The value of selecting the best forecasting model as the basis for empirical economic policy analysis is questioned. When no model coincides with the data generation process, non-causal statistical devices may provide the best available forecasts: examples from recent work include intercept...

The relationships between real wages, output per capita, inflation and unemployment in Italy between 1970 and 1994, are modelled using a cointegrated vector autoregression. There is evidence of a change in the underlying equilibria and in the dynamic evolution of the variables, probably...

The relationship between wages, prices, productivity, inflation and unemployment in Italy, Poland, and the UK between the 1960s and the early 1990s is modelled as a cointegrated vector autoregression subject to regime shifts. For each of these economies there is clear evidence of a change in the...

This paper considers the implications of structural breaks, such as have occurred in many transition economies, for econometric modelling based on the multivariate cointegration paradigm. It outlines recent developments on the identification of linear cointegrated systems, discusses some...

There has been a dramatic surge in Islamic participation and values since the 1970s.  We propose a theory of the contemporary Islamic revival based upon two forms of relative deprivation - envy and unfulfilled aspirations.  To analyze these motivations, a behavioral model of religion is...

Game harmony is a generic game property that can be used to predict cooperation in both generic and well-known normal form games. It describes how harmonious (non-conflictual) or disharmonious (conflictual) the interests of players are, as embodied in the payoffs. Pure coordination games are...

It is often claimed that large buyers wield buyer power.  Existing theories of this effect generally assume upstream monopoly.  Yet the evidence is strongest with upstream competition.  We show that upstream competition can yield buyer power for large buyers by generating supplier-level...

In many rural settings, informal mutual support networks have evolved into semiformal insurance groups, such as funeral societies.  Using detailed panel data for six villages in Ethiopia, we can distinguish two types of contracts, in terms of whether payments are only made at the time of death...

Data from three bargaining games - the Dictator Game, the Ultimatum Game, and the Third-Party Punishment Game - played in 15 societies are presented.  The societies range from US undergraduates to Amazonian, Arctic, and African hunter-gatherers.  Behaviour within the games varies markedly...

Financial liberalisation and innovation (FLIB) in Australia over the 1980s and 1990s provided the institutional backdrop for one of the most rapid increases in household balance sheets and house prices in the world.  An equilibrium correction model of quarterly Australian house prices for...