Many studies use shift-share (or "Bartik") instruments, which average a set of shocks with exposure share weights. We provide a new econometric framework for shift-share instrumental variable (SSIV) regressions in which identification follows from the quasi-random assignment of shocks, while exposure shares are allowed to be endogenous. The framework is motivated by an equivalence result: the orthogonality between a shift-share instrument and an unobserved residual can be represented as the orthogonality between the underlying shocks and a shock-level unobservable. SSIV regression coefficients can similarly be obtained from an equivalent shock-level regression, motivating shock-level conditions for their consistency. We discuss and illustrate several practical insights of this framework in the setting of Autor et al. (2013), estimating the effect of Chinese import competition on manufacturing employment across U.S. commuting zones.
{"title":"Quasi-Experimental Shift-Share Research Designs","authors":"K. Borusyak, Peter Hull, Xavier Jaravel","doi":"10.3386/W24997","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W24997","url":null,"abstract":"Many studies use shift-share (or \"Bartik\") instruments, which average a set of shocks with exposure share weights. We provide a new econometric framework for shift-share instrumental variable (SSIV) regressions in which identification follows from the quasi-random assignment of shocks, while exposure shares are allowed to be endogenous. The framework is motivated by an equivalence result: the orthogonality between a shift-share instrument and an unobserved residual can be represented as the orthogonality between the underlying shocks and a shock-level unobservable. SSIV regression coefficients can similarly be obtained from an equivalent shock-level regression, motivating shock-level conditions for their consistency. We discuss and illustrate several practical insights of this framework in the setting of Autor et al. (2013), estimating the effect of Chinese import competition on manufacturing employment across U.S. commuting zones.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"25 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132075319","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The amount of computational power devoted to anonymous, decentralized blockchains such as Bitcoin's must simultaneously satisfy two conditions in equilibrium: (1) a zero-profit condition among miners, who engage in a rent-seeking competition for the prize associated with adding the next block to the chain; and (2) an incentive compatibility condition on the system's vulnerability to a “majority attack”, namely that the computational costs of such an attack must exceed the benefits. Together, these two equations imply that (3) the recurring, “flow”, payments to miners for running the blockchain must be large relative to the one-off, “stock”, benefits of attacking it. This is very expensive! The constraint is softer (i.e., stock versus stock) if both (i) the mining technology used to run the blockchain is both scarce and non-repurposable, and (ii) any majority attack is a “sabotage” in that it causes a collapse in the economic value of the blockchain; however, reliance on non-repurposable technology for security and vulnerability to sabotage each raise their own concerns, and point to specific collapse scenarios. In particular, the model suggests that Bitcoin would be majority attacked if it became sufficiently economically important — e.g., if it became a “store of value” akin to gold — which suggests that there are intrinsic economic limits to how economically important it can become in the first place.
{"title":"The Economic Limits of Bitcoin and the Blockchain","authors":"Eric Budish","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3197300","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3197300","url":null,"abstract":"The amount of computational power devoted to anonymous, decentralized blockchains such as Bitcoin's must simultaneously satisfy two conditions in equilibrium: (1) a zero-profit condition among miners, who engage in a rent-seeking competition for the prize associated with adding the next block to the chain; and (2) an incentive compatibility condition on the system's vulnerability to a “majority attack”, namely that the computational costs of such an attack must exceed the benefits. Together, these two equations imply that (3) the recurring, “flow”, payments to miners for running the blockchain must be large relative to the one-off, “stock”, benefits of attacking it. This is very expensive! The constraint is softer (i.e., stock versus stock) if both (i) the mining technology used to run the blockchain is both scarce and non-repurposable, and (ii) any majority attack is a “sabotage” in that it causes a collapse in the economic value of the blockchain; however, reliance on non-repurposable technology for security and vulnerability to sabotage each raise their own concerns, and point to specific collapse scenarios. In particular, the model suggests that Bitcoin would be majority attacked if it became sufficiently economically important — e.g., if it became a “store of value” akin to gold — which suggests that there are intrinsic economic limits to how economically important it can become in the first place.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"15 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121975496","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
We provide evidence that risk aversion leads pharmaceutical firms to underinvest in radical innovation. We introduce a new measure of drug novelty based on chemical similarity and show that firms face a risk-reward trade-off: novel drug candidates are less likely to obtain FDA approval but are based on more valuable patents. Consistent with a simple model of costly external finance, we show that a positive shock to firms’ net worth leads firms to develop more novel drugs. This suggests that even large firms may behave as though they are risk averse, reducing their willingness to investment in potentially valuable radical innovation.
