Doctoral Dissertations in Economics One-Hundred-Second Annual List

Journal of Economic Literature, December 2005

On Doctors, Mechanics, and Computer Specialists: The Economics of Credence Goods

By Uwe Dulleck and Rudolf Kerschbamer

Journal of Economic Literature, March 2006

Most of us need the services of an expert when our apartment's heating or our washing machine breaks down, or when our car starts to make strange noises. And for most of us, commissioning an expert to solve the problem causes concern. This concern does no...

What Determines Cartel Success?

By Margaret C. Levenstein and Valerie Y. Suslow

Journal of Economic Literature, March 2006

Following George Stigler (1964), many economists assume that incentive problems undermine attempts by firms to collude to raise prices and restrict output. But the potential profits from collusion can create a powerful incentive as well. Theory cannot tel...

Annotated Listing of New Books

Journal of Economic Literature, March 2006

JEL Classification System

Journal of Economic Literature, March 2006

The Impact of Economic Conditions on Participation in Disability Programs: Evidence from the Coal Boom and Bust

By Dan Black, Kermit Daniel, and Seth Sanders

American Economic Review, March 2002

We examine the impact of the coal boom of the 1970's and the coal bust of the 1980's on disability program participation. These shocks provide clear evidence that as the value of labor-market participation increases, disability program participation falls...

Endogenous Federal Grants and Crowd-out of State Government Spending: Theory and Evidence from the Federal Highway Aid Program

By Brian Knight

American Economic Review, March 2002

Contrary to simple theoretical predictions, existing evidence suggests that federal grants do not crowd out state government spending. A legislative bargaining model with endogenous grants documents a positive correlation between grant receipts and prefer...

Increasing Returns and All That: A View from Trade

By Werner Antweiler and Daniel Trefler

American Economic Review, March 2002

Do scale economies help to explain international trade flows? Using a large database on output, trade flows, and factor endowments, we find that allowing for the presence of increasing returns to scale in production significantly increases our ability to ...

Geographic Localization of International Technology Diffusion

By Wolfgang Keller

American Economic Review, March 2002

Income convergence across countries turns on whether technological knowledge spillovers are global or local. I estimate the amount of spillovers from R&D expenditures on a geographic basis, using a new data set which encompasses most of the world's in...

Plant-Level Irreversible Investment and Equilibrium Business Cycles

By Marcelo L. Veracierto

American Economic Review, March 2002

This paper evaluates the importance of microeconomic irreversibilities for aggregate dynamics using a real-business-cycle (RBC) model characterized by investment irreversibilities at the establishment level. The main finding is that investment irreversibi...

How Important Is Human Capital for Development? Evidence from Immigrant Earnings

By Lutz Hendricks

American Economic Review, March 2002

This paper offers new evidence on the sources of cross-country income differences. It exploits the idea that observing immigrant workers from different countries in the same labor market provides an opportunity to estimate their human-capital endowments. ...

Journal Pricing and Mergers: A Portfolio Approach

By Mark J. McCabe

American Economic Review, March 2002

Do Women Pay More for New Vehicles? Evidence from Transaction Price Data

By David W. Harless and George E. Hoffer

American Economic Review, March 2002

Did Community Rating Induce an Adverse Selection Death Spiral? Evidence from New York, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut

By Thomas Buchmueller and John Dinardo

American Economic Review, March 2002

The Rise in Old-Age Longevity and the Market for Long-Term Care

By Darius Lakdawalla and Tomas Philipson

American Economic Review, March 2002

Public Schooling for Young Children and Maternal Labor Supply

By Jonah B. Gelbach

American Economic Review, March 2002

A Century of Missing Trade?

By Antoni Estevadeordal and Alan M. Taylor

American Economic Review, March 2002

The Case of the Missing Trade and Other Mysteries: Comment

By Patrick J. Conway

American Economic Review, March 2002

Policy-Driven Productivity in Chile and Mexico in the 1980's and 1990's

By Raphael Bergoeing, Patrick J. Kehoe, Timothy J. Kehoe, and Raimundo Soto

American Economic Review, May 2002

Accounting for the Great Depression

By V. V. Chari, Patrick J. Kehoe, and Ellen R. McGrattan

American Economic Review, May 2002