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Economic Models (economic + models)
Selected AbstractsIntegrating Transportation Network and Regional Economic Models to Estimate the Costs of a Large Urban EarthquakeJOURNAL OF REGIONAL SCIENCE, Issue 1 2001Sungbin Cho In this paper we summarize an integrated, operational model of losses due to earthquake impacts on transportation and industrial capacity, and how these losses affect the metropolitan economy. The procedure advances the information provided by transportation and activity system analysis techniques in ways that help capture the most important ecomonic implications of earthquakes. Network costs and origin-destination requirements are modeled endogenously and consistently. Indirect and induced losses associated with direct impacts on transportation and industrial capacity are distributed across zones and ecomonic sectors. Preliminary results are summarized for a magnitude 7.1 earthquake on the Elysian Park blind thrust fault in Los Angeles. [source] Characterization and comparison of health-related utility in people with diabetes with various single and multiple vascular complicationsDIABETIC MEDICINE, Issue 10 2006C. Ll. Abstract Aims To characterize and compare health-related utility in a large cohort of patients treated in hospital with diabetes and with single and multiple comorbidities. Methods The study was conducted in Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan, UK. Health-related utility was measured using the EQ5Dindex, a standardized instrument for measuring health outcome. Patients from the Health Outcomes Data Repository (HODaR) were surveyed by postal questionnaire 6 weeks post discharge for in-patients and during clinics for patients attending as out-patients between January 2002 and July 2005. Patients with diabetes were identified by a previous history of in-patient admission with diabetes or as an out-patient with diabetes recorded as a coexisting diagnosis. Results, We identified 4502 patients with diabetes. Mean ages were 65.4 and 64.2 years for males and females, respectively. Of these, 2003 (45%) had no recorded vascular complication. Overall, the EQ5Dindex was 0.584 (sd 0.325) for males and 0.533 (sd 0.351) for females. For those without any vascular complications the mean EQ5Dindex was 0.735 (sd 0.288). In a general linear model, the presence of single and multiple complications had a detrimental impact on the EQ5Dindex. Conclusion The results of this study provide an indication of the true impact of diabetes in terms of health-related utility. There was a decrease in the mean EQ5Dindex for those with vascular complications. Economic models of diabetes that have used additive or multiplicative methods to assess utility in individuals with several complications may be unreliable, and direct measurements, such as this, are recommended. [source] LAND RICH AND DATA POOR: MODELLING REQUIREMENTS IN AUSTRALIA'S FAR NORTHECONOMIC PAPERS: A JOURNAL OF APPLIED ECONOMICS AND POLICY, Issue 3 2005Natalie Stoeckl Economic models have long been used as a way of organising and presenting information for policy makers interested in large regions,e.g. nations,and recent advances in information technology make the goal of developing models for decision makers in other locales a realistic one. The research on which this paper focuses was part of large project investigating the feasibility and desirability of developing a multi-disciplinary computer model of the Australian Savannas. In the large project, researchers were broken in to three teams: those considering the biophysical, demographic, and economic aspects of the modelling problem. This paper presents findings from part of the economic component of the investigation: that which sought information from key local ,stakeholders' about the type of information that would be useful to them. Responses indicate that many of Australia's existing economic models are capable of providing the ,right' type of information; but at too coarse a geographic scale for those in remote regions. Evidently, there is a need for developing other models. [source] The cost-effectiveness of population Helicobacter pylori screening and treatment: a Markov model using economic data from a randomized controlled trialALIMENTARY PHARMACOLOGY & THERAPEUTICS, Issue 3 2002J. Mason Background: Economic models have suggested that population Helicobacter pylori screening and treatment may be a cost-effective method of reducing mortality from gastric cancer. These models are conservative as they do not consider that the programme may reduce health service peptic ulcer and other dyspepsia costs. We have evaluated the economic impact of population H. pylori screening and treatment over 2 years in a randomized controlled trial and have incorporated the results into an economic model exploring the impact of H. pylori eradication on peptic ulcer disease and gastric cancer. Methods: Subjects between the ages of 40 and 49 