{"title":"Missing Novelty in Drug Development","authors":"Joshua L. Krieger, Danielle Li, D. Papanikolaou","doi":"10.3386/W24595","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W24595","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 We provide evidence that risk aversion leads pharmaceutical firms to underinvest in radical innovation. We introduce a new measure of drug novelty based on chemical similarity and show that firms face a risk-reward trade-off: novel drug candidates are less likely to obtain FDA approval but are based on more valuable patents. Consistent with a simple model of costly external finance, we show that a positive shock to firms’ net worth leads firms to develop more novel drugs. This suggests that even large firms may behave as though they are risk averse, reducing their willingness to investment in potentially valuable radical innovation.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"5 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114425286","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper studies how information and communication technology (ICT) improvements affect trade along the value chain and international technology diffusion. We examine the impact of a revolutionary technology, the roll-out of the global telegraph network, on the 19th century cotton textile industry. First, we show that connection to the telegraph disproportionately increased trade in intermediate goods relative to final goods. We document that this was due to differences in codifiability; that is, the extent to which product specifications could be communicated at a distance using only words (and thus by sending telegrams) as opposed to inspecting a sample of the product. Second, adoption of the telegraph also facilitated international technology diffusion through the complementary mechanisms of importing machinery and acquiring knowledge of the production process and local demand through importing intermediates. These results shed light on how ICT facilitates the formation of global value chains and the diffusion of frontier technology.
{"title":"Spinning the Web: The Impact of ICT on Trade in Intermediates and Technology Diffusion","authors":"R. Juhász, C. Steinwender","doi":"10.3386/W24590","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W24590","url":null,"abstract":"This paper studies how information and communication technology (ICT) improvements affect trade along the value chain and international technology diffusion. We examine the impact of a revolutionary technology, the roll-out of the global telegraph network, on the 19th century cotton textile industry. First, we show that connection to the telegraph disproportionately increased trade in intermediate goods relative to final goods. We document that this was due to differences in codifiability; that is, the extent to which product specifications could be communicated at a distance using only words (and thus by sending telegrams) as opposed to inspecting a sample of the product. Second, adoption of the telegraph also facilitated international technology diffusion through the complementary mechanisms of importing machinery and acquiring knowledge of the production process and local demand through importing intermediates. These results shed light on how ICT facilitates the formation of global value chains and the diffusion of frontier technology.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"16 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125712533","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Based on recent developments in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), we examine what type of human labor will be a substitute versus a complement to emerging technologies. We argue that these recent developments reduce the costs of providing a particular set of tasks – prediction tasks. Prediction about uncertain states of the world is an input into decision-making. We show that prediction allows riskier decisions to be taken and this is its impact on observed productivity although it could also increase the variance of outcomes as well. We consider the role of human judgment in decision-making as prediction technology improves. Judgment is exercised when the objective function for a particular set of decisions cannot be described (i.e., coded). However, we demonstrate that better prediction impacts the returns to different types of judgment in opposite ways. Hence, not all human judgment will be a complement to AI. Finally, we show that humans will delegate some decisions to machines even when the decision would be superior with human input.
