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This study was conducted to assess the ethical consumer practices of selected public and private senior high school of district 1 Tondo, Manila in terms of ecological consciousness and social consciousness. After assessing this, a proposed strategic learning plan for applied economics subject was formulated. This study used purposive sampling in the selection of schools participants, while convenience sampling for students as respondents in gathering data and information needed for the study and collecting data among the selected senior high schools in district 1 Tondo, Manila. In the construction of the questionnaire, the researcher adopts and translate a validated research instrument with the permission of the original owner. The researcher sought the assistance among experts and master teachers coming from different schools to check tagalog translation and validation of the research instrument. Letter of request sent to the division’s office and principal of the school for the administration of the survey. The researcher personally administered the questionnaire to avoid problems that may occur. This study found out that students seldom practiced ethical consumer practices in public senior high school while students from private senior high school sometimes practice ethical consumer practices in terms of ecological consciousness and social consciousness. It is evidently implied with their answers in the survey. Through T-test of independent means, it was revealed that there is a significant difference on the assessment between the public and private senior high school students in ethical consumer practices because the assessment showed the extensiveness of the difference in terms of ecological consciousness and social consciousness of both public and private schools students. Furthermore, they need to strengthen their practices. A proposed strategic learning plan for applied economics subject specifically in consumption topic was formulated based from the findings of the study. Este estudio se llevó a cabo para evaluar las prácticas éticas de consumo de una escuela secundaria superior pública y privada seleccionada del distrito 1 de Tondo, Manila, en términos de conciencia ecológica y conciencia social. Luego de evaluar esto, se formuló una propuesta de plan estratégico de aprendizaje para la asignatura de economía aplicada. Este estudio utilizó un muestreo intencional en la selección de las escuelas participantes, mientras que el muestreo de conveniencia para los estudiantes como encuestados en la recopilación de datos e información necesaria para el estudio y la recopilación de datos entre las escuelas secundarias seleccionadas en el distrito 1 de Tondo, Manila. En la construcción del cuestionario, el investigador adopta y traduce un instrumento de investigación validado con el permiso del propietario original. El investigador buscó la asistencia de expertos y maestros de diferentes escuelas para verificar la traducción al tagalo y la validación del instrumento de investigación. Carta de solicitud enviada a la oficina de la división y al director de la escuela para la administración de la encuesta. El investigador administró personalmente el cuestionario para evitar problemas que pudieran ocurrir. Este estudio descubrió que los estudiantes rara vez practicaron prácticas de consumo ético en la escuela secundaria superior pública, mientras que los estudiantes de la escuela secundaria superior privada a veces practican prácticas de consumo ético en términos de conciencia ecológica y conciencia social. Evidentemente, está implícito en sus respuestas en la encuesta. A través de la prueba T de medios independientes, se reveló que existe una diferencia significativa en la evaluación entre los estudiantes de secundaria pública y privada en las prácticas de consumo ético porque la evaluación mostró la amplitud de la diferencia en términos de conciencia ecológica y conciencia social. de estudiantes de escuelas públicas y privadas. Además, necesitan fortalecer sus prácticas. Se formuló una propuesta de plan de aprendizaje estratégico para la asignatura de economía aplicada específicamente en el tema del consumo, a partir de los hallazgos del estudio. Este estudo foi conduzido para avaliar as práticas éticas de consumo de escolas secundárias públicas e privadas selecionadas do distrito 1 de Tondo, Manila em termos de consciência ecológica e consciência social. Depois de avaliar isso, uma proposta de plano de aprendizagem estratégica para a disciplina de economia aplicada foi formulada. Este estudo usou amostragem intencional na seleção de participantes das escolas, enquanto amostragem de conveniência para alunos como respondentes na coleta de dados e informações necessárias para o estudo e coleta de dados entre as escolas secundárias selecionadas no distrito 1 Tondo, Manila. Na construção do questionário, o pesquisador adota e traduz um instrumento de pesquisa validado com a autorização do proprietário original. A pesquisadora buscou o auxílio de especialistas e professores mestres oriundos de diferentes escolas para verificação da tradução tagalog e validação do instrumento de pesquisa. Carta de solicitação enviada ao escritório da divisão e ao diretor da escola para a administração da pesquisa. O pesquisador aplicou pessoalmente o questionário para evitar problemas que possam ocorrer. Este estudo descobriu que os alunos raramente praticavam práticas éticas de consumo no ensino médio público, enquanto os alunos do ensino médio particular às vezes praticavam práticas éticas de consumo em termos de consciência ecológica e consciência social. Está evidentemente implícito em suas respostas na pesquisa. Por meio do teste T de médias independentes, foi possível perceber que existe uma diferença significativa na avaliação entre os alunos do ensino médio público e privado nas práticas de consumo ético, pois a avaliação mostrou a extensão da diferença em termos de consciência ecológica e consciência social. alunos de escolas públicas e privadas. Além disso, eles precisam fortalecer suas práticas. Uma proposta de plano de aprendizagem estratégica para a disciplina de economia aplicada especificamente no tópico de consumo foi formulada com base nos resultados do estudo.