years were randomly invited to attend their local primary care centre. H. pylori status was evaluated by 13C-urea breath test and infected individuals were randomized to receive omeprazole, 20 mg b.d., clarithromycin, 250 mg b.d., and tinidazole, 500 mg b.d., for 7 days or identical placebos. Economic data on health service costs for dyspepsia were obtained from a primary care note review for the 2 years following randomization. These data were incorporated into a Markov model comparing population H. pylori screening and treatment with no intervention. Results: A total of 2329 of 8407 subjects were H. pylori positive: 1161 were randomized to receive eradication therapy and 1163 to receive placebo. The cost difference favoured the intervention group 2 years after randomization, but this did not reach statistical significance (£11.42 per subject cost saving; 95% confidence interval, £30.04 to , £7.19; P=0.23). Analysis by gender suggested a statistically significant dyspepsia cost saving in men (£27.17 per subject; 95% confidence interval, £50.01 to £4.32; P=0.02), with no benefit in women (, £4.46 per subject; 95% confidence interval, , £33.85 to £24.93). Modelling of these data suggested that population H. pylori screening and treatment for 1 000 000 45-year-olds would save over £6 000 000 and 1300 years of life. The programme would cost £14 200 per life year saved if the health service dyspepsia cost savings were the lower limit of the 95% confidence intervals and H. pylori eradication had only a 10% efficacy in reducing mortality from distal gastric cancer and peptic ulcer disease. Conclusions: Modelling suggests that population H. pylori screening and treatment are likely to be cost-effective and could be the first cost-neutral screening programme. This provides a further mandate for clinical trials to evaluate the efficacy of population H. pylori screening and treatment in preventing mortality from gastric cancer and peptic ulcer disease. [source] Communicating quality: a unified model of disclosure and signallingTHE RAND JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS, Issue 4 2008Andrew F. Daughety Firms communicate product quality to consumers through a variety of channels. Economic models of such communication take two alternative forms when quality is exogenous: (i),disclosure of quality through a credible direct claim; or (ii),signalling of quality via producer actions that influence buyers' beliefs about quality. In general, these two literatures have ignored one another. We argue that firms should be viewed as choosing which means of communication they will employ. We show that integration of these two alternatives leads to new implications about disclosure, signalling, firm preferences over type, and the social efficiency of the channel of communication employed. [source] Maximizing revenue in Grid markets using an economically enhanced resource managerCONCURRENCY AND COMPUTATION: PRACTICE & EXPERIENCE, Issue 14 2010M. Macías Abstract Traditional resource management has had as its main objective the optimization of throughput, based on parameters such as CPU, memory, and network bandwidth. With the appearance of Grid markets, new variables that determine economic expenditure, benefit and opportunity must be taken into account. The Self-organizing ICT Resource Management (SORMA) project aims at allowing resource owners and consumers to exploit market mechanisms to sell and buy resources across the Grid. SORMA's motivation is to achieve efficient resource utilization by maximizing revenue for resource providers and minimizing the cost of resource consumption within a market environment. An overriding factor in Grid markets is the need to ensure that the desired quality of service levels meet the expectations of market participants. This paper explains the proposed use of an economically enhanced resource manager (EERM) for resource provisioning based on economic models. In particular, this paper describes techniques used by the EERM to support revenue maximization across multiple service level agreements and provides an application scenario to demonstrate its usefulness and effectiveness. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Dynamic data replication in LCG 2008CONCURRENCY AND COMPUTATION: PRACTICE & EXPERIENCE, Issue 11 2008C. Nicholson Abstract To provide performance access to data from high-energy physics experiments such as the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), controlled replication of files among grid sites is required. Dynamic, automated replication in response to jobs may also be useful and has been investigated using the grid simulator OptorSim. In this paper, results are presented from simulations of the LHC Computing Grid in 2008, in a physics analysis scenario. These show, first, that dynamic replication does give improved job throughput; second, that for this complex grid system, simple replication strategies such as Least Recently Used and Least Frequently Used are as effective as more advanced economic models; third, that grid site policies that allow maximum resource sharing are more effective; and lastly, that dynamic replication is particularly effective when data access patterns include some files being accessed more often than others, such as with a Zipf-like distribution. