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on Urban and Real Estate Economics |
| By: | Yiming He |
| Abstract: | Inter-city public transit system, like high-speed rail and inter-city railway, continues to promote the development of regional economic integration, however, relatively little is known about the impacts of inter-city metro system on regional integration. Different from western countries, in China, the primary commuting mode is traditionally public transit within urban although there is higher reliance on automobile for commuting in past years. Therefore, citizens’ commute behavior and residential location choice is mainly influenced by traditional public transit system, especially urban mass rail transit. The construction and operation of Guangfo Metro, the first urban metro system that directly connects two cities- Guangzhou and Foshan in China, stimulates the immigration of residents and movement of enterprises from Guangzhou to Foshan during past decade, because of more affordable housing price and improved accessibility in Foshan. At present, Foshan acts as satellite city of Guangzhou economically and socially at a large extend, particularly after the operation of Guangfo metro. Therefore, Guangfo Metro system is a special and good case for observing the influence of inter-city metro system on regional integration, especially its impacts among satellite city in the context of China. The paper investigates the territorial influences of inter-city metro system on residents’ willingness to pay on residential property in Foshan by conducting a panel data analysis on real estate project-based transaction price around existing and proposed Guangfo Metro stations. This study contributes to understand the inter-city metro investment and its impacts on regional integration in metropolitan area in the context of China. |
| Keywords: | Commute behavior; Inter-city metro system; Regional intgration; Satellite city |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_307&r=ure |
| By: | Jun Hyung Kim; Jeongseob Kim |
| Abstract: | The external effects of public housing have been a controversial topic in housing studies. Negative spillover effect of public housing on nearby property values may exist due to the deteriorated physical structure of public housing and the concentration of poor tenants. Some researchers believe that concentrated poverty by the public housing could lead to crime and youth misbehavior, thus resulting in further neighborhood decline. But, other scholars argue that public housing, such as HOPE VI projects, could contribute to neighborhood revitalization by removing disamenities of the neighborhood.Although the results of empirical studies about the spillover effects of public housing are still inconsistent, the impacts of various assisted rental housing programs have been investigated continuously in the context of developed countries, in particular, using many U.S. cases. But, less is known regarding the effect of public housing projects in Asian countries having different institutional and market contexts. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the effects of public housing projects in Korea. South Korea has experienced rapid urbanization and economic growth, and it has a very unique housing tenure system, called Chonsei, and relatively lower level of residential segregation compared to U.S. cities.Specifically, three research questions are addressed.What is the effect of public housing projects on nearby home values?Does the effect of public housing vary depending on the income level of target population?Does the effect of public housing vary depending on the rental tenure types? |
| Keywords: | difference-in-difference; Hedonic price model; Housing Policy; Public Housing; spillover |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_285&r=ure |
| By: | Cecile Gaubert |
| Abstract: | The distribution of firms in space is far from uniform. Some locations host the most productive large firms, while others barely attract any. In this paper, I study the sorting of heterogeneous firms across locations and analyze policies designed to attract firms to particular regions (place-based policies). I first propose a theory of the distribution of heterogeneous firms in a variety of sectors across cities. Aggregate TFP and welfare depend on the extent of agglomeration externalities produced in cities and on how heterogeneous firms sort across them. The distribution of city sizes and the sorting patterns of firms are uniquely determined in equilibrium. This allows me to structurally estimate the model, using French firm-level data. I find that nearly half of the observed productivity advantage of large cities is due to firm sorting. I use the estimated model to quantify the general equilibrium effects of place-based policies. I find that policies that decrease local congestion lead to a new spatial equilibrium with higher aggregate TFP and welfare. In contrast, policies that subsidize under-developed areas have negative aggregate effects. |
| JEL: | F11 R10 R30 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24478&r=ure |
| By: | Andrea Cipollini; Fabio Parla |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we use a Global Vector Autoregression (GVAR) model to assess the spatio-temporal mechanism of house price spillovers, also known as “ripple effect”, among 93 Italian provincial housing markets, over the period 2004 - 2016. In order to better capture the local housing market dynamics, we use data not only on house prices but also on transaction volumes. In particular, we focus on estimating, to what extent, exogenous shocks, interpreted as negative housing demand shocks, arising from 10 Italian regional capitals, impact on their house prices and sales and how these shocks spill over to neighbours housing markets. The negative housing market demand shock hitting the GVAR model is identified by using theory-driven sign restrictions. The spatio-temporal analysis carried through impulse response functions shows that there is evidence of a “ripple effect” mainly occurring through transaction volumes. |
| Keywords: | Ripple effect; housing market prices and volumes; Global VAR; sign restrictions |
| JEL: | C32 C33 R21 R50 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mod:wcefin:18041&r=ure |
| By: | Radoslaw Trojanek; Sonia Huderek-Glapska |
| Abstract: | The interactions between air transport activities, airport location, local society and the regional economy are of great importance nowadays. Air traffic growth enhances the development of the economy and brings benefits to the users. On the other hand, there are some negative external effects and the costs are borne to great extent by the local community. Sustainable development requires all the effects caused by the provision of air services to be included in a comprehensive assessment of air transport activities. The aim of this study is to discuss the role of air transport as an instrument for sustainable development, investigate the external costs of aviation with particular emphasis on the effect of aviation noise on the local community and estimate to what degree this impact is stable over a period of time. The social cost of noise was evaluated through a complementary market, namely a change in the value of properties located in an area affected by airport activities. Therefore the impact of the Limited Use Area (LUA) related to aircraft noise associated with the operations of the largest airport in Poland, Warsaw Chopin Airport, on the housing prices in Warsaw was measured through the use of hedonic price modelling. Our estimates suggest that the impact of aviation noise on land-use policy has implications for the housing market. The location of a dwelling within the Limited Use Area around Warsaw Chopin Airport reduces its value by about 3%on average in the years 2011-2014, the NDI value being 0.6. According to the results of estimations the LUA variable for the years 2007-2009 was statistically insignificant. |
| Keywords: | aviation noise; limited use area; property prices |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_251&r=ure |
| By: | Abulkader Mostafa; Colin A. Jones |
| Abstract: | The UK experienced a substantial rise in owner occupation over the twentieth century. Despite the recent fall in ownership rate, many tenants still aspire to own their own homes. These strong aspirations to own are attributed to a set of financial and non-financial benefits. Although the financial benefits are perceived to be significant and to outweigh housing benefits, there is a paucity of rigorous research measuring and confirming the significance and nature of the financial benefits from buying versus renting. This research calculates, for the first time, the historical pure financial returns from buying versus renting in Britain for first-time buyers and disaggregates the results by the eleven regions. It investigates whether the long-term growing homeownership aspiration in Britain has been sustained and rationalised by solid financial payoff or not. It is based on a DCF analysis of historical housing and mortgage market data from 1975 to 2012. The empirical analysis produces more than 18,000 simulations using a comprehensive financial model. The results of the research explore the return from house purchase differential between regions and develop a regional return ranking. It also explores the historical contribution of capital gains to the overall return by calculating the returns after excluding capital gains. The research investigates how much timing matters by comparing the returns at (or near) peaks and troughs over the major three housing cycles. The research finally explores how many holding years were historically required in order for house purchase by first time buyers to breakeven. |
| Keywords: | financial returns; Housing Markets; owner occupation; private rented sector; regions |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_217&r=ure |
| By: | Jay Mittal |
| Abstract: | This article uses a hedonic modelling approach to assess the effect of visual accessibility of scenic lands on housing price. It estimates households’ implicit willingness to pay for the visual accessibility of privately owned voluntarily protected scenic lands in a single family housing market. These lands are protected in perpetuity for natural, historic, and scenic characteristics. The premium price effect was captured using the visual accessibility variable, a combined weighted measure of visibility and proximity. This is named as Gravity Inspired Visibility Index (GIVI). A comprehensive review of eight environmental amenity from multidisciplinary sources provides basis on significance of ‘proximity’ and ‘view.’ A detailed methodology on developing spatial interaction variable using 3D GIS and viewshed1 technology is provided. This variable was used to estimate the capitalized premium from the preserved lands. Both global (adjusted R2= 0.52, AICc= 29828) and geographically weighted regression (GWR) models (adjusted R2= 0.59, AICc= 29729) estimated the marginal price effect. The results indicate an average 3.4% price premium on mean home value from the GWR model. The article offers a useful framework for evaluating effects of land protection for planning and real estate scholars. It also offers useful insight to conservation agencies, local governments, professional planners, and real estate professionals for prioritizing land sites with scenic views and for property development. |
| Keywords: | Geographically Weighted Regression; GIS; Land Conservation; Spatial Hedonic Model; Viewshed analysis |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_1&r=ure |
| By: | Anthony Owusu-Ansah; Kenneth W. Soyeh |
| Abstract: | Housing is a basic necessity of life. As a result of this, the severe housing supply problems experienced by most cities in the developing world are of utmost concern to governments and policy makers. The main focus of this study is to document the major underlying forces prohibiting housing development in Urban Ghana. We analyse both institutional and market-based constraints on the supply of housing. Using a purposive sampling technique, we surveyed CEOs of private real estate development companies within Accra and Tema with a Likert scale questionnaire to measure the severity of the factors hindering housing development in these areas. All the CEOs surveyed work for firms that are part of the Ghana Real Estate Developers Association (GREDA) and thus, have a good understanding of the constraints on housing development. The results show that real estate developers consider the supply problems in housing to be more driven by institutional factors than market forces. A large percentage of the CEOs report that land tenure arrangements, the lengthy procedure involved in securing building permits, the process of land acquisition and registration in Ghana are the major factors that significantly affect housing supply. The difficulty in accessing development funds, underdeveloped mortgage market, high interest rates are some of the market-based factors constraining housing development. Policy recommendations are proposed for a more effective and direct government intervention to improve urban housing supply. |
| Keywords: | constraints; Housing Supply; institutional; market forces; Urban |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_271&r=ure |
| By: | Peddy PiYing Lai |