There is strong interest in both developing and developed countries toward expanding health insurance coverage. How should the benefits, and costs, of expanded coverage be measured? While the value of reducing the financial risks that result from insurance coverage have long been recognized, there has been less attention in how best to measure such benefits. In this paper, we first provide a framework for assessing the financial value from health insurance. We focus on three distinct potential benefits: Pooling the risk of unexpected medical expenditures between healthy and sick households, redistributing resources from high- to low-income recipients and smoothing consumption over time. We then use this theoretical framework and an illustrative example to provide practical guidelines for benefit-cost analysis in capturing the full benefits (and costs) of expanding health insurance coverage. We conclude by considering other potential financial effects of broad insurance coverage, such as the ability to consolidate purchases and thus lower input prices.

Renewable energy (RE) resources are those energy types that are replaced by natural processes over time. However, the noted definition is not complete. After the Industrial Revolution, the rate of energy resources utilization jumped, and as an example annual per capita energy consumption has been increased about 170% during 1750s to 1850s in England (Wrigley 2010). As a result, the definition of an RE resource has evolved to incorporate the replacing period, such that the consumption rate of an RE should be slower than the rate of which nature can replace them, unless the gap can be filled by human activities.

We consider the role of culture in determining the size of government. To that purpose, we develop three theoretical hypotheses on the relationship between “thrift” (our proxy of culture) and government consumption. We then test these hypotheses using panel data for 62 countries. Our main finding is that government consumption is higher in thriftier countries. The positive effect of thrift on government consumption weakens in more corrupt or more democratic societies.

While it is well known that new technologies enhance consumer welfare, the manner in which these technologies impact the ability to realize economies of scale in consumption is not well understood. We use Sri Lankan household data to examine how the adoption of new technologies by households positively impacts their ability to achieve household economies of scale. This suggests that new technologies not only deliver a greater variety of consumption goods to consumers, but they may also play an important role in enabling large households to escape poverty by lowering the per-capita costs of maintaining a given standard of living. Given the importance of consumption economies of scale in the measurement of poverty, this study provides some insights on the extent to which the number of poor households changes when food consumption scale economies due to technology adoption in the domestic sphere are incorporated.

We study the effects of monetary policy shocks on—and their historical contribution to—consumption and income inequality in the United States since 1980 as measured by the Consumer Expenditure Survey. Contractionary monetary policy systematically increases inequality in labor earnings, total income, consumption and total expenditures. Furthermore, monetary policy shocks account for a non-trivial component of the historical cyclical variation in income and consumption inequality. Using detailed micro-level data on income and consumption, we document some of the different channels via which monetary policy shocks affect inequality, as well as how these channels depend on the nature of the change in monetary policy.

In the “Economic Possibilities of our Grandchildren” (Keynes 1933), John Maynard Keynes recognized that the extent to which economic growth delivers better living conditions in the long run is mediated by how the character of demand evolves as households become more affluent. If consumer needs are indeed insatiable, there is little reason to doubt that any extra income generated by economic growth will continuously be converted into increases in demand ad infinitum (Stiglitz 2008). This is the position adopted by much of the growth literature that typically does not consider the possibility of non-homothetic preferences. In contrast, Keynes started to outline a more nuanced approach in this essay. In line with other scholars preceding him (e.g. Menger 1871) – Keynes considered the nature of the underlying needs that motivate consumption and how rising affluence may impact their satisfaction.

It is generally understood that greenhouse gasses produced by human activities are having a warming effect on the climate. Discussions concerning efforts to curb carbon dioxide emissions often focus on large countries. However, considerable resources have been spent to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by relatively small, open economies. Although, these economies are small players in international markets, international trade has an important influence on their economies. Investigating the outcome of efforts to curb emissions by these small, open economies provides insights into the situation faced by a large set of the world's economies. This paper has three objectives: (1) investigate the outcome of Denmark's efforts to reduce its carbon emissions by characterizing the relationship between Denmark's macroeconomic activity and carbon emissions; (2) determine the carbon content of Danish trade and document the important effects that growing trade with China has had on Danish consumption emissions; and (3), investigate the robustness of measures of consumption emissions under varying information requirements. Our analysis of the outcomes of Danish efforts to reduce carbon emissions suggest two, related lessons. First, small, open economies, should track both production and consumption emissions when evaluating their progress towards reducing carbon emissions. Second, international trade should be considered in the design of environmental policy. The Danish experience indicates that increasing trade with a much larger and more emission intensive country can have substantial influence on consumption emissions.

The system-wide approach to demand analysis emphasises the interrelatedness of all n elements of the consumption basket and leads to a set of demand equations characterised by n income elasticities and an n × n matrix of own- and cross-price elasticities. This approach is now used on a routine basis in CGE modelling, the measurement of the deadweight loss of distortions in consumption and a number of other areas in applied economics. Half a century ago, Barten (1964) and Theil (1965) formulated the Rotterdam model, now an important member of the system-wide family. A path-breaking innovation, this model allowed for the first time rigorous testing of the theory of the utility-maximising consumer. This has led to a vibrant, on-going strand of research on the theoretical underpinnings of the model, extensions and numerous applications. But perhaps due to its European heritage and unorthodox derivation, there is still misunderstanding and a tendency for the Rotterdam model to be regarded with reservations and/or uncertainties (if not mistrust). This paper marks the golden jubilee of the model by clarifying its foundations, highlighting its strengths and weaknesses, elucidating its links with other models of consumer demand, and dealing with some recent developments that have their roots in Barten and Theil's pioneering research of the 1960s.

