Size of Home, Home Ownership, and the Mortgage Interest Deduction

This paper offers an empirical test of the effect of the mortgage interest deduction (MID) on both the extensive (own vs. rent) and intensive (size of home) housing purchase margins. Using state level differences in MID availability to identify, I examine this relationship using standard ordinary least squares, instrumental variables, regression discontinuity, and sample selection estimation techniques. I find the MID to be responsible for a 10.9–18.4% increase in the size of home purchased, but that no relationship exists between the MID and home ownership. These results imply an elasticity of home size with respect to changes in user cost between −1 and −1.4

E-learning adoption in universities: the ‘gazebo’ effect of the social system on diffusion.

The implementation of e-learning in universities is often explored through the conceptual framework of the innovation diffusion model (Rogers 2003). Analysis using the five adopter categories or the characteristics of the innovation is common, but a less frequently explored element is the influence on diffusion of the social system within which the individual adopters are situated. The paper considers the potential of this element of Rogers’ model to explain the diffusion of e-learning within the social system of a university and demonstrates that the nature of universities, traditionally considered to be highly decentralized organizations composed of many ‘ivory gazebos’ rather than a single ‘ivory tower’, may expose some challenges to the usefulness of the model. Factors considered include the ambiguity of management positions and the nature of communication in devolved departments

Harton\u27s Orthodoxy and heresy in early Christian contexts: Reconsidering the Bauer thesis (Book Review)

A review of Harton, P. A. (Ed.). (2015). Orthodoxy and heresy in early Christian contexts: Reconsidering the Bauer thesis. Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications. 288 pp. $32.00. ISBN 978161097504