This paper analyzes firm level adjustment of the product mix and its implications for aggregate output growth. Using firm level panel data from Ethiopian manufacturing during the period 1996-2007, it shows that about 30% of firms adjust their 'extensive margin' annually by adding and/or dropping...

I apply a common factor approach to identifying substitution possibilities between input factors in a factor demand system. Technological changes can lead to shifts in the relative use of input factors within an industry. Technological changes can also be common to several industries. If such...

In most OECD-countries, labour demand has shifted from unskilled to skilled over time. Many analyses of this phenomenon focus on either the effect of technical change, capital-skill complementarity or labour-labour substitution. We present a more general analysis of labour demand in Norwegian...

An applied econometric study of aggregation, based on an unbalanced panel data set for manu-facturing plants is presented. Panel data are informative in examining aggregation of variables, parameters, and relationships empirically since they (i) allow estimation at both the micro and the macro...

National and international expansion of transmission networks and diminishing returns to scale in hydropower capacity expansion has raised the opportunity cost of electricity. The resulting changes in comparative advantage between industries have in many countries been counteracted by government...

In medieval times, most people identifi ed with religious values and aggregate income and productivity grew at glacier speed. In the 20th century, religion played a much lesser role in daily life and income and productivity grew at high and unprecedented rates. The present paper develops a...

In this paper, we revisit the association between happiness and inequality. We argue that the perceived fairness of the income generation process affects this association. Building on a two-period model of individual life-time utility maximization, we predict that persons with higher perceived...

From 1997 to 2005, an astonishing 5,200 million USD was invested to reduce cocaine production in Colombia, the world's main cocaine producer. However, little is known about the effectiveness of policies targeting coca cultivation. This paper uses a surveybased experiment to evaluate the effects...

Approximately 1.2% of Colombia's GNP is spent every year on the war on drugs, but very little is known about coca farming decisions at the household level. In order to understand the decision to cultivate coca as well as that of the amount of land to use for its cultivation, we develop an...

Although empowerment is seen as intrinsically important and instrumentally valuable to escape poverty, there is very little research on the empirical drivers of empowerment. Using custom-made household-level information and using advanced econometric techniques that also correct for endogeneity,...