Population Aging, Elderly Migration and Education Spending: Intergenerational Conflict Revisited

Elderly have been increasingly targeted as a group to enhance economic development and the tax base in communities. A major factor in their rise in importance is the rapid increase in the number of retired elderly through aging of the U.S. population. While recent literature on elderly migration tends to focus on how elderly migration patterns are influenced by state fiscal variables, the reverse effect from elderly population on fiscal variables is very plausible as shown to be the case for estate, inheritance, and gift taxes by Conway and Rork (2006). In this paper, we reexamine the intergenerational conflict in education financing raised by Poterba (1997) using U.S. state and county level data that allows to analyze how preferences for education might vary across different elderly age groups, which has not been explored before. Moreover, this paper uses a variety of advanced econometric techniques to estimate the impact of elderly population and elderly migration on education spending. Our state and county regression results broadly support the presence of intergenerational conflict in education financing. We also find dramatic age heterogeneity in preferences for education spending among elderly migrants.Population aging, elderly migration, education spending, intergenerational conflict

\u27Getting It Right\u27: Three Essays in International Development.

This dissertation puts together a collection of essay examining issues that surround the age old question why some nations are rich and other nations poor. Within the international development field of economics there are several different topics of focus. These include ‘Getting the Policies Right,’ ‘Getting the Institutions Right,’ and ‘Getting the Culture Right.’ Each essay in my dissertation examines a specific question from one of these three areas. My dissertation is arranged in five chapters. Chapter 1 serves as introduction to the three essays, explains how each essay fits into the development literature, and presents some of the results and conclusions. Chapter 2 presents the essay that falls into the category ‘Getting the Policies Right.’ This chapter examines the role of foreign aid and human development, specifically how foreign aid to the health sector impacts a variety of health indicators. Chapter 3 examines ‘Getting the Institutions Right.’ This essay explores how secure property rights are achieved and presents evidence of the relative importance of formal and informal property rights institutions. Chapter 4 develops a theory and empirically examines ‘Getting the Culture Right.’ This essay explores the relationship between formal and informal institutions and how different institutional arrangements impact economic development. Chapter 5 serves to conclude the dissertation with a discussion of the implication of the findings and areas for future research

Population Aging, Elderly Migration and Education Spending: Intergenerational Conflict Revisited

Elderly have been increasingly targeted as a group to enhance economic development and the tax base in communities. While recent literature on elderly migration tends to focus on how elderly migration patterns are influenced by state fiscal variables, the reverse effect from elderly population on fiscal variables is very plausible. This paper reexamines the intergenerational conflict in education financing using U.S. state and county level data. We analyze how preferences for education spending might vary across different elderly age groups, an analysis that has not been explored before. We estimate the impact of elderly population and elderly migration rates on education spending using panel data and spatial econometric techniques. Our results broadly support the presence of intergenerational conflict and age heterogeneity in preferences for education spending among elderly migrants.population aging, elderly migration, education spending, intergenerational conflict

Adolescents: Orphaned and Vulnerable in the Time of HIV/AIDS

This paper calls for greater attention to orphaned and vulnerable adolescents by agencies working in this field

Rhetoric versus reality: the best and worst of aid agency practices

Foreign aid critics, supporters, recipients, and donors have produced eloquent rhetoric on the need for better aid practices— has this translated into reality? This paper attempts to monitor the best and worst of aid practices among bilateral, multilateral, and UN agencies. We create aid practice measures based on aid transparency, specialization, selectivity, ineffective aid channels, and overhead costs. We rate donor agencies from best to worst on aid practices. We find that the UK does well among bilateral agencies, the US is below average, and Scandinavian donors do surprisingly poorly. The biggest difference is between the UN agencies, who mostly rank in the bottom half of donors, and everyone else. Average performance of all agencies on transparency, fragmentation, and selectivity is still very poor. The paper also assesses trends in best practices over time—we find modest improvement in transparency and more in moving away from ineffective channels. However, we find no evidence of improvements (and partial evidence of worsening) in specialization, fragmentation, and selectivity, despite escalating rhetoric to the contrary

Rhetoric versus reality: the best and worst of aid agency practices

Foreign aid critics, supporters, recipients, and donors have produced eloquent rhetoric on the need for better aid practices— has this translated into reality? This paper attempts to monitor the best and worst of aid practices among bilateral, multilateral, and UN agencies. We create aid practice measures based on aid transparency, specialization, selectivity, ineffective aid channels, and overhead costs. We rate donor agencies from best to worst on aid practices. We find that the UK does well among bilateral agencies, the US is below average, and Scandinavian donors do surprisingly poorly. The biggest difference is between the UN agencies, who mostly rank in the bottom half of donors, and everyone else. Average performance of all agencies on transparency, fragmentation, and selectivity is still very poor. The paper also assesses trends in best practices over time—we find modest improvement in transparency and more in moving away from ineffective channels. However, we find no evidence of improvements (and partial evidence of worsening) in specialization, fragmentation, and selectivity, despite escalating rhetoric to the contrary

Exploring the costs and outcomes of sexually transmitted infection (STI) screening interventions targeting men in football club settings: preliminary cost-consequence analysis of the SPORTSMART pilot randomised controlled trial

Background: The objective of this study was to compare the costs and outcomes of two sexually transmitted infection (STI) screening interventions targeted at men in football club settings in England, including screening promoted by team captains. Methods: A comparison of costs and outcomes was undertaken alongside a pilot cluster randomised control trial involving three trial arms: (1) captain-led and poster STI screening promotion; (2) sexual health advisor-led and poster STI screening promotion and (3) poster-only STI screening promotion (control/comparator). For all study arms, resource use and cost data were collected prospectively. Results: There was considerable variation in uptake rates between clubs, but results were broadly comparable across study arms with 50% of men accepting the screening offer in the captain-led arm, 67% in the sexual health advisor-led arm and 61% in the poster-only control arm. The overall costs associated with the intervention arms were similar. The average cost per player tested was comparable, with the average cost per player tested for the captain-led promotion estimated to be £88.99 compared with £88.33 for the sexual health advisor-led promotion and £81.87 for the poster-only (control) arm. Conclusions: Costs and outcomes were similar across intervention arms. The target sample size was not achieved, and we found a greater than anticipated variability between clubs in the acceptability of screening, which limited our ability to estimate acceptability for intervention arms. Further evidence is needed about the public health benefits associated with screening interventions in non-clinical settings so that their cost-effectiveness can be fully evaluated