| Abstract: | An attractive environment is likely to influence house price. We have high regard for the quality of living environment and living function. Especially, one of the crucial factors of choosing residence is the construct of public facilities that provide much service, such as park, school and green space. The aim of this study was to find the effect of parks and green space on housing price. The research used hedonic price model and geographic information system (GIS) to evaluate the effect of parks and green space in Kaohsiung in Taiwan.The result shows that housing price is determined by the effect of different characteristics. For parks and green space, the more close to parks and green space is, the higher total price is. When the transaction cases surround more parks, the value of property would go up. This situation leads to higher price on transaction cases. When land use zoning is non-residential kind with the purpose of residential type, the total price would raise. The total price of townhouse is higher than apartment, condominium and mansion. There is a negative correlation between building age and total price.However, there is a different result that the effect of difference distance of parks and green space within 500 meter radius on transaction cases. We found that the distance of parks and green space within 500 meter radius is not main factor on transaction cases. The existing and quantity of parks and green space is the main reason for transaction cases. We infer that this is the reason why the result did not fit the expected outcome. The housing price would become higher when it is close to green space |
| Keywords: | Geographic information system%28GIS%29; Hedonic Price Mode; Housing Price; Park and Green space |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_353&r=ure |
| By: | Takahiro Akita (Rikkyo University, International University of University); Sachiko Miyata (Ritsumeikan University) |
| Abstract: | This study analyzes spatial inequalities in Indonesia from 1996-2010 using the hierarchical decomposition method. It uses household expenditures rather than regional accounts and tries to investigate the contributions of spatial inequalities to overall expenditure inequality. We find that urban-rural disparity constitutes 15-25% of overall expenditure inequality. A large difference exists between urban and rural areas in the magnitude of inequality among districts. After controlling for the urban and rural difference, inequality among districts accounts for 15-25% of overall inequality. While disparity between five major island regions is negligible, inequalities between districts within provinces appear to have played an increasingly important role in both urban and rural areas. Given unequal geographic distributions of resource endowments, public infrastructure and economic activities, some spatial inequalities are inevitable. Nevertheless, sustained efforts are necessary to reduce spatial inequalities to facilitate national unity, cohesion and stability. |
| Keywords: | spatial inequality, expenditure inequality, hierarchical decomposition of inequality, Theil index, Indonesia |
| JEL: | O15 O18 R12 |
| Date: | 2017–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iuj:wpaper:ems_2017_02&r=ure |
| By: | Henkel, Marcel; Seidel, Tobias; Südekum, Jens |
| Abstract: | Many countries operate pronounced fiscal equalization schemes that shift tax revenue across jurisdictions. We use a general equilibrium model with multiple asymmetric regions, costly trade and labor mobility to carve out the aggregate implications of this policy. Calibrating the model for Germany, we find that it indeed delivers smaller spatial economic disparities across regions. This comes at the cost of lower national output, however, because activity is diverted away from core cities and towards remote areas with low productivity. But despite this output loss, fiscal transfers may still raise national welfare, because they effectively countervail over-congestion in large cities. |
| Keywords: | Fiscal equalization; migration; regional transfers; spatial economics |
| JEL: | F15 R11 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12875&r=ure |
| By: | Alexis Antoniades; Charles W. Calomiris |
| Abstract: | Voters punish incumbent Presidential candidates for contractions in the local (county-level) supply of mortgage credit during market-wide contractions of credit, but they do not reward them for expansions in mortgage credit supply in boom times. Our primary focus is the Presidential election of 2008, which followed an unprecedented swing from very generous mortgage underwriting standards to a severe contraction of mortgage credit. Voters responded to the credit crunch by shifting their support away from the Republican Presidential candidate in 2008. That shift was particularly pronounced in states that typically vote Republican, and in swing states. The magnitude of the effect is large. If the supply of mortgage credit had not contracted from 2004 to 2008, McCain would have received half the votes needed in nine crucial swing states to reverse the outcome of the election. The effect on voting in these swing states from local contractions in mortgage credit supply was five times as important as the increase in the unemployment rate; if unemployment had not increased from 2004 to 2008, that improvement in local labor markets would only have given McCain only 9% of the votes needed to win the nine crucial swing states. We extend our analysis to the Presidential elections from 1996 to 2012 and find that voters’ reactions are similar for Democratic and Republican incumbent parties, but different during booms and busts of mortgage credit. These asymmetric results indicate that voters react strongly and negatively to credit supply contraction; however, organized political bargaining (the “smoke-filled room channel”) rather than voting was the primary vehicle for rewarding politicians for supporting government subsidies for mortgage risk during booms. |
| JEL: | D72 E51 G01 G21 L51 N22 N42 P16 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24459&r=ure |
| By: | Ervi Liusman; Danika Wright |
| Abstract: | In a number of markets with high house prices, governments have implemented various forms of stamp duty. Stamp duty is a tax on the transfer of assets, including residential property. Policy-makers claim that stamp duty increases are an instrument through which they intend to decrease property demand, and ultimately ease housing costs. However, empirical evidence suggests that such taxes are ineffective in achieving this objective.We present evidence that the likely reason these taxes for this outcome is that the demand function of property buyers in these high house price markets are not elastic. The event study methodology is used to test the impact of stamp duty on the residential property price and transaction volume.Following this, we develop a model to show that the real impact of residential property stamp duties is an increase in government revenue. Governments in high housing cost markets face an agency-like problem when determining taxation policy. Our paper aims to examine the impact on government revenue from stamp duty using data from Hong Kong.Hong Kong presents a natural experiment in which to test our model. Often ranked as one of the world’s most expensive and unaffordable property markets, the Hong Kong government has introduced various stamp duties since 2010. While their stated aim is to stabilize housing prices and transactions, no prior studies have examined the effect of stamp duty on government revenue.Our findings provide a timely contribution to the current discourse on housing affordability policies. While tax policy may not directly ease housing costs, through redistribution of wealth governments may still use tax policy to alleviate the affordability problem. |
| Keywords: | government revenue; Housing Price; Residential Property; stamp duty; taxation policy |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_310&r=ure |
| By: | Lee, Neil; Rodríguez-Pose, Andrés; von Berlepsch, Viola |
| Abstract: | Does the economic effect of immigrant women differ from that of immigrants in general? This paper examines if gender has influenced the short- and long-term economic impact of mass migration to the US, using Census microdata from 1880 and 1910. By means of ordinary least squares and instrumental variable estimations, the analysis shows that a greater concentration of immigrant women is significantly associated with lower levels of economic development in US counties. However, immigrant women also shaped economic development positively, albeit indirectly, via their children. Communities with more children born to foreign mothers and that successfully managed to integrate female immigrants experienced greater economic growth than those dominated by children of foreign-born fathers or American-born parents. |
| Keywords: | Counties; Development; Economic Growth; Gender; migration; US. |
| JEL: | F22 J16 J61 O15 R23 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12878&r=ure |
| By: | Marko Kryvobokov |
| Abstract: | Residential rents are analysed in the Walloon region in Belgium. In the region, particularly touched by urban sprawl, households rent accommodation in urbanised areas as well as in their peripheries. The average rents per square meter in urban agglomerations and peri-urban areas are the same. At the same time, important provincial differences exist. In particular, peri-urban rents in some provinces are higher than those in the biggest cities of the region. Are the urban and peri-urban rental markets different? The aim of this study is to evaluate the role of the regional territorial structure in the determination of rents.With a hedonic regression model, this paper seeks the best treatment of spatial disparities in order to better understand rent determinants and their impact in the region with the focus on urban agglomerations and peri-urban areas. Regional and municipal variables and proximity to attractive foreign cities have been tested to understand the role of the regional territorial structure. For the same reason, the hedonic models are constructed in provincial submarkets. OLS, spatial and geographically weighted regression methods are applied. The map of location value response surface supplements hedonic analysis.Significant disparities between the willingness to pay for the higher levels of comfort in agglomerations and peri-urban zones are found. The calculated market basket rent reveals a significant difference: the rent of a typical dwelling is 11%-18%higher in peri-urban areas than in urban agglomerations. Another finding is that proximity to several foreign neighbouring cities influences rents in Wallonia, while the accessibility to the biggest regional cities does not have a significant impact. |
| Keywords: | Agglomeration; Hedonic Model; peri-urban area; Rent; Wallonia |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_17&r=ure |
| By: | Zhanna Mingaleva (Perm National Research Polytechnic University); Marina Sheresheva (PRUE - Plekhanov Russian University of Economics [Moscow]); Matvey Oborin (MSU - Lomonosov Moscow State University); Tatyana Gvarliani (Sochi State University) |
| Abstract: | The paper addresses networking as a basis for cooperation of small cities leading to more sustainable regional development at the city, regional, and federal level. It is shown that networking of cities can contribute to increasing sustainability in many ways. Still, additional research is needed to adjust best management practices discussed in the relevant academic literature to the peculiarities of transition economies. The objective of the research presented in the paper was to help regional and municipal authorities in the optimization of territorial development planning aimed at long-term sustainability. Research was carried out in Russia on an example of two regions, namely Perm Krai and Vladimir Oblast. The case study revealed that local authorities underestimate the potential of small cities in raising regional sustainability. Actually, a number of small cities in both regions have hidden competitive advantages but cannot realize them separately, whilst development of regional city networking is a fruitful approach to improve their socioeconomic situation, and to boost sustainable regional development. Therefore, when planning regional development, federal and local authorities should regard the role of small cities, including disadvantaged and depressed ones, as potentially valuable members of a city network. Measures to embed small cities into different types of networks should be based on the thorough assessment of their resources, with the aim to develop collaboration of cities with mutually beneficial network externalities. |
| Keywords: | sustainability,small city,networking,regional development,planning,specialization |
| Date: | 2017–09–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01735841&r=ure |
| By: | Maria Elkhdari (CERDI - Centre d'Études et de Recherches sur le Développement International - Clermont Auvergne - UCA - Université Clermont Auvergne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Babacar Sarr (CERDI - Centre d'Études et de Recherches sur le Développement International - UdA - Université d'Auvergne - Clermont-Ferrand I - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, International Monetary Fund (IMF)) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies how decentralization affects poverty, vulnerability, and inequality in Morocco, in the context of ongoing regionalization reforms. We use different non-parametric approaches to assess spending efficiency of Moroccan municipalities and regions over the period 2005-2009. The results indicate that the efficiency of spending in improving pro-poor outcomes is dependent on the fiscal autonomy of subnational governments. While the impact of transfer dependency is not statistically significant, more granular data show that formula-based (unconditional) transfers significantly improve spending efficiency when the opposite is true for ad-hoc (conditional) transfers. Furthermore, we investigate the impact of political decentralization and find that local spending is less efficient in regions where municipal governments have a greater responsibility for spending compared to the regional government. This finding also holds in more fragmented regions with a high number of municipalities. Finally, we test whether there is an electoral budget cycle in Morocco and find that spending efficiency decreases the year of local elections, but increases with the level of education of elected officials. |