{"title":"Exploring the Impact of Artificial Intelligence: Prediction Versus Judgment","authors":"A. Agrawal, J. Gans, Avi Goldfarb","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3177467","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3177467","url":null,"abstract":"Based on recent developments in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), we examine what type of human labor will be a substitute versus a complement to emerging technologies. We argue that these recent developments reduce the costs of providing a particular set of tasks – prediction tasks. Prediction about uncertain states of the world is an input into decision-making. We show that prediction allows riskier decisions to be taken and this is its impact on observed productivity although it could also increase the variance of outcomes as well. We consider the role of human judgment in decision-making as prediction technology improves. Judgment is exercised when the objective function for a particular set of decisions cannot be described (i.e., coded). However, we demonstrate that better prediction impacts the returns to different types of judgment in opposite ways. Hence, not all human judgment will be a complement to AI. Finally, we show that humans will delegate some decisions to machines even when the decision would be superior with human input.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130394463","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
B. Hamilton, Andrés Hincapié, Robert A. Miller, Nicholas W. Papageorge
This paper develops and estimates a dynamic structural model of demand for a multi-attribute product. The demand side equilibrium supports a product spectrum, the characteristics of which evolve over time in response to supply innovations induced by the composition and extent of aggregate demand. The direction and speed of innovation is inefficient because individuals create an externality by not accounting for their influence on the discovery process. We apply the model to drugs invented to combat the HIV epidemic, during which frequent, incremental innovations in medication were punctuated by sporadic breakthroughs. In this application products differ in their efficacy and their propensity to cause side effects. Our biennial data on four American cities track a replenished panel of individuals for over twenty years, from when drugs were not only ineffective but also created debilitating side effects, to when the market matured. We find that the externalities are quantitatively important and that even a temporary subsidy would have improved average social welfare and been more equitable.
{"title":"Innovation and Diffusion of Medical Treatment","authors":"B. Hamilton, Andrés Hincapié, Robert A. Miller, Nicholas W. Papageorge","doi":"10.3386/W24577","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W24577","url":null,"abstract":"This paper develops and estimates a dynamic structural model of demand for a multi-attribute product. The demand side equilibrium supports a product spectrum, the characteristics of which evolve over time in response to supply innovations induced by the composition and extent of aggregate demand. The direction and speed of innovation is inefficient because individuals create an externality by not accounting for their influence on the discovery process. We apply the model to drugs invented to combat the HIV epidemic, during which frequent, incremental innovations in medication were punctuated by sporadic breakthroughs. In this application products differ in their efficacy and their propensity to cause side effects. Our biennial data on four American cities track a replenished panel of individuals for over twenty years, from when drugs were not only ineffective but also created debilitating side effects, to when the market matured. We find that the externalities are quantitatively important and that even a temporary subsidy would have improved average social welfare and been more equitable.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"153 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123914343","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper analyzes how entrepreneurs fare in an intermediary market segment when the segment is closely attached to a single supplier market. While focusing on two structural constraints, organizational structure and competitive pressure, I build off of the fact that in the past thirty years in the U.S. beer industry, as the number of beer producers (i.e. brewers) proliferated, their intermediaries (i.e. wholesalers) declined. Using establishment-level restricted-access economic microdata from the Longitudinal Business Database, I examine what happens with intermediaries when (some) producers start competing on product variety instead of competing on scale. Piecewise exponential survival models show that Stinchcombe’s ‘liability of newness’ principle can get suspended and certain newcomers have better survival chances than industry incumbents. I call this effect the potential of newness under which entrepreneurial establishments fare better if they are part of well-resourced multiunit firms. Furthermore, I show that these resource-rich entrepreneurs benefit from the potential of newness especially in areas with competition-laden history and where the industry experiences shakeouts. For market incumbents, the more competition-laden the history of the local market, the higher the hazards of current time establishment failure. For multiunit entrepreneurs, however, a more competition-laden history of the local market is associated with a decrease in the hazards of current time establishment failure. This paper highlights that market structure not only enables but sometimes traps already existing organizations and make them less adaptive to changing logics of competition. The results highlight how organizational factors and geography create inequalities among intermediary organizations.
