Jeffrey L. Jordan

Joint Production and Averting Expenditure Measures of Willingness to Pay: Do Water Expenditures Really Measure Avoidance Costs?

A multinomial selection model of averting behavior in response to water contamination risks is estimatedfor Georgia residents. Measures of non-health related water quality (taste, odor, and appearance) are incorporated into the model to account for joint production of utility and health. The model examines the choice between bottled, filtered tap, and unfiltered tap water. Results of the estimation indicated that perceived risk from tap water, concern about water quality (taste, odor, and appearance of tap water), race, and age are the most important determinants of bottled water selection. Information regarding current or prior problems with tap water, perceived risk from tap water, and income are the most important determinants of water filter selection. Adjusting for quality differences between tap and bottled water, we show that averting costs estimates using bottled water expenditures would lead to an overstatement of avoidance costs by about 12%. Copyright 2000, Oxford University Press.

WILLINGNESS TO PAY FOR IMPROVEMENTS IN DRINKING WATER QUALITY

In this paper, data from a 1991 survey of Georgia residents were used to study peoples willingness to pay (WTP) for improvements in drinking water quality and peoples perceptions of potential groundwater contamination. Results showed that 27% of the respondents served by public water supplies rated drinking water quality as poor, and 23% were uncertain about their drinking water quality. The contingent valuation method was used to estimate WTP using a checklist format. The median estimated WTP was

ESTIMATING IMPLICIT MARGINAL PRICES OF QUALITY CHARACTERISTICS OF TOMATOES

5.49 per month above their current water bills for people on public systems and

The Effect of Social Capital on the Choice to Use Sustainable Agricultural Practices

7.38 for those using private wells, after rejecting outliers and using the maximum likelihood method. The aggregate WTP for all of Georgia was estimated to be about

The Today and Tomorrow of Kids

111.5 million per year for public water users and

Economic evaluation of bottled water consumption as an averting means: evidence from a hedonic price analysis

42.3 million per year for private well owners. This aggregate WTP can serve as an estimate of benefits to consumers from improvements in drinking water quality statewide.

Community Development and Local Social Capital

A hedonic price function is developed for estimating the implicit prices for selected quality characteristics of fresh tomatoes at three points in the marketing season. The estimation of this function, proposed as a method of evaluating change in the post-harvest system, is accomplished using a flexible functional form. Those quality characteristics that most affect the price of tomatoes can help determine the economic feasibility of alternative handling techniques or new technologies.

Are Friendly Farmers Environmentally Friendly? Environmental Awareness as a Social Capital Outcome

We investigate whether social capital in the form of community involvement affects farmers’ choice to use sustainable agricultural practices. Using associational memberships as a measure of community involvement we study its effects on agricultural practices among Georgia farmers. Our findings show that, first, community involvement had a positive effect on the decision to adopt sustainable agricultural practices, and, secondly, it also had a positive effect on the extent to which farmers adopt these practices. These findings establish an additional dimension to the benefits that would accrue to policies that promote social interaction and civic engagement in rural areas.

Race, Gender, School Discipline, and Human Capital Effects

We experimentally investigate the distribution of childrens time preferences along gender and racial lines. We find that boys are more impatient than girls and black children are no more impatient than white children. However, this pattern hides the fact that black boys have the highest discount rates of all groups. Most importantly, we show that impatience has a direct effect on behavior. An increase of one standard deviation in the discount rate increases the probability that a child has at least 3 disciplinary referrals by 5 percent. Time preferences might play a large role in setting appropriate incentives for children.

Housing Uncertainty and Childhood Impatience

This study alerts researchers and policy makers to the importance of the price effect of bottle size in an economic evaluation of using bottled water as a means to avoid health risks from drinking home tap water. It derived a proxy for the economic value of smaller bottle size by analysing a hedonic price model. The results show that, by not accounting for the economic value of smaller bottle size, we can overstate consumer willingness-to-pay for safer drinking water by more than 100%.