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Solving, Estimating, and Selecting Nonlinear Dynamic Models Without the Curse of DimensionalityECONOMETRICA, Issue 2 2010Viktor Winschel We present a comprehensive framework for Bayesian estimation of structural nonlinear dynamic economic models on sparse grids to overcome the curse of dimensionality for approximations. We apply sparse grids to a global polynomial approximation of the model solution, to the quadrature of integrals arising as rational expectations, and to three new nonlinear state space filters which speed up the sequential importance resampling particle filter. The posterior of the structural parameters is estimated by a new Metropolis,Hastings algorithm with mixing parallel sequences. The parallel extension improves the global maximization property of the algorithm, simplifies the parameterization for an appropriate acceptance ratio, and allows a simple implementation of the estimation on parallel computers. Finally, we provide all algorithms in the open source software JBendge for the solution and estimation of a general class of models. [source] Estimation and Confidence Regions for Parameter Sets in Econometric Models,ECONOMETRICA, Issue 5 2007Victor Chernozhukov This paper develops a framework for performing estimation and inference in econometric models with partial identification, focusing particularly on models characterized by moment inequalities and equalities. Applications of this framework include the analysis of game-theoretic models, revealed preference restrictions, regressions with missing and corrupted data, auction models, structural quantile regressions, and asset pricing models. Specifically, we provide estimators and confidence regions for the set of minimizers ,I of an econometric criterion function Q(,). In applications, the criterion function embodies testable restrictions on economic models. A parameter value ,that describes an economic model satisfies these restrictions if Q(,) attains its minimum at this value. Interest therefore focuses on the set of minimizers, called the identified set. We use the inversion of the sample analog, Qn(,), of the population criterion, Q(,), to construct estimators and confidence regions for the identified set, and develop consistency, rates of convergence, and inference results for these estimators and regions. To derive these results, we develop methods for analyzing the asymptotic properties of sample criterion functions under set identification. [source] Anchoring Economic Predictions in Common KnowledgeECONOMETRICA, Issue 2 2002R. Guesnerie The paper examines within a unified methodology expectational coordination in a series of economic models. The methodology views the predictions associated with the Rational Expectations Hypothesis as reasonable whenever they can be derived from the more basic Common Knowledge Hypothesis. The paper successively considers a simple non-noisy N -dimensional model, standard models with "intrinsic" uncertainty, and reference intertemporal models with infinite horizon. It reviews existing results and suggests new ones. It translates the formal results into looser but economically intuitive statements, whose robustness, in the present state of knowledge, is tentatively ascertained. [source] LAND RICH AND DATA POOR: MODELLING REQUIREMENTS IN AUSTRALIA'S FAR NORTHECONOMIC PAPERS: A JOURNAL OF APPLIED ECONOMICS AND POLICY, Issue 3 2005Natalie Stoeckl Economic models have long been used as a way of organising and presenting information for policy makers interested in large regions,e.g. nations,and recent advances in information technology make the goal of developing models for decision makers in other locales a realistic one. The research on which this paper focuses was part of large project investigating the feasibility and desirability of developing a multi-disciplinary computer model of the Australian Savannas. In the large project, researchers were broken in to three teams: those considering the biophysical, demographic, and economic aspects of the modelling problem. This paper presents findings from part of the economic component of the investigation: that which sought information from key local ,stakeholders' about the type of information that would be useful to them. Responses indicate that many of Australia's existing economic models are capable of providing the ,right' type of information; but at too coarse a geographic scale for those in remote regions. Evidently, there is a need for developing other models. [source] Inequality Aversion versus Risk AversionECONOMICA, Issue 277 2003Yoram Kroll Inequality aversion and