How much do journal titles tell us about the academic interest and relevance of economic research? An empirical analysis

Unlike in other disciplines, research output in economics is commonly measured based on the journal titles in which an author has published. Here, I examine how much output measures based on journal titles tell us about the academic interest and relevance of economic papers as measured by citation frequency. Using data from the 2008 Handelsblatt ranking of economists in German speaking countries and interdisciplinary citation data from the Web of Science, I find that researcher scores based on journal titles explain only about one fourth of the variation (variance) in article citations. When the top 10 (20) percent of the researchers according to journal title scores are excluded, the percentage of explained variation in citation frequency drops to 5 (3) percent. These findings empirically confirm the hypothesis that the measures of research output in economics promote narrow and complacent work that is of interest to few, even among an academic audience. They suggest that responsible hiring committees and funding institutions should re-examine existing standards in evaluation and abandon the heavy reliance on journal titles as a measure of individual research output.citation index, incentives, publication, research evaluation, scientometrics

When Are Preferences Consistent? The Effects of Task Familiarity and Contextual Cues on Revealed and Stated Preferences

Traditionally, economists make a sharp distinction between stated and revealed preferences, viewing the latter as more fully meeting the assumptions of economic analysis. Here, we consider one form of empirical evidence regarding this belief: the consistency of choices in stated and revealed preference tasks. We show that both kinds of task can produce consistent choices, suggesting that both can measure underlying preferences, if necessary conditions are met. We propose that a necessary condition is that task be either familiar to those facing it or offer contextual cues that substitute for familiarity, such as prices in competitive markets or recommendations from trusted, knowledgeable sources. We show that how well decision makers achieve such understanding is often confounded with the method that researchers use. Considering task familiarity not only clarifies some of the conflicting evidence regarding revealed and stated preference methods, but raises potentially productive questions regarding the roles of social institutions in shaping preferences.Consistency, contingent valuation, framing, public goods, revealed preferences, stated preferences, validity

The role of landscape amenities in regional development: a survey of migration, regional economic and hedonic pricing studies

Quality of life factors continue to gain importance in residential location decisions as well as location decisions of firms. One such factor is an attractive local landscape. The aim of this paper is to provide a survey of the empirical literature on the role of landscape amenities in local economic change. Following common amenity definitions, we define landscape amenities as landscape features that are location-specific, latent non-market input goods that directly enter residents’ utility functions. Using this definition we identify thirty-nine relevant studies that use either migration or regional economic models or hedonic pricing techniques. One result from the analysis of migration and regional economic studies is that intra-country migrants were attracted by amenities about as frequently as by a low tax burden. Effects of amenities on employment and income are less well established. However, many of these studies used rather limited amenity variables. The results from hedonic studies show that a wide variety of local amenity attributes are partly capitalized in housing prices and that studies on a larger geographic scale are more likely to identify a significant a role of amenities. Newly available land cover datasets and spatial analysis tools have the potential to overcome important data limitations of many earlier studies. Future research may thus contribute to a better understanding of the role of landscape amenities in economic change and to a better coordination of regional and environmental policies.landscape amenities, migration, local development, hedonic models, environmental valuation, regional economic modeling, land use

