Fixed-to-Mobile Substitution: Effects of Mobile Broadband Subscription on Fixed Broadband Termination

Motivation, background and problem statement: Fixed and mobile broadband substitutability has recently been a debate in the telecom industry as the issue affects infrastructure investment decisions of service providers and service obligation regulation decision of telecom authorities. Previous studies have debated over both the definition of substitutability, measurement and the conclusions. Theoretically, substitution is the demand side concept measured using the cross-price elasticity. With a unique dataset, this study takes a simpler approach to examine the fixed-to-mobile substitution. Instead of examining the problem through the estimation of cross-price elasticity, this study estimates the impact of users’ mobile broadband subscription on their decision to terminate fixed broadband subscription. Data and methodology: The data used in this study are from the 2016 Telecom Consumption Survey of Thailand by the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission of Thailand. This study estimates the fixed to mobile substitution using the concept of average treatment effect of mobile broadband usage on the fixed broadband termination. Without random assignment, the estimation of factors determining the fixed broadband termination decision, focusing on the mobile broadband subscription, faces the endogeneity problem. Therefore, we applied the endogenous switching Probit model to estimate the average treatment effect. Results and concluding remarks: From the survey, 1949 respondents subscribed to a fixed broadband service at home at one point. Among them, 85.48 percent remain subscribed to the service and 14.52 percent has canceled the service prior to 2016. The regression analysis shows that mobile broadband subscription has a positive significant effect on the decision to cancel fixed broadband service. The contribution of the study lies on the heterogeneity of the level of fixed to mobile substitution across different groups of internet users. For those who are online for less than 40 hours per day, mobile broadband is considered as a substitute for fixed broadband to a certain level. For those whose lifestyle requires a higher usage of internet, the results show no substitution. As telecom regulations normally target to help users with lower telecom accessibility rather than those with higher level of usage, the higher level of fixed and mobile substitution for individuals with low usage should imply the possibility to unify regulatory framework for fixed and mobile broadband markets

Economic survival duration of Thai workers during COVID-19

This study examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the livelihood and economic survival of Thai citizen workers, using The Asia Foundation’s survey data which were conducted in May 2020 (first round), August 2020 (second round) and November 2020 (third round). We adopt the Cox proportional-hazards regression with lasso estimation to estimate the coefficients and perform variable selection simultaneously. The model allows us to identify the vulnerable groups with risks of consumption inadequacy. The empirical results show that those workers characterized as low-educated, unemployed, unskilled, working in the tourism sector and living in the northeastern or southern regions are less likely to sustain their consumption. However, our study highlights that higher education is a crucial factor influencing the survivability of Thai workers. Regarding the role of government schemes, the result shows that that a set of cash assistance programs is less likely to increase the survivability of the non-agricultural workers

Minimum Wages and Wage Distribution in Thailand: A Quantile Selection Model with Copula

Minimum wage policies were designed to raise the wages of low-skilled workers. In this study, we use data from the Thai Labor Force Survey (2011-2020) to examine the impact of the minimum wage policy on the wage distribution using a quantile regression model corrected for sample selection with a copula. We find that the minimum wage has the strongest effect on the lowest quantile and the effect decreases toward the higher quantiles. This confirms the effectiveness of the minimum wage policy in raising the wages of low-income individuals. In addition, there is also a spill-over effect on individuals in higher wage quantiles. The effect of the minimum wage estimated by our model is smaller compared to the standard quantile regression. This suggests that without correcting for sampling bias, the estimated effect of the minimum wage leads to an upward bia

Why Linear Expressions in Discounting and in Empathy: A Symmetry-Based Explanation

People\u27s preferences depend not only on the decision maker\u27s immediate gain, they are also affected by the decision maker\u27s expectation of future gains. A person\u27s decisions are also affected by possible consequences for others. In decision theory, people\u27s preferences are described by special quantities called utilities. In utility terms, the above phenomena mean that the person\u27s overall utility of an action depends not only on the utility corresponding to the action\u27s immediate consequences for this person, it also depends on utilities corresponding to future consequences and on utilities corresponding to consequences for others. These dependencies reflect discounting of future consequences in comparison with the current ones and to empathy (or lack of) of the person towards others. In general, many formulas involving utility are nonlinear, even formulas describing the dependence of utility on money. However, surprisingly, for discounting and for empathy, linear formulas work very well. In this paper, we show that natural symmetry requirements can explain this linearity