The window between a film's theatrical and video releases has been steadily declining with some studios now testing day-and-date strategies (i.e., when a film is released across multiple channels at once). We present a model of consumer choice that examines trade-offs between substitutable products (theatrical and video forms), the possibility of purchasing both alternatives, and a congestion externality affecting consumption at theaters; this permits a normative study of the impact of smaller release windows (0-3 months) for which there is a scarcity of relevant data. We characterize the market conditions under which a studio should pursue direct-to-video, day-and-date, and delayed video release strategies. During seasons of peak congestion, we establish that day-and-date strategies are optimal for films with high content durability (i.e., films whose content tends to lead consumers to purchase both alternatives) whereas prices are set to perfectly segment the consumer market for films with low content durability. We find that lower congestion effects provide studios with incentives to delay release and price the video to induce multiple purchasing behavior. However, an increase in congestion effects can actually lead to higher studio profitability. We also illustrate that, at the lower range of quality, an increase in movie quality should be accompanied by a later video release time. Surprisingly, however, we observe the opposite result at the upper range of movie quality: an increase in quality can justify an earlier release of the video. Finally, we explore the effect of piracy on studio strategy, finding a day-and-date strategy works better for plain vanilla video offerings such as video-on-demand and reduced-feature DVDs while a delayed release strategy can increase profits for feature-rich Blu-ray offerings.

The idea that work has meaning and is meaningful beyond its contribution to consumption has been largely absent from mainstream economics. This paper gives reasons for why mainstream economics has neglected the idea of meaningful work. It identifies the idea of the disutility of work, the assumption of free choice on the part of workers and the use of a formal and individualistic method as key constraints on the ability of mainstream economics to incorporate the idea of meaningful work. It also addresses the contribution of happiness economics and shows how it is unable to encompass the idea of meaningful work. Ideas on work from heterodox economics are then discussed. These ideas provide essential insight and inspiration for the incorporation of the idea of meaningful work into the economics of work. In all respects, the paper seeks to contribute towards the development and promotion of a heterodox economics of work that has the goal of meaningful work at its centre.

© 2014 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System. We investigate the effect of introducing a fiscally neutral increasing block rate water budget price structure on residential water demand. We estimate that demand was reduced by around 17%, although the reduction was achieved gradually over more than three years. As intermediate steps we derive estimates of price and income elasticities that rely only on longitudinal variability. We investigate how different subpopulations responded to the pricing change and find evidence that marginal, rather than average, prices may be driving consumption. We also derive alternative rate structures that might have been implemented, and assess their estimated demand effects.

Pervasive energy subsidies for groundwater pumping pose a challenge to policy makers around the world, who have to cope with lower water tables due to increased reliance on groundwater resources for irrigation. The present paper outlines a laboratory experiment aimed to study the groundwater extraction decisions of stakeholders under alternative subsidy structures. We propose a model and a methodology for testing the implications of the model and the modifications of energy subsidies for irrigation. We analyze the performance of two traditional policy interventions—elimination and reduction of subsidy—and then analyze a novel policy: decoupling the subsidy from the electricity rate by replacing it with a lump sum transfer. Our results suggest that the rate of water extraction and the level of water in the aquifer may significantly be improved by altering the subsidy structure. An important finding for policy makers is that the decoupling leads to outcomes similar to those of eliminating the subsidy, however, with fewer political economy conflicts.

© 2016, Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht. In the U.S. there has been considerable interest in connecting low-income households to alternative food networks like Community Supported Agriculture (CSA). To learn more about this possibility we conducted a statewide survey of CSA members in California. A total of 1149 members from 41 CSAs responded. Here we answer the research question: How do CSA members’ (1) socioeconomic and demographic backgrounds, (2) household conditions potentially interfering with membership, and (3) CSA membership experiences vary between lower-income households (LIHHs) and higher-income households (HIHHs)? We divided members into LIHHs (making under $50,000 annually) and HIHHs (making over $50,000 annually). We present comparisons of LIHHs’ and HIHHs’ (1) employment, race/ethnicity, household composition and education, use of food support, and enjoyment of food-related activities; (2) conditions interfering with membership and major life events; and (3) sources of information influencing decision to join, reasons for joining, ratings of importance of and satisfaction with various CSA attributes, gaps between importance of and satisfaction with various CSA attributes, valuing of the share and willingness to pay more, and impacts of membership. We find that LIHHs are committed CSA members, often more so than HIHHs, and that CSA members in California are disproportionately white, but that racial disproportionality decreases as incomes increase. We conclude by considering: (1) the economic risks that LIHHs face in CSA membership, (2) the intersection of economic risks with race/ethnicity and cultural coding in CSA; and (3) the possibilities of increasing participation of LIHH in CSA.