本文分析了当中间细分市场与单一供应商市场紧密相连时，企业家在中间细分市场中的表现。在关注两种结构性约束，组织结构和竞争压力的同时，我建立了一个事实，即在过去的三十年里，在美国啤酒行业，随着啤酒生产商(即酿造商)的数量激增，他们的中间商(即批发商)减少了。利用纵向商业数据库(Longitudinal Business Database)中企业层面的限制访问经济微观数据，我研究了当(一些)生产商开始在产品种类而不是规模上竞争时，中间商会发生什么。分段指数生存模型显示，Stinchcombe的“新责任”原则可以被暂停，某些新来者比行业现有者有更好的生存机会。我把这种效应称为新颖性的潜力，在这种效应下，如果创业机构是资源充足的多部门企业的一部分，它们就会发展得更好。此外，我还指出，这些资源丰富的企业家受益于创新的潜力，特别是在历史上竞争激烈的地区和行业经历洗牌的地区。对于市场现有者来说，当地市场的历史竞争越激烈，当前时间建立失败的风险就越高。然而，对于多单位企业家来说，当地市场竞争更激烈的历史与当前建立失败的危险减少有关。本文强调，市场结构不仅使现有组织成为可能，有时还会使它们陷入困境，使它们对不断变化的竞争逻辑的适应能力下降。研究结果突出了组织因素和地理因素如何导致中介组织之间的不平等。
{"title":"When Liability Becomes Potential: The Survival Chances of Multiunit Entrants in U.S. Beer Wholesaling","authors":"Tunde Cserpes","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3246656","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3246656","url":null,"abstract":"This paper analyzes how entrepreneurs fare in an intermediary market segment when the segment is closely attached to a single supplier market. While focusing on two structural constraints, organizational structure and competitive pressure, I build off of the fact that in the past thirty years in the U.S. beer industry, as the number of beer producers (i.e. brewers) proliferated, their intermediaries (i.e. wholesalers) declined. Using establishment-level restricted-access economic microdata from the Longitudinal Business Database, I examine what happens with intermediaries when (some) producers start competing on product variety instead of competing on scale. Piecewise exponential survival models show that Stinchcombe’s ‘liability of newness’ principle can get suspended and certain newcomers have better survival chances than industry incumbents. I call this effect the potential of newness under which entrepreneurial establishments fare better if they are part of well-resourced multiunit firms. Furthermore, I show that these resource-rich entrepreneurs benefit from the potential of newness especially in areas with competition-laden history and where the industry experiences shakeouts. For market incumbents, the more competition-laden the history of the local market, the higher the hazards of current time establishment failure. For multiunit entrepreneurs, however, a more competition-laden history of the local market is associated with a decrease in the hazards of current time establishment failure. This paper highlights that market structure not only enables but sometimes traps already existing organizations and make them less adaptive to changing logics of competition. The results highlight how organizational factors and geography create inequalities among intermediary organizations.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"92 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-04-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116020593","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
“Moore’s Law” in the semiconductor manufacturing industry is used to describe the predictable historical evolution of a single manufacturing technology platform that has been continuously reducing the costs of fabricating electronic circuits since the mid-1960s. Some features of its future evolution were first correctly predicted by Gordon E. Moore in 1965, and Moore’s Law became an industry synonym for continuous, periodic reduction in both size and cost for electronic circuit elements. This paper develops develops some stylized economic facts, reviewing why and how this progression in manufacturing technology delivered a 20 to 30 percent annual decline in the cost of manufacturing a transistor, on average, as long as it continued. Other characteristics associated with smaller feature sizes would be expected to have additional economic value, and historical trends for these characteristics are reviewed. Lower manufacturing costs alone pose no special challenges for price and innovation measurement, but these other benefits do, and motivate quality adjustment methods when semiconductor product prices are measured. Empirical evidence of recent changes to the historical Moore’s Law trajectory is analyzed, and shows a slowdown in Moore’s Law as measured by prices for the highest volume products: memory chips, custom chip designs outsourced to dedicated contract manufacturers (foundries), and Intel microprocessors. Evidence to the contrary, which relates primarily to Intel microprocessors is reviewed, as are economic reasons why Intel microprocessor prices might behave differently from prices for other types of semiconductor chips. A computer architecture textbook model of how chip characteristics affect microprocessor performance is specified and tested in a structural econometric model of microprocessor computing performance. This simple econometric model, using only a small set of explanatory chip characteristics, explains 99% of variance across processor models in performance on commonly used performance benchmarks. This small set of characteristics should clearly be included in any hedonic model of computer or processor prices. Most of these chip characteristics also affect chip production cost, and therefore have an additional rationale for inclusion in a hedonic model that is separate from their demand-side effects on computer performance metrics relevant to users.
