Linked randomised controlled trials of face-to-face and electronic brief intervention methods to prevent alcohol related harm in young people aged 14–17 years presenting to Emergency Departments (SIPS junior)

Background: Alcohol is a major global threat to public health. Although the main burden of chronic alcohol-related disease is in adults, its foundations often lie in adolescence. Alcohol consumption and related harm increase steeply from the age of 12 until 20 years. Several trials focusing upon young people have reported significant positive effects of brief interventions on a range of alcohol consumption outcomes. A recent review of reviews also suggests that electronic brief interventions (eBIs) using internet and smartphone technologies may markedly reduce alcohol consumption compared with minimal or no intervention controls. Interventions that target non-drinking youth are known to delay the onset of drinking behaviours. Web based alcohol interventions for adolescents also demonstrate significantly greater reductions in consumption and harm among ‘high-risk’ drinkers; however changes in risk status at follow-up for non-drinkers or low-risk drinkers have not been assessed in controlled trials of brief alcohol interventions

From theory to econometrics to energy policy : Cautionary tales for policymaking using aggregate production functions

Development of energy policy is often informed by economic considerations via aggregate production functions (APFs). We identify a theory-to-policy process involving APFs comprised of six steps: (1) selecting a theoretical energy-economy framework; (2) formulating modeling approaches; (3) econometrically fitting an APF to historical economic and energy data; (4) comparing and evaluating modeling approaches; (5) interpreting the economy; and (6) formulating energy and economic policy. We find that choices made in Steps 1-4 can lead to very different interpretations of the economy (Step 5) and policies (Step 6). To investigate these effects, we use empirical data (Portugal and UK) and the Constant Elasticity of Substitution (CES) APF to evaluate four modeling choices: (a) rejecting (or not) the cost-share principle; (b) including (or not) energy; (c) quality-adjusting (or not) factors of production; and (d) CES nesting structure. Thereafter, we discuss two revealing examples for which different upstream modeling choices lead to very different policies. In the first example, the (kl)e nesting structure implies significant investment in energy, while other nesting structures suggest otherwise. In the second example, unadjusted factors of production suggest balanced investment in labor and energy, while quality-adjusting suggests significant investment in labor over energy. Divergent outcomes provide cautionary tales for policymakers: greater understanding of upstream modeling choices and their downstream implications is needed

On the Power and Weakness of Rational Expectations: Logical Fallacies, Periodic Bubbles and Business Cycles

A popular interpretation of the Rational Expectations/Efficient Markets hypothesis states that, if the hypothesis holds, then market valuations must follow a random walk. This postulate has frequently been criticized on the basis of empirical evidence. Yet the assertion itself incurs what we could call 'fallacy of probability diffusion symmetry': although market efficiency does indeed imply that the mean (i.e. expected) path must be a random walk, if the probability diffusion process is asymmetric then the observed path will most closely resemble not the mean but the median, which does not necessarily follow a random walk. To illustrate the implications, this paper develops an efficient markets model where the median path of Tobin's q ratio displays regular cycles of bubbles and crashes reflecting an agency problem between investors and producers. The model is tested against US market data, with results suggesting that such a regular cycle does indeed exist and is statistically significant. The aggregate production function in Gracia (Uncertainty and Capacity Constraints: Reconsidering the Aggregate Production Function, 2011) is then put forward to show how financial fluctuations can drive the business cycle by periodically impacting aggregate productivity and, as a consequence, GDP growth

The geography of wage inequality in British cities

There is widespread concern about the scale and implications of urban inequality in Great Britain, but little evidence on which cities are the most unequal and why. This paper investigates patterns of wage inequality in 60 British cities. It has two principal goals: (1) to describe which cities are most unequal and (2) to assess the important determinants of inequality. The results show a distinct geography of wage inequality, the most unequal cities tend to be affluent and located in parts of the Greater South East of England. A central determinant of these patterns is the geography of highly skilled workers. Because of this, the geography of urban wage inequality reflects the geography of affluence more generally