Renewable Energy in the Context of Sustainable Development

Historically, economic development has been strongly correlated with increasing energy use and growth of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Renewable energy (RE) can help decouple that correlation, contributing to sustainable development (SD). In addition, RE offers the opportunity to improve access to modern energy services for the poorest members of society, which is crucial for the achievement of any single of the eight Millennium Development Goals. Theoretical concepts of SD can provide useful frameworks to assess the interactions between SD and RE. SD addresses concerns about relationships between human society and nature. Traditionally, SD has been framed in the three-pillar model—Economy, Ecology, and Society—allowing a schematic categorization of development goals, with the three pillars being interdependent and mutually reinforcing. Within another conceptual framework, SD can be oriented along a continuum between the two paradigms of weak sustainability and strong sustainability. The two paradigms differ in assumptions about the substitutability of natural and human-made capital. RE can contribute to the development goals of the three-pillar model and can be assessed in terms of both weak and strong SD, since RE utilization is defined as sustaining natural capital as long as its resource use does not reduce the potential for future harvest. The relationship between RE and SD can be viewed as a hierarchy of goals and constraints that involve both global and regional or local considerations. Though the exact contribution of RE to SD has to be evaluated in a country specifi c context, RE offers the opportunity to contribute to a number of important SD goals: (1) social and economic development; (2) energy access; (3) energy security; (4) climate change mitigation and the reduction of environmental and health impacts. The mitigation of dangerous anthropogenic climate change is seen as one strong driving force behind the increased use of RE worldwide. The chapter provides an overview of the scientific literature on the relationship between these four SD goals and RE and, at times, fossil and nuclear energy technologies. The assessments are based on different methodological tools, including bottom-up indicators derived from attributional lifecycle assessments (LCA) or energy statistics, dynamic integrated modelling approaches, and qualitative analyses. Countries at different levels of development have different incentives and socioeconomic SD goals to advance RE. The creation of employment opportunities and actively promoting structural change in the economy are seen, especially in industrialized countries, as goals that support the promotion of RE. However, the associated costs are a major factor determining the desirability of RE to meet increasing energy demand and concerns have been voiced that increased energy prices might endanger industrializing countries’ development prospects; this underlines the need for a concomitant discussion about the details of an international burden-sharing regime. Still, decentralized grids based on RE have expanded and already improved energy access in developing countries. Under favorable conditions, cost savings in comparison to non-RE use exist, in particular in remote areas and in poor rural areas lacking centralized energy access. In addition, non-electrical RE technologies offer opportunities for modernization of energy services, for example, using solar energy for water heating and crop drying, biofuels for transportation, biogas and modern biomass for heating, cooling, cooking and lighting, and wind for water pumping. RE deployment can contribute to energy security by diversifying energy sources and diminishing dependence on a limited number of suppliers, therefore reducing the economy’s vulnerability to price volatility. Many developing countries specifically link energy access and security issues to include stability and reliability of local supply in their definition of energy security. Supporting the SD goal to mitigate environmental impacts from energy systems, RE technologies can provide important benefits compared to fossil fuels, in particular regarding GHG emissions. Maximizing these benefits often depends on the specific technology, management, and site characteristics associated with each RE project, especially with respect to land use change (LUC) impacts. Lifecycle assessments for electricity generation indicate that GHG emissions from RE technologies are, in general, considerably lower than those associated with fossil fuel options, and in a range of conditions, less than fossil fuels employing carbon capture and storage (CCS). The maximum estimate for concentrating solar power (CSP), geothermal, hydropower, ocean and wind energy is less than or equal to 100 g CO2eq/kWh, and median values for all RE range from 4 to 46 g CO2eq/kWh. The GHG balances of bioenergy production, however, have considerable uncertainties, mostly related to land management and LUC. Excluding LUC, most bioenergy systems reduce GHG emissions compared to fossil-fueled systems and can lead to avoided GHG emissions from residues and wastes in landfill disposals and co-products; the combination of bioenergy with CCS may provide for further reductions. For transport fuels, some first-generation biofuels result in relatively modest GHG mitigation potential, while most next-generation biofuels could provide greater climate benefits. To optimize benefits from bioenergy production, it is critical to reduce uncertainties and to consider ways to mitigate the risk of bioenergy-induced LUC. RE technologies can also offer benefits with respect to air pollution and health. Non-combustion-based RE power generation technologies have the potential to significantly reduce local and regional air pollution and lower associated health impacts compared to fossil-based power generation. Impacts on water and biodiversity, however, depend on local conditions. In areas where water scarcity is already a concern, non-thermal RE technologies or thermal RE technologies using dry cooling can provide energy services without additional stress on water resources. Conventional water-cooled thermal power plants may be especially vulnerable to conditions of water scarcity and climate change. Hydropower and some bioenergy systems are dependent on water availability, and can either increase competition or mitigate water scarcity. RE specific impacts on biodiversity may be positive or negative; the degree of these impacts will be determined by site-specific conditions. Accident risks of RE technologies are not negligible, but the technologies’ often decentralized structure strongly limits the potential for disastrous consequences in terms of fatalities. However, dams associated with some hydropower projects may create a specific risk depending on site-specific factors. The scenario literature that describes global mitigation pathways for RE deployment can provide some insights into associated SD implications. Putting an upper limit on future GHG emissions results in welfare losses (usually measured as gross domestic product or consumption foregone), disregarding the costs of climate change impacts. These welfare losses are based on assumptions about the availability and costs of mitigation technologies and increase when the availability of technological alternatives for constraining GHGs, for example, RE technologies, is limited. Scenario analyses show that developing countries are likely to see most of the expansion of RE production. Increasing energy access is not necessarily beneficial for all aspects of SD, as a shift to modern energy away from, for example, traditional biomass could simply be a shift to fossil fuels. In general, available scenario analyses highlight the role of policies and finance for increased energy access, even though forced shifts to RE that would provide access to modern energy services could negatively affect household budgets. To the extent that RE deployment in mitigation scenarios contributes to diversifying the energy portfolio, it has the potential to enhance energy security by making the energy system less susceptible to (sudden) energy supply disruption. In scenarios, this role of RE will vary with the energy form. With appropriate carbon mitigation policies in place, electricity generation can be relatively easily decarbonized through RE sources that have the potential to replace concentrated and increasingly scarce fossil fuels in the building and industry sectors. By contrast, the demand for liquid fuels in the transport sector remains inelastic if no technological breakthrough can be achieved. Therefore oil and related energy security concerns are likely to continue to play a role in the future global energy system; as compared to today these will be seen more prominently in developing countries. In order to take account of environmental and health impacts from energy systems, several models have included explicit representation of these, such as sulphate pollution. Some scenario results show that climate policy can help drive improvements in local air pollution (i.e., particulate matter), but air pollution reduction policies alone do not necessarily drive reductions in GHG emissions. Another implication of some potential energy trajectories is the possible diversion of land to support biofuel production. Scenario results have pointed at the possibility that climate policy could drive widespread deforestation if not accompanied by other policy measures, with land use being shifted to bioenergy crops with possibly adverse SD implications, including GHG emissions. 712 Renewable Energy in the Context of Sustainable Development Chapter 9 The integration of RE policies and measures in SD strategies at various levels can help overcome existing barriers and create opportunities for RE deployment in line with meeting SD goals. In the context of SD, barriers continue to impede RE deployment. Besides market-related and economic barriers, those barriers intrinsically linked to societal and personal values and norms will fundamentally affect the perception and acceptance of RE technologies and related deployment impacts by individuals, groups and societies. Dedicated communication efforts are therefore a crucial component of any transformation strategy and local SD initiatives can play an important role in this context. At international and national levels, strategies should include: the removal of mechanisms that are perceived to work against SD; mechanisms for SD that internalize environmental and social externalities; and RE strategies that support low-carbon, green and sustainable development including leapfrogging. The assessment has shown that RE can contribute to SD to varying degrees; more interdisciplinary research is needed to close existing knowledge gaps. While benefi ts with respect to reduced environmental and health impacts may appear more clear-cut, the exact contribution to, for example, social and economic development is more ambiguous. In order to improve the knowledge regarding the interrelations between SD and RE and to fi nd answers to the question of an effective, economically effi cient and socially acceptable transformation of the energy system, a much closer integration of insights from social, natural and economic sciences (e.g., through risk analysis approaches), refl ecting the different (especially intertemporal, spatial and intra-generational) dimensions of sustainability, is required. So far, the knowledge base is often limited to very narrow views from specifi c branches of research, which do not fully account for the complexity of the issue

