This essay develops a new method to diagnose inconsistency in dichotomous choice contingent valuation with follow-up questions: in particular, downward bias in the mean WTP. It is shown that the previous methods aimed to explain this inconsistency in responses have ignored statistical...

Given the current situation with the high price of oil (an average of $53 per barrel in 2005) and the risk of global warming, the European Union (EU) is reinforcing its objectives related to the production of biofuels: they should account for 5.75% of the overall fuel consumption by 2010 in...

In a model with two basic innovations that are fundamental to the development of an application, we investigate whether a patent pool can rectify the lack of incentives for developers to invest in applications when basic innovators themselves cannot develop follow-up applications. Furthermore,...

Organic production, while still a niche market in U.S. agriculture, is growing at a rapid rate. This paper argues that organic producers, particularly those seeking certification to sell at the retail level, share many characteristics with conventional producers who opt for contracting over...

Land-use change is arguably the most pervasive socioeconomic force driving the change and degradation of watershed ecosystems. This paper combines an econometric model of land use choice with three models of watershed health indicators (conventional water pollution, toxic water pollution, and...

The Dixit entry/exit real option model was applied to the entry/exit decisions of New York dairy farmers. For the cost structure of a 500-cow farm the entry milk price is $17.52 per hundredweight (cwt.) and the exit milk price is $10.84. For the 50-cow farm cost structure the entry price is...

In this study, a market segmentation approach is developed and applied to analyze U.S. household cheese purchases. The segmentation is based on household interpurchase time or the hazard rate of purchases. The hazard rate for a household belonging to a given segment is a function of household...

The use of protected areas as a fishery management tool has been suggested as a hedge against management failures and variation in harvests. A stochastic bioeconomic model of a two-species fishery will be used to test the performance of protected areas as a management tool in a fishery with...