Do drivers reduce speeds when gasoline prices are high? Previous research investigating this energy conservation hypothesis produced mixed results. We take a fresh look at the data and estimate a significant negative relationship between speeding and gasoline prices. This presents a new...

Every year from 2000 to 2010, our planet lost native forests roughly the size of Costa Rica (FAO 2010). This rapid deforestation has dramatically changed the chemical composition of the world’s atmosphere, the level of biodiversity, and the presence of vegetation key to maintaining watershed...

Although weather shocks are a major source of income fluctuation, most of the world's poor lack insurance coverage against them. Absence of formal insurance contributes to poverty traps, as investment decisions are conflicted with risk management ones: risk-averse farmers tend to underinvest and...

We measure and examine data error in health, education and income statistics used to construct the Human Development Index. We identify three sources of data error which are due to (i) data updating, (ii) formula revisions and (iii) thresholds to classify a country's development status. We...

Do drivers reduce speeds when gasoline prices are high? Previous research investigating this energy conservation hypothesis produced mixed results. We take a fresh look at the data and estimate a significant negative relationship between speeding and gasoline prices. This presents a new...

Most activities in life require a certain amount of continuous time. Yet, in the traditional economic model of time allocation, the time block is not taken into account. Hence, the same amount of utility is derived from an activity regardless of whether it is performed continuously over one time...