Social trust and human development

A series of studies connect social trust to economic growth. In this paper, we explore the connection between trust and a broader measure of development, the UN Human Development Index. We find that trust is significantly associated with faster human development in the 1980–2005 period. The impact of trust occurs mainly in less democratic countries.     

Demographic change, macroeconomic conditions, and the murder rate: The case of the United States, 1934–2006

Fluctuations in aggregate crime rates contrary to recent shifts in the age distribution of the U.S. population have cast doubt on the predictive power of the age–crime hypothesis. By examining a longer time horizon, back to the early 1930s, we show that the percentage of the young population is a robust predictor of the observed large swings in the U.S. murder rate over time. However, changes in the misery index—the sum of the inflation and unemployment rates—significantly contribute to explaining changes in the murder rate. This applies, in particular, to those changes that are at odds with the long-run trend of the U.S. age distribution, such as the decline in the murder rate in the latter part of the 1970s or its increase starting around the middle of the 1980s.     

Birth order effects on young students’ academic achievement

We examine birth order effects on academic achievement for ten-year-old students using data for the entire population of fifth graders in Norway 2007/2008. The analysis thus adds to a thin empirical literature focusing on birth order effects among young children. We find that being firstborn confers a significant advantage in families with two, three and four children. The analysis makes two other contributions. First, we provide evidence that unless mother's age at childbirth is included among the control variables, only small and imprecise birth order effects are revealed in families with low socioeconomic status. Second, we provide some evidence that the birth order effects differ across families with highly educated and less educated mothers, which lend support to the resource dilution model over the confluence model.     

International trade, foreign direct investment, and transaction costs in languages

We examine the roles of major trade languages in international trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) flows. Empirical results confirm that speaking a common language increases trade and FDI flows, yet the effect of major languages is more substantial in FDI than in international trade. In addition, we find evidence of a hierarchy in transaction costs of major languages in both trade and FDI.     

Full-time, part-time employment and life satisfaction of the elderly

There is continued interest in employment and subjective well-being among the elderly because of the increasing proportion of elderly population in the labor force. This study investigates the association between part-time and full-time employment and life satisfaction of the elderly in Taiwan. We also examine how these associations may differ across socio-demographic groups. An ordinal treatment effect model is developed to accommodate the discrete feature of the employment decision and the potential endogeneity of these two outcomes. Using a unique sample of the elderly in Taiwan, in contrast to findings for the general population of the previous studies, we find that part-time employment is significant and positively associated with life satisfaction, while elderly with full-time employment have lower life satisfaction. These results are robust across socio-demographic groups.     

Are people in the South less intelligent than in the North? IQ and the North–South disparity in Italy

Socioeconomic disparity between North and South Italy has been recently explained by Lynn (2010) as the result of a lower intelligence quotient (IQ) of the Southern population. The present article discusses the procedure followed by Lynn, supplementing his data with new information on school assessments and per head regional income. Genetic North–South differences are then discussed on the basis of the most recent literature on the subject. The results do not confirm the suggested IQ-economy causal link.     

Urban Aboriginal use of fringe financial institutions: Survey evidence from Prince George, British Columbia

This paper analyses the use of fringe financial institutions (FFIs), such as payday loan and check cashing providers, by urban Aboriginal people based on a survey undertaken in Prince George, British Columbia. We found that 60% of FFIs’ clients surveyed self-identified as Aboriginal. Their characteristics, compared to the non-Aboriginal FFI clients, included having lower average incomes, lower levels of education, more likely to be female, a higher incidence of being unemployed, higher levels of financial exclusion, and less satisfaction with the service provided by FFIs. We find that government policy towards regulating the FFI industry is inadequate for meeting the basic financial needs of urban Aboriginal people.     

