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In the first half of this paper we develop a perspective on the role of "boldness" in explaining gender differences in thinking and attitudes. We apply this analysis to evidence from Australia, the USA and the UK in relation to economics at school and university levels. In the second half we present the results of a study of over 1000 15-17-year-olds in UK secondary schools. On the basis of the gender differences revealed in these data and our preceding analysis we offer some implications for learning and teaching.

A stochastic framework for coordination of macroeconomic policies is introduced in this paper. It is suggested that: (i) measures of policy accountability should allow for the climate of uncertainty that surrounds policy decisions, and (ii) most models of aggregate economic activity impose arbitrary specifications of uncertainty that do not appear to be empirically justifiable. Ambiguities in interpreting the Humphrey-Hawkins reports of policy authorities are sketched in section II; a proposal for maximizing the ex ante prospects of policy objectives is illustrated in section III; finally, nonstationary allocations of uncertainty are discussed in sections IV and V. This paper provides a brief survey of ongoing work by members of the Federal Reserve Board staff on the role of uncertainty in policy forecasts. It suggests that policy discussion could be improved by more explicit consideration of the allocation of uncertainty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article comments on a paper published within the issue, "Capital Formation and the Recent Productivity Slowdown," by Peter Clark. The author also discusses results from his own research in "Accounting for United States Economic Growth, 1929-1969," and applies it to Clark's paper. It is suggested that an abrupt rise in energy prices may have affected growth rates during the mid-1970s. The author also looks at a similar analysis made by John Kendrick, who focuses on the U.S. postwar period of 1948-1966.