International audience; A large literature in psychology studies the effects of the immediate decision environment on behavior, and conceptualizes both cognitive capacity and self-control as scarce resources that can be depleted by recent use, and replenished by factors like rest and nutrition. We assess the relevance ofresource-depletion models for intertemporal financial decisions by estimating the effects of three interventions –prior impulse-controlling activity, consumption of a sugared drink, and consumption of a placebo (sugar-free) drink-- on intertemporal monetary choices in a cash-advance framework. These manipulations have large impacts on the demand for advances, but contrary to resource-based models prior impulse-controlling activity and placebo drink consumption increase patience. To understand these effects, we estimate treatment effects on the three parameters of a decision utility model for every subject in our sample. All treatments reduce utility curvature and present-bias, and these movements are highly correlated. Together, we argue that these patterns suggest that the treatments are acting not on subjects’ fundamental utility parameters but on subjects’ tendencies to frame financial decisions narrowly (within the frame of the lab experiment) versus broadly (in the context of their other financial options). Thus, while decision environments have large effects on intertemporal financial decisions, both the direction and the mechanisms underlying these effects appear to be quite different from those suggested by resource-depletion models.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to critically evaluate consumer society through various perspectives. In addition, it applies Buddhist economics as an exemplary model which helps managing consumer society. Design/methodology/approach – The study started by comparing and contrasting the management of consumption between Mainstream and Buddhist economic. In addition, various perspectives such as Marxian economics, Frankfurt School, sociology as well as social critics are added to comprehend consumer society. Finally, it proposed the practices of Buddhist economics as an exemplary model for managing consumer society. Findings – The study found that while Mainstream economics focusses on increasing the amount of goods and services, Buddhist economics focusses on converting the insatiable to satiable desires. There are two viewpoints of the interconnected spheres of consumption and production through the evolution of consumerism; a producer-led approach and a consumer-led approach. This polarization presents the debate in a very well-established tension between structure and agency. Originality/value – This paper proposed an exemplary model for managing consumer society by applying the dialectical relationship of both structure and agency.

This paper examines the extent to which foreign borrowing funds private investment, consumption and government expenditure in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand (the Anglosphere), advanced economies which have been the world's largest international borrowers since 1990. Using a bivariate predictive regression model, we estimate the relative importance of these expenditure aggregates as predictors of their external deficits, and hence foreign borrowing. Overall, based on quarterly macroeconomic data for the period 1990–2011, the evidence suggests that foreign borrowing has not financed higher household consumption in these economies over recent decades, with the possible exception of the United States. While results concerning government spending are mixed due to policy reaction, business cycle and public-private saving offset effects, strong results for private investment augur well for the sustainability of this grouping's foreign borrowing.

Jim Berkovec’s interest in applied economics spanned a broad subject range. His work reflected a keen ability to address timely and significant issues of public policy via the application of cutting-edge econometric methods and data. Some of his earliest research on energy and transportation economics was motivated in part by the late-1970s spike in energy costs and the challenge of delivering cost-effective travel. His early research interests covered fuelefficient vehicles and residential energy demand (such as for heating and appliances) and culminated in his dissertation on the automobile market. His early peer-reviewed publications emanated from that work and subsequently James Berkovec evolved into an interest in the effects of macroeconomic fluctuations on housing consumption and investment. While in the Division of Research and Statistics of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, his research moved toward labor market issues and the economics of failed banks, an important issue in the aftermath of the widespread failures of banks and savings-institutions during the late 1980s and early 1990s. By the early 1990s, he also began to work on issues surrounding racial discrimination in mortgage lending and published a series of influential papers on that topic. Further, it was through that work that Jim became a recognized expert in empirical methods of mortgage performance, notably including models of mortgage default and prepayment. Jim further deepened his expertise in

Author(s): Asensio, Omar I; Delmas, Magali A | Abstract: Little is known about the effect of message framing on conservation behavior over time. In a randomized controlled trial with residential households, we use advanced metering and information technologies to test how different messages about household energy use impact thedynamics of conservation behavior down to the appliance level. Our results, based on 374 million panel observations of kilowatt-hour (kWh) electricity consumption for 118 householdsover 9 months, show that differences in behavioral responses due to message framing become more significant over time. We find that a health-based frame, in which households consider thehuman health effects of their marginal electricity use, induced persistent energy savings behavior of 8-10% over 100 days; whereas a more traditional cost savings frame, drove sharp attenuationof treatment effects after 2 weeks with no significant savings versus control after 7 weeks. We discuss implications for the design of effective information campaigns to engage households inconservation behavior.

© 2015 Elsevier B.V.. Children are prone to the contagion of waterborne diseases without adequate water and sanitation services. When not sick, children and their caregivers without proper access to such services have to allocate their leisure time in order to meet their water and sanitation needs. It is through these health and leisure time use changes that access to water and sanitation services impacts the educational attainment of children. This paper proposes a household utility maximization model in which access and sanitation services determine the child's health, which in turn affects the child's education and the household welfare. Comparative statics indicate that households consider the health gains to the market value of their leisure time, and the changes in the consumption of other goods. The model is applied to data from Brazil. In order to sort out the endogeneity between provision of water and sanitation services, and educational attainment, the paper uses an instrumental approach, based on the technical features of the water systems and an instrument that measures a proxy of water availability within the municipality territory. Estimates suggest that access to water and sanitation services has a positive and significant effect on schooling, when measured by the completed number of school years. These positive effects call for the expansion of the laggard sewerage systems in the country, both at home and at school.