| Keywords: | Decentralization, Morocco, Poverty, Vulnerability, Inequality, Public spending efficiency, Data Envelopment Analysis, Partial Frontier Analysis. |
| Date: | 2018–04–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-01774949&r=ure |
| By: | Qi Tu; Peter Boelhouwer; Jan De Haan |
| Abstract: | The aftermath of the recent global financial crisis has led to a stricter macro prudential policy in the mortgage market in the Netherlands, which requires a graduate curtail in the maximum loan-to-value ratio. This policy change would no doubt exert substantial impact on the housing market, especially for the first time buyers. Given the substantial changes in the mortgage lending, the question arises that how would the stricter lending criteria affect the house prices? This paper tries to investigate the association between credit constraints and house prices.In a broad context, the macroprudential policies seem necessary and essential to reduce the vulnerability of the financial system, especially with the evidence of the subprime crisis. The credit rationing such as a tightened ceiling loan-to-value ratio is the widely used maroprudential policy in the housing market (Jácome and Mitra, 2015). The housing situation in the Netherlands, however, is unique in the context of Europe.Literature has demonstrated the strong linkage between mortgage lending and house prices, and this linage is only strengthened for Dutch market because households rely more on the mortgage loan to purchase a house due to the low saving rate . This study aims at exploring the channel through which maximum borrowing limit affects the house prices and attempts to provide a theoretical model to interpret the channel between them. Two measurements of the maximum borrowing limit are used to identify the influence of shrinking credit offering on house prices. Particularly, we are driven to investigate the potential consequences or impacts on the ownership market in a scenario of stricter lending policy. The results are expected to give some hints on the future of the housing market. |
| Keywords: | borrowing limit; House Prices; loan-to-value; Modelling; The Netherlands |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_215&r=ure |
| By: | Michael Doumpos; Dimitrios Papastamos; Constantin Zopounidis; Dimitrios Andritsos |
| Abstract: | The global credit crunch of 2007-2008 and the subsequent European sovereign debt crisis had a significant negative impact on real estate asset values in general and house prices in particular, in many countries around the world. This further had a direct impact on mortgage loans, thus creating a major burden for financial institutions as the quality of their credit portfolios declined rapidly. As a response to the effects of the crisis on financial stability, stress tests have been introduced as a means to assess the capital requirements of financial institutions. While these have focused on a global analysis of the capital position of the institutions, more focused results are required for particular type of products, including mortgage loans and real estate investment portfolios. To this end, this study presents the application of a Monte Carlo simulation approach to stress testing house prices in Greece. The Greek market has experience a major decline in asset values over the past 6-7 years, due to the deteriorating economic environment. The adopted approach is combines an econometric model that relates regional houses price indices to economic variables, with a simulation approach based on mid-term economic scenarios. Empirical results are presented for a sample portfolio of residencies in Greece provide by a leading real estate service provider in Greece and South-East Europe. |
| Keywords: | Automated Valuation Models; House Prices; Monte Carlo Simulation |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_5&r=ure |
| By: | Helen Bao; Chunming Meng |
| Abstract: | Loss aversion is a core concept in prospect theory that refers to people’s asymmetric attitudes with respect to gains and losses. More specifically, losses loom larger than gains. With the capability of loss aversion to explain economic phenomena, some of which are puzzling under expected utility theory, this concept has received significant attention. This study develops a behavioral model of loss aversion to explain the development decisions by residential property developers in the People’s Republic of China. Under the leasehold property right system, real estate development has two stages—first to lease land from the government, and then to develop the property according to the lease terms. This presents a unique opportunity to test the presence and effect of loss aversion in real estate development decisions. More specifically, this study determines when the land premium paid by a developer is substantially higher than the market value, whether and how this "paper loss" will affect the pricing of the housing products and development time of the project in future development. We use a sample of land and house transaction records from Beijing to test the hypothesis. This is the first study to use a semi-parametric model in estimating developers’ loss aversion. Results show that developers are most prone to loss aversion bias around the reference point or when facing large losses. The results also suggest that loss aversion contributes to the cyclical trading pattern in housing markets. |
| Keywords: | Behavioural Economics; China; Housing; Loss aversion |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_156&r=ure |
| By: | Laura Gabrielli; Salvatore Giuffrida; Maria Rosa Trovato |
| Abstract: | The real estate capital is one of the most resistant forms of the process through which the social surplus product was consolidated, making possible the development of cities. The gradual layering of these "traces" has given shape to structured and complex urban environments, characterized by the complementarity between homogeneity and heterogeneity. This led to the multiplicity of functions that properties gradually were able to play, and the expectations that these potentials have engendered in the players of its growing enhancement process: administrations, owners, large and small investors.This paper focuses on the interpretation of the urban pattern of the historic city through the analysis of the housing markets. The research deals with the case study of the town of Syracuse, a complex urban context from several points of view. Firstly, the city has a particular geographical and landscape planning; secondly the sequences of historical phases that have characterized its urban development; finally, the amount of public and private investments that over the past three decades have helped to make it one of the thirty major touristic destinations in the world.The formal and functional articulation of this real estate market justifies the use of different, layered and structured analysis tools to identify sub-markets and to place among them some unique properties as residual cases (gaps) or exemplary cases (overlaps). Those cases are traditionally considered outlier due to a relationship between value/price difficult to interpret in the light of the consolidated analysis tools. |
| Keywords: | Cluster Analysis; Complex urban context %B7; Fuzzy clustering; Property Valuation; Real Estate Market |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_371&r=ure |
| By: | Venables, Anthony J |
| Abstract: | External trade affects the internal spatial structure of an economy, promoting growth in some cities or regions and decline in others. Internal adjustment to these changes has often proved to be extremely slow and painful. This paper combines elements of urban and international economics to draw out the implications of trade shocks for city performance. Localisation economies in production of internationally tradable goods mean that cities divide into two types, those producing tradables and those specialising in sectors producing just for the national market (non-tradables). Negative trade shocks (and possibly also some positive ones) reduce the number of cities engaged in tradable production, increasing the number producing just non-tradables. This has a negative effect across all non-tradable cities, which lose population and land value. Remaining tradable cities boom, gaining population and land value. Depending on the initial position, city size dispersion may increase, this raising the share of urban land-rents in national income and reducing the share of labour. |
| Keywords: | de-industrialisation; globalisation; Polarisation; urban |
| JEL: | F12 R11 R12 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12877&r=ure |
| By: | Michael L. Anderson; Lucas W. Davis |
| Abstract: | Transportation engineers are taught that as demand for travel goes up, this decreases not only speed but also the capacity of the road system, a phenomenon known as hypercongestion. We revisit this idea. There is no question that road systems experience periods in which capacity falls. However, we point out that capacity is determined by both demand and supply. Road construction, lane closures, stalled vehicles, weather, and other supply shocks provide an alternative explanation for the empirical evidence on hypercongestion. Using data from the Caldecott Tunnel in Oakland, California, we show that a naive regression recovers the standard hypercongestion result in the literature. However, once we use instrumental variables to isolate the effect of travel demand this effect disappears and across specifications we find no evidence that capacity decreases during periods of high demand. This lack of evidence of hypercongestion calls into question long-standing conventional wisdom held by transportation engineers and implies that efficient “Pigouvian” congestion taxes should be substantially lower than implied by hypercongestion models. |
| JEL: | C36 H23 R41 R42 R48 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24469&r=ure |
| By: | Sean P. Corcoran; Jennifer L. Jennings; Sarah R. Cohodes; Carolyn Sattin-Bajaj |
| Abstract: | We conducted a field experiment in 165 high-poverty New York City middle schools to help students navigate a complex high school choice process and access higher-performing schools. Students in treatment schools were given a customized one-page list of proximate high schools with a graduation rate at or above the city median (70%). Some also received a supplemental list highlighting academically non-selective schools or high schools organized by academic interest area. The interventions changed student application behavior in ways that led to more matches to higher-performing schools. While treatment students did not apply to higher graduation rate schools, they applied to schools where their odds of admission were higher, were more likely to receive their first-choice high school, and were less likely to match to a school with a low graduation rate. Our findings also suggest that informational interventions may not reduce inequality, since both disadvantaged and comparatively advantaged students used our materials, and in some cases the latter benefited more from them by applying and matching to more schools on our lists. Students in non-English speaking households, who were particularly responsive to the intervention and were much less likely to match to a low-performing school, were one notable exception to this pattern. |
| JEL: | D83 I21 I24 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24471&r=ure |
| By: | Marcelo Cajias; Philipp Freudenreich |
| Abstract: | Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the market liquidity (time-on-market) and its determinants for rental dwellings in the largest seven German cities with big data.Design/methodology/approach – The determinants of time-on-market are estimated with the Cox proportional hazards model. Hedonic characteristics as well as socioeconomic and spatial variables are combined with different fixed effects and controls for non-linearity to maximise the explanatory power of the model.Findings – Higher asking rent and larger living space decrease the liquidity on all seven markets, while dwelling’s age, the number of rooms and proximity to the city centre fasten the letting process. For the linear and non-linear hedonic characteristics heterogeneous implications are found.Practical implications – The findings are of interest for institutional and private landlords as well as governmental organizations in charge of housing and urban development.Originality/value – It is the first paper to deal with liquidity of rental dwellings in the seven most populated cities of Europe’s second largest rental market by applying the Cox proportional hazards model. Furthermore, the German rental market is of particular interest, as approximately 60%of all rental dwellings are owned by private landlords and the German market is organized polycentric. |
| Keywords: | Big data; Cox proportional hazard model; Housing real estate; Liquidity%2F Time-on-market; Non-linearity |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_225&r=ure |
| By: | Philip J. Cook; Songman Kang |
| Abstract: | Since, other things equal, older children do better in school, the extent and pattern of delayed entry affects observed patterns in academic performance. This paper provides three new sets of relevant findings, utilizing comprehensive data on birth cohorts of children who enrolled in first grade in North Carolina public schools.: (1) Delayed entry (redshirting) reduces the male-female achievement gap by 11%; (2) For each of 6 groups defined by sex and race/ethnicity, the likelihood of redshirting is strongly inversely related to academic ability; and (3) A recent shift in the cut date to earlier in the calendar year reduced redshirting, and provided clear evidence that parental decisions are tied to the absolute age of the child rather than age relative to classmates. The adaptation of redshirting to changes in the cut date is an important mechanism by which such changes affect patterns in academic outcomes. |
| JEL: | I21 I24 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24492&r=ure |
