Ana Jesús López

A Multidimensional Analysis of the Disability Digital Divide: Some Evidence for Internet Use

Over the last few years, information and communication technologies have become an essential part of daily life, affecting education, employment, and leisure, among other activities. Nonetheless, many individuals still reap few or no benefits from these technologies, and there are resilient gaps in their use. Within this larger context, the authors examine the Internet digital divide between people with and without disabilities from a multidimensional approach. Rather than analyzing the gap in terms of “haves” and “have-nots,” a range of Internet-related dimensions—affordability, motivation and attitudes, skills, usage, and others—is taken into account.

Some empirical evidence on Internet diffusion in the New Member States and Candidate Countries of the European Union

This article contributes to the line of research devoted to the diffusion of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). In particular, we analyse Internet adoption in the New Member States (NMS) and Candidate Countries (CC) of the European Union, for which empirical evidence is quite scarce. Results confirm that income, educational attainment and age are the main determinants of Internet use. Nonetheless, there are substantial differences in the impacts of such variables in the nine analysed countries.

Response surface estimates of stationarity tests with a structural break

Abstract Standard stationarity tests are affected by structural breaks. Therefore, modified tests have been developed including changes in the intercept and/or slope. In this work, response surfaces for a modified stationarity test are estimated allowing the approximation of critical values for different break locations and sample sizes.

What drives broadband diffusion? Evidence from Eastern Europe

Recent studies stress the crucial role of broadband diffusion to enhance economic growth and performance. Therefore, the analysis of the factors shaping its diffusion becomes a matter of special importance. In this context, this article examines the impact of several socio-economic factors on the likelihood of broadband subscription, using a bivariate probit model, and making use of a unique data survey among Eastern European households. This is an area where broadband diffusion is just starting to take off and there is a lack of empirical evidence. In this context, a first interesting point is the fact that certain demographic variables (income and education) appear to be more correlated with Internet access as such than with the type of access. Moreover, the substantial differences in cross-country penetration rates are mainly explained by investments in information and communication technologies together with the level of competition in telecommunications markets.

Combining economic forecasts through information measures

The increasing number of prospective sources and methods provides a wide variety of forecasts for a given economic variable. Therefore, the theory suggests the convenience of combining the individual results to obtain a single aggregated prediction. The traditional methods for combining forecasts are based on the relative past performance of the forecasts to be combined. However, the number of forecasters is increasing considerably in the last years so it is not possible to have enough information about their past forecast task. This article focuses on the information theory as a framework to combine experts’ forecasts when information is limited. More specifically, we use the principle of entropy maximization to obtain a combined forecast from Shannons measure (1948) and we also propose its extension to the quadratic uncertainty measure (Pérez, 1985). The empirical behaviour of both procedures is tested over a pool of forecasts referring to Spanish economic growth.

Are People with Disabilities Losing the ICT Revolution? Some Evidence on European Countries

This paper contributes to the line of research devoted to the diffusion of Information and Communication Technologies. We analyse patterns of Internet diffusion across people with disabilities in ten European countries, a geographical area for which empirical evidence is scarce. Results show that disability status has a significant negative effect on the probability of being an Internet user, even for those with higher income and educational attainment. However, we find no significant relationship between disability and frequency of Internet use. Therefore, it seems that once online the digital divide between people with disabilities and the rest of the population attenuate, at least to some extent.

On Economic Applications of Information Theory

In many of his writings, lectures and talks Pedro Gil emphasized the wide variety of economic applications of Information Theory. In this paper, as a tribute to him, we aim to provide some insight into this topic, mainly referred to income inequality, industrial concentration and economic forecasting.

Figuring Figures: Exploring Europeans’ Knowledge of Official Economic Statistics

Abstract Economic issues have been a major concern for Europeans in the last few years. In this context, it is reasonable to suppose that people are aware of the main economic figures regarding Europe. But are they really familiar with them? Do they know what the rates of growth, unemployment and inflation are? The aim of this article is to explore the level of knowledge of these three economic indicators among Europeans. Several regression models are specified and estimated in order to identify the relationship between an individual’s knowledge and their socioeconomic profile, use of the Internet, perceived importance of economic issues and official statistics and trust in them. Cross-country differences are also assessed.

Analyzing ICT Adoption across European Regions

Information and communication technology (ICT) has been the driver of the major economic and social changes that have taken place in the last ten years. Hence, the European ICT sector accounts for 5 percent of gross domestic product, and contributes to productivity growth in a 20 percent (European Commission, 2010). Services are increasingly being delivered online. And for more and more people the internet has become a major component of their daily life. Over 250 million Europeans use the internet every day (European Commission, 2010). Within this context, the evaluation of the state of ICT in a territory has become key issue. In fact, there have been several calls for monitoring and benchmarking ICT at international, national and regional levels. Hence, the World Summit on the Information Society stated the need for international evaluation of information society developments. Likewise, successive European action plans for the information society (eEurope and i2010) have considered several measures and indicators to track ICT diffusion across the member states. Nevertheless, little is known about the regional spread of ICT. Most evidence has focused on American states (Atkinson and Andes, 2010), while the references to Europe are scarce (Billon et al., 2008, 2009; Vicente and Lopez, 2010).