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The self‐sacrifice of suicide terrorists is subject to sophisticated models of altruistic sacrifice. Yet, a simpler account is that it reflects common suicidal tendencies. This paper offers new micro and macro evidence supportive of this hypothesis. At the micro level, the paper compares a sample of suicide and non‐suicide terrorists in the United States from 1948 to 2017. Results indicate that suicide terrorists are more likely to display various established suicidal risk factors including history of child abuse, absent parent/s, and relationship troubles. Results from Bayesian Model Averaging indicate that suicide risk factors outperform other individual factors (e.g., ideology and lone‐actor terrorism) in explaining suicide terrorism. At the macro level, the paper takes advantage of the cross‐national variations in suicidal tendencies to explain the incidence of suicide and non‐suicide terrorist attacks worldwide from 1991 to 2014. Results reveal that countries with higher share of deaths from suicide display higher incidences of suicide attacks but similar incidences of non‐suicide attacks. However, other contextual factors such as the share of Muslims also predict the incidence of suicide terrorism. The decision of some terrorists to sacrifice their life may well have been subject to over‐theorization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been almost no research into what makes an effective chairperson in a university department. This paper constructs a historical longitudinal dataset on economics departments in 58 US research universities. It documents evidence that a department's research output tends to improve substantially when the incoming department Chair is himself or herself an outstanding scholar (in particular, is highly cited). The analysis adjusts for a set of other possible influences, including the standing of the department, university resources, the previous Chair, the trend in the department's productivity, and time-lags. Possible interpretations, and implications for future research, are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to provide an explanation for the finding that 'employed American adults have had no net gain in their leisure time in 30 years' [OWEN, 1976, p. 3], a finding which OWEN goes on to describe as 'somewhat surprising'. Our explanation is sought in the intensity of advertising, which is shown to influence the income-leisure decisions of the labour force. We focus on the workweek and the workyear of production workers in U.S. manufacturing industries, which provide long time series for a group which has remained relatively homogenous over time[1].
Previous studies of the workweek or workyear find that the real wage exerts a negative influence. But no satisfactory analysis has been put forward to explain why hours of work have virtually stopped falling in the post-war period. We suggest that the answer lies in the growth in advertising, which has exercised a cumulative impact on the desire to acquire goods and in consequence has created a reluctance to substitute leisure for income as the real wage rises.
The long-run decline in the workweek in U.S. manufacturing appears to have been arrested in the 1940's, even though the real wage rose continuously over the next 30 years. This paper argues that advertising, by creating a stronger desire for goods, tilts the long-run supply-side decision about work and leisure towards longer hours. It is frequently suggested that the workweek is a poor measure of the leisure choice because leisure is increasingly taken in the form of longer vacations. But whether or not vacation time is allowed for, we find that the negative effect of a rising real wage upon hours of work has been offset by the strong positive impact of aggregate advertising. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I seek to facilitate the further extension of economic analysis to political participation by estimating the income elasticity for another form of participation, namely, contributing to the general fund used to publicly subsidize the campaign costs of Presidential candidates in the United States.
In this paper I have attempted to extend further the application of economic analysis to political participation by the empirical estimation of an income elasticity. Previous research has not provided such an estimate because it has concentrated on the act of voting which does not allow the necessary empirical conditions to be met.