| By: | Eric Fesselmeyer; Kiat Ying Seah |
| Abstract: | Are all social capital investments equal in the eyes of homeowners and renters? Presumably, social capital investments that lead to increases in home values provide stronger incentives for homeowners than renters. In contrast, for social capital investments that do not directly impact home values, one would not expect homeowners and renters to differ in their investment rates. In this paper, we test this hypothesis using confidential and detailed individual-level panel data from Los Angeles county. We estimate the effect of homeownership on social capital investment, i.e., participation in social-capital creating activities, using a bivariate probit model and fixed effects models that control for individual-specific, time-constant heterogeneity that would otherwise cause omitted variable bias. Each model addresses the endogeneity of homeownership differently with identification arising from different sources. We find strong evidence that homeownership increases the rate of participation in block meetings, a social capital investment that should affect property values, and find no homeownership effect on three other social capital creating activities that likely do not: volunteerism, participation in a local political organization, and participation in a civic group. The results suggest that the effect of homeownership on social capital investment depends on whether the returns to such investments accrue solely to homeowners. |
| Keywords: | Homeownership; Housing externalities; Social Capital |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_287&r=ure |
| By: | Alla Koblyakova |
| Abstract: | This paper presents empirical evidence of regional variations in mortgage lending conditions within the UK’s mortgage sector. This is an important question because mortgages constitute a major part of households’ liabilities and financial institutions’ assets, demonstrating potential to destabilise the financial system and economy in whole. So far, in spite of its importance, research on residential debt lacks a broader cross country insight on various mortgage market issues. The important point is that regional variations in incomes, house prices and employment rates may have generated a regional dimension in mortgage lending conditions, having different impacts in various regions according to the pattern of distribution of more risky mortgage contracts. This paper addresses the question of regional differentiation in lending conditions linked with mortgage contract choice decisions. The empirical estimation takes the form of a three-stage simultaneous equations model and investigates the regional dimension of mortgage lending conditions by inclusion of regional dummies and regionally differentiated variables in econometric estimates. Cross-sectional estimations employ data extracted from the British Household Panel Survey and Understanding Society Survey Data, covering the period from 2007 to 2014. This periodical frame includes the start of the financial crisis, presenting an opportunity to acquire a deeper understanding of how households’ mortgage choice decisions have altered following economic changes. Empirical findings suggest regional deviations in loan to value ratios and mortgage rates within the UK’s mortgage market. Policy implications may include the need for the enforcement of regional considerations in governmental mortgage affordability programmes. |
| Keywords: | loan to value ratios%2C regional differences%2C house prices |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_126&r=ure |
| By: | Jan K. Brueckner; Ruchi Singh |
| Abstract: | This paper has explored the stringency of land-use regulation in US cities, focusing on building heights. Substantial stringency is present when regulated heights are far below free-market heights, while stringency is lower when the two values are closer. Using FAR as a height index, theory shows that the elasticity of the land price with respect to FAR is a proper stringency measure. This elasticity is estimated for five US cities by combining CoStar land-sales data with FAR values from local zoning maps, and the results show that New York and Washington, D.C., have stringent height regulations, while Chicago’s and San Francisco’s regulations are less stringent (Boston represents an intermediate case). |
| Keywords: | building heights, FAR, stringency, regulation |
| JEL: | R31 |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_6978&r=ure |
| By: | Daniel Levy (Bar-Ilan University); Avichai Snir |
| Abstract: | We use novel and unique data to study the effect of price changes in the market for luxury and middle class homes. We find that luxury home sales respond less to price changes than the middle-class home sales; in the market for luxury homes, past prices affect current prices; luxury home prices persist; and prices of luxury homes are stickier than prices of middle-class homes. Recent macroeconomic models predict that housing markets can have counter-cyclical effect, if home prices are flexible. Our findings imply that home prices, especially luxury home prices, may not be flexible enough to generate such effect. |
| Keywords: | Housing market, luxury housing, housing demand, price rigidity, sticky prices, predictability, Veblen effect. |
| JEL: | E31 E32 R21 G14 D12 |
| Date: | 2018–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:biu:wpaper:2018-01&r=ure |
| By: | Nguyen-Ones, Mai; Steen, Frode |
| Abstract: | Applying detailed consecutive daily micro data at the gasoline station level from Sweden we estimate a structural model to uncover the degree of competition in the gasoline retail market. We find that retailers do exercise market power, but despite the high upstream concentration, the market power is very limited on the downstream level. The degree of market power varies with both the distance to the nearest station and the local density of gasoline stations. A higher level of service tends to raise a seller's market power; self-service stations have close to no market power. Contractual form and brand identity also seem to matter. We find a clear result: local station characteristics significantly affect the degree of market power. Our results indicate that local differences in station characteristics can more than offset the average market power found for the whole market. |
| Keywords: | Gasoline markets; local market competition; market power; markup estimation |
| JEL: | D22 L13 L25 L81 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12879&r=ure |
| By: | Aragon, Fernando; Kessler, Anke |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the economic effects of existing private property rights on First Nations' reserves. We focus on three forms of land tenure regimes: lawful possession, designated land, and permits. These land regimes have been used to create individual land holdings, and grant secure and transferable rights of use of reserve land to band and non-band members. Using confidential Census micro-data and rich administrative data, we find evidence of improvements in home ownership and housing conditions, as well as increments in band's public spending. However, we find no significant impact on Aboriginal household income nor employment outcomes. Instead, we document that individual land holdings are associated with sizeable increases in the non-Aboriginal population. Our findings suggest that some caution is warranted when discussing the potential economic benefits of property right reforms for First Nations' communities. |
| Keywords: | economic development; First Nations; institutions; Property rights |
| JEL: | O12 O43 P48 R14 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12818&r=ure |
| By: | Ahmad, Mahyudin |
| Abstract: | This paper seeks to deepen our understanding of the globalization-growth nexus as it extends the investigation to using a spatial econometric approach, hitherto has been rarely used in the globalization literature. The objective of the paper is to uncover not only the significant growth-effects of globalization, but also the possible spillover effects of globalization onto neighbouring countries. Using a panel dataset of 83 countries and 30-year period and via a spatial autoregressive panel data method, this paper estimates a standard growth model augmented with a parameter to capture the countries’ spatial dependence, whilst controlling for globalization indices. The findings indicate a positive effect of economic globalization and the effect is dependent upon the political settings in the countries under study. The spillover effects of globalization across neighbouring countries are shown, both in geographical and institutional spheres. The paper concludes with some policy recommendations. |
| Keywords: | globalization, economic growth, institutional quality, spatial autooregressive model |
| JEL: | C31 O43 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:86252&r=ure |
| By: | Frank Troch; Thierry Vanelslander (Department of Transport and Regional Economics - UA - University of Antwerp); Christa Sys (BNP Paribas Fortis chair on transport, logistics and ports); Florent Laroche (UA - University of Antwerp); Angel Merchan; Martine Mostert; Vidar Stevens; Christine Tawfik; Sandra Belboom; Angelique Leonard (Université de Liège); Sabine Limbourg; Koen Verhoest |
| Abstract: | The starting point of this article is the weak usage of rail freight in Belgium and Europe, both as a sustainable mode of land transportation in itself as well as a part of the intermodal chain. The results are obtained by transversal research on rail freight transport in Belgium, taking into account the European context. This interdisciplinary research develops a road map for the creation of three integrated scenarios: a best case, medium case and worst case scenario for rail freight development, based on a detailed SWOT (strength, weakness, opportunities, threats) analysis. It includes the most probable future developments for rail freight transport and hinterland connections. These developments are obtained from literature review and discussions with a heterogeneous panel of experts in the fields of (i) optimal corridor and hub development, (ii) macroeconomic impact, (iii) sustainability, (iv) effective market regulation and (v) governance and organization for a well-functioning intermodality. The Delphi approach is used in combination with a survey analysis. Frequency tables and the H-index allow defining a ranking and selection of SWOT elements. The obtained scenarios allow future research to quantify and measure the impact of future developments and decisions towards the Belgian rail freight market. |
| Keywords: | survey,Intermodal,rail freight,SWOT analysis,scenario analysis,Delphi technique |
| Date: | 2017–10–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01745735&r=ure |
| By: | Goodfellow, Tom |
| Abstract: | Of the African states experiencing sustained growth and poverty reduction in recent decades, Rwanda and Ethiopia stand out due to the scope of their development visions and relatively effective state-driven transformation, leading them to be compared to the East Asian ‘developmental states’. This article argues that these two states are better conceived as ‘neo-developmental’ due to important differences in the international and national constraints they face compared with the East Asian ‘tigers’. One effect of these differences is the difficulty of attracting investment into manufacturing industry, and the consequent concentration of capital in high-end urban real estate. This underscores the need for effective land value capture and property taxation, which featured strongly in the East Asian cases. Currently, however, both Rwanda and Ethiopia lack effective mechanisms for capturing the value of urban property in a way that is sustainable, redistributive and developmental. The article explores the politics of efforts to introduce property tax in both cases. It argues that property taxation has been obstructed by conflicting imperatives on land reform and tax reform, alongside resistance from vested interests created by the rapid generation of real estate-based wealth in the absence of other sufficiently lucrative investment options. |
| Keywords: | Governance, |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:idq:ictduk:13661&r=ure |
| By: | Miroslav Despotovic; David Koch; Gunther Maier; Matthias Zeppelzauer |
| Abstract: | A growing number of applied studies examine the impact of urban space quality on property price. Especially the planning and development of the immediate neighborhood (micro location) is an important influencing factor in regional economics. An image-based method for the estimation of location quality, in the context of property valuation, does not exist yet. We develop method for the determination of the quality of location using image processing, taking at the same time into account the classification in quality classes based on regional structural characteristics. With the help of automatic image analysis, a new information source is leveraged, which previously could not be taken into account within the scope of evaluation of location quality or within the scope of automated valuation models (e.g. hedonic models). In the field of image analysis, the extraction of parameters related to location quality is a new task. It is so far not clear to which degree meaningful parameters can be found autonomously by machine learning. This dissertation will investigate this question in detail and is to our knowledge the first approach for the automatic image-based valuation of location quality. |
| Keywords: | Hedonic Pricing; Image Processing; location quality; Machine Learning; Neighborhoods |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_511&r=ure |
| By: | Clemencia Cosentino; Swetha Sridharan |
| Abstract: | Enhancing teacher quality is a high priority for the Partnership to Strengthen Innovation and Practice in Secondary Education (PSIPSE)—a collaborative of donors seeking to catalyze improvements in secondary education. |