Important in this paperwork is to underline the significance and the role of one of the economic niche domain, that is food and leisure. We think that this name, evoqued in the title, is more appropriate, than catering, to design the economic process of providing, transformation (even production) and consumption of food, especially within firms, corporations, in the benefit of theirs employees. Therefore, we've analyzed some theoretical and practical aspects of this kind of Economics. Because, it's indeed an aspect of Economics, regarding the factors of production (on a larger scale, the resources), the production and preparation of different meals and, finally, meet the demand required by the people who intend to mix the food pleasure with work activities.The practical example is from Romania's services, which domain is not enough developed and there are many things, especially of qualitative order, in order to improve catering or food services within the entire Romanian economic system. General Approaches: The economic science has incorporated elementsof philosophyfrom the seventeenthandeighteenthcentury(especially from theBritishJohnLocke, David Hume, John Hobbes), which became starting pointsinshaping the neweconomic science.The clear specification of the economics' matter of study comes precisely from this period: theuseofscarce resourcesin order to meetcertainset goals and certain expressed needs.These desiderates, which economics as a science was supposed to fulfill, are best expressed by the subtitle ofJ-B. Say's fondamentalWorks,in fact the firsttreatyof classical Political Economy, entitled, Traited'economie politique, ou simple expose de la maniere dontse forment, se distribuent et se consomment les richesses".We have insisted upon theauthor mentionedabove and the titleof hisreference workbecause, in theAnglo-Saxonperimeter, during the twentiethcentury,but especiallyduring the postwar period, the economic sciencehas evolvedandis evolvingunder the name ofeconomics, translatableasthe theory of studying themeansof meeting certain goals, those regarding the solving of problemssuch as: what toproduce?, Howtoproduce?For whomtoproduce?Being fundamental. The termcompelled recognition and acquired globalopenness andacceptancebythe capitalworkof American ProfessorPaulAnthonySamuelson, entitled"Economics", which was publishedin 1948 andenjoyed manyreprintsandtranslations inover40 languagesaround the world1.

Assuming the division of behavioral economics into old and new, the paper begins to argue that old behavioral economics began with the works of two giants – George Katuna and Herbert Simon during the 1950s and early 1960s. The contributors of Herbert Simon are well established, thanks to the popularity of bounded rationality and satisficing, and his being award Noble Prize in economics. However, economists are much less familiar with the contributions of George Katona that can be viewed as the father of behavioral economics. Furthermore, the author argues that Katona was also misunderstood by various economists when he was attempting to create a psychologically based economics that rejected the mechanistic psychology of neoclassical economics and introducing the survey method to economic research that he had been using in his experimental psychology research previously. He also had influenced various economists during their debates in the 1950s without given the credit for. Many historians of behavioral economics limit Katona's contributions to the start of behavioral economics only to his contributions to macroeconomics. However, the paper demonstrates that Katona's behavioral economics included his contributions to macroeconomics (bringing realism to Keynesian consumption function and consumption behavior), micro-economics (business behavior, the rationality assumption, etc.), public finance and economic policy, and his introduction of the survey method. To demonstrate these contributions, the author argues that Katona attempted to bring realism to economic analysis – through psychological concepts – beginning with his early days of research in Germany which coincided with German hyper inflation- and continued whether working at New school for Social Research, Chicago University's Cowles Commission, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, or the University of Michigan's Survey Research Center. The author also argues that Katona's contributions went through stages, depending upon what economic problem persisted at the time, what advertises he was facing, and what institution/organization he was associated with.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to present a perspective on need that derives from a personalism which is grounded in Catholic social thought and runs counter to the individualism of mainstream economics, focusing on need in the context of three economic activities: consumption, work, and leisure.Design/methodology/approachThree strands of Christian personalism emerged in twentieth‐century Europe: in Paris, Munich, and Lublin. The author's comments derive from the Lublin strand.FindingsMainstream economics regards consumption as satisfying human material wants. Need is disregarded except when poverty is addressed. Personalist economics insists that there are needs of the human spirit which are addressed through consumption. Personalist economics views work as having two effects. First, by producing goods and services it provides income to purchase those goods and services. Second, it provides opportunities to associate with others in the workplace, and to apply creative talents and energies. Mainstream economics regards the first but not the second as within the domain of the discipline. Mainstream economics defines leisure negatively as time spent not working. Personalist economics sees it positively as an activity crucial to personal development.Originality/valueThe reader is asked to consider two questions. Will economic theory continue to be constructed on an economic agent who is represented by the passive and predictable homo economicus of mainstream economics that is based on the individualism of the seventeenth‐to‐eighteenth century enlightenment? Or, will it turn to the active and unpredictable acting person of personalist economics based on a personalism that emerged in the twentieth century?

This article assesses the effect of population ageing on housing consumption and house prices. Using two approaches, this article finds that the ageing of the population may cause average real house prices to be between 3 and 27 per cent lower than they otherwise would be over the period 2008–2050. The first approach is an econometric estimation of house prices for Australia over the period 1980–2008. The second approach is a simulation of a life cycle-optimising model with representative overlapping generations.

This paper uses monthly data from eleven local governments to model residential water demand in Queensland, Australia from 1994 to 2004. In the sample, residential consumption is charged using a variety of structures including fixed charges without allowance, fixed charges with allowance and excess rates, two-part tariffs comprising an access charge and a flat consumption rate, and multi-part tariffs with an access charge and two or more limits with increasing consumption rates. Water demand is specified as average monthly household water consumption and the demand characteristics include the marginal and average price of water and daily average maximum temperatures and rainfall. The findings confirm residential water as price inelastic, more responsive to average than marginal prices, and more responsive to changes in temperature than rainfall. The results also suggest that cross-sectional variation in demand is related to local government-specific factors.