The particular elasticity obtained, with regard to income and contributing the dollar amount to the funding of Presidential campaigns, can perhaps be usefully employed in controlling for the income effect in the context of other participation settings (e. g., voting) and, hence, allow a more precise investigation of the relative prices facing different income groups. Such an investigation would place the act of political participation squarely into the analytical framework of standard consumer-demand theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses how certain electoral settings affect the activity of special interest groups within US state politics. The main result of cross-sectional regression analyses suggests that informed and educated voters prevent political parties from catering to special interests, diminishing the number of lobby registrations, the total amount of campaign contributions as well as groups' overall influence. Electoral competition is believed to exert a curvilinear effect on groups' importance within the political decision making process of each state. Another finding indicates that, in a situation of high electoral competition, voters' level of information plays a pivotal role in determining interest groups' activities. Parties seem to increasingly value median voter's concerns whenever the electorate is informed and political races are expected to be close. An environment of competitive elections and uninformed voters, in contrast, furthers interest groups' activity and strengthens their position within the political arena. This is explained by the rationale that, under such circumstances, politicians increasingly exchange narrowly targeted policies for campaign contributions in order to buy the votes of impressionable citizens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops an economic analysis of infidelity concentrating on the question of how cheating behavior differs between men and women. We develop an expected utility model that borrows from evolutionary biology to form expectations regarding behavior towards infidelity. We use U.S. data from the General Social Survey (GSS) and a Probit model to assess some characteristics of the respondent and his or her spouse that determine the probability of having an extramarital affair. While biology may form basic preferences, some of our results are consistent with the view that people are able to act on more than their base biological instincts alone. Hence, economic theory has a role to play in the understanding of behavior relating to infidelity. More specifically, this study identifies age, social class, individual's own education and the spouse's educational attainment as underlying factors affecting infidelity behavior depending on gender. In general, we find that men and women respond differently to the costs and benefits of having an affair. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses regression analysis to investigate the relationship between military expenditure and stock market performance for the United States and the United Kingdom. Specifically, the study applies the Bierens-Guo unit root procedures to ascertain the time series properties of the variables in the study. The standard OLS technique is employed to determine the influence of military expenditure on stock markets for the period 1914 through 2001. The results from the unit root tests indicate that the military expenditure, military personnel, stock market, and energy consumption series are level stationary. The results from the OLS equations suggest that military expenditure has significantly positive effect on stock market performance for the United States and the United Kingdom. The implication of this finding is that high-income class and people in power are less likely to oppose increases in military spending even though such expenditures are not in the best interest of the society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses a game theoretic model to explain empirical research which has revealed higher relational satisfaction among married couples than cohabiting couples, as well as among married couples who did not cohabit before marriage. Despite these findings, in recent decades cohabitation rates have dramatically increased in both Europe and the United States. Instrumental variables estimations on data from 28 industrialized countries and 50 U.S. states show cohabitation strongly correlated with increases in women's labor force participation, where a 10 percent increase in women's labor force participation results in a 6.4 to 14.6 percent increase in cohabitation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence during the nineties about the response of real wages to shocks highlights that this response is substantially lower in European countries than in the United States and that there are important differences among European countries. Which are the reasons that explain these different reactions? In this paper, we apply meta-analytical techniques in order to provide a quantitative summary of the available evidence regarding the influence of labour market institutions on real wage flexibility. We find that the design of the study affects the obtained results, and that in more deregulated labour markets with a lower presence of trade unions, this response is particularly larger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investment incentives targeted at attracting multinational firms have been extensively researched, and empirical evidence has shown them to be influential. The same is not true of exit restrictions. Yet, as recent theory suggests, there may be a trade-off between entry incentives and ease of exit. This paper focuses on that trade-off in the case of US multinationals in 33 host countries. An indicator of labour market regulations is used as a measure of ease of exit. Results suggest that both entry incentives and labour market regulations are important and ignoring the latter neglects an important dimension in firms' location decision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper puts the role of product quality in the market game of supply and demand into the center of the analysis. To that purpose it provides a systematic investigation of market diagrams with quality instead of price on the ordinate. This new focus allows interesting conclusions by simple application of well-known diagrammatic methods. For instance, as far as single markets are concerned, it is shown that providing consumers with information about product quality may increase or decrease quality in the market, depending on the type of information provided. Another conclusion of practical relevance, concerning the macroeconomic activity level, is that an effective demand problem may be caused ff present product quality is too low compared with the product quality expected for the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the influence of different institutional arrangements of representative government. More specifically, the effects of (1) obligatory fiscal referendum, (2) voter initiative, and (3) veto power of an elected official of the executive branch (for instance, the mayor) on the