| Keywords: | PSIPSE, Secondary Education, Africa, international, teacher quality, practitioners |
| JEL: | F Z |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:607b4777ab614de487b5ed2ab7debb15&r=ure |
| By: | Konrad Zelazowski |
| Abstract: | The housing market plays an important role both in the social and economic life. Residential construction and the entire housing sphere have a fundamental effect on the standard of living of citizens and on the economic strength and development of the country. They play a tremendous role in: individual dimension – they satisfy basic human needs; community dimension – they provide a framework for basic social ties; material dimension – residential assets represent one of the most essential types of family, community, national and economic assets, whereas the housing sector is one of the most important components of the economic system, generating jobs, creating technical infrastructure and providing a foundation for the social infrastructure. In the process of integration of the European economies, one can see a growing trend towards the convergence of the housing markets. Two groups of factors have a fundamental impact on the convergence processes: Internal factors of a regional and national nature, mostly connected with historical conditions which determined the functioning of the housing markets, housing policy priorities, economic potential and investment attractiveness of the region and the country; External factors, including social and economic factors of international magnitude. They have their source in the progressing integration of the European economies and are accompanied by the free movement of capital, migration of human resources and unification of cultural models and lifestyles. The aim of the article is to assess the scope and scale of convergence processes in regional housing markets in Poland. Both the real and the nominal convergence are analyzed. The research on real convergence includes: ownership structure of the housing stock, the quantitative and qualitative structure of the housing stock, the level of unsatisfied housing needs. In a nominal dimension, the analysis of convergence relates to the level of residential property prices. |
| Keywords: | convergence of housing markets; Housing Market; regional housing markets |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_242&r=ure |
| By: | Wolfgang A. Brunauer; Ronald S. Weberndorfer; Wolfgang Feilmayr |
| Abstract: | Automated valuation models (AVM) are increasingly often used by institutional mortgage lenders and real estate agents to determine the value of real estate. Usually, AVM use hedonic models as a basis for appraisal. However, the results are often criticised by real estate professionals, as they lack transparency and comparability to traditional appraisal methods.Therefore, we provide an alternative approach for automated real estate valuation of self-used property in Austria: Instead of using pure hedonic models, we develop a statistically supported sales comparison approach. Therefore, in a first step we select comparable houses or flats in the surroundings of the valuation object; in a second step, we adjust the prices of these comparables using hedonic methods; finally, the market value is derived as a (inverse distance-weighted) mean of these comparables. The quality adjustment parameters are differentiated with respect to property characteristics, time and location, and thus provide a basis for structured valuation of the results.For our research, we have an extensive data set for Austrian single family homes and flats at our disposal. We apply generalized additive models (GAM) that take into account nonlinearity as well as discrete and continuous spatial heterogeneity. The results are shown in an interactive appraisal dashboard hosted by DataScience Service GmbH. |
| Keywords: | Generalized Additive Models; Geographical Information Science; Hedonic Models; Sales Comparison Approach |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_197&r=ure |
| By: | Tunbosun B. Oyedokun; Neil Dunse; Colin A. Jones |
| Abstract: | Evidence continues to emerge that green buildings achieve higher financial performance than conventional buildings (referred to as the green premium in literature). This green premium has been promoted as a potential driver of development of new green buildings as well as the green transformation of the existing office property stock. While the validity of this claim is still a subject of an ongoing debate, the office property market is highly susceptible to a range of local factors which could overshadow or undermine the power of such a premium in this regard. Adopting a case study approach, this study examines the local market forces influencing the office stock greening process in three British cities. Data was obtained through semi-structured one-to-one interviews and analysis of relevant documentary evidence. A total of twenty-five commercial real estate professionals were interviewed across the three cities, namely London, Manchester and Edinburgh. The results of the analysis show that office stock greening process differs among the cities and each market is influenced by distinct local factors. Findings suggest that while green premium may have the prospect of driving the green transformation of city offices, its impact is still largely muddled by the prevailing local market factors. |
| Keywords: | Green premium; greening process; local market factors; Office Buildings; UK |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_139&r=ure |
| By: | Maria Elkhdari (CERDI - Centre d'Études et de Recherches sur le Développement International - Clermont Auvergne - UCA - Université Clermont Auvergne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | The paper examines how the Government of Morocco has addressed the issue of decentralization in recent years and how these processes have evolved and affected fiscal and public policies. More specifically, this paper analyzes the current legislative and institutional provisions governing administrative, political and fiscal decentralization in Morocco and presents a detailed analysis of the decentralized tax system. It analyses the role of each tier and the political, administrative and fiscal prerogatives of their respective councils. It appears from this analysis that the Moroccan system is still largely centralized. First, through the continued control of the central government via the tutelle. Second, because of the low financial autonomy of the local governments which remain widely dependent on intergovernmental transfers. Finally, it appears that the shared management of local taxation by different tiers of government can result in a lack of communication and information sharing as well as a lack of commitment from those that manage the collection on behalf of others. The regional level should be given more power to oversee and harmonize the prerogatives of each level of subnational government. |
| Keywords: | Deconcentration, Political decentralization, Fiscal decentralization, Local taxes, Local governments, Morocco. |
| Date: | 2018–04–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-01774928&r=ure |
| By: | Anne Ardila Brenøe; Ulf Zölitz |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates how high school gender composition affects students’ participation in STEM college studies. Using Danish administrative data, we exploit idiosyncratic within-school variation in gender composition. We find that having a larger proportion of female peers reduces women’s probability of enrolling in and graduating from STEM programs. Men’s STEM participation increases with more female peers present. In the long run, women exposed to more female peers earn less because they (1) are less likely to work in STEM occupations, and (2) have more children. Our findings show that the school peer environment has lasting effects on occupational sorting and the gender wage gap. |
| Keywords: | Gender, peer effects, STEM studies |
| JEL: | I21 J16 J31 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zur:econwp:285&r=ure |
| By: | Tony ShunTe Yuo |
| Abstract: | Environmental product variety is a significant factor to generate agglomeration economies for any shopping area. However, the intangibility of these multifaceted environmental externalities sometimes limited researchers and practitioners to mathematical models or 2 dimensional visibilities, which could not give a holistic overview. This study, thus, aims to establish a methodology process to generate three-dimensional(3D) visualization of the spatial distribution of the previously intangible environmental product variety characteristics. Using geostatistical and spatial analysis tools provided by GIS, the hotpots of specific attributes such as higher rental value, product variety, and shop density, could be revealed. The algorithms of PCA and CA were used for further spatial data mining, to extract the core and periphery product variety layers and the unveiling the different features among clusters. This research compared several shopping areas from the cities of Taiwan, each with over 1200 points of interest (POIs) field surveyed data from 2014-2015. The results showed that this spatial extracting model could successfully illustrate the 34 layers of retail agglomeration areas in 3D maps. The arranged core and periphery layers clearly unveil the spatial distribution of the intangible environmental variety. However, although the regression showed that higher variety can generate higher rents, the spots with highest rents does not with the highest number of product variety layers but closely link with the core layers of product variety and the highest pedestrian spots, such as the main MRT entrance. Spatially dominant anchor stores, such as department stores and cinemas, sometimes could generate sub-centres with higher rents. |
| Keywords: | Agglomeration Economies; City centre attractions; City centre revitalization; Geostatistical analysis; Retail shops |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_142&r=ure |
| By: | Inga Molenda (Institute of Transport Economics, Muenster); Gernot Sieg (Institute of Transport Economics, Muenster) |
| Abstract: | A shopping mall is a meeting platform for retailers and their customers, and may therefore subsidize one particular market side. We consider suburban malls as competitive bottlenecks, because shops are mainly opened up by retail chains which operate in many malls, but whose customers visit only one suburban mall, so as to save transport costs. If the consumer-to-shop externality is larger than the shop-to-consumer externality, parking is subsidized. If customers generate high revenue, the mall operator will generally refrain from charging an entry fee, and offer free parking to its visitors. This result is shown in a model with variety-loving consumers and two competing malls at the end point of a Hotelling line on which their potential visitors, and thus the retailers’ customers, are located. |
| JEL: | L91 R41 |
| Date: | 2017–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mut:wpaper:23&r=ure |
| By: | Katrin Kandlbinder |
| Abstract: | Real estate markets are characterized by heterogeneous goods, infrequent trading, geographic segmentation and information asymmetries. One of the most important differences between a perfectly competitive market and the housing market is the heterogeneity in the cost of acquiring information due to information asymmetry for different buyer types. Historically, research shows that out-of-town buyers are informationally disadvantaged and therefore pay higher prices compared to in-town buyers (Lambson et al. (2004), Clauretie and Thistle (2007), and Zhou et al. (2014)). However, with the recent advent and usage of online platforms like Zillow, Trulia and Redfin a plethora of information about the housing market is provided free. If information asymmetry or search costs decrease systematically with increased availability of information, then the price paid for any property should be more equal, exhibiting less price dispersion, for all buyer types. This research aims to investigate the price differentials between in-town and out-of-town buyers over a ten year window, testing whether information efficiency has improved over time. This time period overlaps the general dissemination and utilization of improved home search web sites. As a theoretical framework, a sequential search model for heterogeneous buyers of real estate is applied following Wheaton (1990), Turnbull and Sirmans (1993), and Lambson et al. (2004) to examine how prices will be affected with our assumption of decreasing search costs. Hence, in a second step, a hedonic regression model is used for six US cities in two different time frames in order to show whether the premium paid by out-of-town buyers has decreased with increasing information efficiency according to Ihlanfeld and Mayock (2010), and Ling et al. (2016). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper which compares the out-of-town buyer premium of different cities over time with respect to increased information efficiency. |
| Keywords: | Housing Market; Search query data; Sentiment Index; Textual Analysis |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_134&r=ure |
| By: | Lida Aminian; Harry Timmermans |
