Does product complexity matter for competition in experimental retail markets?

We describe a first experiment on whether product complexity affects competition and consumers in retail markets. We are unable to detect a significant effect of product complexity on prices, except insofar as the demand elasticity for complex products is higher. However, there is qualified evidence that complex products have the potential to induce consumers to buy more than they would otherwise. In this sense, consumer exploitability in quantities cannot be ruled out. We also find evidence for shaping effects: consumers’ preferences are shaped by past experience with prices, and firms may in principle exploit this to sell more.     

Racial capitalism and STEM education in Chicago Public Schools

ABSTRACT

This article analyzes the role of STEM initiatives designed by city and corporate elites in a large urban district and outlines an alternative, grassroots vision for (STEM) education and city schools. Within a neoliberal context of gentrification, displacement, disinvestment, and privatization, STEM schools have become strategic components of Chicago’s ‘portfolio district’ that serve the interests of racial capitalism in three ways. First, STEM schools provide a claim to fairness in the midst of racist school closures. Second, STEM high schools are a corporate strategy for racially stratified labor force preparation that restricts curriculum and reifies tracking. Third, curriculum restriction prioritizes corporate interests over students’ capacity to shape their communities and the world. The authors draw on the wisdom of Chicago communities who have led resistance against corporate education reform to critique Chicago STEM policy and point to critical mathematics and science education as part of a model for sustainable community schools.     

Identification Properties of Recent Production Function Estimators

This paper examines some of the recent literature on the estimation of production functions. We focus on techniques suggested in two recent papers, Olley and Pakes (1996) and Levinsohn and Petrin (2003). While there are some solid and intuitive identification ideas in these papers, we argue that the techniques can suffer from functional dependence problems. We suggest an alternative approach that is based on the ideas in these papers, but does not suffer from the functional dependence problems and produces consistent estimates under alternative data generating processes for which the original procedures do not.     

Robust Bayesian model selection for variable clustering with the Gaussian graphical model

Statistics and Computing - Variable clustering is important for explanatory analysis. However, only few dedicated methods for variable clustering with the Gaussian graphical model have been...     

Linear Increments with Non‐monotone Missing Data and Measurement Error

Linear increments (LI) are used to analyse repeated outcome data with missing values. Previously, two LI methods have been proposed, one allowing non‐monotone missingness but not independent measurement error and one allowing independent measurement error but only monotone missingness. In both, it was suggested that the expected increment could depend on current outcome. We show that LI can allow non‐monotone missingness and either independent measurement error of unknown variance or dependence of expected increment on current outcome but not both. A popular alternative to LI is a multivariate normal model ignoring the missingness pattern. This gives consistent estimation when data are normally distributed and missing at random (MAR). We clarify the relation between MAR and the assumptions of LI and show that for continuous outcomes multivariate normal estimators are also consistent under (non‐MAR and non‐normal) assumptions not much stronger than those of LI. Moreover, when missingness is non‐monotone, they are typically more efficient.     

Semiparametric Estimation of a Change-point for Recurrent Events Data

One particular recurrent events data scenario involves patients experiencing events according to a common intensity rate, and then a treatment may be applied. The treatment might be effective for a limited amount of time, so that the intensity rate would be expected to change abruptly when the effect of the treatment wears out. In particular, we allow models for the intensity rate, post-treatment, to be at first decreasing and then change to increasing (and vice versa). Two estimators of the location of this change are proposed.     

Association of sexual abstinence in adolescence with mental health in adulthood

We examined whether adolescent sexual abstinence predicts better adult mental health. 1,917 adolescents, recruited from middle schools at age 13, were surveyed at ages 13, 18, 23, and 29. In bivariate analyses, adolescent sexual abstinence was associated with better mental health at age 29 for females, but not males; three adolescent factors, educational prospects, family bonding, and unconventionality were investigated as explanatory variables of this relationship. The abstinence-mental health relationship was nonsignificant when educational prospects was included in multivariate models, and marginally significant when family bonding and unconventionality were included; all three explanatory factors accounted for significant proportions of the variance in adult mental health. Girls who are uninvolved in school, have weak family backgrounds, and exhibit unconventionality may have poor adult mental health, whether or not they abstain from sex in adolescence. Interventions that strengthen adolescents' connections to families and schools may reduce risk for long-term mental health problems.