David H. Good

Efficiency and productivity growth comparisons of European and U.S. Air carriers: A first look at the data

In this paper we carry out technical efficiency and productivity growth comparisons among the four largest European carriers and eight of their American counterparts. The time period of our comparisons is 1976 through 1986. This is a particularly interesting period since it begins just after the informal steps toward deregulation in the United States and ends just prior to the introduction of the first wave of reforms by the Council of Ministers in Europe. We also identify the potential efficiency gains of the European liberalization by comparing efficiency differences between the two carrier groups. The reductions in inefficiency describe the amount that inputs can be decreased without altering output.

Airline efficiency differences between Europe and the US: Implications for the pace of EC integration and domestic regulation☆

Abstract In this paper we examine the performance of the eight largest European and the eight largest American airlines during the period 1976–1986. During this period the American industry was deregulated and the European industrys competitive posture was significantly liberalized. Two alternative methodologies for identifying productive efficiency are used - a parametric one using statistical estimation and a nonparametric one using linear programming. We find that were European carriers under deregulation to be as productively efficient as their American counterparts, the European industry would save approximately

Allocative distortions and the regulatory transition of the U.S. airline industry

4 billion per year (in 1986 dollars).

Organizational justice and workplace mediation: a six‐factor model

Abstract Our paper develops a model of allocative distortions with which we analyze departures of the U.S. airline industry from efficient resource allocation during the period 1970–1981. Airline technology is assumed to transform capital, labor, energy, and materials into passenger and cargo service whose characteristics are endogeneously determined. A generalized-Leontief system of distorted profit, output supply, input demand, and reduced form output characteristics expressions is estimated by FIML using a multivariate error components model with vector autoregressive disturbances. Our results tend to support the common perception that deregulation reduced both the total cost and relative level of allocative distortions.

An Analysis of Youth Crime and Employment Patterns

Purpose – This study examines the structure and dimensionality of organizational justice in a workplace mediation setting. It has three purposes: to determine whether the procedural and interpersonal justice factors in the four‐factor model of organizational justice can be split, thereby providing support for a six‐factor model; to identify how the split factors relate to other factors in the model; and to uncover any differences in employee and supervisor perceptions of organizational justice in workplace mediation.Design/methodology/approach – Confirmatory factor analysis is used to explore the fit of four different models of organizational justice. The paper examines cross factor correlations to assess the strength and relationships among factors and to look for differences between employees and supervisors.Findings – It is found that a six‐factor model of organizational justice provides the best fit for the data and that factor relationships differ little for employees and supervisors.Research limitat...

Specification of Distance Functions Using Semi- and Nonparametric Methods with an Application to the Dynamic Performance of Eastern and Western European Air Carriers

This paper investigates the relationships between the employment and the crime decisions of youths. We assume that youths maximize expected utility and we allow divergence betweenex ante andex post time allocations to legal and illegal activities. This gap motivates the exclusion restrictions which allow us to explore feedbacks between criminality and employability. Moreover, by using a panel of individual-level data, we are able to investigate the impact of historical crime and labor-market activities on the current delinquency and employability of juveniles. The measures of the endogeneous variables of our model are dichotomous. Furthermore, our sample is choice-based. Maximum-likelihood procedures which deal with these complications are used in our empirical investigations.

Child support enforcement for teenage fathers: Problems and prospects

In this paper we examine the productive performance of a group of three East European carriers and compare it to thirteen of their West European competitors during the period 1977–1990. We first model the multiple output/multiple input technology with a stochastic distance frontier using recently developed semiparametric efficient methods. The endogeneity of multiple outputs is addressed in part by introducing multivariate kernel estimators for the joint distribution of the multiple outputs and potentially correlated firm random effects. We augment estimates from our semiparametric stochastic distance function with nonparametric distance function methods, using linear programming techniques, as well as with extended decomposition methods, based on the Malmquist index number. Both semi- and nonparametric methods indicate significant slack in resource utilization in the East European carriers relative to their Western counterparts, and limited convergence in efficiency or technical change between them. The implications are rather stark for the long run viability of the East European carriers in our sample.

The Impact of Net Migration on Neighbourhood Racial Composition

Data from the NLSY (National Longitudinal Survey of Labor Market Experiences-Youth Cohort) indicate that about 7.3 percent of teenage males become fathers and that very few of these fathers live with their children. Father absence and the concurrent increase in female-headed households are closely associated with the impoverishment of children. Most absent teen fathers never come into contact with the child support enforcement program, and the extent to which they financially support their children informally is not well understood. While the income of absent teen fathers is low in the teen years, it increases over time, as does the potential for collecting child support. Nevertheless, men who were absent teen fathers earn less in early adulthood than men who deferred parenting until age 20 or later and teen fathers who lived with their children. Early establishment of paternity and greater standardization in the treatment of adolescent fathers by the child support enforcement program are recommended. Further, the substantial and persistent income deficit experienced by adolescent fathers who live apart from their children raises an interesting dilemma. While children may benefit financially and psychosocially from living with two parents, the lower income of men who were absent teenage fathers may make them poor marital prospects. This raises doubts about the recent recommendations of some scholars that we should bring back the shotgun wedding.

Discrete spatial choice and the axiom of independence from irrelevant alternatives

While it has been commonly assumed that racially mixed neighbourhoods in US cities will become increasingly black, the results of this study question the validity of this assumption. In a series of simulations it is shown that in urban areas with no black inmigration the proportion of the black population does not increase in racially mixed neighbourhoods, unlike the case where there is black in migration to the urban area. With reductions in the rate of black inmigration to US cities, this study suggests policy implications which could help reduce the level of racial segregation in residential areas.

Digital Photography Improves Consistency and Accuracy of Bat Counts in Hibernacula

Abstract The assumption of the independence from irrelevant alternatives (IIA) simplifies the representation of the choice decision. However, this assumption is particularly problematic for choices in a spatial context. Unequal substitutability can lead to systematically misleading results. Formal tests of IIA are outlined and alternatives are suggested for managing the problem when the results warrant it. Such management often leads to more complex models, which are necessary, but generate additional difficulties. These issues are also discussed.