The purpose of this study is to re-investigate the relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth in Malaysia from 1972:1 to 2003:4. This study adopted the newly developed ECM-based F -test [Kanioura, A., Turner, P., 2005. Critical values for an F -test for cointegration in the multivariate model. Applied Economics 37(3), 265–270] for cointegration to examine the presence of long run equilibrium relationship through the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model. The empirical evidence suggests that electricity consumption and economic growth are not cointegrated in Malaysia. However, the standard Granger's test and MWALD test suggest that electricity consumption and economic growth in Malaysia Granger causes each other. This finding provides policymakers with a better understanding of electricity consumption and allows them to formulate electricity consumption policy to support the economic development and to enhance the productivity of capital, labour and other factors of production for future economic growth in Malaysia.

SUMMARY Store brands, when moving upscale, inevitably relinquish their value for money appeal and therefore require some quality dimension to compete. This article is proposing that the promise of “generous” use-by dates as a surrogate for quality could be considered as a positioning plank to promote store brands as alternatives to manufactured brands. Logit analysis is employed to explain shoppers' perceptions and responses to use-by dates, of products that they regularly buy, and of alternative products that they have never bought before if the use-by dates of their regular items are perceived to be too short.

We show that an otherwise standard one-sector real business cycle model with variable capital utilization and mild increasing returns-to-scale is able to generate qualitatively as well as quantitatively realistic aggregate fluctuations driven by news shocks to two formulations of future consumption demand or government spending on goods and services. In sharp contrast to many studies in the existing expectations-driven business cycle literature, this result does not rely on non-separable preferences or investment adjustment costs. When the economy is subject to anticipated total factor productivity or investment-specific technology shocks, the relative strength of the intertemporal substitution effect needs to be enhanced for our model to exhibit positive macroeconomic co-movement and business cycle statistics that are consistent with the data.

This paper investigates the ability of subjective expectations about life expectancy to predict wealth holding patterns in later life. Based on panel data from the Asset and Health Dynamics among the Oldest Old, we estimate a structural life-cycle model with bequests. Each individual’s subjective survival rates in the future are estimated with data on his belief of survival probabilities to a target age. This estimation is build upon a Bayesian updating method developed in Gan et al. (2005). We find that life-cycle model using subjective survival rates performs better than using life-table survival rates in predicting wealth holdings. This result suggests that subjective survival expectations play an important role in deciding consumption and savings. In addition, the estimation results show that most bequests are involuntary or accidental.

This paper extends the collective approach to household behaviour by proposing and estimating a model in which the weights attached to individual members are endogenously determined. The estimation is conducted using two different data-sets from three Indian states. We find that relative bargaining power of the adult decision-makers has a statistically significant effect on the budget share of an item and that the effects are typically nonlinear and vary significantly across items. This implies that household welfare is better protected in households where bargaining power is spread evenly between the spouses than where one partner enjoys a dominant position.

© 2014 Elsevier B.V. This paper reviews the literature on the relationship between climate and the energy sector. In particular, we primarily discuss empirical papers published in peer-reviewed economics journals focusing on how climate affects energy expenditures and consumption. Climate will affect energy consumption by changing how consumers respond to short run weather shocks (the intensive margin) as well as how people will adapt in the long run (the extensive margin). Along the intensive margin, further research that uses household and firm-level panel data of energy consumption may help identify how energy consumers around the world respond to weather shocks. Research on technology adoption, e.g. air conditioners, will further our understanding of the extensive margin adjustments and their costs. We also note that most of the literature focuses on the residential sector. Similar studies are urgently needed for the industrial and commercial sectors.

© 2014 Elsevier B.V. We report results from a laboratory experiment exploring the extent to which individuals can solve a deterministic, intertemporal lifecycle consumption optimization problem and the effect of revealing social information on past average consumption amounts; as all individuals have identical induced preferences and lifetime incomes, such social information could be useful in solving for the optimal consumption path. Instead, we find that the provision of social information on past average levels of consumption results in a greater deviation of consumption from both the unconditional and the conditionally optimal paths. We find some improvement in consumption planning relative to the conditional optimum when social concerns (external habits) are explicitly incorporated into subject's period utility functions as in external habit formation preference specifications. Our results on the effects of social information on consumption behavior may help to explain the phenomenon of over-consumption and under-saving that has been observed in many developed countries in recent decades as social information on the behavior of others has become more readily available.