Trust, tenure insecurity, and land certification in rural Ethiopia

This paper assesses the impact of a land certification program in Ethiopia on the level of interpersonal and institutional trust among households in the Amhara region. The land certification program is designed to enhance land tenure security of farmers, by maintaining (egalitarian) status quo land distribution and equity concerns. The major contribution of the analysis lies in the exogenous nature of the program which addresses the endogeneity problems that characterize related studies, assessing the impact of policy related variables on trust. The effects of the land certification program on trust are identified both by the difference-in-difference approach and by non-parametrical analysis of average treatment effects. Overall trust is found to be enhanced by the certification program, with trust towards formal institutions being more responsive to the program than interpersonal trust. The major policy implication of the result is that trust could be invested on through policy changes regarding the economic betterment of societies.     

Women and men as conservers, users and managers of agrobiodiversity: A feminist social–ecological approach

This feminist socio-ecological heuristic studies agrobiodiversity management, conservation and utilisation by men and women. Four approaches are characterised for an analysis of institutions, local knowledge, household economics and commodity chains. They are in turn linked to unveil their potential contributions towards a better understanding women's handling of, interests in and dependence on agrobiodiversity. The conceptualisation of a feminist framework aims at better informed research into the relationships between women, men and plants and is illustrated by examples from South Asia. Insights derived from a feminist socio-ecological perspective on agricultural biodiversity serve to generate gender-relevant policy recommendations towards establishing sustainable farming systems.     

Procrastination, prompts, and preferences: Evidence from daily records of self-directed learning activities

This paper presents evidence showing that a libertarian paternalistic intervention having significant but uneven effects on the student procrastination of a coursework assignment. We observe the degree of procrastination in a language course at a Japanese university with individuals’ electronic records of daily activities. With a quasi-experiment that generates variations in the frequency of interventions and the preference of students towards the course, we examine the effects of in-class verbal prompts by an instructor on the timing of task completion. We find that prompts affect behavior, especially when reinforced, but the responsiveness depends on the class preferences and the timing of interventions.     

Moderation, contentment, work, and alms—A Buddhist household theory

The paper deals with household theory from the angle of Buddhist thought. We build on the Buddhist terms of tanha versus chanda to express Buddhist preferences and Buddhist household theory in terms of textbook microeconomic terms. We find that preferences of Buddhist (enlightened) people may differ from those of non-Buddhist people in a systematic manner. Among other hypotheses, we deduce that Buddhists work harder than non-Buddhists if we control for meditation time. We argue that any full-grown Buddhist economics (if it is to exist) needs to build on Buddhist preference and household theory, either as presented here or in a different form.     

Multi-dimensional poverty in Australia and the barriers ill health imposes on the employment of the disadvantaged

A little over one million individuals in Australia between the ages of 24 and 64 years are in Freedom poverty – they have low family income, and have either poor health or an insufficient level of education. These individuals are some of the most disadvantaged in society due to their multiple capability restrictions. Current political rhetoric focused on reducing the number of individuals out of the labour force to improve their living standards may offer a means of improving the lives of these most disadvantaged individuals. Indeed, of those in Freedom poverty, 80% are not in employment. But these individuals also have poor health and/or a poor education and these capability limitations may act as barriers to their labour force participation. Indeed, 49% of individuals in freedom poverty who were out of the labour force cited ill health as the reason for this (39% cited their own ill health, and 10% cited another's ill health). Not only will these individual's ill health act as a barrier to their engaging in the labour force, but ill health will also contribute to reduced quality of life. Political promises to improve the lives of citizens should not focus narrowly upon increasing labour force participation rates, but should take a holistic view of the lives of individuals taking note in particular of how health may be restraining their quality of life.     

The impact of physical activity on employment

Using cross-sectional data from 25 European countries this study estimates the probability of an individual being employed controlling for his/her participation and frequency of participation in physical activity. Accounting for endogeneity, the regional prevalence of physical activity calculated from the sample is used as an instrument for individual participation suggesting a causal effect of physical activity on employment, especially for males.     

The hub continent. Immigrant networks, emigrant diasporas and FDI

This paper studies the relations between bilateral FDIs and immigrant networks of France, Germany, UK, Italy and Spain, and the emigrant diasporas of Italy and Spain. It focuses on skilled and unskilled immigrants and on ties with developing and developed countries. Results evidence two different network models: FDIs of UK, Germany and France are prompted by the ties of skilled immigrants, while those of Italy and Spain are only influenced by their respective diasporas. The disparity may stem from history. Differently from the findings of previous literature, the effects of networks with developing countries are similar to those with rich economies.     