One of the notable macroeconomic developments of the last two decades has been the apparent decline in the so-called neutral real rate of interest (or r-star). The declining level of r-star has significantly reduced forecasts of the steady-state federal funds rate associated with “normalized” monetary policy. Because a lower steady-state policy rate implies a heightened probability of reaching the effective lower bound on the federal funds rate in the event of an economic downturn, a debate has opened among academics and policymakers about potential changes in Fed’s monetary policy framework that might ameliorate the lower bound problem. This paper introduces a variation of price-level targeting that satisfies a definition of price stability that requires the central bank to keep the price level within a pre-specified percentage of a pre-specified target path for all time horizons into the future. The framework, referred to as bounded price-level targeting, is compared to other proposed frameworks. The paper discusses the conditions under which bounded price-level targeting is consistent with other proposals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Immigration policy is one of the most hotly contested political issues in the United States. In this paper, we evaluate the role of immigration in the U.S. economy. We pose the counterfactual question, “what would happen if net migration to the U.S. were to cease?” Using the REMI PI+ macroeconomic policy analysis model, we set to zero international immigration from 2018 to 2060, and estimate the national- and state-level economic and demographic implications of this change. Our estimates show that, in the absence of immigration, total U.S. employment would peak in 2019, and the U.S. GDP and labor force would decline by 20% through 2060. Per capita income and GDP effects, however, are relatively minor and sensitive to assumptions in labor and capital markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates historical intergenerational elasticities between fathers and children of both sexes in the United States using a novel empirical strategy. The key insight of our approach is that the information about socioeconomic status conveyed by first names can be used to create pseudo-links across generations. We find that both father-son and father-daughter elasticities were flat during the nineteenth century, increased sharply between 1900 and 1920, and declined slightly thereafter. We discuss the role of regional disparities in economic development, trends in inequality and returns to human capital, and the marriage market in explaining these patterns. (JEL D63, J12, J16, J24, J62, N31, N32) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An optimal pace of business dynamics-encompassing the processes of entry, exit, expansion, and contraction-would balance the benefits of productivity and economic growth against the costs to firms and workers associated with reallocation of productive resources. It is difficult to prescribe what the optimal pace should be, but evidence accumulating from multiple datasets and methodologies suggests that the rate of business startups and the pace of employment dynamism in the US economy has fallen over recent decades and that this downward trend accelerated after 2000. A critical factor in accounting for the decline in business dynamics is a lower rate of business startups and the related decreasing role of dynamic young businesses in the economy. For example, the share of US employment accounted for by young firms has declined by almost 30 percent over the last 30 years. These trends suggest that incentives for entrepreneurs to start new firms in the United States have diminished over time. We do not identify all the factors underlying these trends in this paper but offer some clues based on the empirical patterns for specific sectors and geographic regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The statutory patent length is 20 years in most countries. R&D-based growth models, however, often presume an infinite patent length. In this paper, finite-length patents are embedded in a non-scale R&D-based growth model, while allowing any patent's effective life to be terminated prematurely, subject to two idiosyncratic hazards from imitation and creative destruction. This gives rise to an autonomous system of mixed-type functional differential equations (FDEs) that had never been encountered in the growth literature. Its dynamics are driven by current, delayed and advanced states. We present a relaxation algorithm to solve these FDEs by solving a sequence of standard boundary value problems for systems of ordinary differential equations. We use this algorithm to simulate a calibrated U.S. economy's transitional dynamics by making discrete changes from the baseline 20 years patent length. We find that if transitional impacts are taken into account, the switch to the long-run optimal patent length can incur a welfare loss, albeit rather small. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reviews catch-up growth in various parts of the world, especially in the twentieth century, with a particular focus on what this implies for the Global South. In 1950, US per capita national income, adjusted for purchasing power, was nearly five times the world average. Since then, Western Europe and Japan have closed their per capita income gaps with the USA. East Asia, South Asia and some other developing countries have also started to close their gaps with the West in recent decades. Thus, after well over a century of growing international economic disparities or divergence, the world has witnessed an era of uneven catching up with the North in parts of the South since the mid-twentieth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The new economic growth in nonmetropolitan areas of the U.S. has been the result of numerous economic, social, and political forces. One of these forces has been the location and expansion of export-oriented businesses. This is characterized by the relatively faster growth of manufacturing and some nonmanufacturing employment opportunities compared to the metropolitan changes (Haren and Holling 1979; Petrulis 1979). The export base expansion will have the well-known multiplier effect on total employment. While the central logic of the economic base multiplier is generally accepted, questions continue to abound regarding its apparent instability. Richardson (1978) commented on the wide variability of multiplier estimates. Many reports of economic impact warn the reader that actual results may vary from anticipated results because of type of stimulus, location of spending, timing, etc. However, a search of the literature has yielded few reports that have systematically examined community factors which influence the size of the local multiplier or the impacts from the multiplier. The purpose of this paper then is to present the results of a systematic examination of community characteristics which condition the magnitude of local multiplier impacts. The central hypothesis to be tested here is that community economic growth or decline is a function of the type of exogenous employment change and a vector of community characteristics, including location and population. It is the contention of this study that community characteristics affect consumption, production, and investment decisions and account for much of the variation in the estimated size of economic multipliers among communities, The remainder of this paper presents an argument for consideration of forces that influence the expression of the local multiplier, and the results of a regression model using a 10% stratified random sample of nonmetropolitan counties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pathways toward 'overshoot and collapse' futures are not always or exclusively determined by international trends, national governments, wars and large-scale events. While these gain considerable attention their overall impact is arguably no greater than the constant 'drip, drip, drip' of conventional decision-making around more mundane activities that fall under familiar headings like 'business strategy', 'economic growth' and 'development'. While cities have master plans and strategic goals most of them evolve within, and are expressed through, a continuous series of commercially inspired projects founded on narrow short-term economic assumptions. They emerge from a typically up-beat, entrepreneurial (profit-oriented) and finance-based worldview that is little short of delusional. As a result, many large-scale projects are poorly conceived and end up working against shared community interests. The central purpose of this paper is to contribute toward a broad re-appraisal of such projects in the hope that future 'developments' can be turned toward more consciously proactive and socially responsible ends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the underlying structural elements of US growth patterns, pre- and post-crisis. Prior to the recession, the US economy exhibited a defective growth pattern driven by outsized domestic demand. As domestic aggregate demand retreats to more sustainable levels relative to total income, the tradable side of the economy is a catalyst for restoring strong growth. A structural rebalancing is already underway; although it is only a third of the economy, the tradable sector generated more than half of gross gains in value-added since the start of the recovery. However, distributional issues loom on the horizon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • The internal relationship between decoupling theory and EKC hypothesis was studied. • A two-dimensional decoupling theory was established. • China and US were taken as a case to study. Abstract The current decoupling theory cannot distinguish the decoupling state of a region with different economic development level. To overcome this problem, this paper first studies the internal relationship between decoupling theory and EKC hypothesis. Furthermore, we establish a two-dimensional decoupling theory of economic development and CO 2 emissions. Finally, taking China and US as a case, this theory is used to explore the decoupling relationship between economic development and CO 2 emissions over the period 1965–2016. If the EKC curve satisfies the inverted U type characteristic, the critical point between strong decoupling and weak decoupling can be approximately obtained at the extreme point of EKC curve. Based on the Tapio decoupling theory and extreme point of EKC curve, the two-dimensional decoupling model with 16 kinds of decoupling sates is established. For China and the United States, the EKC curve of carbon emissions and per capita GDP satisfies the inverted U type characteristic. The threshold value of per capita GDP for China and the United States are $7999.5 and $50980.52, respectively. At present, China's economy is experiencing a low level of economic development. The development of the United States in 2014–2015 and 2015–2016 presented strong decoupling with high level of economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Most economists agree that the slowdown in aggregate productivity growth in the U.S. since the mid-1960s has played a pivotal role in the poor performance of the U.S. economy. This mystery perhaps, stems more from the limitations of conventional economic analysis than from the impenetrability of slower productivity growth. Prevailing economic analysis typically neglects the human dimensions of production and the institutional contexts within which economic actors operate. In this paper an alternative account of the productivity slowdown that addresses these various lacunae has been developed. This article presents an alternative account of the productivity slowdown in five parts. Some simple "stylized facts" related to work intensity and business innovation are first summarized. It then outline the basic elements of a social model of aggregate productivity growth. A detailed econometric test of that model is next presented, providing a comparison of its explanatory power with that of more conventional approaches. It next evaluates several possible additional or alternative hypotheses about the productivity slowdown, showing that the basic results of the paper are robust even when confronted with competing or supplementary interpretations. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the policy implications that might be drawn from the explanation of the productivity puzzle.