Voting for Direct Democracy: Evidence from a Unique Popular Initiative in Bavaria

We analyze a constitutional change in the German State of Bavaria where citizens, not politicians, granted themselves more say in politics at the local level through a constitutional initiative at the state level. This institutional setting allows us to focus on revealed preferences for direct democracy and to identify factors which explain this preference. Empirical results suggests support for direct democracy is rather related to dissatisfaction with representative democracy in general than with an elected governing party

Contingent valuation: a new perspective

After several decades of academic research on the contingent valuation (CV) method a consistent behavioral explanation of 'hypothetical bias' is still lacking. Based on evidence from economics, economic psychology and the political sciences, I propose an explanation that is based on two simple working hypotheses about respondent behaviour in contingent valuation surveys. The first hypothesis is that survey respondents are unable to form consistent preferences about unfamiliar goods unless the choice context offers reliable, informative cues that can be rationally exploited in simplified heuristics. The second hypothesis is that the probability and impact of strategic responses in dichotomous-choice questions about public goods depends on the extent to which the presented hypothetical costs differ from the actual costs. The literature on hypothetical bias is revisited in the light of these behavioral hypotheses. I find that the hypotheses are generally supported by the empirical data. Moreover, the hypotheses are able to explain several important empirical phenomena that previous research has not been able to explain. In particular, they solve the puzzle that pre-election polls, but not CV surveys, are able to predict actual referendum outcomes, and they explain why income effects on willingness to pay are lower in CV responses than in actual votes. If confirmed by further studies, the hypotheses will have important implications for future research and practice. First, the hypothetical costs presented in the dichotomous choice question should to be close enough to the actual costs to be credible to all respondents. This can be achieved by specifying the costs as a percentage (rather than absolute) change in taxes. Second, the respondents should be given the option to answer based on information about the positions of large parties and interest groups with known political orientation rather than based on the raw policy information. Theory and evidence suggest that this new survey paradigm largely eliminates the fundamental problems of the conventional stated preference methods

