation. The size of peer effects is similar when identical peers were randomly assigned and when they were selected by individuals. We thus jointly reject the presence of a self-selection bias in the peer effect estimates and of a link strength effect.. |
| Keywords: | Peer Effects,Homophily,Dishonesty,Self-Selection Bias |
| Date: | 2021–04–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-03187671&r=all |
| By: | Ravshanbek Khodzhimatov; Stephan Leitner; Friederike Wall |
| Abstract: | Social norms are rules and standards of expected behavior that emerge in societies as a result of information exchange between agents. This paper studies the effects of emergent social norms on the performance of teams. We use the NK-framework to build an agent-based model, in which agents work on a set of interdependent tasks and exchange information regarding their past behavior with their peers. Social norms emerge from these interactions. We find that social norms come at a cost for the overall performance, unless tasks assigned to the team members are highly correlated, and the effect is stronger when agents share information regarding more tasks, but is unchanged when agents communicate with more peers. Finally, we find that the established finding that the team-based incentive schemes improve performance for highly complex tasks still holds in presence of social norms. |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2104.05993&r=all |
| By: | Marcus, Jan (University of Hamburg); Siedler, Thomas (University of Hamburg); Ziebarth, Nicolas R. (Cornell University) |
| Abstract: | Starting in 2009, the German state of Saxony distributed sports club membership vouchers among all 33,000 third graders in the state. The policy's objective was to encourage them to develop a long-term habit of exercising. In 2018, we carried out a large register-based survey among several cohorts in Saxony and two neighboring states. Our difference-indifferences estimations show that, even after a decade, awareness of the voucher program was significantly higher in the treatment group. We also find that youth received and redeemed the vouchers. However, we do not find significant short- or long-term effects on sports club membership, physical activity, overweightness, or motor skills. |
| Keywords: | physical activity, voucher, primary school, obesity, habit formation, objective health measures, school health examinations, windfall gains, crowd-out, taxpayer subsidies |
| JEL: | I12 I14 I18 I28 I38 Z28 H71 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14246&r=all |
| By: | Sanjeev Goyal (emlyon business school); Penélope Hernández; Guillem Martínez-Cánovas; Frederic Moisan; Manuel Muñoz-Herrera; Angel Sánchez |
| Abstract: | We study a setting where individuals prefer to coordinate with others but they differ on their preferred action. Our interest is in understanding the role of link formation with others in shaping behavior. So we consider the situation in which interactions are exogenous and a situation where individuals choose links that determine the interactions. Theory is permissive in both settings: conformity (on either of the actions) and diversity (with different groups choosing their preferred actions) are both sustainable in equilibrium. We conduct an experiment to understand how link formation affects equilibrium selection. Our experiment reveals the powerful effect of linking on equilibrium selection: with an exogenous complete network, subjects choose to conform on the majority's preferred action. By contrast, with endogenous linking—irrespective of the costs of linking—subjects always opt for diversity of actions. |
| Keywords: | networks,equilibrium selection,Social coordination,experiment |
| Date: | 2020–09–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-03188210&r=all |