risk-aversion are widely assumed in economic models; however existing economic literature fails to distinguish between the two. This paper presents methodology and a laboratory experiment, which separates inequality aversion from risk aversion. In a set of laboratory experiments, subjects had to choose between two risky alternatives which pay meaningful prizes with the same individual risk but different levels of egalitarianism. Thus, the choice of the more egalitarian alternative implies a higher level of inequality aversion. The experiment was conducted among children, some of whom live on a communal system (kibbutz) and some in the city. [source] Equality of what in health?HEALTH ECONOMICS, Issue 2 2009Distinguishing between outcome egalitarianism, gain egalitarianism Abstract When deciding how to weigh benefits to different groups, standard economic models assume that people focus on the final distribution of utility, health or whatever. Thus, an egalitarian is assumed to be an egalitarian in the outcome space. But what about egalitarianism in the gains space, such that people focus instead on how equally benefits are distributed? This paper reports on a study in which members of the public were asked to rank a number of health programmes that differed in the distribution of benefits and final outcomes in ways that enabled us to distinguish between different types of egalitarianism. The results suggest that outcome egalitarianism dominates, particularly for differences in health by social class, but a sizeable minority of respondents appear to be gain egalitarians, especially when the health differences are by sex. These results have important implications for how we think about outcome-based social welfare functions in economics. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Monte Carlo probabilistic sensitivity analysis for patient level simulation models: efficient estimation of mean and variance using ANOVAHEALTH ECONOMICS, Issue 10 2007Anthony O'Hagan Abstract Probabilistic sensitivity analysis (PSA) is required to account for uncertainty in cost-effectiveness calculations arising from health economic models. The simplest way to perform PSA in practice is by Monte Carlo methods, which involves running the model many times using randomly sampled values of the model inputs. However, this can be impractical when the economic model takes appreciable amounts of time to run. This situation arises, in particular, for patient-level simulation models (also known as micro-simulation or individual-level simulation models), where a single run of the model simulates the health care of many thousands of individual patients. The large number of patients required in each run to achieve accurate estimation of cost-effectiveness means that only a relatively small number of runs is possible. For this reason, it is often said that PSA is not practical for patient-level models. We develop a way to reduce the computational burden of Monte Carlo PSA for patient-level models, based on the algebra of analysis of variance. Methods are presented to estimate the mean and variance of the model output, with formulae for determining optimal sample sizes. The methods are simple to apply and will typically reduce the computational demand very substantially. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] TESTING LONG-HORIZON PREDICTIVE ABILITY WITH HIGH PERSISTENCE, AND THE MEESE,ROGOFF PUZZLE*INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 1 2005Barbara Rossi A well-known puzzle in international finance is that a random walk predicts exchange rates better than economic models. I offer a potential explanation. When exchange rates and fundamentals are highly persistent, long-horizon forecasts of economic models are biased by the estimation error. When this bias is big, a random walk will forecast better, even if the economic model is true. I propose a test for equal predictability in the presence of high persistence. It shows that the poor forecasting ability of economic models does not imply that the models are not good descriptions of the data. [source] Popular Attitudes, Globalization and Risk,INTERNATIONAL FINANCE, Issue 2 2005Marcus Noland Popular opposition to globalization may be interpreted as xenophobia or hostility to market economics and signal country risk, including the degree of security risk , the possibility that local staff or facilities could be subject to discriminatory treatment, harassment or attack. This paper integrates the Pew Global Attitudes data into a series of economic models on foreign direct investment (FDI), sovereign ratings and local entrepreneurship, and finds that some responses correlate with economic variables of interest, conveying information beyond what can be explained through standard models. More tolerant countries attract more FDI, obtain better ratings and exhibit more entrepreneurship. [source] Modelling lifetime QALYs and health care costs from different drinking patterns