| Abstract: | The rapid urbanization and its consequences on human life highlight the concept of Urban Quality Of Life (UQOL) as a research priority for both policy and academia. The applications of UQOL studies are very broad and reflect the motivations behind regional migration, residential choices as well as urban growth patterns. During the last decades many researchers have been involved in the field of environmental behaviour science and their results are mainly oriented towards the influence of built environment on enhancing the quality of life.Traditionally, modeling quality of life in urban settings contains objective and subjective attributes, which obtain through cross sectional surveys, observations and aggregated methods. However, with this method it is difficult to address the cause of satisfaction, while with activity modeling satisfaction is the result of the degree to which the environment satisfies a persons needs.We know on one hand that UQOL is a context based and scale-dependent study, and on the other hand people judgments about the environment vary significantly. Therefore, the satisfaction regarding built environment can also be measured through behavioral indicators. Activity modeling of households and individuals is one of the methods that provide opportunity to study the link between characteristics of urban form and micro –level behaviors. At the residential level, daily activity schedules of households are influenced by characteristics of urban environment. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to provide an overview of this link and explore the relationship between the built environment and physical activity with more innovative and comprehensive spatial survey methods. |
| Keywords: | activity modeling; Survey; urban quality of life |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_331&r=ure |
| By: | Mussida, Chiara; Parisi, Maria Laura |
| Abstract: | The relationship between regional income inequality in Italy and the phenomenon of migration is still under current debate. Policymakers and researchers worry about the process of assimilation of the new entrants, in a country where regional disparities are strong. We provide evidence that regional income disparities apply to ethnic groups of migrants, too, like the group of nationals, but the largest source of inequality is still within region and within group. We address this issue by using the 2009 wave of EUSILC data and the ISTAT CVS data in 2009, the latter offering specific information on households with foreigners/migrants by main ethnic groups. We calculate several indexes of income inequality because of their specific sensitivity to different portions of the Italian income distribution. We also estimate the main determinants of such inequality. Our results suggest that, above all, women with very young children and individuals with secondary education belong to categories with significantly increased income inequality, whereas those highly educated and leaving in the Centre-North of Italy belong to categories with reduced inequality. Regional unemployment is associated to lower inequality, especially among those low-income earners, while higher relative mean regional income pushes inequality upwards |
| Keywords: | regional income inequality, household income inequality, migration, ethnic groups, Italy |
| JEL: | D31 F22 O15 R23 |
| Date: | 2017–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:85788&r=ure |
| By: | Michal Rubaszek; Margarita Rubio |
| Abstract: | A low share of the private rental market observed in most Central European countries, including Poland, might be considered as a serious structural weakness in housing markets that may affect the macroeconomy. This paper assesses two important questions. The first one relates to the reasons behind this rental market underdevelopment. The second question is what can be done to increase the size of the rental market. We conduct an original survey among a representative group of Poles and find that preferences are strongly tilted towards owning. Results of logit regressions, as well as the distribution of answers to selected questions, indicate that these preferences are strongly influenced by economic and psychological beliefs. Inefficient institutions and the lack of professional renting services also turned out to be important in the housing tenure choice. Then, using a macro DSGE model we propose a set of reforms that aim at improving the efficiency in rental markets: (i) removing the bad tenant effect" on the level of rents, (ii) equalising fiscal incentives for different types of housing tenure, and (iii) improving the standard of rental services leading to a shift in housing tenure preferences. Our computations indicate that introducing these three reforms would shift the rental share from 6.8%to 15.0%, contributing as well to macroeconomic stability. |
| Keywords: | DSGE model; Rental market; survey data |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_205&r=ure |
| By: | Deal, Cristopher; Stone, Joe A. |
| Abstract: | Employment of teacher aides in U. S. public schools increased roughly six-fold since 1969. Yet randomized studies of aides find predominantly negative effects on student achievement. This study of public elementary schools in Oregon explores the role of teacher experience in the effectiveness of aides and finds a strong complementarity between aides and teacher experience. The complementarity explains two results of prior studies: negative effects for aides and positive effects primarily for early years of teacher experience. Without complementarity, the effect of aides is negative; with it, the effect is positive for schools with experienced teachers and negative only for schools with inexperienced teachers. Similarly, without complementarity, the effect of experience is negative; with it, the effect is positive for schools that use aides intensively and negative only for schools that do not. The study exploits the longitudinal, hierarchical structure of the Oregon data to estimate a hierarchical linear model with controls for both observed and unobserved influences on individual student achievement. A series of alternative specifications, including a nullification test of causality based on prior test scores suggest robustness for the estimates. Results of the study suggest that prior evidence for the effectiveness of aides is too pessimistic in the context of experienced teachers and that prior evidence for the effectiveness of teacher experience is too pessimistic in the context of schools that use aides intensively. The results also suggest that experienced teachers have expertise important to effective supervision of aides, particularly in schools where teachers are relatively inexperienced and aides are prevalent. Hence, attempts to address problems of large class sizes by adding aides are more likely to be effective in schools with experienced teachers. |
| Keywords: | teacher aides student achievement teacher experience schools |
| JEL: | H00 I00 I21 J00 |
| Date: | 2017–08–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:85810&r=ure |
| By: | Fershtman, Chaim; Persitz, Dotan |
| Abstract: | We present a strategic network formation model which is based on membership in clubs. Agents choose a set of clubs with which they wish to be affiliated. The set of all club memberships (an environment) induces a weighted network in which two agents are directly connected if they are members of the same club. Two agents may also be indirectly connected using the multiple memberships of third parties. Agents gain from their position in the induced network and pay membership fees. Thus, both clubs and the network are formed simultaneously. Using two specifications of the weighting function we introduce two models based upon congestion - one, the club congestion model wherein the weight of each link depends upon the size of the smallest shared club and the other, the individual congestion model wherein each link's weight depends on the number of affiliations maintained by the two agents. In the club congestion model we focus on the trade-off between the size of the club, depreciation due to indirect connections and membership fees. In the individual congestion model the Grand Club environment is the unique efficient environment. However, a coordination failure arises due to the wide externalities incurred by the formation of new affiliations. We believe that this framework may serve as a basis for an empirical examination of the role of linking platforms in shaping real-life social networks. |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12874&r=ure |
| By: | Anne Dörr; Andreas Pfnür |
| Abstract: | When planning to develop corporate real estate, Corporates have to choose between different forms of organization and sourcing. The choice of the most suitable form is a crucial decision and often problematic for companies and their corporate real estate management. Different forms like multiple prime contracts, general constructor or partnership based development forms differ with regard to their advantages, disadvantages and requirements for realization. In this context the purpose of this paper is to develop a decision support tool which helps Corporates to maximize their project outcome, project success and, in the long-term, to optimize their real estate portfolio when developing new corporate real estate.To form a scientific basis firstly relevant objectives and requirements in decision-making processes from literature research will be presented. Secondly these decision-making processes and existing tools for comparable situations in literature will then be analyzed. Thirdly the deduced model, which shows the framework for decision-making from literature, is evaluated with a case study and aggregated to specific decision-making criteria from the CREM point of view. The underlying case study was a real estate development project for a German Corporate.As a result 15 criteria, relevant in decision-making processes of Corporates, can be identified. On this basis, a model is chosen from decision theory, which supports the solution of such decision problems. This decision support tool sums up all decision criteria for CREM in a structure for the first time and will allow Corporates to structure their decision-making process for real estate development projects and will help to make them more transparent. |
| Keywords: | Corporate real estate management; decision theory; Project Development; sourcing model |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_46&r=ure |
| By: | Masaru Yarime |
| Abstract: | In our efforts to promote an urban sustainability, the transformation to smart cities will play a significant role. As smart cities are based on advanced systems of hardware and software—covering various types of products and services relevant to urban functions— innovation for smart cities requires a significant degree of diversity in knowledge, actors, and institutions. Hence it is important to understand the characteristics of the innovation system in smart cities and to introduce policies that will promote forms of innovation that incorporate local conditions and contexts. In this paper, the innovation system of smart cities in Japan is examined to consider implications for public policies and institutional design. The analysis reveals a concentrated structure dominated by large actors, particularly in the public sector and the electric (power generation and distribution) and electronics (appliance and equipment) industries, with knowledge and technological domains concerning renewable energy, energy storage, community energy management, and applications for home appliances and electric vehicles. Policies and regulations influencing the innovation system of smart cities include economic incentives to promote renewable energy technologies, liberalization of energy markets for new entrants, participatory processes of road-mapping on key technologies, localization of demonstration projects reflecting specificities, standard setting for component technologies, and platform creation for stakeholder partnerships including academia, industry, government, and civil society. A key implication for public policy is to facilitate communication and engagement with end users in jointly creating innovation for smart cities. |
| Keywords: | smart city, innovation system, network analysis, stakeholder collaboration, Japan |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jic:wpaper:170&r=ure |
| By: | Gerard H. Dericks; Hans R. A. Koster |
| Abstract: | This paper exploits locally exogenous variation in the location of bombs dropped during the Blitz to quantify the effect of density restrictions on agglomeration economies in London: an elite global city. Employing microgeographic data on office rents and employment, this analysis points to effects for London several multiples larger than the existing literature which primarily derives its results from secondary cities. In particular, doubling employment density raises rents by 25%. Consequently if the Blitz had not taken place, the resulting loss in agglomeration economies to present day London would cause total annual office rent revenues to fall by $4:5 billion { equivalent to 1:2% of London's annual GDP. These results illuminate the substantial impact of land-use regulations in one of the world's largest and most productive cities. |
| Keywords: | regulatory costs, office rents, agglomeration economies, London Blitz bombings |
| JEL: | R14 R33 R38 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp1542&r=ure |
| By: | Thorsten Heilker (Institute of Transport Economics, Muenster); Gernot Sieg (Institute of Transport Economics, Muenster) |
| Abstract: | Transportation network companies commonly enter the market for taxi ride intermediation and alter the market outcome. Compared to cooperatively organized radio-taxi dispatch service agencies, transportation network companies run larger fleets and serve more customers with lower fares, when the fixed costs of the dispatch office are relatively small. The same holds for private dispatch firms, when the fixed costs of a taxicab are not too small. These results are shown in a two-stage duopoly of fare and fleet size competition with fare- and waiting-time-dependent demand. |
| Keywords: | digitization, regulatory capture, taxi dispatch market, transportation network companies |
| JEL: | L91 R41 D43 L22 |
| Date: | 2017–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mut:wpaper:24&r=ure |
| By: | Aaron Hedlund (University of Missouri-Columbia) |