半导体制造业中的“摩尔定律”用于描述自20世纪60年代中期以来不断降低制造电子电路成本的单一制造技术平台的可预测的历史演变。1965年，戈登·e·摩尔(Gordon E. Moore)首先正确地预测了其未来发展的一些特征，摩尔定律成为电子电路元件尺寸和成本持续、周期性减少的行业代名词。本文发展了一些程式化的经济事实，回顾了制造技术的进步为什么以及如何使晶体管的制造成本平均每年下降20%到30%，只要这种进步持续下去。与较小特征尺寸相关的其他特征预计具有额外的经济价值，并回顾了这些特征的历史趋势。较低的制造成本本身并没有对价格和创新测量构成特别的挑战，但这些其他好处确实存在，并且在测量半导体产品价格时激发了质量调整方法。本文分析了历史上摩尔定律轨迹最近变化的经验证据，并显示了摩尔定律的放缓，这是用大批量产品的价格来衡量的:内存芯片、外包给专门合同制造商(代工厂)的定制芯片设计和英特尔微处理器。相反的证据，主要涉及英特尔微处理器，以及英特尔微处理器价格可能与其他类型半导体芯片价格不同的经济原因。计算机体系结构教科书模型芯片特性如何影响微处理器的性能被指定和测试在微处理器计算性能的结构计量模型。这个简单的计量经济模型只使用了一小部分解释性的芯片特性，在常用的性能基准测试中，它解释了处理器模型之间99%的性能差异。这一小部分特性应该清楚地包含在任何享乐模型的计算机或处理器价格中。大多数这些芯片特性也会影响芯片的生产成本，因此有一个额外的理由包括在享乐模型中，这与它们对与用户相关的计算机性能指标的需求侧影响是分开的。
{"title":"Measuring Moore's Law: Evidence from Price, Cost, and Quality Indexes","authors":"K. Flamm","doi":"10.3386/W24553","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W24553","url":null,"abstract":"“Moore’s Law” in the semiconductor manufacturing industry is used to describe the predictable historical evolution of a single manufacturing technology platform that has been continuously reducing the costs of fabricating electronic circuits since the mid-1960s. Some features of its future evolution were first correctly predicted by Gordon E. Moore in 1965, and Moore’s Law became an industry synonym for continuous, periodic reduction in both size and cost for electronic circuit elements. This paper develops develops some stylized economic facts, reviewing why and how this progression in manufacturing technology delivered a 20 to 30 percent annual decline in the cost of manufacturing a transistor, on average, as long as it continued. Other characteristics associated with smaller feature sizes would be expected to have additional economic value, and historical trends for these characteristics are reviewed. Lower manufacturing costs alone pose no special challenges for price and innovation measurement, but these other benefits do, and motivate quality adjustment methods when semiconductor product prices are measured. Empirical evidence of recent changes to the historical Moore’s Law trajectory is analyzed, and shows a slowdown in Moore’s Law as measured by prices for the highest volume products: memory chips, custom chip designs outsourced to dedicated contract manufacturers (foundries), and Intel microprocessors. Evidence to the contrary, which relates primarily to Intel microprocessors is reviewed, as are economic reasons why Intel microprocessor prices might behave differently from prices for other types of semiconductor chips. A computer architecture textbook model of how chip characteristics affect microprocessor performance is specified and tested in a structural econometric model of microprocessor computing performance. This simple econometric model, using only a small set of explanatory chip characteristics, explains 99% of variance across processor models in performance on commonly used performance benchmarks. This small set of characteristics should clearly be included in any hedonic model of computer or processor prices. Most of these chip characteristics also affect chip production cost, and therefore have an additional rationale for inclusion in a hedonic model that is separate from their demand-side effects on computer performance metrics relevant to users.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"34 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116936371","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-04-01DOI: 10.5089/9781484349922.001.A001
Gustavo Adler, Daniel Garcia-Macia
With the rapid growth of countries' foreign asset and liability positions over the last two decades, financial returns on those positions ('NFA returns') have become material drivers of current accounts and net stock positions. This paper documents the relative importance of NFA return versus trade channels in driving NFA dynamics, for a sample of 52 economies over 1990-2015. While persistent trade imbalances have been a strong force leading to diverging NFA positions, NFA returns have played an important stabilizing role, mitigating NFA divergence. The stabilizing role of NFA returns primarily reflects the response of asset prices, rather than yield differentials or exchange rates. There is also evidence of heterogeneity in the speed of NFA adjustment, with emerging market economies adjusting more rapidly than advanced economies, and reserve-currency countries adjusting more slowly than others. The paper also documents the role of NFA returns as insurance against domestic and global income shocks, with a focus on reserve-currency countries.
