The hypothesis that individuals try to maximize their life-satisfaction is analyzed. The approach was to derive empirically testable predictions as to the relationships between intentions, actions, importance weights, and satisfaction levels that would be consistent with the hypothesis, and to test these predictions on a Russian and a German panel data set. The respondents investigated were mor...

Refinancing a mortgage is often one of the biggest and most important financial decisions that people make. Borrowers need to choose the interest rate differential at which to refinance and, when that differential is reached, they need to take the steps to refinance before rates change again. The optimal differential is where the interest saved by refinancing equals the sum of refinancing costs...

The authors use panel data constructed from the responses of repeatedly surveyed top managers at 261 companies regarding their firm’s market orientation, along with objective performance measures, to investigate the influence of market orientation on performance for a nine-year period from 1997 to 2005. The authors measure market orientation in 1997, 2001, and 2005 and estimate it in the interv...

The paper uses a modern adaptation of the Ricardian model which incorporates monopolistic competition and multiple factors to derive a MacDougall-type relation between a country’s international competitiveness at the industry level and its productivity performance. This relation is implemented empirically for Canada and the United States, using panel data for 25 years and 40 industries. A key f...

This work was completed while the second author was visiting the Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies (IMES), Bank of Japan (BOJ). He would like to thank the Institute for the hospitality and research support. We would also like to thank two referees and the staff of the institute for helpful comments on an early draft. However, the views expressed in this paper are solely the authors’ o...

This panel highlights a selection of the most interesting and provocative papers from the 2004 New Security Paradigms Workshop. This workshop was held September 2004 the URL for more information is . The panel consists of authors of the selected papers, and the session is moderated by the workshop’s general chairs. We present selected papers focusing on exciting major theme...

Article history: Accepted 14 January 2011 JEL classification: D43 J29 J69 L60

There is strong evidence that house prices and consumption are closely synchronized. There is, however, disagreement over the causes of this link. This paper examines if there is a wealth effect of house prices on consumption. We use a rich household level panel data set with information about house ownership, income, wealth, and demographics for a large sample of the Danish population in the p...

This paper addresses the issue of price negotiation between a municipality and a private water utility operator, and its implications for residential water demand estimation. Because negotiated price may depend on municipality’s specific characteristics, competing forms of price endogeneity have to be considered when using panel data. The impact of variables such as average income, housing and ...