An analysis of the Swiss vote on the use of genetically modified crops

In November 2005, 55.7 percent of 2 million Swiss voters approved a 5-year moratorium (ban) on the commercial cultivation of genetically modified (GM) plants within Switzerland. The present study examines how individual voting decisions were determined by (i) socioeconomic characteristics, (ii) political preference/ideology and (iii) agreement with a series of arguments in favour and against the use of GM plants in Swiss agriculture. The analysis is based on the data of the regular voter survey undertaken after national-level voting decisions in Switzerland. Among the socioeconomic characteristics, only the age group was clearly significant with individuals above 65 years less opposed to crop biotechnology. Several political preference/ideology variables were significant determinants of the vote, most notably the preferences about the role of the state in the economy. Perceived consequences of the use of GM plants for health, natural diversity of plants and animals were also strongly and significantly associated with approving and disapproving voter groups. The disapproving votes were not motivated by perceived benefits of GM-food production but mainly by perceived interests of Swiss science and industry. Our findings suggest that current concerns about the use of genetically engineered plants in agriculture may not automatically decrease with higher levels of education/knowledge and generational change. Furthermore, the analysis of the voter motives suggests that the public support for GM-free agricultural production would be even larger in other countries, where industrial interests in crop biotechnology are less pronounced

How much do journal titles tell us about the academic interest and relevance of economic research? An empirical analysis

Unlike in other disciplines, research output in economics is commonly measured based on the journal titles in which an author has published. Here, I examine how much output measures based on journal titles tell us about the academic interest and relevance of economic papers as measured by citation frequency. Using data from the 2008 Handelsblatt ranking of economists in German speaking countries and interdisciplinary citation data from the Web of Science, I find that researcher scores based on journal titles explain only about one fourth of the variation (variance) in article citations. When the top 10 (20) percent of the researchers according to journal title scores are excluded, the percentage of explained variation in citation frequency drops to 5 (3) percent. These findings empirically confirm the hypothesis that the measures of research output in economics promote narrow and complacent work that is of interest to few, even among an academic audience. They suggest that responsible hiring committees and funding institutions should re-examine existing standards in evaluation and abandon the heavy reliance on journal titles as a measure of individual research output

When Are Preferences Consistent? The Effects of Task Familiarity and Contextual Cues on Revealed and Stated Preferences

Traditionally, economists make a sharp distinction between stated and revealed preferences, viewing the latter as more fully meeting the assumptions of economic analysis. Here, we consider one form of empirical evidence regarding this belief: the consistency of choices in stated and revealed preference tasks. We show that both kinds of task can produce consistent choices, suggesting that both can measure underlying preferences, if necessary conditions are met. We propose that a necessary condition is that task be either familiar to those facing it or offer contextual cues that substitute for familiarity, such as prices in competitive markets or recommendations from trusted, knowledgeable sources. We show that how well decision makers achieve such understanding is often confounded with the method that researchers use. Considering task familiarity not only clarifies some of the conflicting evidence regarding revealed and stated preference methods, but raises potentially productive questions regarding the roles of social institutions in shaping preferences

The role of landscape amenities in regional development: a survey of migration, regional economic and hedonic pricing studies

Quality of life factors continue to gain importance in residential location decisions as well as location decisions of firms. One such factor is an attractive local landscape. The aim of this paper is to provide a survey of the empirical literature on the role of landscape amenities in local economic change. Following common amenity definitions, we define landscape amenities as landscape features that are location-specific, latent non-market input goods that directly enter residents’ utility functions. Using this definition we identify thirty-nine relevant studies that use either migration or regional economic models or hedonic pricing techniques. One result from the analysis of migration and regional economic studies is that intra-country migrants were attracted by amenities about as frequently as by a low tax burden. Effects of amenities on employment and income are less well established. However, many of these studies used rather limited amenity variables. The results from hedonic studies show that a wide variety of local amenity attributes are partly capitalized in housing prices and that studies on a larger geographic scale are more likely to identify a significant a role of amenities. Newly available land cover datasets and spatial analysis tools have the potential to overcome important data limitations of many earlier studies. Future research may thus contribute to a better understanding of the role of landscape amenities in economic change and to a better coordination of regional and environmental policies