There are persistent differences in self-reported subjective wellbeing across US metropolitan areas, and residents of declining cities appear less happy than others. Yet some people continue to move ...to these areas, and newer residents appear to be as unhappy as longer-term residents. While historical data on happiness are limited, the available facts suggest that cities that are now declining were also unhappy in their more prosperous past. These facts support the view that individuals do not maximize happiness alone but include it in the utility function along with other arguments. People may trade off happiness against other competing objectives.
We investigate the sources of the important shifts in the volatility of US macroeconomic variables in the postwar period. To this end, we propose the estimation of DSGE models allowing for time ...variation in the volatility of the structural innovations. We apply our estimation strategy to a large-scale model of the business cycle and find that shocks specific to the equilibrium condition of investment account for most of the sharp decline in volatility of the last two decades.
The Evolution of Work in the United States Atalay, Enghin; Phongthiengtham, Phai; Sotelo, Sebastian ...
American economic journal. Applied economics,
04/2020, Letnik:
12, Številka:
2
Journal Article
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Using the text from job ads, we introduce a new dataset to describe the evolution of work from 1950 to 2000. We show that the transformation of the US labor market away from routine cognitive and ...manual tasks and toward nonroutine interactive and analytic tasks has been larger than prior research has found, with a substantial fraction of total changes occurring within narrowly defined job titles. We provide narrative and systematic evidence on changes in task content within job titles and on the emergence and disappearance of individual job titles.
The Value of Health and Longevity Murphy, Kevin M.; Topel, Robert H.
The Journal of political economy,
10/2006, Letnik:
114, Številka:
5
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We develop a framework for valuing improvements in health and apply it to past and prospective reductions in mortality in the United States. We calculate social values of (i) increased longevity over ...the twentieth century, (ii) progress against various diseases after 1970, and (iii) potential future progress against major diseases. Cumulative gains in life expectancy after 1900 were worth over $1.2 million to the representative American in 2000, whereas post‐1970 gains added about $3.2 trillion per year to national wealth, equal to about half of GDP. Potential gains from future health improvements are also large; for example, a 1 percent reduction in cancer mortality would be worth $500 billion.
We document large long-run differences in average house price appreciation across metropolitan areas over the past 50 years, and show they can be explained by an inelastic supply of land in some ...unique locations combined with an increasing number of highincome households nationally. The resulting high house prices and price-to-rent ratios in those "superstar" areas crowd out lower income households. The same forces generate a similar pattern among municipalities within a metropolitan area. These facts suggest that disparate local house price and income trends can be driven by aggregate demand, not just changes in local factors such as productivity or amenities.
Democracy and foreign education Spilimbergo, Antonio
The American economic review,
03/2009, Letnik:
99, Številka:
1
Journal Article
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Despite the large amount of private and public resources spent on foreign education, there is no systematic evidence that foreign-educated individuals foster democracy in their home countries. Using ...a unique panel dataset on foreign students starting in the 1950s, I show that foreign-educated individuals promote democracy in their home country, but only if the foreign education is acquired in democratic countries. The results are robust to several estimation techniques, to different definitions of democracy, and to the inclusion of a variety of control variables, including democracy in trading partners, neighboring countries, level of income, and level and stock of education.
Strategic interaction among firms may hinder the reduction of excess capacity in a declining industry. Policy interventions that attempt to reduce excess capacity may increase efficiency by ...accelerating the capital adjustment but may decrease efficiency by increasing the market power of firms and/or by distorting firms' divestment decisions. We study capacity coordination policies—forcing firms to reduce their capacity simultaneously—applied to the Japanese cement industry. Estimation results suggest that these interventions did not increase market power because reduction in capacity resulted in higher utilization of the remaining plants, and did not distort firms' scrappage decisions.
Stylists have become increasingly influential in shaping fashion imagery. They have moved from the backstage, as unrecognised players, to the frontstage of fashion, becoming celebrated for their ...creative work as image makers for magazines, advertising and fashion designers. Yet little is known about the profession, its diverse incarnations and its aesthetic economy. Featuring contributions from leading experts and stylists, this collection is the first to explore the history, meaning and practice of fashion styling through interviews and historic and present-day case studies.Featuring in-depth contributions from prominent fashion scholars, chapters span historical periods, cultural contexts and theoretical frameworks, employing a range of methodologies in the international case studies upon which they're based. Interspersed with interviews with innovative fashion stylists working today, and drawing on examples from advertising, the catwalk and magazines, this book explores the challenges faced by stylists in a fashion system increasingly shaped by commercial pressures and by growing numbers of collections and seasons.Fashion Stylists is an invaluable resource for students and professionals interested in image-making, the representation of style and fashion, entrepreneurship and the history of fashion professionals.
In this paper, we empirically examine whether the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Public Assistance (PA) program, which targets postdisaster cleanup and infrastructure rehabilitation, affects ...household purchases of flood insurance. Using the fixed-effects model with instrumental variables to address the endogeneity of disaster aid, we find that increased PA grants reduce a county’s flood insurance take-up rates, thereby driving down its total insurance coverage and premiums paid. Our findings provide empirical evidence on the crowding-out effect of public disaster programs, and shed light on their implicit social costs and increased federal financial exposure to natural disasters and climate change.
Prospects for Nuclear Power Davis, Lucas W.
The Journal of economic perspectives,
01/2012, Letnik:
26, Številka:
1
Journal Article
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Nuclear power has long been controversial because of concerns about nuclear accidents, storage of spent fuel, and how the spread of nuclear power might raise risks of the proliferation of nuclear ...weapons. These concerns are real and important. However, emphasizing these concerns implicitly suggests that unless these issues are taken into account, nuclear power would otherwise be cost effective compared to other forms of electricity generation. This implication is unwarranted. Throughout the history of nuclear power, a key challenge has been the high cost of construction for nuclear plants. Construction costs are high enough that it becomes difficult to make an economic argument for nuclear even before incorporating these external factors. This is particularly true in countries like the United States where recent technological advances have dramatically increased the availability of natural gas. The chairman of one of the largest U.S. nuclear companies recently said that his company would not break ground on a new nuclear plant until the price of natural gas was more than double today's level and carbon emissions cost $25 per ton. This comment summarizes the current economics of nuclear power pretty well. Yes, there is a certain confluence of factors that could make nuclear power a viable economic option. Otherwise, a nuclear power renaissance seems unlikely.
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