Siddharth Chandra

Seasonality in cigarette sales: patterns and implications for tobacco control.

Cigarette smoking is the leading public health problem in the USA, contributing to over 400 000 deaths a year.1 Given its importance, the tobacco control community should be aware of all significant patterns in the consumption of cigarettes that may be relevant to efforts aimed at tobacco control. Unfortunately, little attention has been paid to the seasonal nature of smoking. Findings on seasonal patterns may have major implications for the timing of interventions designed to manage the tobacco problem, both in the USA and in other countries. In this letter, monthly data for cigarette sales at the state level for the USA are analysed to test for the presence of seasonality and to characterise the phenomenon. The results reveal a seasonal pattern that is significant both in the statistical sense and in magnitude. This includes a significant drop in the winter months of January and February, and an increase during the summer months of June, July, and August.* Because seasonality in sales does not reflect seasonality in …

Regional Economy Size and the Growth–Instability Frontier: Evidence from Europe

Predictions of the portfolio model of the economy are tested using regional growth data from Europe. It is shown that more aggregated regions of Europe tend to be more economically diverse than more disaggregated regions. Then, using different frontier estimation methods, evidence of a convex growth-instability frontier for aggregated regions is presented. At the most regionally disaggregated level for which there are data, there is weak if any evidence of the frontier. The results suggest that large economies are appropriately modeled as portfolios, whose growth processes are characterized by the convex growth-instability frontier, whereas small local economies do not display this characteristic. Copyright Blackwell Publishing, Inc. 2003

Mortality From the Influenza Pandemic of 1918–1919: The Case of India

Estimates of worldwide mortality from the influenza pandemic of 1918–1919 vary widely, from 15 million to 100 million. In terms of loss of life, India was the focal point of this profound demographic event. In this article, we calculate mortality from the influenza pandemic in India using panel data models and data from the Census of India. The new estimates suggest that for the districts included in the sample, mortality was at most 13.88 million, compared with 17.21 million when calculated using the assumptions of Davis (1951). We conclude that Davis’ influential estimate of mortality from influenza in British India is overstated by at least 24%. Future analyses of the effects of the pandemic on demographic change in India and worldwide will need to account for this significant downward revision.

A test of the regional growth-instability frontier using state data

The application of the portfolio framework to the economy predicts the existence of a convex growth-instability frontier. Using two data sets on Gross State Product for the states of the United States, this hypothesis is tested. The tests confirm the existence of a convex frontier for economic growth and instability. The shape of the frontier is estimated, and growth-adjusted measures of economic instability based on the frontier are computed. Over long periods of time, economic instability is negatively correlated with a range of measures of economic diversity, providing further support for the portfolio view of economic growth. (JEL R11)

Inferring Cocaine Flows across Europe: Evidence from Price Data

Price data for cocaine in Europe reported in the World Drug Report of 2010 are analyzed with the aim of inferring patterns of transnational cocaine flows across the continent. The concepts of market integration and price gradients are combined to identify the existence and directionality of flows, on the basis of which a geographic characterization of the movement of cocaine is constructed. The findings are broadly consistent with anecdotal data on cocaine flows reported in the World Drug Report. The methodology is, therefore, a simple and promising methodology that can supplement existing efforts by researchers and policy-makers to identify trouble spots with a view to managing the growing cocaine problem in Europe and drug problems in general.

The "Revolution of Rising Expectations," Relative Deprivation, and the Urban Social Disorders of the 1960s: Evidence from State-Level Data

This essay analyzes the economic conditions associated with urban social disturbances in the United States in the 1960s. Using state-level data on the social disturbances in conjunction with census data from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series, the analysis tests the relationship between measures of wage inequality and measures of social disorder. In conjunction with accounts of the unrest, the findings support the rising expectations hypothesis, an aspect of the relative deprivation view of racial violence. In particular, overall wage inequality is a significant factor in the disturbances. Also, although the residual or discrimination component of wage inequality and the human capital component are related to the disturbances in the same way, this relationship is stronger for the human capital component of inequality.

