We apply recent results from the statistics literature to test for multimodality of worldwide distributions of several (unweighted and population-weighted) measures of labor productivity. Specifically, we employ Silverman (Bump) and Dip modality tests, calibrated to correct for their incorrect...

This paper presents a method to test for multimodality of an estimated kernel density of derivative estimates from a nonparametric regression. The test is included in a study of nonparametric growth regressions. The results show that in the estimation of unconditional β-convergence the...

This paper investigates how students’ collegiate athletic participation affects their subsequent labor market success. By using newly developed techniques in nonparametric regression, it shows that on average former college athletes earn a wage premium. However, the premium is not uniform, but...

This paper uses non-parametric kernel methods to construct observation-specific elasticities of substitution for a balanced panel of 73 developed and developing countries to examine the capital-skill complementarity hypothesis. The exercise shows some support for capital-skill complementarity,...

In this paper we used the procedures developed in the Kumar and Russell (2002) growth-accounting study to examine cross-country growth during the 1990's. Using a data set comprising developed, newly industrialized, developing and transitional economies, we decomposed the growth of output per...

In this paper we use the Kumar and Russell ["American Economic Review" (2002) Vol. 92, pp. 527-548] growth-accounting procedure to examine cross-country growth during the 1990s. Using a data set comprising developed, newly industrialized, developing and transitional economies, we decompose the...

Is public expenditure productive? Is there a shortfall or excess in public capital investment? We address these old issues in the light of new econometric tools. It is argued that the Cobb-Douglas specification that ignores nonlinearity inherent in the functional relationship of the production...

Despite the solid theoretical foundation on which the gravity model of bilateral trade is based, empirical implementation requires several assumptions which do not follow directly from the underlying theory. First, unobserved trade costs are assumed to be a (log-)linear function of observables....