This paper contributes to the debate on the inducement of environmental innovations by analysing the extent to which endogenous inducement mechanisms spur the generation of greener technologies in contexts characterized by weak exogenous inducement pressures. In the presence of a fragile environmental regulatory framework, inducement can indeed be endogenous and environmental innovations may be...

Google Econometrics and Unemployment Forecasting The current economic crisis requires fast information to predict economic behavior early, which is difficult at times of structural changes. This paper suggests an innovative new method of using data on internet activity for that purpose. It demonstrates strong correlations between keyword searches and unemployment rates using monthly German data...

This paper proposes a possible framework for identifying excessive investment. Based on this method, it finds evidence that some types of investment are becoming excessive in China, particularly in inland provinces. In these regions, private consumption has on average become more dependent on investment (rather than vice versa) and the impact is relatively short-lived, necessitating ever higher...

This paper evaluates the effect of High Speed Rail (HSR) projects on the economic growth of targeted city nodes (HSR cities) in China using prefectural-level city data from 1990 to 2013. Employing a panel data program evaluation method devised by Hsiao, Chin and Wan (2012), we construct hypothetical counterfactuals for per capita real GDP of HSR cities in the absence of their respective HSR pro...

This study investigates the origins of the guild revolts in late medieval central Europe. At first, using newly compiled city level data, their temporal evolution and spatial distribution is discussed. Afterwards, the paper provides a historical discussion and empirical analysis of their origins. The results show that pre-existing city-level political institutions and location in a large territ...

Sales price indices for the Chicago multifamily real estate market are developed in order to examine the influence that designating an area a tax increment financing district (TIF) has on the real property appreciation rates. Chicago is a community with a long history of TIF investment and a patchwork of more than 130 established TIF districts, comprising over 29 percent of the city’s total acr...

Paul Winters and Susana Sitja Rubio The purpose of this guideline is to discuss the objectives and approaches of regional (subnational) development programs in order to provide guidance on issues related to evaluating the impact of these programs. Regional development programs are designed to improve the income-generating capacity of, and reduce poverty in, a focus region within a country. The ...

A blossoming stream of the regional innovation systems (RIS) literature is being devoted to investigate the relationship between RIS efficiency and productivity growth. Our study aims at evaluating: first, the ex-post relative technical efficiency in innovation in a sample of OECD regions by means of a DEA (data envelopment analysis) methodology. We will also match these results with regression...

Prediction Markets for Economic Forecasting Prediction markets – markets used to forecast future events – have been used to accurately forecast the outcome of political contests, sporting events, and, occasionally, economic outcomes. This chapter summarizes the latest research on prediction markets in order to further their utilization by economic forecasters. We show that prediction markets ha...