Mapping social and environmental concerns and the acceptability of genetically modified organisms in the European Union

Simultaneous conflicting attitudes towards an object make both predicting and explaining behaviour a complex endeavour. This paper explores the hypothesis of social ambivalence (so called as well or approach-avoidance conflict) as a phenomenon influencing attitudes towards the environmental effects of the introduction of GMOs (Genetic Modified Organisms). If social ambivalence exists it would be suggestive of an interplay between rational models or behaviour and normative or moral models of behaviour. This paper provides some quantitative analysis based on a representative sample of the European Union, using unique data from the Eurobarometer 58.0 (2002) examining public perceptions of environmental risks. Our findings suggest that GMOs are perceived as having a non-neutral impact on the environmental and social life and that as hypothesized there is evidence of social ambivalence, which appears to be more significant when environmental effects of GM foods are taken into account. Consistently with the hypothesis of interplay between rational and normative models of behaviour, respondents perceive some risks while benefits are not perceived by the public and moral concerns regarding technologies being developed by international corporations are important. A specific type of social ambivalence is found, namely GMO are not accepted for Europeans but they are in less developed countries.     

The Dutch people and the euro: A structural equations analysis relating national identity and economic expectations to attitude towards the euro

National identity, macro and micro economic expectations affect the attitude toward the euro. In a study in The Netherlands, data were collected and relationships between the latent concepts were modelled with LISREL. In the best fitting model, national identity has a direct and an indirect effect on attitude, respectively, an unstructured and a structured effect. The indirect effect is mediated by macro and micro expectations. Macro expectations also have a direct and an indirect effect. The indirect effect is mediated by micro expectations. On one hand, macro expectations form a strong link between national identity and attitude. On the other hand, macro expectations have a strong direct effect on attitudes. The euro is mainly perceived and evaluated in a macro-economic perspective.PsycINFO classification: 2229; 3920     

The willingness to pay–willingness to accept gap revisited: The role of emotions and moral satisfaction

While many earlier studies have found that people’s maximum willingness to pay for having a good is often substantially lower than their minimum willingness to accept not having it, more recent experimental evidence suggests that this discrepancy vanishes for standard consumption goods when an incentive-compatible design without misconceptions is used. This paper hypothesises that there is nevertheless a discrepancy for goods with a perceived moral character, such as contributions to a good cause, and moreover that the reason for this discrepancy can largely be explained by differences in emotions and moral perceptions. The results from a real-money dichotomous-choice experiment, combined with measurements of emotions and morality, are consistent with these hypotheses.     

An exploration of the robustness of alternative laboratory methodologies: Matching funds and the provision of public goods

The voluntary provision of a pure public good is studied in the presence of an anonymous external donor. New data generated using experimental procedures employing both extra-credit and cash incentives, as well as asynchronous access to real-time decision rounds lasting several days, are compared to previous data generated using traditional cash-only, synchronous-access laboratory procedures. The effect on resource allocations to the public good of introducing external matching funds is examined in two different settings, lump-sum matching and one-to-one matching. The new data confirm the robustness of results previously reported in Baker et al. (2009) to the change in laboratory procedures and incentives. The new data are then used to extend the parameter space in which the two matching mechanisms are studied, including: varying within-round information regarding the current level of public-good allocations and varying group size from four to twenty group members. Allocations in lump-sum matching are no worse, and sometimes better, than one-to-one matching in these new treatments.     

Do other-regarding preferences change with age? Evidence from a gift exchange experiment

A series of laboratory experiments investigate potential differences in other-regarding behavior by age of participant. Specifically, a gift exchange experiment is conducted with eighth graders, high school seniors, undergraduates, and working adults, all with similar observable demographic characteristics. All groups exhibit significant levels of gift exchange. Eighth graders exhibit significantly less gift exchange than other groups whereas the responses of other groups do not appear to differ. The findings indicate that other-regarding behavior is present, but still developing in adolescents and undergraduate subjects in gift exchange experiments exhibit similar behavior to adults with similar observable characteristics.