Group Education and Exercise Program for Overweight Knee Osteoarthritic Patients

Objective: To study the benefits of patient education and an exercise program for the overweight knee osteoarthritis (OA) patients. Methods: Group education (GE) was arranged for overweight patients for 2 weeks including how to use their joints properly in their daily activities, how to calculate energy of various kinds of food as well as performing controlled group exercise. Each parameter was evaluated at three time points including before joining GE, after 2 weeks of attending GE and 3 months later. The outcomes were determined by the knowledge score about the disease, gait speed calculated from a 50-meter walk, knee pain score after walking, body weight and quadriceps strength. Results: Eighty-seven subjects were recruited, 11 males (12.6%) and 76 females (87.4%) with a mean age of 59.5 ± 7.6 years, and an average body mass index of 27.5 ± 3.5 kg/m2. The duration of disease was 4.6 ± 4.7 years. Most subjects (79.3%) have good compliance on performing exercise with an average 9.15 ± 1.46 days (range 3-10). The knowledge score before and after attending the group education were 35.1 ± 4.2 and 38.1 ± 4.9, respectively (p < 0.001). After two weeks, their body weight and pain score decreased whereas quadriceps strength and gait speed increased. Those outcomes were even better at the 3-month follow up period. Conclusion: GE, comprised of providing appropriate knowledge, sharing ideas among groups, learning about diet and daily exercise for 2 weeks which can significantly increase knowledge scores, decrease knee pain and body weight, as well as increase quadriceps strength and gait speed

The Possible Pathophysiological Outcomes and Mechanisms of Tourniquet-Induced Ischemia-Reperfusion Injury during Total Knee Arthroplasty

Ischemia and reperfusion (I/R) injury induced by tourniquet (TQ) application leads to the release of both oxygen free radicals and inflammatory cytokines. The skeletal muscle I/R may contribute to local skeletal muscle and remote organ damage affecting outcomes after total knee arthroplasty (TKA). The aim of the study is to summarize the current findings associated with I/R injury following TKA using a thigh TQ, which include cellular alterations and protective therapeutic interventions. The PubMed database was searched using the keywords “ischemia reperfusion injury,” “oxidative stress,” “tourniquet,” and “knee arthroplasty.” The search was limited to research articles published in the English language. Twenty-eight clinical studies were included in this qualitative review. Skeletal muscle I/R reduces protein synthesis, increases protein degradation, and upregulates genes in cell stress pathways. The I/R of the lower extremity elevates local and systemic oxidative stress as well as inflammatory reactions and impairs renal function. Propofol reduces oxidative injury in this I/R model. Ischemic preconditioning (IPC) and vitamin C may prevent oxygen free radical production. However, a high dose of N-acetylcysteine possibly induces kidney injury. In summary, TQ-related I/R during TKA leads to muscle protein metabolism alteration, endothelial dysfunction, oxidative stress, inflammatory response, and renal function disturbance. Propofol, IPC, and vitamin C show protective effects on oxidative and inflammatory markers. However, a relationship between biochemical parameters and postoperative clinical outcomes has not been validated

Do Bitcoin and Traditional Financial Assets Act as an Inflation Hedge during Stable and Turbulent Markets? Evidence from High Cryptocurrency Adoption Countries

This study analyzes whether Bitcoin, gold, oil, and stock have the ability to hedge against inflation in high cryptocurrency adoption countries in the periods from January 2010 to March 2021. It is hypothesized that the assets behave differently and thereby respond differently to inflation in different market conditions. Therefore, we employ the Markov Switching Vector Autoregressive to examine these assets&rsquo; hedging ability against inflation in both stable and turbulent market regimes. Our main findings are threefold: We show that there exists a structural change and nonlinear relationship between the returns of hedging assets and inflation. Second, all assets can hedge against inflation more effectively in the short run than in the long run. We find that the inflation hedging ability of these assets are weak in the long run for both market regimes. We also find some evidence that the rigidity between the assets and inflation is relatively high in the stable regime. Third, according to the impulse response analysis, we also find that the responses of assets to inflation shock are heterogeneous across two market regimes

Do Bitcoin and Traditional Financial Assets Act as an Inflation Hedge during Stable and Turbulent Markets? Evidence from High Cryptocurrency Adoption Countries

This study analyzes whether Bitcoin, gold, oil, and stock have the ability to hedge against inflation in high cryptocurrency adoption countries in the periods from January 2010 to March 2021. It is hypothesized that the assets behave differently and thereby respond differently to inflation in different market conditions. Therefore, we employ the Markov Switching Vector Autoregressive to examine these assets’ hedging ability against inflation in both stable and turbulent market regimes. Our main findings are threefold: We show that there exists a structural change and nonlinear relationship between the returns of hedging assets and inflation. Second, all assets can hedge against inflation more effectively in the short run than in the long run. We find that the inflation hedging ability of these assets are weak in the long run for both market regimes. We also find some evidence that the rigidity between the assets and inflation is relatively high in the stable regime. Third, according to the impulse response analysis, we also find that the responses of assets to inflation shock are heterogeneous across two market regimes