Poverty dominance analysis uses stochastic dominance to provide rankings of distributions in terms of poverty which are not sensitive to the choice of poverty line. This analysis is carried out for Ireland using Household Budget Survey data for 1987 and 1994 including tests for the statistical...

In Ireland, approximately 30 per cent of the population (medical cardholders) receive free GP services while the remainder (non-medical cardholders) must pay for each visit. In 1989, the manner in which GPs were reimbursed by the State for their medical cardholder patients was changed from...

This paper uses duration analysis to investigate the role of tobacco taxes in starting and quitting smoking. Applying a variety of parametric duration models, including a split population model, to a sample of Irish women, it finds that in general tobacco taxes do influence starting and quitting...

This paper analyses the pure time-series properties of doctors’ fees in Ireland to assess whether a structural change in the series is observed at the time of the change in reimbursement in 1989. Such a break would be consistent with doctors responding to the reimbursement change in a manner...

There is a well-established debate between Heckman sample selection and two-part models in health econometrics, particularly when no obvious exclusion restrictions are available. Most of this debate has focussed on the application of these models to health care expenditure. This paper revisits...

When measuring poverty over time analysts must choose the value of the income elasticity of the poverty line, which essentially determines whether an absolute or relative poverty line is being used. The choice of this parameter is ultimately a value judgement, but this paper suggests an approach...

This paper examines Irish demand patterns using conditional demand functions. This overcomes the problems faced by traditional demand analysis which neglects the influence of labor supply and thus assumes weak separability. The conditional approach allows for more exact tests of weak...