Generating Reforms and Reforming Generations: Military Politics in Indonesia's Democratic Transition and Consolidation

This article examines the importance of the internal structural dynamics of the military in the analysis of transitions from nondemocratic rule and in democratic consolidation. The authors argues that factors endogenous to the military—including variations in the size of the officer corps, solidarity among graduating classes from the military academy, and promotional prospects—are important determinants of the political behavior of militaries. As a case study, military structure and politics during Indonesias recent transition from nondemocratic rule and current consolidation of democracy are explored in detail. While the ongoing interaction between civilians and the military is acknowledged, systematic structural features are identified as being important for understanding the behavior of the Indonesian military between 1998 and 2001. The authors compare and contrast the study of Indonesia with other cases in the literature on transitions—including Ghana, Nigeria, Portugal, and Thailand—and discuss resulting implications for the study of transitions and consolidations.

What the price data tell us about heroin flows across Europe

Using data from the World Drug Reports on wholesale prices for heroin for 17 European countries over the period 2000–2008, patterns of heroin flows across Europe are constructed. For any pair of countries, heroin markets are inferred to be linked if the heroin price correlations exceed a threshold that is determined by calibration to sparsely available anecdotal information on these flows. For any pair of linked markets, heroin is inferred to flow from the country with the lower price to the country with the higher price. The results demonstrate that heroin flows from the Southeastern part of Europe to points north and west. They also suggest that heroin markets are not as well integrated as cocaine markets. This methodology can be used to identify hitherto unnoticed transnational linkages between heroin markets.

Transnational cocaine and heroin flow networks in western Europe: A comparison

BACKGROUND A comparison of the properties of drug flow networks for cocaine and heroin in a group of 17 western European countries is provided with the aim of understanding the implications of their similarities and differences for drug policy. METHODS Drug flow data for the cocaine and heroin networks were analyzed using the UCINET software package. Country-level characteristics including hub and authority scores, core and periphery membership, and centrality, and network-level characteristics including network density, the results of a triad census, and the final fitness of the core-periphery structure of the network, were computed and compared between the two networks. RESULTS The cocaine network contains fewer path redundancies and a smaller, more tightly knit core than the heroin network. Authorities, hubs and countries central to the cocaine network tend to have higher hub, authority, and centrality scores than those in the heroin network. The core-periphery and hub-authority structures of the cocaine and heroin networks reflect the west-to-east and east-to-west patterns of flow of cocaine and heroin respectively across Europe. The key nodes in the cocaine and heroin networks are generally distinct from one another. CONCLUSION The analysis of drug flow networks can reveal important structural features of trafficking networks that can be useful for the allocation of scarce drug control resources. The identification of authorities, hubs, network cores, and network-central nodes can suggest foci for the allocation of these resources. In the case of Europe, while some countries are important to both cocaine and heroin networks, different sets of countries occupy positions of prominence in the two networks. The distinct nature of the cocaine and heroin networks also suggests that a one-size-fits-all supply- and interdiction-focused policy may not work as well as an approach that takes into account the particular characteristics of each network.

Reassessing the Links between Regime Type and Economic Performance: Why Some Authoritarian Regimes Show Stable Growth and Others Do Not

This analysis challenges claims that regime type determines national economic performance, and hypothesizes that the level of public deliberation, rather than broad categories of regime type, is the driver of national economic performance across political systems; specifically, that negotiations, disagreements, and compromises between decentralized decision-making partisans (e.g., citizens, business representatives, professional associations, labor, and public administrators) are the underlying causal mechanism explaining the non-monotonic relationship between different types of political system and economic performance. Countries with high levels of public deliberation more often experience stable growth outcomes, while other countries can make radical changes in economic policy with uncertain outcome. The variation in public deliberation within regime type is significant, especially amongst authoritarian regimes. One startling implication is that, in certain situations, impressive gains in economic growth can be achieved only at the expense of active negotiation and participation in the policy-making process.