| Abstract: | This paper uses a structural model to quantitatively evaluate whether and under what conditions loose credit constraints are essential to achieving a high homeownership rate. A dichotomy emerges between the short run and long run response to a moderate tightening of credit, with homeownership initially falling before gradually reverting to its original level. When consumption and housing are complements, this long-run stability is robust to larger credit shifts,though the short-run adjustment can be severe. These results suggest that policymakers may have more latitude than thought in pursuing other objectives(e.g. macroprudential stabilization) without harming long-run homeownership. |
| Keywords: | Homeownership, Credit Constraints, Housing, Debt, Mortgages |
| Date: | 2018–04–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:umc:wpaper:1806&r=ure |
| By: | Jan Willem Gunning; Pramila Krishnan; Andualem T Mengistu |
| Abstract: | The lack of market development in remote areas is usually measured by spatial variation in prices for a given set of consumer goods. We focus instead on the way distance constrains the choices consumers can make. We construct a model of monopolistic competition between traders moving goods from market towns to rural areas. An increase in transport costs reduces consumer welfare not only through lower incomes for farm households and higher prices for manufactures but also through reduced availability of manufactures: choice fades with distance. The model allows for heterogeneity of villages in terms of market size and the distribution of income. We test the model using data from a purpose-designed survey of shops and consumers in rural villages in Ethiopia. Falling transport costs, larger market size and higher inequality dramatically raise variety of items and brands available locally. We use data on prices of matched source and destination goods to estimate similar tastes for variety across space and estimate an average markup of 10-15 percent. We use these results to estimate the welfare costs of falling variety at between 5-7 percent of expenditures on manufactured consumer goods. Our results suggest ignoring the costs of lower variety in remote places will mean that the level of poverty is underestimated while the rate at which poverty declines is underestimated as well. |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:csa:wpaper:2018-05&r=ure |
| By: | Lee Branstetter; Britta Glennon; J. Bradford Jensen |
| Abstract: | The location of US multinational foreign R&D has shifted significantly to include emerging markets in addition to traditional Western R&D hubs, resulting in two challenges for multinationals: (1) how to transfer knowledge across geographic distances, and (2) how to facilitate learning when local knowledge sources in given technological areas are inadequate. This paper argues that to overcome these challenges, multinationals utilize home country inventors on foreign affiliate inventor teams – and in particular on teams in locations with insufficiently specialized local knowledge stocks – to facilitate knowledge transfer. Empirical analysis of a comprehensive dataset of US multinational R&D and patenting activity provides robust support for this argument. The findings have important implications for understanding how countries can gain expertise in technical areas and how poor countries can escape the knowledge trap, and they provide insight into management of increasingly dispersed multinational global R&D networks, particularly in locations with relatively unspecialized local inventors. |
| JEL: | O31 O32 O57 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24453&r=ure |
| By: | Tom Emmerling; Crocker Liu; Yildiray Yildirim |
| Abstract: | When do real estate trusts exhibit superior performance, when they mimic the underlying real estate or when they behave like stock? We test whether real estate trusts outperform common stock only when it mimics underlying property fundamentals. We also explore what capital market conditions correspond to and/or contribute to when securitized real estate behaves more like underlying property fundamentals. To explore this issue, we examine the investment performance of real estate trusts over the Great Depression and also the Great Recession. A distinguishing feature of our study is that we are the first to analyze the investment performance of real estate trusts (RETs), the predecessor to modern day real estate investment trusts (REITs), which traded over the late 19th and early 20th century. We compare the behavior and performance of RETs to REITs in the process. We find evidence consistent with the notion that securitized real estate exhibits superior performance only when it mimics the direct real estate market. This performance is fueled in part by cheaper borrowing costs, greater availability of debt and equity financing, and loosening credit standards. With the advent of a crisis, securitized real estate exhibits a greater co-movement with common stock. When this occurs, real estate behaves in a similar fashion to common stock and any abnormal performance disappears. This corresponds to tighter lending conditions and higher borrowing costs. We also show that RETs behave in a similar fashion to REITs. |
| Keywords: | Great Depression; Great Recession; Real Estate Cycles; REIT |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_370&r=ure |
| By: | Jillian Berk; Linda Rosenberg; Lindsay Cattell; Johanna Lacoe; Lindsay Fox; Myley Dang; Elizabeth Brown |
| Abstract: | This document highlights practices for delivering services to disconnected youth, as identified in the literature scan and described in the study’s Evidence Scan report. |
| Keywords: | Job Corps, youth engagement, discipline, safety, career preparation, group dynamics, residential program |
| JEL: | J |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:f30a4f9fdc484f898f47198511b9f220&r=ure |
| By: | Margaretha Buurman (VU Amsterdam, Netherlands); Josse (J.) Delfgaauw (Erasmus University Rotterdam); Robert (A.J.) Dur (Erasmus University Rotterdam, CESifo, IZA); Robin Zoutenbier (Ministry of Finance, The Netherlands) |
| Abstract: | We conducted a field experiment to examine the effects of student feedback to teachers at a large Dutch school for intermediate vocational education. Students evaluated all teachers, but only a randomly selected group of teachers received feedback. Additionally, we asked all teachers before as well as after the experiment to assess their own performance on the same items. We find a precisely estimated zero average treatment effect of receiving feedback on student evaluation scores a year later. Only those teachers whose self-assessment before the experiment is much more positive than their students' evaluations improve significantly in response to receiving feedback. We also find that provision of feedback reduces the gap between teachers' self-assessment and students' assessment, but only to a limited extent. All of these results are driven by the female teachers in our sample; male teachers turn out to be unresponsive to student feedback. |
| Keywords: | field experiment; feedback; teachers; student evaluations; gender differences |
| JEL: | C93 I2 M5 |
| Date: | 2018–04–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tin:wpaper:20180042&r=ure |
| By: | Yuichi Ishimura (Faculty of Management Information, Kyoto College of Economics); Kenji Takeuchi (Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates the spatial concentration of waste landfill sites over two decades. Using a unique dataset of 2,164 industrial-waste landfill sites from 1992 to 2012, we find a persistent spatial concentration of sites managed by private companies. The empirical results show that the economic factors and the existence of other waste-related facilities have a positive effect on the location of private landfill sites. Interestingly, this relationship was fairly stable for 20 years despite a significant decline in the number of sites in operation. The results suggest the difficulty in addressing NIMBY "not in my backyard" issues without public intervention. |
| Keywords: | Waste landfill site, Industrial waste, Spatial econometrics, NIMBY, Japan |
| JEL: | D72 Q53 R39 |
| Date: | 2018–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:koe:wpaper:1818&r=ure |
| By: | Eiji Koazuka |
| Abstract: | Providing local communities with authority to manage school resources is a popular education policy in the developing world. However, recent studies suggest that this type of intervention has limited impact on student learning outcomes. To investigate how communities can effectively utilize school resources, we conducted a randomized experiment in Niger by providing school grants and training for school committees to increase communities’ awareness of student learning and improve resource management. The result shows that, when the training was conducted with grant provision, communities increased activities that enhanced student effort, and student test scores in math and French remarkably improved, particularly for low-performing children. As a secondary effect of the training, parents, who have realized their children are not learning the basics at school, increased their contribution to school committees and their support for children’s home study. These results suggest that sharing information and knowledge with communities and raising their awareness is a key to enhancing effectiveness of community participation and school grants policy. |
| Keywords: | Education, Decentralization, Accountability, Field experiments |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jic:wpaper:166&r=ure |
| By: | Deborah Laura Isaacs; Ali Parsa; Seow Eng Ong |
| Abstract: | The role for and of Islam in urban planning is typically overlooked or misperceived, with the question of how ‘Islamic’ contemporary Muslim cities are not addressed. Despite numerous works on Muslim city planning and characteristics, these have not provided a simplified model of Islamic goals and features which can be utilised for general testing and comparison. In this study, such a model is constructed using the Qur’an, Sunnah, and sources detailing planning and administration of cities in the Caliphate from 622 AD to roughly 650 AD. Eight major objectives are linked to 21 observable features, which can be used to measure conformance of a subject city with the theoretical ideal based on Shari’ah. The measured conformance differences can also be used to compare modern cities across time and with each other. This allows clearer identification of contextual factors responsible, and can depict the fluctuating influence of Islamic objectives. The constructed model additionally exhibits Islam’s compatibility with and relevance to modern urban planning paradigms, including economic and environmental sustainability and social cohesion. Adaptation and application of Islamic planning objectives in contemporary cities can then rationally be utilised to ameliorate current shortcomings, improving urban conditions for Muslim and other communities. |
| Keywords: | Islamic city; testing model; Urban Form; Urban Planning |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_356&r=ure |
| By: | Goos, Maarten; Konings, Jozef; Vandeweyer, Marieke |
| Abstract: | Examining employment growth in local labor markets across Europe, this paper finds that each worker in a high-skilled occupation creates up to five extra jobs in less-skilled intensive services in the same region. However, it is also shown that there exist persistent differences in the size of this local high-tech job multiplier across regions. In particular, we find that the multiplier is larger in regions with high immigration, an abundance of less-skilled workers, and lower gross output per capita. At the country level we also show that this results in local high-tech job multipliers that are larger in Southern European countries than in the rest of Europe. |
| Keywords: | high-tech jobs; local job multiplier; regional growth |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12868&r=ure |
| By: | Gheorghe Multescu |
| Abstract: | Enhancing our cities adaptive capacity to react to adverse conditions, generated by climate, environmental, resource or community driven vulnerabilities, is part of a global new approach to strengthening our living and working environment. The creation of a resilient business environment plays a key role in the competition between modern day global cities. Various rankings of resilient global cities list technology innovation, digitalization and access to data as crucial factors in achieving a success status. The development of Data Centres (DCs) forms a growing sector as part of new strategies for global business. Safe data storage and management have been identified as a key business strategy components for banking, finance, retail, TNT and global service companies alike. Precise design requirements and challenging location constraints for developing such DCs are better tackled as part of a Corporate Real Estate Strategy (CRES) aligned to each global company’s business needs. At the same time technological advances and the constraints for local property markets generated by the development of DCs in overcrowded urban centres require more research on future implications. What is the role and impact of Data Centres on developing new Corporate Real Estate Strategies in line with resilient business requirements? How can decision-making factors for developing new DCs be included in the management of global companies’ property portfolios? The proposed research is two-fold. First a case study approach will be used to analyse the role and impact of DCs on the alignment of new resilient business strategy requirements with CRES for global companies. Second, future implications of DCs becoming a core component of global companies’ portfolios will be assessed in order to establish requirements for a more resilient CRES approach. |
| Keywords: | Corporate Real Estate Strategy; Data Centres; Resilience |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_347&r=ure |
| By: | Jillian Berk; Linda Rosenberg; Lindsay Cattell; Johanna Lacoe; Lindsay Fox; Myley Dang; Elizabeth Brown |
| Abstract: | The external review covers a broad range of topics that are relevant to the Job Corps program, including program operations and services. |