Professor Sir Alan Peacock has worked in cultural economics for over 35 years and he pioneered much of what is now the core subject matter of the field. This paper traces the development of his theoretical work on the economics of the arts, heritage and broadcasting, and shows how it interacted with his role as adviser to and chairman of several prestigious committees in the cultural sector. 'Subsidising the Arts involves the same kind of issues as subsidising particular industries or services in the economy, however distasteful this may seem to those who are conditioned to think in terms of a moral ordering of consumption expenditure ... Apart from any predisposition of the author to oppose paternalism, the assertion of any imposed value judgements is too easy a way of deriving support for public intervention designed to give the public not what it wants but what it ought to have!' (Peacock, 1969, p. 323). For a minor field of economics, cultural economics - the economics of the arts, heritage and cultural industries - has been blest with the attention of some major players: besides Keynes, Robbins and Baumol, whose contributions are sketched below, Ashenfelter, Boulding, Caves, Feldstein, Galbraith, Rosen, Scherer, Scitovsky and Shubik have all actively engaged in it, and Coase may also be included on account of his work on broadcasting. Some topics in cultural economics, such as museum entry charges, the finance of public service broadcasting and the size of the subsidy to opera, seem to be perennially controversial and the growing interest in cultural industries and the role of copyright look set to experience a similar future. As with other areas of applied economics, such as the economics of education, of the environment and of health, the analytical basis of cultural economics is welfare economics. It is no surprise, therefore, to find Peacock with his combined interest in welfare economics and cultural policy in this august company. Indeed, he may rightly be called primus inter pares, for he has arguably contributed to more areas of cultural economics than any of the others. Alan Peacock has had a long career as an economist, university teacher, university administrator, government adviser and arts administrator. He also has been an active composer and musician. He has continuously worked in cultural economics since the mid-1960s, having a seminal influence on its development, particularly, but by no means only, in the UK; he was in at the start of the subject and is still contributing to it. He has written his autobiography as a cultural economist, Paying the Piper (Peacock, 1993), in which he lays out his lifelong commitment to applying economics to understanding the arts, drawing on his * This paper was originally written for the Luce conference on 'Economists' case for government support of the Arts' organised in 2002 by Neil De Marchi and Crauford Goodwin of Duke University. I am grateful to Alan Peacock for his factual corrections to this article; also to William Baumol, Mark Blaug and Muriel Nissel for their helpful comments on an earlier draft and to three referees for theirs.

I What is a Noneconomic Objective? EXAMPLES OF THE NONECONOMIC OBJECTIVES OF GOVERNMENT WERE RIFE in mercantilist times, and can also be found in classical writings, starting with Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. The concept of a noneconomic objective, however, is more familiar to international trade economists than to historians of economic thought. It was defined formally for the first time by Harry Johnson in connection with noneconomic arguments for protection. Toward the end of one of his best-known articles, "The Cost of Protection and the Scientific Tariff." Johnson (1960, p. 341) argued that advocates of tariffs sometimes "want to use the tariff as a means of promoting non-economic objectives of various kinds, identified in one way or another with the effects of the tariff on domestic production and consumption of certain products." He identified five such objectives. The first is "national self-sufficiency and independence," whose promotion entails a reduction in imports, or an increase in the proportion of consumption supplied from domestic production. The second is "diversification, industrialization, or agriculturalization," measured by an increase in production (or income) in the favored industries. Third, "a tariff to promote a 'way of life'" implies the boosting or protection of employment in sectors such as farming. Fourth, "military preparedness" is an application of the objective of self-sufficiency to commodities considered as strategic for defense, and is likewise measured by a reduction in imports. Fifth, a "bargaining tariff ... is aimed at inflicting economic damage upon another country or countries in order to obtain advantageous tariff concessions" (Johnson 1960, pp. 342-345). The concept of noneconomic objectives was refined later by Johnson when he viewed protection "as a means of achieving objectives with respect to the structure and composition of output that are desired for their own sake rather than as a means of increasing real income." Indeed, the test he proposed for identifying such objectives is that their attainment causes real income to be smaller than otherwise: "The distinguishing characteristic of non-economic as distinct from economic arguments for protection is that--at least if they are honestly advocated--they involve the willingness to forego potential real income in order to achieve other objectives of national policy" (Johnson 1964, pp. 6-7). The attainment of a noneconomic objective thus implies a tradeoff against more conventional economic goals such as the maximization of real income or the welfare from the consumption of goods and .services. This criterion of a tradeoff is used in this article to distinguish noneconomic from economic objectives. In commenting on Johnson (1960) in his survey of the pure theory of international trade, Jagdish Bhagwati (1964, p. 72) noted that "[a]n important limitation of the foregoing analysis is that it specifies a non-economic objective and considers tariffs as the only available instrument variables. While, however, this approach does yield the scientific tariff structure, it is possible that the same non-economic objective could have been achieved at a smaller cost if the range of policy instruments had been wider." This had already been pointed out by Max Corden (1957), who showed that art economy facing fixed terms of trade can achieve a given level of production in a certain industry more efficiently by means of a subsidy than with a tariff, due to the gratuitous consumption cost that the latter entails. In "Optimal Trade Intervention in the Presence of Domestic Distortions," which according to Corden (2001, p. 642) "is now his most influential article," Johnson (1965) also acknowledged that a tariff is not the best means to attain a noneconomic objective, unless that objective is self-sufficiency, and in fact made this one of the key propositions of his article. The analogy between an economy's endogenous distortions, such as external economies or unexploited monopoly power in trade, and its noneconomic objectives, which amount to policy-imposed distortions, was noted later by Bhagwati (1971). …

The reduction of the “metabolism” of the human economy has become one of the central themes of recent environmental and economic research and policy focused upon paths for achieving global sustainable development. Since the late 1980s, there has emerged a diverse array of “physical economy” approaches that utilise some form of material flow analysis (MFA) to quantify the pattern of flows of material and energy into, within, and out of the economic system. In principle, the reduction of the human socioeconomic metabolism, and appropriate changes in technology and consumption, are highly consistent with Buddhist economics. Indeed, MFA may be one of the most valuable devices for encouraging and implementing a global “green” technoeconomic paradigm that helps realize the type of benefits proffered under the vision of Buddhist economics. This paper describes the links between methodology or potential application of MFA and the central themes of the Buddhist economic path to the long‐term, harmonious co‐existence of humans within the natural environment.

