The Effect of Grandparental Support on Mothers’ Labour Market Participation: An Instrumental Variable Approach

Childcare arrangements are key in women’s ability to juggle motherhood and work outside the home. As such, the study of access to childcare and its use is of great policy relevance. We focus on a particular kind of informal childcare, the one provided by grandparents. Empirically, assessing the effect of grandparental childcare is not an easy task due to unobserved preferences. In light of the potential outcome framework, we interpret the biases resulting from unobserved preferences as arising from the non-compliance of mothers to the availability of grandparents and from preferences of grandparents for activities other than childcare. Using an instrumental variable approach on Italian data, we find that the effect of grandparental childcare on mothers’ labour supply is positive, statistically significant and economically relevant. The effect is stronger for less educated mothers, with young children and living in northern and central Italy.     

Use of the scale-up methods in injury prevention research: An empirical assessment to the case of choking in children

The scale-up method estimates the size of hard to count subpopulations. This method is based on the idea that the proportion of subjects in a subpopulation E known to each member of the general population T is the same as the proportion of members of E belonging to general population T.     

Large Risks,Limited Liability,and Dynamic Moral Hazard

We study a continuous‐time principal–agent model in which a risk‐neutral agent with limited liability must exert unobservable effort to reduce the likelihood of large but relatively infrequent losses. Firm size can be decreased at no cost or increased subject to adjustment costs. In the optimal contract, investment takes place only if a long enough period of time elapses with no losses occurring. Then, if good performance continues, the agent is paid. As soon as a loss occurs, payments to the agent are suspended, and so is investment if further losses occur. Accumulated bad performance leads to downsizing. We derive explicit formulae for the dynamics of firm size and its asymptotic growth rate, and we provide conditions under which firm size eventually goes to zero or grows without bounds.     

On Recalling ANT

This paper explores one after the other the four difficulties of actor-network theory, that is the words 'actor', 'network' and 'theory'—without forgetting the hyphen. It tries to refocus the originality of what is more a method to deploy the actor's own world building activities than an alternative social theory. Finally, it sketches some of its remaining potential.     

Risk Target: An Interactive Context Factor in Risk Perception

The effect of specification of the target on risk evaluation was examined. A whole set of hazards, covering most of the domains, were considered: common individual hazards, outdoor activities, medical care, public transportation, energy production, pollutants, sex, deviance, and addictions. Three human targets were introduced: personal health risk (including personal risk of death), health risk for people in the country, and health risk for people in the world. The basic design was a between-subjects design. The first hypothesis was that risk judgments made in the "world" condition should be higher than risk judgments made in the "country" condition, and risk judgments made in this condition should be higher than risk judgments made in the "personal" condition. This is what was observed. The second hypothesis was that the target effect should differ as a function of the kind of hazards considered. This also is what was observed. In two domains--pollutants, and deviance, sex, and addictions--the target effect was important. It corresponded to about one-tenth of the response scale. In the four remaining domains, the target effect was unimportant or absent.     

The Grasshoppers and the Great Cattle: Participation and Non-Participation in the ASB's Standard-Setting Process

This paper presents the results of a research study of participation in the accounting standard-setting process in the United Kingdom. The study considers the 1,519 responses to the Accounting Standards Board's ('the ASB') proposals for accounting standards. Consistent with the findings of other studies in the USA and Australia, the present paper finds that there is a high level of participation by the preparers of financial statements in the ASB's consultation process. The paper then examines the size of the preparer firms which formally lobby the ASB. The evidence confirms that those firms which become involved in the lobbying process in the UK tend to be larger than non-lobbying firms, and the paper concludes that, as elswhere, the standard-setting process in the UK appears to be a discourse of the powerful.