over time: a Markov modelINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF METHODS IN PSYCHIATRIC RESEARCH, Issue 2 2010Carolina Barbosa Abstract The negative health consequences of alcohol use and its treatment account for significant health care expenditure worldwide. Long-term modelling techniques are developed in this paper to establish a link between drinking patterns, health consequences and alcohol treatment effectiveness and cost-effectiveness. The overall change in health related quality and quantity of life which results from changes in health-related behaviour is estimated. Specifically, a probabilistic lifetime Markov model is presented where alcohol consumption in grams of alcohol per day and drinking history are used for the categorization of patients into four Markov states. Utility weights are assigned to each drinking state using EQ-5D scores. Mortality and morbidity estimates are state, gender and age specific, and are alcohol-related and non-alcohol-related. The methodology is tested in a case study. This represents a major development in the techniques traditionally used in alcohol economic models, in which short-term costs and outcomes are assessed, omitting potential longer term cost savings and improvements in health related quality of life. Assumptions and implications of the approach are discussed. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Power, Property Rights and the Issue of Land Reform: A General Case Illustrated with Reference to BangladeshJOURNAL OF AGRARIAN CHANGE, Issue 1-2 2004Mushtaq Husain Khan The argument for land reform is most persuasive when the proposed land reform promises not only to improve distribution but also to increase growth and efficiency. Such is the promise in the GKI advocacy of radical redistributive land reform. In this paper, first (a) the Griffin, Khan and Ickowitz (GKI) and (b) World Bank positions on land reform are compared, and their points of agreement and disagreement identified. Secondly, the political economy of Bangladesh is examined to evaluate the appropriateness of these two competing neoclassical approaches for understanding the constraints in the agrarian sector. Thirdly, it is argued that the anomalous evidence on land transactions and productivity in Bangladesh cannot be easily accommodated within purely economic models of markets in the way that the neoclassical approach attempts. Paradoxically, both the World Bank's focus on institutional reform and GKI's focus on radical land reform are derived from such attempts and both suffer from similar empirical and theoretical problems. There is a strong case for going back to Brenner-type political economy approaches for understanding the dynamism and constraints facing agrarian transitions. Such an approach puts the analysis of class and power at the centre stage of an analysis of structure and change in the agrarian economy, and focuses on the distribution of power that prevents primitive accumulation in some countries leading to a capitalist transformation. [source] REAL OPTIONS AND PATENT DAMAGES: THE LEGAL TREATMENT OF NON-INFRINGING ALTERNATIVES, AND INCENTIVES TO INNOVATEJOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SURVEYS, Issue 4 2006Jerry Hausman Abstract Patent litigation has become an increasingly important consideration in business strategy. Damage awards in patent litigation are supposed to compensate the patent owner for economic harm created by infringement and are therefore important for protecting returns to innovation. We analyze the effects that a recent court decision in the United States, called Grain Processing, has had on the incentives of potential infringers to infringe and innovators to innovate. We find that Grain Processing has decreased the expected value of damages awards in patent cases by conferring a ,free option' on infringers. Grain Processing also concluded that the patent owner in the case did not suffer lost profits due to the infringement because the infringer would have adopted an (inferior) non-infringing technology had it not infringed. We demonstrate that this conclusion is inconsistent with standard economic models. [source] Current Issues in the Economics of Groundwater Resource ManagementJOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SURVEYS, Issue 5 2004Phoebe Koundouri Abstract., The issue of groundwater management remains a practical concern in many regions throughout the world, while water managers continue to grapple with the question of how to manage this resource. In this article, we attempt to bring the most advanced and appropriate tools to bear on the issue of resource allocation involving groundwater. Our objective is to demonstrate the state of the art in the literature on ways to think about this complex resource and to deal with the important economic issues emanating from its complexity. We present the conceptual framework within which economists examine the elements interacting in the management