This paper shows that conditional subsidies aimed at certain kinds of goods do not merely generate the traditional excess burden: there is an alternative welfare loss as the distortion affects good characteristics rather than prices. We provide empirical evidence of the welfare loss after...

The bulk of the literature investigating persistence properties of non-renewable resource prices series has focused on application of unit root tests. This paper contributes to the debate, applying a methodology which allows (1) robust detection of the presence and (if so) the number of changes,...

The bulk of the literature investigating persistence properties of non-renewable resource prices series has focused on application of unit root tests. This paper contributes to the debate, applying a methodology which allows (1) robust detection of the presence and (if so) the number of changes,...

The framework of stationarity testing is extended to allow a generic smooth trend function estimated nonparametrically. The asymptotic behavior of the pseudo-Lagrange multiplier test is analyzed in this setting. The proposed implementation delivers a consistent test whose limiting null...

Quantile regression models are examined from the standpoint of their suitability to analyse company profitability. Some linear and non-linear ("B"-spline) structures are proposed. Linear conditional quantile models provide an intuitive framework which permits conventional statistical inference...