The backward-bending commute times of married women with household responsibility

The purpose of this paper is to examine theoretically and empirically whether the commute times of married women follow a backward-bending pattern with respect to wage rates. The existing literature has shown that married women tend to choose short commutes because of their relatively low wages combined with comparatively heavy household responsibilities. However, a workleisure model, which includes the simultaneous decision wives take regarding commute times and wage rates, suggests that married women employed in highly paid positions also undertake short commutes, while married women with wage rates in the middle range choose long commutes. These results suggest that the commute times of married women display a backward-bending pattern. Applying an instrumental variable strategy that accounts for the endogeneity of wage rates, the empirical results for employed married women in Japan appear to support this nding. Moreover, one of our results suggests that highly paid married women can still secure greater leisure time with short commutes, despite retaining a heavy load of domestic responsibilities.Working Paper, No.234, 2008.9.1版http://hdl.handle.net/10110/254

A test of the signalling hypothesis

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:3631.125105(80) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

The Effect of Development Impact Fees on Land Values*

This paper presents an empirical analysis of the effect of impact fees on the value of land used in residential development. A random effects model is estimated to examine the relationship between impact fees and land values using forty-three Texas cities that impose impact fees. Prior research suggests that higher impact fees result in higher lot values, and the results of this research support this suggestion. Results indicate that for each $1,000 increase in impact fees, lot values increase by 1.3 percent. Additionally, these results suggest that developers are able to pass a small amount of the impact fee to the owners of developable land. However, for undeveloped land the results are mixed. For each$1,000 in assessed impact fees, undeveloped land values decrease by 0.042 percent. These results support prior evidence that suggests home buyers may ultimately bear the majority of the cost of impact fees. Copyright 2005 Blackwell Publishing Ltd..

Studiengebühren in Deutschland: Drei Thesen und ihr empirischer Gehalt

Several Länder in Germany have introduced, or are about to introduce, tuition fees for higher education. We discuss three hypotheses pertaining to (i) their distributional effects, (ii) their effect on the demand for higher education and study behaviour, and (iii) the competition and financial resources effects. We utilize a large number of empirical studies and other country experiences to assess likely effects in Germany. We conclude that fees are likely to reduce enrolment modestly and that the existing system of higher education financing is probably regressive. Tuition fees will reduce regressiveness only if they replace tax-financed funding, which conflicts with the objective of increasing resources for universities, however. We are sceptical about the latter happening. Copyright 2007 die Autoren Journal compilation 2007, Verein für Socialpolitik und Blackwell Publishing Ltd.