of groundwater resources, indicate why the role of the market is limited with respect to the price of this very complex resource, and point to the mechanisms that can pull competitive groundwater price and quality-graded quantity of groundwater in line with their equilibrium levels. In particular, we critically review economic models of groundwater use, examine the potential for groundwater management, discuss the difficulties encountered in the estimation of the relevant control variables of such models, and identify the advantages and limitations of the instruments devised for the efficient use (allocation) of this resource. Finally, we argue that devised regulatory schemes usually ignore the information and knowledge needed for their implementation, and we suggest a core of conditions necessary for successful groundwater management reforms. [source] A linear benchmark for forecasting GDP growth and inflation?JOURNAL OF FORECASTING, Issue 4 2008Massimiliano MarcellinoArticle first published online: 30 APR 200 Abstract Predicting the future evolution of GDP growth and inflation is a central concern in economics. Forecasts are typically produced either from economic theory-based models or from simple linear time series models. While a time series model can provide a reasonable benchmark to evaluate the value added of economic theory relative to the pure explanatory power of the past behavior of the variable, recent developments in time series analysis suggest that more sophisticated time series models could provide more serious benchmarks for economic models. In this paper we evaluate whether these complicated time series models can outperform standard linear models for forecasting GDP growth and inflation. We consider a large variety of models and evaluation criteria, using a bootstrap algorithm to evaluate the statistical significance of our results. Our main conclusion is that in general linear time series models can hardly be beaten if they are carefully specified. However, we also identify some important cases where the adoption of a more complicated benchmark can alter the conclusions of economic analyses about the driving forces of GDP growth and inflation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Economic analysis of different options in integrated pest and soil fertility management in maize systems of Western KenyaAGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 5 2010Hugo De Groote Abstract The major biotic constraints to the production of maize, the major staple food in Western Kenya, are field pests such as,Striga,and stem borers, and low soil fertility. To counter these constraints, new cropping systems have been developed, including "push-pull," rotations with promiscuous soybean varieties and green manure crops, and imidazolinone resistant- (IR-) maize. To analyze the technical and economic performance of these technologies, both with and without fertilizer, on-farm researcher-managed long-term trials were implemented over six seasons in two sites each in Vihiga and Siaya districts of Western Kenya. The economic results, based on marginal analysis using a multioutput, multiperiod model, show that the new cropping systems with fodder intercropping (push-pull) or soybean rotations were highly profitable. Push-pull is more profitable but requires a relatively high initial investment cost. Green manure rotation, IR-maize, and fertilizer all increased yields, but these investments were generally not justified by their increased revenue. We argue that research on rotation and cropping systems to tackle pest and soil fertility problems in Africa deserve more attention. This will require increased collaboration between agronomists and economists to set up long-term experiments with new cropping systems to develop proper economic models. [source] Deforestation and land use change: sparse data environmentsAGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 3 2002Gerald C. Nelson Abstract Understanding determinants of land use in developing countries has become a priority for researchers and policy makers with a wide range of interests. For the vast majority of these land use issues, the location of change is as important as its magnitude. This overview paper highlights new economic approaches to modeling land use determinants that combine non-traditional data sources with novel economic models and econometric techniques. A key feature is that location is central to the analysis. All data elements include an explicit location attribute, estimation techniques include the potential for complications from spatial effects, and results are location-specific. The paper reviews the theory underlying these models. Since this paper is intended to provide the potential new researcher with an introduction to the challenges of this analysis, we present an overview of how remotely-sensed data are collected and processed, describe key GIS concepts and identify sources of data for this type of econometric