3,959 research outputs found
The Determinants of Polish Farmers' Credit Interest Rates: Hedonic Price Analysis and Implications for Government Policy
Our micro-econometric analysis of agricultural credit market outcomes in Poland sheds new light on the relationship between contractual arrangements and interest rates. An innovative theoretical framework based on a hedonic market model is developed. We interpret the factors that influence interest rates as "quality" components of the credit contract. We use unique data including detailed information about Polish farmers' credit contracts. Both nominal interest rates and bank fees are considered. Results show that banks prefer liquid types of collateral, and care little about the loan's purpose. The effect of government subsidies on interest rates is small compared to the officially declared reduction of the nominal rate.agricultural finance, credit policy, hedonic regression, micro-econometrics, Poland, Agricultural and Food Policy, Financial Economics, Q12, Q14, P32,
Credit access and borrowing costs in Poland's agricultural credit market: a hedonic pricing approach
The paper empirically investigates credit access and borrowing costs in Poland's rural financial market. We conduct an econometric analysis based on cross-sectional survey data including formal loans taken in the period 1997-1999. A hedonic regression of the effective interest rate, comprising both the nominal interest rate and additional transaction costs faced by farmers, allows the identification of the determinants of borrowing costs. These determinants can be interpreted as loan attributes and their implicit prices calculated. We proceed in two steps. In the first step, farmers' credit access is estimated by a Probit model. The second step is the hedonic regression, in which the Probit results are taken to test for selectivity. The results support the widely held view that formal lenders tend to discriminate against smaller farms. They also suggest that the presence of devices to screen and signal the quality of borrowers makes borrowing more likely and reduces borrowing costs. Furthermore, the analysis reveals that the choice of the type of bank has a significant effect on borrowing costs. All other loan attributes equal, the traditional institutions for agricultural lending (the cooperative banks and the governmentally controlled Bank for Food Economy) offer between 1.1 and 1.3 percentage point higher effective interest rates as compared with the most favourable terms available, which has implications for a potential future restructuring of the Polish rural banking sector. In addition, there is strong evidence that the government subsidisation of nominal interest rates is severely counteracted by increased transaction costs and an adverse selection of borrowers. However, there is still a net reduction of the effective interest rate by 1.4 percentage point on average, compared to non-subsidised loans. This raises the question whether lending procedures under the government programme are sufficiently streamlined and whether loans are effectively targeted. -- G E R M A N V E R S I O N: Gegenstand dieses Beitrags ist die empirische Untersuchung von Kreditzugang und Kreditkosten auf Polens ländlichen Finanzmärkten. Zu diesem Zweck wird eine ökonometrische Analyse von Querschnittsdaten durchgeführt, die Informationen zu formellen Kreditkontrakten für die Zeitperiode 1997-1999 beinhaltet. Mit Hilfe einer hedonischen Regression des effektiven Zinssatzes, der sowohl den nominalen Zinssatz als auch zusätzliche Transaktionskosten umfasst, werden die Determinanten der Kreditkosten analysiert. Diese Determinanten können als Krediteigenschaften interpretiert werden, was eine Berechnung ihrer impliziten Preise ermöglicht. Unser Vorgehen besteht aus zwei Schritten. Im ersten Schritt wird der Zugang zu Krediten durch ein Probit-Modell geschätzt. Der zweite Schritt beinhaltet die hedonische Regression, wobei die Probit-Ergebnisse für einen Selektivitäts-Test verwendet werden. Die Ergebnisse bestätigen die verbreitete Ansicht, dass formelle Kreditgeber kleinere landwirtschaftliche Betriebe tendenziell benachteiligen. Die Ergebnisse legen außerdem nahe, dass Verfahren zur Aufdeckung und Signalisierung der Nachfragerqualitäten die Kreditaufnahme wahrscheinlicher machen und die Kreditkosten senken. Die Analyse verdeutlicht, dass die Wahl der Bank einen signifikanten Effekt auf die Höhe der Kreditkosten hat. Bei sonst gleichen Vertragseigenschaften bieten die traditionellen landwirtschaftlichen Kreditgeber (die Genossenschaftsbanken und die von der Regierung kontrollierte Bank für Nahrungsmittelwirtschaft) um 1,1 bzw. 1,3 Prozentpunkte höhere effektive Zinssätze, verglichen mit dem günstigsten Angebot. Dies ist für eine künftige Restrukturierung des ländlichen Bankensektors in Polen von Bedeutung. Außerdem gibt es deutliche Hinweise darauf, dass die Wirkung der staatlichen Zinssubventionierung durch gesteigerte Transaktionskosten und adverse Selektion von Kreditnehmern stark verringert wird. Allerdings führt sie im Vergleich zu nichtsubventionierten Krediten immer noch zu einer Netto-Verringerung des effektiven Zinssatzes um durchschnittlich 1,4 Prozentpunkte. Es stellt sich daher die Frage, ob die Vergabeprozeduren des staatlichen Kreditprogramms hinreichend effizient sind und ob die Kredite effektiv plaziert werden.agricultural finance,credit policy,transaction costs,Poland,microeconometrics,Agrarfinanzierung,Kreditpolitik,Transaktionskosten,Polen,Mikroökonometrie