| Keywords: | Job Corps, disconnected youth, at-risk youth, youth engagement, discipline, safety, career preparation, group dynamics, residential program, innovation, contracts |
| JEL: | J |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:c862f115989a4b94a151e38d932b260c&r=ure |
| By: | W. Walker Hanlon |
| Abstract: | This study provides new evidence on the impact of air pollution in London over the century from 1866-1965. To identify weeks with elevated pollution levels I use new data tracking the timing of London's famous fog events, which trapped emissions in the city. These events are compared to detailed new weekly mortality data. My results show that acute pollution exposure due to fog events accounted for at least one out of every 200 deaths in London during this century. I provide evidence that the presence of infectious diseases of the respiratory system, such as measles and tuberculosis, increased the mortality effects of pollution. As a result, success in reducing the infectious diseases burden in London in the 20th century reduced the impact of pollution exposure and shifted the distribution of pollution effects across age groups. |
| JEL: | I15 N3 Q53 |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24488&r=ure |
| By: | Kerwin Kofi Charles; Erik Hurst; Mariel Schwartz |
| Abstract: | Using data from a variety of sources, this paper comprehensively documents the dramatic changes in the manufacturing sector and the large decline in employment rates and hours worked among prime-aged Americans since 2000. We use cross-region variation to explore the link between declining manufacturing employment and labor market outcomes. We find that manufacturing decline in a local area in the 2000s had large and persistent negative effects on local employment rates, hours worked and wages. We also show that declining local manufacturing employment is related to rising local opioid use and deaths. These results suggest that some of the recent opioid epidemic is driven by demand factors in addition to increased opioid supply. We conclude the paper with a discussion of potential mediating factors associated with declining manufacturing labor demand including public and private transfer receipt, sectoral switching, and inter-region mobility. Overall, we conclude that the decline in manufacturing employment was a substantial cause of the decline in employment rates during the 2000s particularly for less educated prime age workers. Given the trends in both capital and skill deepening within this sector, we further conclude that many policies currently being discussed to promote the manufacturing sector will have only a modest labor market impact for less educated individuals. |
| JEL: | E24 J21 J23 R23 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24468&r=ure |
| By: | MORIKAWA Masayuki |
| Abstract: | Although there have been a number of studies that have applied the gravity model to migration and tourist flows, analyses covering both international and intranational movements have been scarce. This study, using unique official statistics for accommodation facilities in Japan, empirically analyzes the determinants of both international and intranational tourist flows. According to gravity model estimations, physical distance has a large, negative effect on tourist flows, but the quantitative magnitude of these effects differs little between foreign and domestic (interregional) tourists. The border effect on tourist flows is quantitatively large, and the number of tourists from foreign countries is more than 60% smaller than that from domestic ones. These results suggest that policies mitigating border barriers may contribute to a higher number of foreign tourists. |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eti:dpaper:18021&r=ure |
| By: | Alexander Konon; Michael Fritsch; Alexander S. Kritikos |
| Abstract: | We analyze whether start-up rates in different industries systematically change with business cycle variables. Using a unique data set at the industry level, we mostly find correlations that are consistent with counter-cyclical influences of the business cycle on entries in both innovative and non-innovative industries. Entries into the largescale industries, including the innovative part of manufacturing, are only influenced by changes in the cyclical component of unemployment, while entries into small-scale industries, like knowledge intensive services, are mostly influenced by changes in the cyclical component of GDP. Thus, our analysis suggests that favorable conditions in terms of high GDP might not be germane for start-ups. Given that both innovative and non-innovative businesses react counter-cyclically in ‘regular’ recessions, business formation may have a stabilizing effect on the economy. |
| Keywords: | New business formation, entrepreneurship, business cycle, manufacturing, services, innovative industries |
| JEL: | E32 L16 L26 R11 |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwwpp:dp1732&r=ure |
| By: | Wei Keat Benny Ng; Rianne Appel-Meulenbroek; Myriam Cloodt; Theo Arentze |
| Abstract: | Although science parks are established globally for decades, still limited attention is paid towards research into possible typologies within these real estate concepts. Science parks are believed to enhance, among others, innovative output, entrepreneurship, and economic value for firms and regions. Past academic research shows mixed results on these performances and suggests that the lack of clear results is due to not taking into account the wide variety of of types of science parks that exist in reality. Prior attempts in categorizing science parks are characterized by the limited number of cases and variables. Therefore the present study serves to fill this gap in the literature by developing a more comprehensive analysis of science park typologies. A large-scale survey on science park characteristics is distributed among all known science park managers/owners in Europe in order to collect data on both physical and non-physical science parks features. The selected variables of science park features are based on prior academic research. The total list of science parks is compiled through a number of sources including desk research (case studies reported in the literature), member lists of science park associations and other registers. A cluster analysis is conducted to group the different science parks into types with clearer differences. The typologies of science parks, derived in this way from data, provide a further understanding of science parks in general and offers researchers and practitioners a means to compare, market, and benchmark science parks more adequately. |
| Keywords: | Campuses; Cluster Analysis; science parks; technology parks; Typology |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_89&r=ure |
| By: | Koomin Kim (Florida State University); Seunghoo Lim (International University of Japan) |
| Abstract: | Previous research and theory on policy innovation and diffusion have developed explanatory factors for the adoption of TELs. However, past research on which states adopt TELs have only examined the first adoption dates. However, since the state policy making regarding TELs is more complicated?TELs have been proposed and failed, and multiple TELs have been passed since 1970. These previous studies have limitations and have not considered the comprehensive policy making process of TELs adoption and revision. In this respect, this research empirically examines the differentiated process of adoptions through event history analysis (EHA) using state data from 1970 to 2006. This study reveals the comprehensive policy making process of TEL adoption that can be summarized as follows: (1) having a direct democracy initiative continuously affects the adoption process of TELs; (2) states will imitate other similar states' TELs based on size (expenditure) during the agenda setting process; and (3) Enactment failure of TELs is induced by anticipatory competition that states behave strategically, and successful passage of TELs are driven by direct democracy, and professionalized legislature rather than regional diffusion factors. |
| Keywords: | Tax and Expenditure Limitations, Competition, Imitation, Direct democracy |
| Date: | 2017–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iuj:wpaper:ems_2017_03&r=ure |
| By: | Navarro, Noemí; Tran, Dan H. |
| Abstract: | We study how the presence of transitive cycles in the interbank network affects the extent of financial contagion. In a regular network setting, where the same pattern of links repeats for each node, we allow an external shock to propagate losses through the system of linkages (interbank network). The extent of contagion (contagiousness) of the network is measured by the limit of the losses when the initial shock is diffused into an infinitely large network. This measure indicates how a network may or may not facilitate shock diffusion in spite of other external factors. Our analysis highlights two main results. First, contagiousness decreases as the length of the minimal transitive cycle increases, keeping the degree of connectivity (density) constant. Second, as density increases the extent of contagion can decrease or increase, because the addition of new links might decrease the length of the minimal transitive cycle. Our results provide new insights to better understand systemic risk and could be used to build complementary indicators for financial regulation. |
| Keywords: | Financial contagion, networks, shock diffusion, transitive cycles, degree |
| JEL: | C02 C69 D85 G33 |
| Date: | 2018–04–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:86267&r=ure |
| By: | MORIKAWA Masayuki |
| Abstract: | This study, using original survey data, presents empirical evidence on the relationship between commuting time and telecommuting on the one hand, and wages and subjective well-being on the other hand in Japan, where long commuting time is prevalent. According to the analysis, first, individuals, particularly female and non-standard employees, have a strong preference for avoiding long commuting hours compared to long working hours. Second, there is a wage premium for long commuters, and this is greater for female employees. Third, although the number of telecommuters is currently very small, they enjoy wage premiums and higher job satisfaction. These findings suggest that diffusion of telecommuting and satellite offices may contribute to increasing the labor market participation of female and elderly people in metropolitan areas. |
| Date: | 2018–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eti:dpaper:18025&r=ure |
| By: | Alexander Koutamanis; Boukje Van Reijn; Ellen Van Bueren |
| Abstract: | In recent years there has been growing interest in urban mining from various environmental and economic perspectives. Materials hidden in buildings are attractive alternatives to raw ones, while building activities are responsible for a large share of waste. The paper is a summary of findings from an analysis of possibilities for urban mining in Amsterdam, focusing on prospecting for metals in residential buildings. Both global literature and interviews with Dutch demolition experts suggest that performance in metal recovery from buildings is as high as it can get. However, estimation of metal content in buildings and of waste processing rates is far from reliable, accurate and precise enough to support such claims or identify possibilities for further improvement, especially in relation to processes of urban and real-estate redevelopment and rejuvenation. To improve understanding and embedding of urban mining in these processes, we propose (a) a BIM-based information infrastructure that connects to municipal and owner information processes, so as to progressively collect all relevant information, allow for validation, verification and localization of valuable resources, as well as identify opportune moments for their extraction, and (b) policies that overcome the fragmented institutional character of the building sector, making information sharing a consequence of networking based on trust and shared values, driven by both demand and soft incentives relating to circularity. |
| Keywords: | Building Information Modelling (BIM); construction and demolition waste; policy formation; prospecting; Redevelopment; Renovation; urban mining |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2017–07–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2017_70&r=ure |
| By: | Benjamin Montmartin (Observatoire français des conjonctures économiques); Marcos Herrera (National University of Salta (Argentine) (CONICET)); Nadine Massard (Université Grenoble Alpes (UGA)) |
| Abstract: | Based on a spatial extension of an R&D investment model, this paper measures the macroeconomic impact of the French R&D policy mix on business R&D using regional data. Our measure takes into account not only the direct effect of policies but also indirect effects generated by the existence of spatial interaction between regions. Using a unique database containing information on the levels of various R&D policy instruments received by firms in French NUTS3 regions over the period 2001-2011, our estimates of a spatial Durbin model with structural breaks and fixed effects reveal the existence of a negative spatial dependence among R&D investments in regions. In this context, while a-spatial estimates would conclude that all instruments have a crowding-in effect, we show that national subsidies are the only instrument that is able to generate significant crowding-in effects. On the contrary, it seems that the design, size and spatial allocation of funds from the other instruments (tax credits, local subsidies, European subsidies) lead them to act (in the French context) as beggar-thy-neighbor policies. |
| Keywords: | Policy mix evaluation; R&D investment; Spatial panel; French Nuts3 regions |
| JEL: | H25 O31 O38 |
| Date: | 2018–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/7rrsl07p559bjr85tr7hsft1o9&r=ure |