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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

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Articles 1 - 8 of 8

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Profiting From Regulation: Evidence From The European Carbon Market, James B. Bushnell, Howard Chong, Erin T. Mansur Nov 2013

Profiting From Regulation: Evidence From The European Carbon Market, James B. Bushnell, Howard Chong, Erin T. Mansur

Dartmouth Scholarship

We investigate how cap-and-trade regulation affects profits. In late April 2006, the EU CO2 allowance price dropped 50 percent, equating to a €28 billion reduction in the value of aggregate annual allowances. We examine daily returns for 552 stocks from the EUROSTOXX index. Despite reductions in environmental costs, we find that stock prices fell for firms in both carbon- and electricity-intensive industries, particularly for firms selling primarily within the EU. Our results imply that investors focus on product price impacts, rather than just compliance costs and the nominal value of pollution permits.


Corruption Dynamics: The Golden Goose Effect, Paul Niehaus, Sandip Sukhtankar Nov 2013

Corruption Dynamics: The Golden Goose Effect, Paul Niehaus, Sandip Sukhtankar

Dartmouth Scholarship

Theoretical work on disciplining corrupt agents has emphasized the role of expected future rents -- for example, efficiency wages. Yet taken seriously this approach implies that illicit future rents should also deter corruption. We study this "golden goose" effect in the context of a statutory wage increase in India's employment guarantee scheme, comparing official microrecords to original household survey data to measure corruption. We estimate large golden goose effects that reduced the total impact of the wage increase on theft by roughly 64 percent. In short, rent expectations matter. (JEL D73, D82, H83, J41, K42, O17, O21)


The U.S. Federal Trade Commission’S Line Of Business Program And Innovation Research, John T. Scott Aug 2013

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission’S Line Of Business Program And Innovation Research, John T. Scott

Dartmouth Scholarship

This paper examines how the resources of the Line of Business (LB) Program of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) leveraged academic research to develop understanding of science and technology policy and to point to new directions for both research and policy. The paper provides an overview and discussion of the birth and death of the FTC LB Program and its unique LB data, the innovation research using the LB data, and the legacy of the program.


Local Responses To Federal Grants: Evidence From The Introduction Of Title I In The South, Elizabeth U. Cascio, Nora Gordon, Sarah Reber Aug 2013

Local Responses To Federal Grants: Evidence From The Introduction Of Title I In The South, Elizabeth U. Cascio, Nora Gordon, Sarah Reber

Dartmouth Scholarship

We analyze the effects of the introduction of Title I of the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act, a large federal grants program designed to increase poor students' educational services and achievement. We focus on the South, the poorest region of the country. Title I increased school spending by $0.50 on the dollar in the average southern school district and by more in districts with less ability to offset grants through local tax reductions. Title I-induced increases in school budgets appear to have reduced high school dropout rates of whites, but not blacks.


Testing For Factor Price Equality With Unobserved Differences In Factor Quality Or Productivity, Andrew B. Bernard, Stephen J. Redding, Peter K. Schott May 2013

Testing For Factor Price Equality With Unobserved Differences In Factor Quality Or Productivity, Andrew B. Bernard, Stephen J. Redding, Peter K. Schott

Dartmouth Scholarship

We develop a method for identifying departures from relative factor price equality that is robust to unobserved variation in factor productivity. We implement this method using data on the relative wage bills of nonproduction and production workers across 170 local labor markets comprising the continental United States for 1972, 1992, and 2007. We find evidence of statistically significant differences in relative wages in all three years. These differences increase in magnitude over time and are related to industry structure in a manner that is consistent with neoclassical models of production. (JEL J31, J61, R23)


The Poverty Gap In School Spending Following The Introduction Of Title I, Elizabeth U. Cascio, Sarah Reber May 2013

The Poverty Gap In School Spending Following The Introduction Of Title I, Elizabeth U. Cascio, Sarah Reber

Dartmouth Scholarship

Title I of the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act explicitly directed more federal aid for K-12 education to poorer areas for the first time in US history, with a goal of promoting regional convergence in school spending. Using newly collected data, we find some evidence that Title I narrowed the gap in per-pupil school spending between richer and poorer states in the short- to medium-run. However, the program was small relative to then-existing poverty gaps in school spending; even in the absence of crowd-out by local or state governments, the program could have reduced the gap by only 15 …


An Activity-Generating Theory Of Regulation, Joshua Schwartzstein, Andrei Shleifer Feb 2013

An Activity-Generating Theory Of Regulation, Joshua Schwartzstein, Andrei Shleifer

Dartmouth Scholarship

We propose an activity-generating theory of regulation. When courts make errors, tort litigation becomes unpredictable and as such imposes risk on firms, thereby discouraging entry, innovation, and other socially desirable activity. When social returns to activity are higher than private returns, it may pay the society to generate some information ex ante about how risky firms are and to impose safety standards based on that information. In some situations, compliance with such standards should entirely preempt tort liability; in others, it should merely reduce penalties. By reducing litigation risk, this type of regulation can raise welfare.


Effects Of Terms Of Trade Gains And Tariff Changes On The Measurement Of Us Productivity Growth, Robert C. Feenstra, Benjamin R. Mandel, Marshall B. Reinsdorf, Matthew J. Slaughter Feb 2013

Effects Of Terms Of Trade Gains And Tariff Changes On The Measurement Of Us Productivity Growth, Robert C. Feenstra, Benjamin R. Mandel, Marshall B. Reinsdorf, Matthew J. Slaughter

Dartmouth Scholarship

The acceleration in US productivity growth since 1995 is often attributed to declining prices for information technology (IT ) goods, and therefore enhanced productivity growth in that sector. We investigate an alternative explanation for these IT price movements: gains in the US terms of trade and tariff reductions, especially for IT products, which led to greater gains than shown by official indexes. We do not, however, investigate the indexes used to deflate the domestic absorption components of GDP, and if upward biases are present in those indexes that could offset some of the effects of mismeasured export and import indexes. …