Semi-parametric estimation of the hazard function in a model with covariate measurement error
We consider a model where the failure hazard function, conditional on a
covariate is given by ,
with . The baseline
hazard function and relative risk belong both
to parametric families. The covariate is measured through the error model
where is independent from , with known density
. We observe a -sample , , where
is the minimum between the failure time and the censoring time, and
is the censoring indicator. We aim at estimating in presence
of the unknown density . Our estimation procedure based on least squares
criterion provide two estimators. The first one minimizes an estimation of the
least squares criterion where is estimated by density deconvolution. Its
rate depends on the smoothnesses of and as a
function of ,. We derive sufficient conditions that ensure the
-consistency. The second estimator is constructed under conditions
ensuring that the least squares criterion can be directly estimated with the
parametric rate. These estimators, deeply studied through examples are in
particular -consistent and asymptotically Gaussian in the Cox model
and in the excess risk model, whatever is
The Impacts of the Climate Change Levy on Manufacturing: Evidence from Microdata
We estimate the impacts of the Climate Change Levy (CCL) on manufacturing plants using panel data from the UK production census. Our identification strategy builds on the comparison of outcomes between plants subject to the CCL and plants that were granted an 80% discount on the levy after joining a Climate Change Agreement (CCA). Exploiting exogenous variation in eligibility for CCA participation, we find that the CCL had a strong negative impact on energy intensity and electricity use. We cannot reject the hypothesis that the tax had no detrimental effects on economic performance and on plant exit.
The Impacts of the Climate Change Levy on business: Evidence from Microdata
We estimate the impacts of the Climate Change Levy (CCL) on manufacturing plants using panel data from the UK production census. Our identification strategy builds on the comparison of outcomes between plants subject to the CCL and plants that were granted an 80% discount on the levy after joining a Climate Change Agreement (CCA). Exploiting exogenous variation in eligibility for CCA participation, we find that the CCL had a strong negative impact on energy intensity and electricity use. We cannot reject the hypothesis that the tax had no detrimental effects on economic performance and on plant exit.Climate policy, carbon tax, United Kingdom, manufacturing, impact assessment
Unsupervised Classification for Tiling Arrays: ChIP-chip and Transcriptome
Tiling arrays make possible a large scale exploration of the genome thanks to
probes which cover the whole genome with very high density until 2 000 000
probes. Biological questions usually addressed are either the expression
difference between two conditions or the detection of transcribed regions. In
this work we propose to consider simultaneously both questions as an
unsupervised classification problem by modeling the joint distribution of the
two conditions. In contrast to previous methods, we account for all available
information on the probes as well as biological knowledge like annotation and
spatial dependence between probes. Since probes are not biologically relevant
units we propose a classification rule for non-connected regions covered by
several probes. Applications to transcriptomic and ChIP-chip data of
Arabidopsis thaliana obtained with a NimbleGen tiling array highlight the
importance of a precise modeling and the region classification
Anatomy of a Paradox: Management Practices, Organisational Structure and Energy Efficiency
This paper presents new evidence on managerial and organizational factors that explain firm level energy efficiency and TFP. We interviewed managers of 190 randomly selected manufacturing plants in the UK and matched their responses with official business microdata. We find that 'climate friendly' management practices are associated with lower energy intensity and higher TFP. Firms that adopt more such practices also engage in more R&D related to climate change. We show that the variation in management practices across firms can be explained in part by organizational structure. Firms are more likely to adopt climate friendly management practices if climate change issues are managed by the environmental or energy manager, and if this manager is close to the CEO. Our results support the view that the "energy efficiency paradox" can be explained by managerial factors and highlight their importance for private-sector innovation that will sustain future growth in energy efficiency.climate policy, energy efficiency, firm behavior, management practices, manufacturing,microdata, organizational structure
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