Economic growth and inequality : the role of fiscal policies

This paper analyses the impact of different instruments of fiscal policy on economic growth as well as on income inequality, using an unbalanced panel of 43 upper-middle and high income countries for the period 1972-2006. We consider and estimate two individual equations explaining growth and inequality in order to assess the incidence of different fiscal policies. Firstly, our approach considers imposing orthogonal assumptions between growth and inequality in both equations, and secondly, it allows growth to be included in the inequality equation, and inequality to be included in the growth equation. The empirical results suggest that an increase in the size of government measured through current expenditures and direct taxes diminishes economic growth while reducing inequality, being public investment the only fiscal policy that may break this trade-off between efficiency and equity, since increases in this item reduces inequality without harming output. Therefore, the results reflect that the trade-off between efficiency and equity that governments often confront when designing their fiscal policies may be avoided

Net Government Expenditures and the Economic Well-Being of the Elderly in the United States, 1989-2001

We examine the economic well-being of the elderly, using the Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being (LIMEW). Compared to the conventional measures of income, the LIMEW is a comprehensive measure that incorporates broader definitions of income from wealth, government expenditures, and taxes. It also includes the value of household production. We find that the elderly are much better off, relative to the nonelderly, according to our broader measure of economic well-being than by conventional income measures. The main reason for the higher relative LIMEW of the elderly is the much higher values of income from wealth and net government expenditures for the elderly than the nonelderly. There are pronounced differences in well-being among the population subgroups within the elderly. The older elderly are worse off than the younger elderly, nonwhites are worse off than whites, and singles are worse off than married couples. We also find that the degree of inequality in the LIMEW is substantially higher among the elderly than among the nonelderly. In contrast, inequality in the most comprehensive measure of income published by the Census Bureau is virtually identical among the elderly and nonelderly. The main factor behind the degree of inequality, as the decomposition analysis reveals, is the greater size and concentration of income from nonhome wealth in the LIMEW compared to extended income (EI)

Long-Term Trends in the Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being (LIMEW), United States, 1959-2004

We use here a new measure of household economic well-being called LIMEW. LIMEW is different in scope from the official U.S. Census Bureau measure of gross money income (MI) in that it includes taxes, noncash transfers, public consumption, income from wealth, and household production. We analyze trends in LIMEW from 1959 to 2004, and find that median LIMEW grew by 0.7 percent per year while median MI increased by 0.6 percent per year. LIMEW grew much slower than MI from 1959 to 1982, and much faster than MI from 1982 to 2004. In 2004, measured inequality was lower in LIMEW than MI (a difference of 5.5 Gini points); similarly, the increase in inequality between 1959 and 2004 was higher in MI than LIMEW (6.2 versus 5.1 Gini points). Much of the difference in these measures can be traced to the role of net government expenditures. According to both measures, the racial gap narrowed from 1959 to 1989; it then widened somewhat from 1989 to 2004 according to LIMEW but continued to narrow according to MI. The difference in time trends can be traced mainly to the rising income from wealth of white households relative to nonwhite households. The gap in well-being between single females and married couples widened from 1959 to 1989 and then narrowed slightly between 1989 and 2004 according to LIMEW but increased rather steadily from 1959 to 2004 according to MI. The fortunes of the elderly relative to the nonelderly showed considerable improvement from 1959 to 2004 according to LIMEW, almost reaching parity in 2004. In contrast, according to MI, the relative position of the elderly was about the same in 2004 as in 1959. In this instance, the difference in time trends can be traced mainly to rising income from wealth and government transfers accruing to the elderly relative to the nonelderly

The Middle-Income Transition around the Globe: Characteristics of Graduation and Slowdown

The paper investigates the situation of middle-income economies around the world. Since 1965, only 18 economies with a population of more than 3 million and not dependent on oil exports have made the transition to being high income. Many more have not been able to move beyond the middle-income stage. We conduct statistical tests of differences between two groups of economies across a range of growth and development variables. The results suggest that middle-income economies are particularly weak in the following areas: governance, infrastructure, savings and investment, inequality, and quality - but not quantity - of education. The findings are used to suggest whether the People's Republic of China is successfully progressing through the middle-income stage or whether it may get caught in a middle-income trap