Are States with Larger than Average Black Populations Really the Worst Places to live in the USA? A Spatial Equilibrium Approach to Ranking Quality of Life

Quality-of-life rankings based on location-specific attributes/local amenities could induce elected official and policy makers into incorrectly constructing economic development plans if the ranking scheme was flawed. Hierarchical rankings of states in the USA in terms of quality-of-life that use an explicit amenity accounting method, typically assign lower ranks to states with large Black American populations. We show that these rankings utilize methodologies that are not based on economic theory, and that they arbitrarily construct ranking schemes about what individuals and firms value about the places where they locate. This pick-and-choose amenities accounting approach has its merits; however, we show that this approach introduces a bias into the ranking process. An alternative theoretically tenable and unbiased approach to measuring quality-of-life in particular locations follows from two important notions. First, a significant amount of what individuals and firms value in the places where they locate is unobservable. Secondly, the value of tangible and intangible location specific attributes (amenities) is captured by the difference between amenity-adjusted, housing prices and incomes. We implement a ranking scheme consistent with this notion, and find that when ranking states in the USA in terms of quality-of-life, states with large Black populations move up in the rankings substantially. Additionally, we find that relative to standard explicit amenity accounting quality-of-life measure, our spatial equilibrium measures can better explain the location choices of individuals, as measured by net migration

Break in the Mean and Persistence of Inflation: A Sectoral Analysis of French CPI

This paper uses disaggregated CPI time series to show that a break in the mean of French inflation occurred in the mid-eighties and that the 1983 monetary policy shift mostly accounted for it. CPI average yearly growth declined from nearly 11% before the break date (May 1985) to 2.1% after. No other break in the 1973-2004 sample period can be found. Controlling for this mean break, both aggregate and sectoral inflation persistence are stable and low, with the unit root lying far in the tail of the persistence estimates. However, persistence differs dramatically across sectors. Finally, the duration between two price changes (at the firm level) appears positively related with inflation persistence (at the aggregate level)

Breaking Bad in Mississippi: Do County-Level Alcohol Sale Bans Encourage Crystal Methamphetamine Production and Consumption?

If alcohol has substitutes, changes in its relative price can encourage the production and consumption of other illicit and harmful drugs. This paper considers if county-level bans on the sale of alcohol in the state of Mississippi encourage the production and consumption of crystal methamphetamine. We estimate the parameters of a drug production function in which the inputs are the density of people and firms, underscoring the importance of learning and knowledge spillovers to production and consumption. Poisson and Negative Binomial parameter estimates reveal that county-level bans on hard liquor sales; but not on beer and wine, increase the number of crystal methamphetamine labs. In the absence of such laws, there would be approximately 308 fewer crystal methamphetamine labs in the state of Mississippi. Our findings suggest that in Mississippi, which is the least healthiest state in the nation, county-level bans on hard liquor sales are not welfare improving as they encourage substitution for a drug that is potentially more harmful to individual health than alcohol

Does religion constrain the risky sex behaviour associated with HIV/AIDS?

This article examines the likely effectiveness of public health interventions designed to change the risky sexual behaviour associated with Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) by Faith-Based Organizations (FBOs). We utilize data from the General Social Survey (GSS) to estimate an economic model of sexual behaviour. Our theoretical approach proceeds by rationalizing, on evolutionary grounds, the existence of sexual activity in individual preference functions, with unobservable costs imposed by religious beliefs and participation. Given the objective of utility maximization, we justify the existence of demand functions for sexual activity that generate empirically testable hypotheses about the effects of religion and religious participation on risky sexual activity. Our results suggest that, at least in the case of heterosexuals, FBOs can indeed influence the risky sexual behaviour that is associated with the transmission of HIV/AIDS.