{"title":"The Stabilizing Role of Net Foreign Asset Returns","authors":"Gustavo Adler, Daniel Garcia-Macia","doi":"10.5089/9781484349922.001.A001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5089/9781484349922.001.A001","url":null,"abstract":"With the rapid growth of countries' foreign asset and liability positions over the last two decades, financial returns on those positions ('NFA returns') have become material drivers of current accounts and net stock positions. This paper documents the relative importance of NFA return versus trade channels in driving NFA dynamics, for a sample of 52 economies over 1990-2015. While persistent trade imbalances have been a strong force leading to diverging NFA positions, NFA returns have played an important stabilizing role, mitigating NFA divergence. The stabilizing role of NFA returns primarily reflects the response of asset prices, rather than yield differentials or exchange rates. There is also evidence of heterogeneity in the speed of NFA adjustment, with emerging market economies adjusting more rapidly than advanced economies, and reserve-currency countries adjusting more slowly than others. The paper also documents the role of NFA returns as insurance against domestic and global income shocks, with a focus on reserve-currency countries.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"77 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131482533","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This report provides findings from an in-depth survey conducted at 72 local businesses clustered around commercial markets located across Ganta, Gbarnga and Monrovia Cities of Liberia. The aim of the study is to provide a better understanding of wage rate business proprietors pay employees, which are classified in the study as entry level apprentices without soft skills, entry level apprentices with soft skills, entry level employees, and experienced employees. Our study shows that business owners place a very high wage premium on apprentices with soft skill training than with new apprentices without soft skill training with later earning significantly lower wages. The study found entry level employees with the PROSPECTS soft skills training earning significantly higher (Ganta $58, Montserrado $52, Gbarnga $50) than entry level apprentices without PROSPECTS soft skills training (Ganta $37 monthly, Gbarnga $25 monthly, Montserrado $14 monthly). A challenge mentioned by majority of business owners is the prevalence of unskilled and untrained workers within our sampled respondents. The study shows very experienced employees at Montserrado earn a lot higher at $166 when compared to entry level employee wages of $52. Experienced employees at Gbarnga also earn considerably higher at $63 than entry level employee wages of $50.4 Findings from the sampled businesses across the three counties show a few businesses commit funds in addition to PROSPECTS subsidy of $70 towards stipend for apprentices participating in the three months placement. We found a few apprentices on placement supported by businesses with 15$ at Montserrado, Gbarnga apprentices $24, and Ganta apprentices $17 monthly. PROSPECTS apprentices not only receive soft skills treatment but also get work experience after the three months placement, and this prepares the youths towards better employment opportunities. Our study shows that businesses are proliferating at a faster pace since phase 11 PROSPECTS intervention ended mid-2017, with 28.75% of surveyed businesses newly established in the last three years. This has meant an increase in businesses employing workers between 3 and 6 in number in the localities surveyed. Findings also show a poor percentage of businesses at 50% can pay workers on time which likely impacts on work motivation and attitude to work of employees. For over half of business owners, there are difficulties with training employed staff with identified skills gaps, despite business owners commonly stating employees need marketing training to enable higher turnover of goods on sale. Only 5.56% of business employers financially support employees with needed training and skills, with 89% of employers suggesting staff have low business and work-readiness skills. General perception of business owners is that ventures are profitable with 77.78% of the sample with this view and difficulties noted with 63% of businesses not owning business premises where transactions take place.