level of expenditure are analyzed. Moreover, the influence of agenda setting power of bureaucracy on outcomes is compared with a case in which the legislature is able to introduce amendments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a rigorous framework for the incorporation of characteristics in estimating U.S. import demand functions by region of origin Assuming a CES aggregator function, we derive an import share equation that is identical for all regions of origin. Differences in shares are explained by differences in prices and in the characteristics of the exporting regions The model is estimated with data for seven of the major exporters to the United States, Canada, Japan, West Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and, in some cases, Mexico The results indicate that the U.S. import share of a foreign region is positively related to that region's economic size, labor intensity, labor efficiency and proximity to the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wage supplements in the form of private fringe benefits and statutory contributions to social welfare account for around 25 per cent of the typical firm's total labour costs throughout OECD countries. Yet the relative emphasis on private and statutory payments differs from country to country. For example, the ratio of statutory contributions to private fringes (excluding holiday payments) was 5 0 in the FRG compared to 0.9 in the USA in 1981. This paper critically assesses the economic arguments for and against both forms of non-wage payment. On the private side, the discussion concentrates on human capital anti union median voter explanations for private fringe payments. Attention is also given to the implications of favourable corporate and individual tax concessions with respect both to the demand for private fringes and to the evaluation of their human capital effects. On the statutory side, social security contributions are discussed in relation to general social welfare, government employment policy and employer-union relations. As part of the general assessment, it is argued that governments should provide a Fiscal framework in this area which is designed to stimulate more effective individual and firm-level choice between equivalent forms of private and statutory supplementary compensation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers further evidence on the political business cycle hypothesis by testing for a relationship between aggregate economic activity and the legislative output of the US Congress from its first assembly in 1789 through the biennial session ending in 1980. The advantage of this approach is that it captures the fiscal initiatives necessary to spur expansionary or contractionary pressures as well as government's off-budget intrusions into the private economy. The empirical results from three alternative tests offer little evidence that the legislature attempts to engineer macroeconomic events so as to enhance the reelection prospects of incumbent politicians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper studies the impact on international capital movements of the accelerated tax depreciation scheme introduced in the U.S.A. under the REAGAN administration. It is argued on theoretical grounds that, contrary to most other potential tax reforms, this depreciation scheme calls for a substantial restructuring in the world-wide capital stock in favor of the U.S. Moreover, it is demonstrated that the scheme may reduce severe sectoral changes within national economies. Countries that do not take countervailing actions against the U.S policy are likely to experience a rise in their labour intensive industries at the expense of losing their capital intensive industries. A tentative estimate based on stylized economic facts indicates the necessity of a capital import into the U.S. of at least 7% of the OECD capital stock, which means that even with a doubling of the 1983 U.S. current account deficit of $40 billion more than a decade would have to pass in order for the required structural changes to be accomplished. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is worth noting that 82% of the cross industry variation in PFRD has been explained without using any explanatory variable measuring the cost advantages of an American versus a 'rest of the world' R & D location. While such a variable certainly belongs in the regressions run, it is and will remain prohibitively difficult to obtain unless the OECD or some other international body publishes suitable comparative data[38]. Significant multicollinearity between this omitted independent variable and the eight others used in the regressions is, with the possible exception of LWRDI, a very remote possibility.
This study develops and empirically tests a 'scenario' describing the evolution of a typical American multinational manufacturing corporation's (AMMC's) foreign research and development (R&D) activity. It finds that international differences in R & D factor costs probably have very little effect on R & D location decisions. The critical variables appear instead to be less traditional things like the time elapsed since the AMMC first engaged in foreign production. That such variables were discovered and emphasized in the study is a result of the 'satisficing' approach adopted in its 'scenario'. In vindicating that approach, the paper's findings also show the need for economic theorizing to take explicit account of the fact that information costs something to obtain and to use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper attempts a more direct test of the growth and profit maximizing theories of the firm, than previously presented. The approach is to estimate directly the marginal rates of return on investment for individual firms and individual years, over time, for a sample of large U.S. industrial corporations. The marginal rate of return estimates are then statistically compared to several cost of capital series, on a year-by-year basis. Substantial, prolonged, and statistically significant overinvestment is discovered, casting doubt on the profit maximizing conditions but supporting the growth theory of the firm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper analyzes J. K. GALBRAITH's new vision of the economic system of the U.S.A., seen as an example of popular institutionalist thinking. Such a critique seems important because of GALBRAITH's claim to a closed and complete doctrine and because of the growing influence of his vulgarized economics. An examination of his methods discovers deficiencies of the systemic approach, obscurities in concept formation, arbitrary formulations of behavioral theories, purely persuasive modes of argumentation and techniques of immunization against contrary evidence. An analysis of his system of political economy shows that it lacks a genuine theory of the state and a truly consistent explanation of inequalities of power. So his programme of reforms and of measures of economic policy rests upon rather weak methodological and theoretical foundations. SUBSTITUTION ALONG THE TIME AXIS CARL CHRISTIAN VON WEIZSCKER. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]