The Belgian Ministry for Social Affairs asked the departments of Applied Economics (DULBEA) and Operational Research (SMG) of the Universite Libre de Bruxelles to develop methodological tools aimed at helping to understand health care budget consumption. The paper will describe the proposed methodology while focusing on the construction of “health care channels” through causality analysis and on the multicriteria assignment of the insured to them. The Minister decided to prolong that research by putting the accent on the development of a decision support system implementing the worked out methodology. This system is meant for the I.N.A.M.I.-R.I.Z.I.V.'s (National Institute of Insurance against Disease and Handicap) actuaries to provide them with new analysis elements. Along with various packages, these elements are being encompassed in a decision support system the characteristics of which are presented in the last section of the paper.

This paper examines a dynamic model of nonlinear income taxation in which the government cannot commit to its future tax policy, and individuals are quasi-hyperbolic discounters who cannot commit to future consumption plans. The government has both paternalistic and redistributive objectives, and therefore uses its taxation powers to maximize a utilitarian social welfare function that reflects individuals' true (long-run) preferences. Under first-best taxation, quasi-hyperbolic discounting exerts no effect on the level of social welfare attainable. Under second-best taxation, quasi-hyperbolic discounting increases (resp. decreases) the level of social welfare attainable when separating (resp. pooling) taxation is optimal. In stark contrast to previous studies, this result implies that some individuals can actually be better-off in the long run as a result of their short-run impatience.

Environmental damage is often an unseen byproduct of other activities. Disclosing environmental impact privately to consumers can reduce the costs and/or increase the moral benefits of conservation behaviors, while publicly disclosing such information can provide an additional motivation for conservation - cultivating a green reputation. In a unique field experiment in the residence halls at the University of California - Los Angeles, we test the efficacy of detailed private and public information on electricity conservation. Private information was given through real-time appliance level feedback and social norms over usage, and public information was given through a publicly visible conservation rating. Our analysis is based on 7,120 daily observations about energy use from heating and cooling, lights and plug load for 66 rooms collected over an academic year. Our results suggest that while private information alone was ineffective, public information combined with private information motivated a 20 percent reduction in electricity consumption achieved through lower use of heating and cooling. Public information was particularly effective for above median energy users. © 2014 Elsevier Inc.

jective is to understand the nature of this conduct and its underlying rationale. But the pragmatic reasons why economists undertake their investigations are two: (a) to predict future behavior and its social consequences, and (b) to alter (or regulate) that conduct or its effects in accord with given or perceived performance standards. These reasons are also central to the distinction between positive and normative economic analysis (Buse, pp. 23-24); the "positivist" perceiving his role as describing, rationalizing and predicting within a given institutional framework, the "normativist" extending his study to consideration of alternative institutional mechanisms used to achieve stated public or private goals. Economists have a long history of debating which analytical role is professionally appropriate (Bronfenbrenner, p. 7-8). While any serious study of the history of economic thought suggests that normative considerations have been fundamental to most new developments in economic theory and method, an early and lingering insistence by many practitioners on striving for a form of "scientific objectivity" (presumably devoid of value judgments) has tended to place economists into either positive or normative ''camps.'' The discipline of agricultural economics is both an outgrowth of the agricultural sciences and an extension of economic analysis to agricultural problems (Taylor). From its beginnings, and into the present day, agricultural economics has been distinguished as an "applied" discipline-one that initially addressed a range of social problems encountered as farmers, agribusinessmen, consumers and public bodies allocated their scarce resources to achieve various levels of food and fiber production, distribution and consumption. Now it has been broadened to include community and regional development, public decision making, and the application of economic analysis to the study of the use of other basic resources. As the scope of agricultural economics has expanded, it has retained a real world "problem" orientation. To the extent that the problems analyzed have a "what-ought-to-be" component, agricultural economic studies are implicitly or explicitly value-laden and take on a normative character. This conclusion (or assertion) does not simplistically suggest that all agricultural economic analysis is normative in nature, but it does emphasize that various types of normative economic analysis have been a leading hallmark of our discipline. Principally during the past two decades, an extensive literature on the subject of the economics of regulation has come into existence (Grant, 1979). While some authors have identified the 1962 and 1971 articles by Stigler as groundbreaking (Peltzman), there appears to be a consensus that these and subsequent studies are "an attempt to join neoclassical theory with 'institutional economics,' " (Kahn p. VII) and that this type of work represents a rigorous and potentially valuable example of normative economic analysis. The purpose of this article is to explore the potential of regulation analysis-this developDale C Dahl is professor of agricultural and applied economics and adjunct professor of law, University of Minnesota. The author acknowledges useful ideas and suggestions from Winston W. Grant, Glenn L. Nelson, Willard F. Mueller, and James D. Shaffer but holds them blameless for errors found in this article.

Conventional economics typically defines the science in terms of such concepts as production, distribution, consumption, resources, goods, services, wealth, prices and efficiency. These terms focus attention primarily on things, making it easier to argue that since those things are quantifiable economics is a positive, higher‐order science.