analysis. Finally, selected papers using these techniques are reviewed. [source] Identification and estimation of local average derivatives in non-separable models without monotonicityTHE ECONOMETRICS JOURNAL, Issue 1 2009Stefan Hoderlein Summary, In many structural economic models there are no good arguments for additive separability of the error. Recently, this motivated intensive research on non-separable structures. For instance, in Hoderlein and Mammen (2007) a non-separable model in the single equation case was considered, and it was established that in the absence of the frequently employed monotonicity assumption local average structural derivatives (LASD) are still identified. In this paper, we introduce an estimator for the LASD. The estimator we propose is based on local polynomial fitting of conditional quantiles. We derive its large sample distribution through a Bahadur representation, and give some related results, e.g. about the asymptotic behaviour of the quantile process. Moreover, we generalize the concept of LASD to include endogeneity of regressors and discuss the case of a multivariate dependent variable. We also consider identification of structured non-separable models, including single index and additive models. We discuss specification testing, as well as testing for endogeneity and for the impact of unobserved heterogeneity. We also show that fixed censoring can easily be addressed in this framework. Finally, we apply some of the concepts to demand analysis using British Consumer Data. [source] NONPARAMETRIC LIKELIHOOD: EFFICIENCY AND ROBUSTNESS,THE JAPANESE ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 1 2007YUICHI KITAMURAArticle first published online: 8 FEB 200 Nonparametric likelihood is a natural generalization of parametric likelihood and it offers effective methods for analysing economic models with nonparametric components. This is of great interest, since econometric theory rarely suggests a parametric form of the probability law of data. Being a nonparametric method, nonparametric likelihood is robust to misspecification. At the same time, it often achieves good properties that are analogous to those of parametric likelihood. This paper explores various applications of nonparametric likelihood, with some emphasis on the analysis of biased samples and data combination problems. [source] ,An anthropological concept of the concept': reversibility among the Siberian YukaghirsTHE JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL ANTHROPOLOGICAL INSTITUTE, Issue 3 2007Alberto Corsín Jiménez This article attempts to sketch a new anthropological epistemology. It does so by revisiting the work that concepts do in economic models, and by suggesting an alternative ,anthropological concept of the concept' for the economy. The article looks to how concepts create their own limits of meaning and uses the very idea of limit to rethink how conceptual thought out-grows and transforms itself. We develop our epistemology by looking at the socio-economic practices and institutions of the Yukaghirs, a small group of indigenous hunters, living along the Kolyma River in northeastern Siberia. The Yukaghirs' moment of creative possibilities is given through the reversibility of every one of their economic practices, informed by the work of a shadow force (ayibii) that aims for the limit. We gain insights from this notion of reversibility to rethink the purchase of the ,economic' in our contemporary world, questioning the validity of such ,conceptual' descriptions as virtualism or the knowledge economy. Résumé Les auteurs tentent ici d'ébaucher une nouvelle épistémologie anthropologique en revisitant l'action des concepts dans les modèles économiques et en suggérant un autre « concept anthropologique du concept » en économie. L'article étudie la manière dans les concepts créent leurs propres limites de signification et utilise cette idée de limite pour revoir la façon dont la pensée conceptuelle se dépasse et se transforme elle-même. Les auteurs développent leur épistémologie par l'étude des pratiques et institutions socio-économiques des Yukaghirs, un petit groupe de chasseurs indigènes vivant le long de la rivière Kolyma, dans le nord-est de la Sibérie. Le moteur des possibilités créatives des Yukaghirs est constitué par la réversibilité de chacune de leurs pratiques économiques, informées par l',uvre d'une force de l'ombre (ayibii) qui tend vers la limite. Cette notion de réversibilité fournit des éléments pour repenser l'emprise de « l'économique » sur notre monde contemporain et remettre en question la validité des descriptions « conceptuelles » telles que l'économie virtuelle ou celle de la connaissance. [source] FORECASTING QUARTERLY AGGREGATE CRIME SERIES,THE MANCHESTER SCHOOL, Issue 6 2005MICHAEL P. CLEMENTS In this paper we assess the forecasting performance of quarterly economic models of aggregate property and personal crime. We show that models that include long-run relationships