This paper develops and empirically tests a two‐factor model for pricing financial and real assets contingent on the price of oil. The factors are the spot price of oil and the instantaneous convenience yield. The parameters of the model are estimated using weekly oil futures contract prices from January 1984 to November 1988, and the model's performance is assessed out of sample by valuing futures contracts over the period November 1988 to May 1989. Finally, the model is applied to determine the present values of one barrel of oil deliverable in one to ten years time.

Using aggregated data for twelve countries, a cross section of microeconomic data, and a panel of households, the authors demonstrate that increases in time in the labor market reduce sleep. Their theory of the demand for sleep differs from standard models of time use by assuming that sleep affects wages by affecting labor market productivity. Estimates of a system of demand equations demonstrate that higher wage rates reduce sleep time among men, but increase their waking nonmarket time by an equal amount. Among women the wage effect on sleep is negative by very small.

This paper presents a dynamic general equilibrium model of North-South trade in which research and development races between firms determine the rate of product innovation in the North. Tariffs designed to protect dying industries in the North from Southern competition reduce the steady-state number of dominant firms in the North, reduce the rate of product innovation, and increase the relative wage of Northern workers.

Our analysis of growth assumes endogenous fertility and a rising rate of return on human capital as the stock of human capital increases. When human capital is abundant, rates of return on human capital investments are high relative to rates of return on children, whereas when human capital is scarce, rates of return on human capital are low relative to those on children. As a result, societies with limited human capital choose large families and invest little in each member; those with abundant human capital do the opposite. This leads to two stable steady states. One has large families and little human capital; the other has small families and perhaps growing human and physical capital.

Executive stock option plans have asymmetric payoffs that could induce managers to take on more risk. Evidence from traded call options and stock return data supports this notion. Implicit share price variance, computed from the Black‐Scholes option pricing model, and stock return variance increase after the approval of an executive stock option plan. The event is accompanied by a significant positive stock and a negative bond market reaction. This evidence is consistent with the notion that executive stock options may induce a wealth transfer from bondholders to stockholders.

Prior studies report lower issue costs for shelf registered debt and conclude that the benefits of increased underwriter competition can be realized by those firms using this registration procedure. This study re‐examines the purported superiority of issuing debt via shelf registration, and finds that the savings in issue costs displayed by earlier studies can be attributed to a self selection bias and not the method of registration.

In this paper, we examine the profitability of insider trading in firms whose securities trade in the OTC/NASDAQ market. Although the evidence suggests timing and forecasting ability on the part of insiders, high transaction costs (especially bid-ask spreads) appear to eliminate the potential for positive abnormal returns from active trading. By implication, outside investors who mimic the trading of insiders are also precluded from earning abnormal profits. In addition, we provide evidence on the determinants of insiders' profits. The data suggest that insiders closer to the firm trade on more valuable information than insiders removed from the firm.

In this paper, we examine the profitability of insider trading in firms whose securities trade in the OTC/NASDAQ market. Although the evidence suggests timing and forecasting ability on the part of insiders, high transaction costs (especially bid‐ask spreads) appear to eliminate the potential for positive abnormal returns from active trading. By implication, outside investors who mimic the trading of insiders are also precluded from earning abnormal profits. In addition, we provide evidence on the determinants of insiders' profits. The data suggest that insiders closer to the firm trade on more valuable information than insiders removed from the firm.