{"title":"Apprentice Wage Rates: Extent, Determinants and Implications","authors":"Arinze Francis Udenka","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3719555","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3719555","url":null,"abstract":"This report provides findings from an in-depth survey conducted at 72 local businesses clustered around commercial markets located across Ganta, Gbarnga and Monrovia Cities of Liberia. The aim of the study is to provide a better understanding of wage rate business proprietors pay employees, which are classified in the study as entry level apprentices without soft skills, entry level apprentices with soft skills, entry level employees, and experienced employees. Our study shows that business owners place a very high wage premium on apprentices with soft skill training than with new apprentices without soft skill training with later earning significantly lower wages. The study found entry level employees with the PROSPECTS soft skills training earning significantly higher (Ganta $58, Montserrado $52, Gbarnga $50) than entry level apprentices without PROSPECTS soft skills training (Ganta $37 monthly, Gbarnga $25 monthly, Montserrado $14 monthly). A challenge mentioned by majority of business owners is the prevalence of unskilled and untrained workers within our sampled respondents. The study shows very experienced employees at Montserrado earn a lot higher at $166 when compared to entry level employee wages of $52. Experienced employees at Gbarnga also earn considerably higher at $63 than entry level employee wages of $50.4 Findings from the sampled businesses across the three counties show a few businesses commit funds in addition to PROSPECTS subsidy of $70 towards stipend for apprentices participating in the three months placement. We found a few apprentices on placement supported by businesses with 15$ at Montserrado, Gbarnga apprentices $24, and Ganta apprentices $17 monthly. PROSPECTS apprentices not only receive soft skills treatment but also get work experience after the three months placement, and this prepares the youths towards better employment opportunities. Our study shows that businesses are proliferating at a faster pace since phase 11 PROSPECTS intervention ended mid-2017, with 28.75% of surveyed businesses newly established in the last three years. This has meant an increase in businesses employing workers between 3 and 6 in number in the localities surveyed. Findings also show a poor percentage of businesses at 50% can pay workers on time which likely impacts on work motivation and attitude to work of employees. For over half of business owners, there are difficulties with training employed staff with identified skills gaps, despite business owners commonly stating employees need marketing training to enable higher turnover of goods on sale. Only 5.56% of business employers financially support employees with needed training and skills, with 89% of employers suggesting staff have low business and work-readiness skills. General perception of business owners is that ventures are profitable with 77.78% of the sample with this view and difficulties noted with 63% of businesses not owning business premises where transactions take place.","PeriodicalId":325993,"journal":{"name":"Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Research Paper Series","volume":"17 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-03-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115999671","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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