between crime and its economic determinants tend to generate inaccurate forecasts, and attribute this to structural change. The forecast performance of the economic models is compared with that of time-series models, and forecast encompassing tests are reported. [source] A healthy diet consistent with Australian health recommendations is too expensive for welfare-dependent familiesAUSTRALIAN AND NEW ZEALAND JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH, Issue 6 2009Christine Kettings Abstract Objective: Examine the cost of healthy food habits for welfare-dependent families in Australia. Method: A seven-day meal plan was developed, based on Australian public health recommendations, for two typical welfare-dependent families: a couple-family (two adults, two children) and a one-parent family (one adult, two children). The cost of the meal plan was calculated using market brand and generic brand grocery items, and total cost compared to income. Results: In Australia, the cost of healthy food habits uses about 40% of the disposable income of welfare-dependent families. Families earning an average income would spend only 20% of their disposable income to buy the same healthy food. Substituting generic brands for market brands reduced the weekly food cost by about 13%. This is one of few economic models to include generic brands. Conclusion: Compared with average-income Australian families, healthy food habits are a fiscal challenge to welfare-dependent families. Implications: These results provide a benchmark for economic and social policy analysis, and the influence disposable income has on prioritising healthy food habits. [source] HEALTH IMPROVEMENTS AND THE TRANSITION OUT OF MALTHUSIAN STAGNATIONBULLETIN OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH, Issue 4 2009Luis Currais I10; I20; O10 ABSTRACT The central component of most economic models that analyse the transition from the Malthusian regime to self-sustaining developed economies is education. Improved health is normally envisaged as simply a by-product of economic growth. Whereas growth does, indeed, tend to improve health status, the reverse is also true, namely that health improvements are a dynamic force capable of driving economic expansion. This paper underlines the importance of health improvements in escaping from Malthusian stagnation. Further, and in contrast to existing literature, which emphasizes the effects of changes in mortality rates, this paper focuses on the relationship between health status and the efficiency of human capital technology. Through this channel, health improvements stimulate investments in child quality in terms of both nourishing and schooling and drive the economy towards the Modern Growth regime. [source] Fishing Rights as an Example of the Economic Rhetoric of Privatization: Calling for an Implicated Economics,CANADIAN REVIEW OF SOCIOLOGY/REVUE CANADIENNE DE SOCIOLOGIE, Issue 3 2000Melanie G. Wiber Au cours des dernières années, toutes les sciences sociales ont eu à produire des travaux de recherche aux répercussions d'ordre public. Mais dans quelle mesure ces sciences sociales devraient-elles inter-venir dans le domaine de l'ordre public quand leurs recommandations dans ce domaine créent des situations inattendues et préjudiciables? Dans cet article, nous nous penchons sur cette question en étudiant l'exemple de l'économie et des modèles de droits privés de propriété dans les pêcheries des provinces de l'Atlantique. Ces modèles sont comparés et mis en contraste avec les modèles anthropologiques et juridiques afin de montrer dans quel domaine et pour quelle raison l'économie s'est égarée dans l'élaboration de modèles de droits de propriété sur les ressources halieutiques. De ce fait, les recommandations de politique économique en matière de droits de propriéte dans l'industrie de la pêche sont erronées. En conclusion, nous proposons que les économistes soignent leur rhétorique afin de susciter des attentes et de créer des solutions qui donnent un caractère plus raisonnable à leurs recommandations. In recent years, all the social sciences have come under pressure to produce research that has public policy implications. But how implicated should those social sciences be when their policy advice leads to unexpected and perhaps detrimental outcomes? This paper explores this issue using the example of economics and private property rights in the Canadian Maritime fisheries. It compares and contrasts economic models of property rights with those in anthropology and law to show where and why economics has gone astray in its fish property rights models. It suggests that, having gone astray, economic policy advice on fisheries property systems is flawed. It concludes that economists should pay more attention to the role of their rhetoric in the construction of expectations and outcomes that make their recommendations seem the more reasonable. [source] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||