This paper considers the historical record and time series properties of United States' industrial production for the period 1860 to 1991, utilizing unit root tests and measures of persistence. The results identify a segmented trend model which is used to assess the time-series simulation performance of four well-known models of economic growth: Solow (1957); Mankiw, Romer and Weil (MRW, 1992); Barro and Sala i Martin (BSM, 1992); and Rebelo (1991). Both the MRW and BSM models dominate the Solow model in accounting for twentieth century industrial growth, high-lighting the importance of human capital, and the paper suggests a new measure related to higher education. However, the Rebelo model explains the post-1973 slowdown more successfully than either of the 'augmented-Solow' approaches. The paper concludes with a discussion of the impact of shocks on US industrial growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on the book "The Other Side of the Frontier: Economic Explorations Into Native American History," edited by Linda Barrington. The book presents recent economic explorations into key episodes of Native American economic history. The book discusses economy, ecology, and institutions in the emergence of humankind, the Mississippians and economic development before European colonization, how Plains Indian institutions and culture responded to the introduction of the horse, the roles of Native Americans, the Hudson's Bay Company, property rights, and competition in the depletion of the beaver, 1700-1763. The book also presents information on, the subsistence versus trade and growth in the eighteenth-century South-eastern American Indian economy. In addition to that, the article presents information on various other features of the book.

