Knowledge that Transforms

A specification test is proposed to test the adequacy of the implicit conditional mean specification in a transformation model. Regardless of the transformation under the null, the statistic is computable from ordinary least squares output via auxiliary ordinary least squares regressions. Further, the test presumes no particular form for the conditional variance of the transformed and untransformed regressands. A simple goodness-of-fit measure that can be used to compare across transformations is a natural byproduct of the analysis. An application to a well-known fisheries data set is included. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

This paper compares the geographic dispersion of employment in manufacturing industries across U.S. metropolitan areas with an imputed measure of local industry demand. The results indicate that local demand has significant long-term and short-term location effects in many industries, including some with negligible transportation costs. Variation in location patterns across industries indicates that demand-side agglomeration economies and technological intensity strengthen the pull of local demand, while supply-side economies of scale and agglomeration effects weaken it. Implications are discussed with regard to international trade, technological change, industrialization and development, urban and regional issues, and industrial organization. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

Teofilo Ozuna, Jr., Irma Adriana Gomez, Estimating a System of Recreation Demand Functions Using a Seemingly Unrelated Poisson Regression Approach, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 76, No. 2 (May, 1994), pp. 356-360

John A. Bishop, John P. Formby, Paul D. Thistle, Convergence and Divergence of Regional Income Distributions and Welfare, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 76, No. 2 (May, 1994), pp. 228-235

This paper analyzes the technical efficiency of group home care for the developmentally disabled in the Detroit metropolitan area. Linear programming methods are used to construct a production frontier that allows measurement of relative technical efficiency among homes in the sample. A sensitivity analysis is performed to identify influential observations in the data that might result from measurement error that could distort the efficiency measures. A regression analysis is undertaken to examine the effect of various factors on measured efficiency. Policy implications are discussed in the concluding section. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

Janez Prasnikar, Jan Svejnar, Dubravko Mihaljek, Vesna Prasnikar, Behavior of Participatory Firms in Yugoslavia: Lessons for Transforming Economies, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 76, No. 4 (Nov., 1994), pp. 728-741

A controversial aspect of the management buyouts that were popular throughout the 1980s is the potential for a conflict of interest to arise when a manager bids to acquire the firm he manages. This study examines 184 management buyouts and reports three findings. First, returns to prebuyout shareholders are greater when managers must bid against outside acquirers. Second, bid revisions in the face of competition exceed revisions due to shareholder litigation and negotiations with boards. Third, the incidence of competition is negatively related to the prebuyout share holdings of managers. Coauthors are Ronald F. Singer, Anju Seth, and Darla F. Lang. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

This paper describes a low variance simulator of the normal distribution function. The probability integral is evaluated exactly at an initial point specified with a factor analytic covariance structure, so that the integral can be derived using dimension reduction techniques. The line integral between the initial point and the desired point is evaluated using Plackett's identity. A Monte Carlo simulation of this line integral simulator (LIS) with the Geweke-Hajivassiliou-Keane (GHK) simulator demonstrates that for dimensions of ten or less, the LIS outperformed the GHK simulator, typically by an order of magnitude and in some cases by two orders of magnitude. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

Thomas J. Prusa, James A. Schmitz, Jr., Can Companies Maintain their Initial Innovative Thrust? A Study of the PC Software Industry, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 76, No. 3 (Aug., 1994), pp. 523-540

Keith R. Ihlanfeldt, Madelyn V. Young, Intrametropolitan Variation in Wage Rates: The Case of Atlanta Fast-Food Restaurant Workers, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 76, No. 3 (Aug., 1994), pp. 425-433