Central Academic Institutions
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Recent Submissions
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The merger of populations, the incidence of marriages, and aggregate unhappiness
Stark, Oded; Rendl, Franz; Jakubek, Marcin (2011-07)Let a society’s unhappiness be measured by the aggregate of the levels of relative deprivation of its members. When two societies of equal size, <em>F</em> and <em>M</em>, merge, unhappiness in the merged society is shown ... -
Is population growth conducive to the sustainability of cooperation?
Stark, Oded; Jakubek, Marcin (2011-07)This paper asks whether population growth is conducive to the sustainability of cooperation. A simple model is developed in which farmers who live around a circular lake engage in trade with their adjacent neighbors. The ... -
Food demand analysis of Indonesian households with particular attention to the poorest
Pangaribowo, Evita Hanie; Tsegai, Daniel (2011-08)The purpose of this study is to analyze the demand responses of Indonesian households to food prices, income changes and other socioeconomic factors. The underlying assumption here is that inadequate information on household ... -
The economics of desertification, land degradation, and drought: Toward an integrated global assessment
Nkonya, Ephraim; Gerber, Nicolas; Baumgartner, Philipp; von Braun, Joachim; De Pinto, Alex; Graw, Valerie; Kato, Edward; Kloos, Julia; Walter, Teresa (2011-05) -
Why would some migrants choose to engage in degrading work?
Stark, Oded; Fan, C. Simon (2011-03)This paper develops a model of voluntary migration into degrading work. The essence of the model is a tension between two “bads:” that which arises from being relatively deprived at home, and that which arises from engaging ... -
Endogenous selection of comparison groups, human capital formation, and tax policy
Stark, Oded; Hyll, Walter; Wang, Yong (2011-01)This paper considers a setting in which the acquisition of human capital entails a change of location in social space that causes individuals to revise their comparison groups. Skill levels are viewed as occupational groups, ... -
Harnessing the forces of urban expansion: The public economics of farmland development allowance
Chau, Nancy H.; Zhang, Weiwen (2011-01)For decades, rapid urban expansion has led to concerns over the loss of cultivated land in rural China. This contrasts sharply with another salient feature of the Chinese land policy reform landscape that has gone on largely ... -
The prospect of migration, sticky wages, and "educated unemployment"
Stark, Oded; Fan, C. Simon (2011-01)An increase in the probability of work abroad, where the returns to schooling are higher than at home, induces more individuals in a developing country to acquire education, which leads to an increase in the supply of ... -
Income redistribution going awry: The reversal power of the concern for relative deprivation
Sorger, Gerhard; Stark, Oded (2012-12)We demonstrate that a rank-preserving transfer from a richer individual to a poorer individual can exacerbate income inequality (when inequality is measured by the Gini coefficient). This happens when individuals’ preferences ... -
Intersectoral health action in Tanzania: Determinants and policy implications
Simon, Michael; Tsegai, Daniel; Fleßa, Steffen (2012-12)The tremendous human resource and economic burden of HIV/AIDS, malaria and diarrhoeal diseases is well acknowledged in many developing countries. Most of these diseases have multifaceted causes such as malnutrition, the ... -
Effects of weather shocks on agricultural commodity prices in Central Asia
Mirzabaev, Alisher; Tsegai, Daniel (2012-11)Higher weather volatility may be reflected in higher incidences of weather shocks. Weather shocks could potentially affect the supply of agricultural commodities and their prices. In this study, the effects of weather ... -
Do family ties with those left behind intensify or weaken migrants’ assimilation?
Stark, Oded; Dorn, Agnieszka (2012-09)Strong ties with the home country and with the host country can coexist. An altruistic migrant who sends remittances to his family back home assimilates more the more altruistic he is, and also more than a non-remitting migrant. -
The role of scarcity in global virtual water flows
Lenzen, Manfred; Bhaduri, Anik; Moran, Daniel; Kanemoto, Keiichiro; Bekchanov, Maksud; Geschke, Arne; Foran, Barney (2012-09)Recent analyses of the evolution and structure of trade in virtual water revealed that the number of trade connections and volume of virtual water trade have more than doubled over the past two decades, and that developed ... -
Migration networks as a response to financial constraints: Onset and endogenous dynamics
Stark, Oded; Jakubek, Marcin (2012-08)A migration network is modeled as a mutually beneficial cooperative agreement between financially-constrained individuals who seek to finance and expedite their migration. The cooperation agreement creates a network: ... -
The role of virtual water for sustainable economic restructuring: evidence from Uzbekistan, Central Asia
Bekchanov, Maksud; Bhaduri, Anik; Lenzen, Manfred; Lamers, John P. A. (2012-06)Increases in water demand due to population growth, industrial development and urbanization necessitate economically efficient use of water resources worldwide. This is particularly true in the dryland zones of the world ... -
Price volatility, speculation and excessive speculation in commodity markets: sheep or shepherd behaviour?
Algieri, Bernardina (2012-05)The present study aims to investigate the dynamics of primary commodity prices and the role of speculation over time. In particular the relationship between speculation and price volatility on the one side, and the linkage ... -
Infrastructure in developing countries: An overview of some economic issues
Dethier, Jean-Jacques; Moore, Alexander (2012-04)This paper surveys the main issues and controversies in the economic literature on infrastructure in developing countries. Section I reviews the evidence on the role of infrastructure in promoting economic growth. It is ... -
A back-door brain drain
Stark, Oded; Byra, Lukasz (2012-04)In this paper we study the impact of the international migration of unskilled workers on skill formation and the average skill level in the home country. We analyze what appears to be the least threatening scenario from ... -
Policy responses to a dark side of the integration of regions and nations
Stark, Oded (2012-03)In this paper I study policy responses to an increase in post-merger distress. I consider the integration of regions and nations as a merger of populations which I view as a revision of social space, and I identify the ... -
Integration, social distress, and policy formation
Stark, Oded (2012-01)I study the integration of regions in the form of a merger of populations, which I interpret as a revision of people’s social space and their comparison set; I illustrate the way in which a merger can aggravate social ...