Modern growth theory suggests that more than three-quarters of growth since 1950 reflects rising educational attainment and research intensity. As these transition dynamics fade, US economic growth is likely to slow at some point. However, the rise of China, India, and other emerging economies may allow another few decades of rapid growth in world researchers. Finally, and more speculatively, the shape of the idea production function introduces a fundamental uncertainty into the future of growth. For example, the possibility that artificial intelligence will allow machines to replace workers to some extent could lead to higher growth in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the degree of synchronization between the Mexican states and the US business cycles by using a growth cycle approach for the period 1997-2007. The business cycle indicators are obtained from seasonally-adjusted monthly manufacturing production. Our results confirm that the Mexican aggregate cycle is highly synchronized with the US business cycle. However, although specific Mexican state cycles are pro-cyclical with respect to the US business cycle, their synchronization is very heterogeneous. In particular, it is strong and robust only for the states of Baja California, Jalisco, Nuevo León and the Federal District, and at least moderate for the state of Mexico and Querétaro. The results are robust with respect to three different detrending methods. Synchronization may be explained by the high volumes of international trade carried out by foreign firms in the case of the central and traditionally industrialized states, and by the "maquila" production in the Northern bordering states. This synchronization may be explained by the vertical integration of the productive processes resulting from the internationalization of production of multinational firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neoliberal theory rationalizes inequality as both 1) necessary for growth and 2) offset by a trickle down to lower income groups. However, benefits from income growth failed to reach most of the population for the last several decades in the United States. Instead, a negative trickle down has lowered many people's wellbeing. The first aspect of negative trickle down is a new form of Veblen's conspicuous consumption with positional goods. The second is the effect on the provision of public goods. The third is the competition for limited resources, such as housing. We review how greater income inequality contributes to each. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Economic losses caused by tropical cyclones have increased dramatically. Historical changes in losses are a result of meteorological factors (changes in the incidence of severe cyclones, whether due to natural climate variability or as a result of human activity) and socio-economic factors (increased prosperity and a greater tendency for people to settle in exposed areas). This paper aims to isolate the socio-economic effects and ascertain the potential impact of climate change on this trend. Storm losses for the period 1950–2005 have been adjusted to the value of capital stock in 2005 so that any remaining trend cannot be ascribed to socio-economic developments. For this, we introduce a new approach to adjusting losses based on the change in capital stock at risk. Storm losses are mainly determined by the intensity of the storm and the material assets, such as property and infrastructure, located in the region affected. We therefore adjust the losses to exclude increases in the capital stock of the affected region. No trend is found for the period 1950–2005 as a whole. In the period 1971–2005, since the beginning of a trend towards increased intense cyclone activity, losses excluding socio-economic effects show an annual increase of 4% per annum. This increase must therefore be at least due to the impact of natural climate variability but, more likely than not, also due to anthropogenic forcings. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Published QUARTERLY in the interest of constructive synthesis in the social sciences, under grants from the FrancisNeilsonFund and the RobertSchalkenbachFoundation.Founded in 1941Volume 64 April, 2005 Number 2 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the study on the economic growth and development in the U.S. Many economists and international organizations argue that investment in education is a policy priority. Recently, some studies have provided more reliable findings on specific policies and programs. This article examines this recent work in detail. The article, therefore offers three objectives which is to review the literature on the relationship between school and teacher characteristics, and the acquisition of cognitive skills, to examine the relationship between schooling and labor productivity, and to investigate the relationship between cognitive skills and socioeconomic outcomes other than labor productivity. A final section summarizes the findings and provides recommendations for future research.

In this paper we investigate how telecommunications infrastructure affects economic growth. We use evidence from 21 OECD countries over a 20-year period to examine the impacts that telecommunications developments may have had. We jointly estimate a micromodel for telecommunication investment with a macro production function. We find evidence of a significant positive causal link, especially when a critical mass of telecommunications infrastructure is present. Interestingly, the critical mass appears to be at a level of telecommunications infrastructure that is near universal service. (JEL O57, O47, L69) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years the American states have begun to adopt new types of economic development policies, variously called "demand side" policies, industrial policy, or interventionist policy. In this paper the authors discuss the emergence of these policies and the political and economic changes in states which led to their consideration. Two explanations for their adoption are developed--the business capture hypothesis and the meso-corporatist hypothesis. These differing interpretations are tested with data on state interest groups, government capacity, and economic stress. Data on policy adoptions by 1986 show that the meso-corporatist model provides a better account of industrial policy than does the business capture hypothesis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is an attempt to contribute to the integration of business-cycle analysis with long-term growth. a real-business-cycle model with endogenous growth is developed and estimated with U.S. data. In the present framework, wage movements do not have to be transitory to generate fluctuations in labor effort. The reduced form is a constrained bivariate output/hours (or real-wage/hours) VAR process. The bivariate setup provides a useful framework for analyzing the persistence of output fluctuations, given that the theory implies that hours of work contain information about future output movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the policy mix-defined as the contemporaneous joint state of monetary and fiscal policy-has conditioned the patterns of the business cycle, set up numerous imbalances in macroeconomic and microeconomic behavior, and is laying the groundwork for future economic performance. Restrictive monetary and fiscal policies produced back-to-back economic downturns in 1980 and 1981-82. From 1982 to 1985, massive fiscal stimulus against a backdrop of monetary growth targeting by the Federal Reserve comprised a "loose fiscal-tight money" policy mix. Subsequently, an actual and prospective tightening of the federal budget and suspension of monetary growth targeting suggest a shift in the policy mix to a "tight fiscal-easier money" combination. In this paper, the policy mix of the 1980's first half-in the context of an open economy with flexible exchange rates-is characterized. Some of the important economic and financial effects are identified. Among these are higher nominal and real interest rates than otherwise would have been the case, a strong domestic currency, lower inflation rates, a large and growing trade deficit, an unbalanced composition of economic activity across sectors and industries, and a depressed industrial sector.

