The Demand for Medical Care in Urban China

This is the first paper to investigate the determinants of the demand for medical care in the People's Republic of China. It uses a data set that consists of detailed characteristics of 6407 urban households, a continuous measure of health care spending, and price. A two-part model and a discrete factor model are used in the estimation. Household characteristics and work conditions impact the demand for medical care. Income elasticity is around 0.3, indicating medical care is a necessity. Medical care demand is price inelastic, and price elasticity is larger in absolute value for poorer households.

Theft and Deterrence

We report results from economic experiments of decisions that are best described as petty larceny, with high school and college students who can anonymously steal real money from each other. Our design allows exogenous variation in the rewards of crime, and the penalty and probability of detection. We find that the probability of stealing is increasing in the amount of money that can be stolen, and that it is decreasing in the probability of getting caught and in the penalty for getting caught. Furthermore, the impact of the certainty of getting caught is larger when the penalty is bigger, and the impact of the penalty is bigger when the probability of getting caught is larger.crime, punishment, incentives, deterrence, juvenile, arrest, risk, larceny

An Experimental Test of Criminal Behavior Among Juveniles and Young Adults

We report results from economic experiments that provide a direct test of the hypothesis that criminal behavior responds rationally to changes in the possible rewards and in the probability and severity of punishment. The experiments involve decisions that are best described as petty larceny, and are done using high school and college students who can anonymously take real money from each other. We find that decisions about whether and how much to steal are, in general, rational and responsive to the variations in tradeoffs, and sometimes, though not always, to the overall availability of criminal opportunities.

Theft and Deterrence

We report results from economic experiments of decisions that are best described as petty larceny, with high school and college students who can anonymously steal real money from each other. Our design allows exogenous variation in the rewards of crime, and the penalty and probability of detection. We find that the probability of stealing is increasing in the amount of money that can be stolen, and that it is decreasing in the probability of getting caught and in the penalty for getting caught. Furthermore, the impact of the certainty of getting caught is larger when the penalty is bigger, and the impact of the penalty is bigger when the probability of getting caught is larger.

Effects of processing on polyphenolic and volatile composition and fruit quality of clery strawberries

Strawberries belonging to cultivar Clery (Fragaria x ananassa (Duchesne ex Weston)), cultivated in central Italy were subjected to a multi‐methodological experimental study. Fresh and defrosted strawberries were exposed to different processing methods, such as homogenization, thermal and microwave treatments. The homogenate samples were submitted to CIEL*a*b* color analysis and Head‐Space GC/MS analysis to determine the impact of these procedures on phytochemical composition. Furthermore, the corresponding strawberry hydroalcoholic extracts were further analyzed by HPLC‐DAD for secondary metabolites quantification and by means of spectrophotometric in vitro assays to evaluate their total phenolic and total flavonoid contents and antioxidant activity. These chemical investigations confirmed the richness in bioactive metabolites supporting the extraordinary healthy potential of this fruit as a food ingredient, as well as functional food, highlighting the strong influence of the processing steps which could negatively impact on the polyphenol composition. Despite a more brilliant red color and aroma preservation, nonpasteurized samples were characterized by a lower content of polyphenols and antioxidant activity with respect to pasteurized samples, as also suggested by the PCA analysis of the collected data

Women and Illegal Activities: Gender Differences and Women's Willingness to Comply Over Time

In recent years the topics of illegal activities such as corruption or tax evasion have attracted a great deal of attention. However, there is still a lack of substantial empirical evidence about the determinants of compliance. The aim of this paper is to investigate empirically whether women are more willing to be compliant than men and whether we observe (among women and in general) differences in attitudes among similar age groups in different time periods (cohort effect) or changing attitudes of the same cohorts over time (age effect) using data from eight Western European countries from the World Values Survey and the European Values Survey that span the period from 1981 to 1999. The results reveal higher willingness to comply among women and an age rather than a cohort effect. Working Paper 06-5

Comment on the consensus report on the management of hyperglycaemia in Type 2 diabetes by the American Diabetes Association and the European Association for the Study of Diabetes

Letter to the edito

Taming the pandemic? The importance of homemade plant-based foods and beverages as community responses to COVID-19

Household responses to COVID-19 in different corners of the world represent the primary health care that communities have relied on for preventing and mitigating symptoms. During a very complex and confusing time, in which public health services in multiple countries have been completely overwhelmed, and in some cases even collapsed, these first-line household responses have been quintessential for building physical, mental, and social resilience, and for improving individual and community health. This editorial discusses the outcomes of a rapid-response preliminary survey during the first phase of the pandemic among social and community contacts in five metropolises heavily affected by the COVID-19 health crisis (Wuhan, Milan, Madrid, New York, and Rio de Janeiro), and in twelve rural areas or countries initially less affected by the pandemic (Appalachia, Jamaica, Bolivia, Romania, Belarus, Lithuania, Poland, Georgia, Turkey, Pakistan, Cambodia, and South Africa). We summarized our perspectives as 17 case studies, observing that people have relied primarily on teas and spices (“food-medicines”) and that there exist clear international plant favorites, popularized by various new media. Urban diasporas and rural households seem to have repurposed homemade plant-based remedies that they use in normal times for treating the flu and other respiratory symptoms or that they simply consider healthy foods. The most remarkable shift in many areas has been the increased consumption of ginger and garlic, followed by onion, turmeric, and lemon. Our preliminary inventory of food medicines serves as a baseline for future systematic ethnobotanical studies and aims to inspire in-depth research on how use patterns of plant-based foods and beverages, both “traditional” and “new”, are changing during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Our reflections in this editorial call attention to the importance of ethnobiology, ethnomedicine, and ethnogastronomy research into domestic health care strategies for improving community health

Global economic crisis and corruption

© 2014, Springer Science+Business Media New York. We study the effects of the 2008–2009 global economic crisis on the household experience of bribing public officials. The data come from the Life in Transition-2 survey, conducted in 2010 in 30 post-socialist economies of Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia. We find that households hit by crisis are more likely to bribe and, among people who bribe, crisis victims bribe a wider range of public officials than non-victims. The crisis victims are also more likely to pay bribes because public officials ask them to do so and less likely because of gratitude. The link between crisis and bribery is stronger in the poorest countries of the region. Our findings support the conjecture that public officials misuse sensitive information about crisis victims to inform bribe extortion decisions