Contemporary Economic Policy back issues from July 1999:
Estimating the non-environmental consequences of greehouse gas reductions is harder than you think
Jul 01, 1999; ... Top-down and bottom-up models of the non-environmental consequences of policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions embody different implicit theories of economic organizations. Yet neither approach is explicit in showing the detailed computations that must be traced if the activities of firms ...
The Kyoto Protocol, cafe standards, and gasoline taxes
Jul 01, 1999; ... The Kyoto Protocol mandates that the U.S. reduce emissions of greenhouse gases to 93% of their 1990 levels by the period 2008-2012. This paper explores the possibility of reducing carbon dioxide emissions in the transportation sector to 7% below their 1990 level by 2010. This paper examines two ...
The determinants of hazardous waste disposal choice: An empirical analysis of halogenated solvent waste shipments
Jul 01, 1999; ... Disposal of hazardous waste is more complex than simply choosing the option with the lowest price: Legislation may hold a waste generator responsible for cleaning up a badly contaminated waste disposal site if the operator of that site goes bankrupt. This paper estimates conditional logit models ...
Assessing the efficiency of public schools using data envelopment analysis and frontier regression
Jul 01, 1999; ... The cost efficiency of 520 New York school districts is measured using data envelopment analysis and stochastic frontier regression. Mean inefficiency is 14% using either method, and the rank order correlation coefficient of inefficiency between the two methods is . 86. The three largest school ...
Inflation targeting in practice: Further evidence
Jul 01, 1999; ... This paper empirically investigates the plausibility, which has been argued but not fully established, that the efficacy of the inflation-targeting strategy recently implemented by New Zealand, Canada, and the U.K. has been an artifact of a global disinflationary environment. A data ...
E-money and payment system risks
Jul 01, 1999; ... The rapid development of new electronic systems of payment, or e-money, offers society many potential benefits even as it poses new types of risk for system operators. The risks to which e-money is most subject-operational, fraud, and legal risk-pose new challenges to payment system risk ...
Exchange rate-based stabilization in Western Europe: Greece, Ireland, Italy, and Portugal
Jul 01, 1999; ... This paper reviews the experience with exchange rate-based stabilization of four Western European countries-Italy, Ireland, Portugal, and Greece-in 1980-1996 and compares it with the experience of high-inflation developing countries. We find that inflation stabilization was contractionary, in ...
Does financial market development stimulate savings? Evidence from emerging stock markets
Jul 01, 1999; ... This paper examines the empirical relation between financial market development, as measured by the stock market, and gross private savings rates in 16 emerging markets over 1982-1993. With data from all 16 countries, there is evidence of a significant positive relation between savings and stock ...
Is the exclusionary rule worthwhile?
Jul 01, 1999; ... In the U.S. criminal courts must throw out improperly obtained evidence. A key justification for this practice is that it is that it deters law-enforcement misconduct. This paper uses principal-agent theory to suggest that, contrary to economic and other conventional wisdom, if the exclusionary ...
Infrastructure and production efficiency: An analysis on the Korean manufacturing industry
Jul 01, 1999; ... This study estimates an aggregate production function of manufacturing industry using panel data of 11 Korean regions covering 1977-1992. While the previous studies regard infrastructure as a direct input for production, the present study proposes that infrastructure has an effect on actual ...
The waiver pork barrel: Committee membership and the approval time of medicaid waivers
Jul 01, 1999; ... Recent growth in Medicaid spending has forced states to look for ways to slow the program's rate of growth. Under the Medicaid program's rules, state governments must submit a waiver to the federal government in order to implement a cost-saving program. The time required to process a waiver ...
A reduction in consumer expenditure on cigarettes and its effects on employment: A case study of South Africa
Jul 01, 1999; ... This study estimates empirically the employment effects if stronger tobacco control policies result in reduced consumption in South Africa. Since 1995, the government has committed itself to a stronger tobacco control policy and increased excise taxes. Yet policy makers are sensitive to the need ...