Knowledge that Transforms

Jyoti Khanna, Wallace E. Huffman, Todd Sandler, Agricultural Research Expenditures in the United States: A Public Goods Perspective, The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 76, No. 2 (May, 1994), pp. 267-277

Abrtmcr-An important question in the study of aging concerns the rate at which people physically deteriorate with age.HOW much, for example.CB~ be physically expected of, say, a healthy, non-injured 75.year-old man or woman relative to what be or she could do at ape 4% This paper applies econometric techniques to data on men's track and field and road racing remrds by age to estimate the rate at which men sknv down with asc.Eight track.eight field.and eleven road racing events me considered.The main econometric technique usad is a combination of the polytwmial-spline method and the frontier-function method.A number of the evetttr have been pooled to provide more et%cient estimates.1.

Antitrust regime shifts represented by the 1933 adoption and 1935 annulment of the National Industrial Recovery Act are postulated to have effects analogous to temporary achievement of Bradburd and Over's 'integrative concentration level' (Bradburd and Over, 1982); a level at which cartel formation and maintenance costs are outweighed by collusive spoils. 'Regime switching' analysis of Census of Manufactures data reveals a 'critical concentration level' of 60 percent in 1933, which disappears in 1935, and reemerges at 38 percent in 1937. The empirical results support the Bradburd and Over framework and suggest that temporary shifts in antitrust regimes may have lasting impacts on the ability of an industry to exercise market power. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

The effects of unemployment and inflation on quintile shares of family income in the United States are estimated by means of generalized least squares. Inflation is found to have a significant progressive impact on the distribution of income. The results also lend support to earlier findings regarding the regressive effects of unemployment. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

This study examines the Treasury's experiment with single-price bond auctions in the mid-1970s and finds that, controlling for factors unrelated to auction technique, markups of auction average rates over when-issued rates shortly after auctions were a statistically significant seven to eight basis points higher at single-price auctions than at discriminating-price auctions. These results suggest that single-price auctions raised Treasury borrowing costs by roughly 3/4 percent of the issuing price of auctioned securities. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

The instantaneous probability (hazard rate) of a firm's exit from Chapter 11 protection is examined. Using the Weibull duration model, the effect of various regressors and the effect of the time a firm spends under Chapter 11 protection on this instantaneous probability is analyzed. I show that the hazard increases significantly under Chapter 11. Among the variables chosen, the interest burden of the firm and the capacity utilization of the firm's industry significantly increase the hazard. Other firm-specific variables like the long-term debt-to-assets ratio and the number of shares outstanding and economy wide variables, like the prime interest rate and the gross national product growth rate have no significant effect on the hazard. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

A transaction-cost model of vertical integration is tested, based on detailed descriptions of every pulp and paper mill operating in the United States between 1900 and 1940. This study contributes to the literature on integration through the use of a large, disaggregated database that allows identification of individual mills over time. Vertical integration of pulp and paper production is found to be positively associated with regional concentration, paper-mill capacity, and production of standardized grades of paper. Over time, new entrants behaved differently than established mills, because few mills switched between integration and specialization once established. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

Available from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:3597.9512(CEPR-DP--660) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply Centre

We estimate the general deterrent effect of criminal justice resources on criminal behavior using panel data for a sample representative of young men in U.S. urban areas. Our data, which combine individual-level information on arrests and personal characteristics with aggregate information on criminal justice resources, allow us to obtain deterrence measures that reflect theoretical concepts and are of potential policy relevance. We find robust evidence of a general deterrent effect flowing from criminal justice, particularly police, resources. The nature of our data also allows us to conduct extensive exogeneity tests and to explore a number of possible 'third causes' for the deterrent effect. We find strong evidence that our deterrence variables are exogenous and no evidence that our deterrence result stems from commonly hypothesized third causes. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.

Instrumental variable tests for serial correlation can be carried out by adding lagged residuals from initial estimation to the regressors of the model under scrutiny and then checking their joint significance. It is shown that asymptotically valid tests are obtained if the lagged residuals are also added to the initial instrument set. Monte Carlo evidence suggests that useful improvements in finite sample behavior under null and alternative hypotheses can be produced when the instrument set is extended to include the relevant lagged residuals. Links with other tests are discussed and a modification allowing for conditional heteroskedasticity is described. Copyright 1994 by MIT Press.