There has been much concern recently that large U.S. deficits have, or will soon, produce high interest rates, thus hindering capital formation and economic growth in the U.S. and the rest of the world. In this paper, the author surveys U.S. history to determine whether this concern has merit. There are three periods during which the federal deficit has exceeded 10 percent of national income. In none of these periods did interest rates rise appreciably. Regression analysis applied to data from these three periods has not uncovered a positive association between deficits and interest rates. Economists like to think of economics as a science. In a science, repeated contradictions of a paradigm lead to its abandonment if there is any sensible alternative. One paradigm in economics implies that large deficits produce high interest rates. This paradigm is not supported by the facts. In over a century of U.S. history, large deficits have never been associated with high interest rates. Even the postwar periods separately offer no support for a positive association between deficits and interest rates. Indeed, the evidence more strongly supports a negative association than a positive one. Therefore, it seems that economists should be looking for an alternative paradigm to replace their current one.

In a recent research paper by Bruno Frey and Friedrich Schneider (to be called FS for later reference) presented some interesting results on the political-economic interactions in the U.S. for the period 1953-1975. According to these results, the state of the economy (represented by unemployment, inflation and the growth of private consumption) exercises a significant influence on presidential popularity on the one hand and, on the other, there is substantial evidence that the president manipulates economic policies (government nondefense expenditures, transfer payments, and civilian jobs created in the public sector) to get himself reelected. However, the purpose of this article is first to point out some shortcomings of their model, and then to test their model against our own with the same set of data. The model of the reaction function, as formulated by FS, has some shortcomings, it was made largely a function of political variables and it was developed in terms of individual instruments of fiscal policy only.

The paper introduces a series of articles about economics and international trade. The gap in income and wealth between the rich and the poor countries is ever widening. Ha-Joon Chang is a trade economist and historian who strongly contends that at the heart of trade theory lies a flaw when it comes to developing countries. Infant industries often need protecting, he argues. In fact, every rich economy today protected its infant industries on its way to development in the 1800s and through much of the early 1900s. Thomas Palley, a Washington economist who works for George Soros's Open Society Institute, also maintains that world trade is at a turning point. He also believes that poor countries must become more willing to accept labor and environmental standards. He believes it is up to Democrats in Washington to take the lead on the issue. Michael Perelman in his article traces several historical cases to show how tight patent laws have harmed technological progress in the U.S. The issue also features an interview with a French doctoral student, Gilles Raveaud, by an American economist, Richard McIntyre, about an eruption in the French academic establishment that is being taken very seriously in France.

The article discusses ways in which difficult changes in Eastern Europe have allowed Japan to become an economic power. Eastern Europe's financial crises have arisen due to troubles transitioning to free markets and capitalism. American policy makers who have acknowledged the financial problems of countries such as the Soviet Union or Germany have also realized they can implant Japanese money in the place of European money. In the same time that communism is on the verge of extinction as a viable species of government, Japan has undergone changes nearly as significant to international relations as those of the Soviet bloc. Advantages to Japan's economic involvement in Western markets are discussed.

