Beck A. Taylor

Change in family income-to-needs matters more for children with less

Hierarchical linear modeling was used to model the dynamics of family income-to-needs for participants of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care (N = 1,364) from the time that children were 1 through 36 months of age. Associations between change in income-to-needs and 36-month child outcomes (i.e., school readiness, receptive language, expressive language, positive social behavior, and behavior problems) were examined. Although change in income-to-needs proved to be of little importance for children from nonpoor families, it proved to be of great importance for children from poor families. For children in poverty, decreases in income-to-needs were associated with worse outcomes and increases were associated with better outcomes. In fact, when children from poor families experienced increases in income-to-needs that were at least 1 SD above the mean change for poor families, they displayed outcomes similar to their nonpoor peers. The practical importance and policy implications of these findings are discussed.

Incomes and Outcomes in Early Childhood.

Prior research has identified statistically significant but small income effects for children’s cognitive, language, and social outcomes. We examine the impact of family economic resources on developmental outcomes in early childhood, the stage of life during which developmental psychologists have suggested income effects should be largest. Using participants from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care, we estimate income effects that are comparable in absolute terms to those reported in previous research. Relative income effect sizes are found to have practical significance, however, both within our sample, and compared to participation in Early Head Start.

Losing to Win: Tournament Incentives in the National Basketball Association

The focus of tournament models has been rank‐order compensation schemes whereby participants receive higher payments for higher relative performance, either incrementally or winner‐takes‐all. Our research focuses on a unique tournament that offers rewards for both winning and losing, specifically the National Basketball Association’s regularly scheduled season of games. We examine three NBA seasons to determine whether team performance responded to changes in the underlying tournament incentives provided by the NBA’s introduction and restructuring of the lottery system to determine draft order. Our results yield strong evidence that NBA teams are more likely to lose when incentives to lose are present.

Maximum or Minimum Differentiation? Location Patterns of Retail Outlets

We empirically test implications from location theory using the location of Los Angeles-area gasoline stations in physical space and in the space of product attributes. We consider the effect of demand patterns, entry costs, and several proxies for competition on the tendency for a gasoline station to be physically located more or less closely to its competitors. Using an estimation procedure that controls for spatial autocorrelation and spatial autoregression, and controlling for market characteristics and nonspatial product attributes, we find considerable evidence that firms locate their stations in an attempt to spatially differentiate their product as market competition increases.

Implications of Family Income Dynamics for Women’s Depressive Symptoms During the First 3 Years After Childbirth

OBJECTIVES We examined within-person associations between changes in family income and womens depressive symptoms during the first 3 years after childbirth. METHODS Data were analyzed for 1351 women (mean baseline age = 28.13 years) who participated in the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care. Nineteen percent of these women belonged to an ethnic minority, and 35% were poor at some time during the study. RESULTS Changes in income and poverty status were significantly associated with changes in depressive symptoms. Effects were greatest for chronically poor women and for women who perceived fewer costs associated with their employment. CONCLUSIONS Given that women head most poor households in the United States, our findings indicate that reductions in poverty would have mental health benefits for women and families.

Interactions between Personality Type and the Experimental Methods.

The authors bring together two research streams in the literature that examine separately the effectiveness of using experiments in the principles classroom and the relationship between different personality types and student achievement. Using a sample of 255 principles of microeconomics students, 48 of whom were enrolled in sections that relied heavily on classroom experiments, they estimate the effectiveness of experimental teaching across personality types defined by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Although students enrolled in the experimental sections generally outperformed students in lecture-oriented classes, the authors ask whether students with certain personality types (and corresponding learning styles) would have performed better under traditional pedagogy. The experimental approach appears to benefit, or be neutral with respect to, most personality types and learning styles. Some evidence indicates that students in the experimental classroom whose thinking tends to be more concrete and factual may not perform as well as more abstract thinkers.

Rural isolation and the availability of hospital services

Abstract This study empirically examines some important factors affecting the geographic distribution of hospitals. Using 1996 cross-sectional data on hospital locations in Texas, we employ a count-data methodology to estimate the impact of demand and rural isolation on the frequency of hospital service in a given geographical area. Using the models estimates, we calculate the population thresholds needed to support a given frequency. Results suggest that population, population density, per capita income, and rural isolation are important factors in determining the number of hospitals in an area. Our methodology and results provide a means to inform and evaluate policy decisions regarding the designation of medically underserved areas.

Retail Characteristics and Ownership Structure

The choice of vertical relationships between an upstream manufacturer and a set of heterogeneous downstream retailers/entrepreneurs is examined using a principal-agent framework. Standard principal-agent theory predicts that as unobservable effort exerted by the retailer/entrepreneur becomes more important to the manufacturer, contracts between the manufacturer and agent will entail strong incentives and less direct control. The observability of effort is linked to retail characteristics in the gasoline industry, and station-level data on retail characteristics and ownership structure from every gasoline station in the Los Angeles retail gasoline market from 1992–1996 confirm the models predictions.

The Impact of Agglomeration Economies on Estimated Demand Thresholds: An Extension of Wensley and Stabler

Central place theory predicts that geographic markets located in rural areas have lower demand thresholds, and, therefore, a higher frequency of business establishments relative to areas that are more proximate to urban centers, other things equal. Wensley and Stabler (1998) confirm this prediction using data on the location and frequency of business activities in rural Saskatchewan. We demonstrate that this relationship may not always hold true depending on the existence and magnitude of agglomeration economies. If average cost differences associated with being located in an urbanized area are sufficiently large, then the relationship between urban proximity and number of establishments may be reversed. We provide evidence of this reversal using 1996 cross‐sectional data on hospital services in Texas.

The Role of Search Costs in Determining the Relationship between Inflation and Profit Margins

Previous empirical studies have found a negative relationship between inflation and industry profit margins. Recent theoretical findings, however, suggest that buyer search costs can significantly impact this relationship. We use an actual measure of search cost that varies across wholesale industries to estimate the impact of these costs on the relationship between inflation and markups. Using firm-level data from 57 industries, we show that margins increase during inflation if search costs become sufficiently high. Our findings reconcile the theoretical and empirical literatures on this topic.