Traditional panel stochastic frontier models do not distinguish between unobserved individual heterogeneity and inefficiency. They thus force all time-invariant individual heterogeneity into the estimated inefficiency. Greene (2005) proposes a true fixed-effect stochastic frontier model which,...

In this paper, we provide micro-econometric evidence on the determinants of life insurance demand in China, the largest emerging market in the world. We employ the China Household Income Project (CHIP) dataset for the year 2002 in the analysis. The timing is ideal, because of the nature of the...

In this paper we consider a fixed-effects stochastic frontier model. That is, we have panel data, fixed individual (firm) effects, and the usual stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) composed error.

We consider a model that provides flexible parameterizations of the exogenous influences on inefficiency. In particular, we demonstrate the model's unique property of accommodating non-monotonic efficiency effect. With this non-monotonicity, production efficiency no longer increases or decreases...

Consider a stochastic frontier model with one-sided inefficiency u, and suppose that the scale of u depends on some variables (firm characteristics) z. A “one-step” model specifies both the stochastic frontier and the way in which u depends on z, and can be estimated in a single step, for...