Under current policies the deficit may get to 7% of GDP in 10 years. Our political process is not coming to grips with responsible fiscal policy. We have both parties agreeing a deficit is a great way of attracting votes. Future increases in spending are coming from entitlements. We need incentives in health care to do things more efficiently and encourage competition. The biggest risk for the U.S. economy is the global bond market. We need to get moving. If not, eventually inflation, or a crisis of confidence, will be the wake-up call on the growth of U.S. debt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a diffusion process to describe the global dynamic evolution of credit operations at a national level given observed operations at a subnational level in a sovereign country. Empirical analysis with a unique dataset from Brazilian federate constituents supports the conclusions. Despite the heterogeneity observed in credit operations at a subnational level, the aggregated dynamics at a national level were accurately described by the proposed model. Results may guide management of public finances, particularly debt manager authorities in charge of reaching surplus targets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The U.S. economy faces sizeable headwinds to keeping GDP growth even at 2% over the next decade. Demographics imply that labor force growth will be much slower than historical norms. The enormous twentieth century increase in average educational attainment is unlikely to be repeated. And the best guess for productivity growth is that it will continue to be modest-perhaps along the lines seen in the 1970s to early 1990s, or since 2004. There are no easy cures for low growth. We can hope for another wave of broadbased IT-linked innovation. But while there is enormous uncertainty, even worthwhile policy steps are unlikely to move the dial very much on their own. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article profiles Barry K. Goodwin, a Fellow of the American Agricultural Economics Association in 2006. Goodwin's various affiliations and awards are presented. He is William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor at the Departments of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Economics from 2003 and up to the present in 2006. He is also the Associated Editor of the "American Journal of Agricultural Economics" from 1999 to 2001. He develops a deep interest in the quantitative analysis of markets and policy issues important to agriculture.

The article reports on the economic impact of water management and the opportunities to improve water use in the U.S. These opportunities include creating centralized water-right registers, unbundling water allocation, entitlement and use management and drafting statutory water resource plans. Other related topics mentioned include the successful water reforms in Australia and the allocation and trading of water resources.

Nonfarm employment continued to expand in 2015. Private service-providing industries accounted for the vast majority of job gains. Despite a slowdown in the overall rate of job growth in 2015, the gains were a continuation of an expansion that started in May 2014, when employment recovered to its previous peak level of January 2008. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use a growth model in which saving, fertility and labour market participation are endogenous, to quantify the cost that barriers to female labour force participation impose in terms of an economy's output. The model is calibrated to mimic the US economy's behaviour in the long-run. We find that a 50% increase in the gender wage gap leads to a 35% decrease in income per capita in the steady state. Using independent estimates of the female to male earnings ratio for a wide cross-section of countries, we construct an economy with parameters similar to those calibrated for the US economy, except for the degree of gender barriers. For several countries, a large fraction of the difference between the country's output and the US output can be ascribed to differences in gender discrimination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research and development (R&D) has a large effect on both state output and total factor productivity in the long run. Our estimates for the private sector of the U.S. states from 1963 to 2007 show that the R&D elasticity averages 0.056-0.143. The implied returns to state Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from R&D spending are 82-211%. There are also positive R&D spillovers, with 70-80% of the total returns accruing to other states. We also find that states with more human capital have higher own- and other-R&D elasticities, and those in lowest tier of economic development have the least own-state R&D elasticity but the highest other-R&D elasticity. In addition, we find that the positive effect of R&D spillovers across states is larger when we consider R&D spillovers across states based on economic similarity of R&D across sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study identifies the determinants of growth for male and female business ownership in a subset of U.S. counties. The results indicate that there are important characteristic and behavioral differences between the male and female populations in each county that affect regional changes in business ownership for each gender. In particular, the education level of males and females as well as the local family structure impact the propensity for firms owned by each gender differently. A Blinder-Oaxaca type decomposition, a novel approach in the context of regional outcomes, demonstrates that although the effect of characteristic differences is larger, the behavioral differences are key to narrowing the gender disparity in business ownership. ( JEL L26, R2, R3) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the author's views regarding the uncertainty in employment and income distribution in U.S. Topics discussed including inequality of income distribution, standards of living, economic growth, employment generation, and the role of consumers. Consumer uncertainty and the employment of consumers is also discussed.

A potential solution for weakened rural economies is the development of local food systems, which include affordable foods sources for consumers and economically feasible structures for producers. Local food systems are purported to promote sustainability, improve local economies, increase access to healthy foods, and improve the local diets. Four entrepreneurial food systems innovations that support local economies include farmers' markets, community supported agriculture, farm to institution programs and food hubs. We review current literature to determine whether innovations for aggregation, processing, distribution and marketing in local food systems: 1) enable producers to make a living; 2) improve local economies; 3) provide local residents with greater access to affordable, healthy food; and 4) contribute to greater consumption of healthy food among residents. While there is some evidence for each, more transdisciplinary research is needed to determine whether entrepreneurial food systems innovations provide economic and public health benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]