Showing 11 - 20 of 80 Items
The supply of media slant across outlets and demand for slant within outlets: Evidence from US presidential campaign news
Date: 2020-06-01
Creator: Marcel Garz, Gaurav Sood, Daniel F. Stone, Justin Wallace
Access: Open access
- We conduct across-outlet and within-outlet (and within-topic) analyses of “congenially” slanted news. We study “horse race” news (news on candidates' chances in an upcoming election) from six major online outlets for the 2012 and 2016 US presidential campaigns. We find robust evidence that horse race headlines were slanted congenially with respect to the preferences of the outlets' typical readers. However, evidence of congenial slant in the timing and frequency of horse race stories is weaker. We also find limited evidence of greater within-outlet demand for headlines most congenial to outlets' typical readers, and somewhat stronger evidence of greater demand for relatively uncongenial headlines. We discuss how various aspects of our results are consistent with each of the major mechanisms driving slant studied in the theoretical literature, and may help explain when each mechanism is more likely to come into play. In particular, readers may be more likely to click on uncongenial headlines due to inferring that these stories are particularly informative when they stand in contrast to an outlet's typically congenial slant.
History lessons: The early development of intellectual property institutions in the United States
Date: 2001-01-01
Creator: B. Zorina Khan, Kenneth L. Sokoloff
Access: Open access
Infant and Maternal Health Outcomes Following Improved Substance Use Disorder Treatment for Pregnant Women This record is embargoed.
- Embargo End Date: 2026-05-18
Date: 2023-01-01
Creator: Emma A. Bomfim
Access: Embargoed
How do Robinhood Investors React to Macroeconomic News? Access to this record is restricted to members of the Bowdoin community. Log in here to view.
- Restriction End Date: 2025-06-01
Date: 2024-01-01
Creator: Aditya S Pall-Pareek
Access: Access restricted to the Bowdoin Community
Voluntary sustainability standards could significantly reduce detrimental impacts of global agriculture
Date: 2019-02-05
Creator: W. K. Smith, E. Nelson, J. A. Johnson, S. Polasky, J. C., Milder, J. S. Gerber, P. C. West, S. Siebert, K. A. Brauman
Access: Open access
- Voluntary sustainability standards (VSS) are stakeholder-derived principles with measurable and enforceable criteria to promote sustainable production outcomes. While institutional commitments to use VSS to meet sustainable procurement policies have grown rapidly over the past decade, we still have relatively little understanding of the (i) direct environmental benefits of large-scale VSS adoption; (ii) potential perverse indirect impacts of adoption; and (iii) implementation pathways. Here, we illustrate and address these knowledge gaps using an ecosystem service modeling and scenario analysis of Bonsucro, the leading VSS for sugarcane. We find that global compliance with the Bonsucro environmental standards would reduce current sugarcane production area (−24%), net tonnage (−11%), irrigation water use (−65%), nutrient loading (−34%), and greenhouse gas emissions from cultivation (−51%). Under a scenario of doubled global sugarcane production, Bonsucro adoption would further limit water use and greenhouse gas emissions by preventing sugarcane expansion into water-stressed and high-carbon stock ecosystems. This outcome was achieved via expansion largely on existing agricultural lands. However, displacement of other crops could drive detrimental impacts from indirect land use. We find that over half of the potential direct environmental benefits of Bonsucro standards under the doubling scenario could be achieved by targeting adoption in just 10% of global sugarcane production areas. However, designing policy that generates the most environmentally beneficial Bonsucro adoption pathway requires a better understanding of the economic and social costs of VSS adoption. Finally, we suggest research directions to advance sustainable consumption and production.
Climate change's impact on key ecosystem services and the human well-being they support in the US
Date: 2013-11-01
Creator: Erik J. Nelson, Peter Kareiva, Mary Ruckelshaus, Katie Arkema, Gary, Geller, Evan Girvetz, Dave Goodrich, Virginia Matzek, Malin Pinsky
Access: Open access
- Climate change alters the functions of ecological systems. As a result, the provision of ecosystem services and the well-being of people that rely on these services are being modified. Climate models portend continued warming and more frequent extreme weather events across the US. Such weather-related disturbances will place a premium on the ecosystem services that people rely on. We discuss some of the observed and anticipated impacts of climate change on ecosystem service provision and livelihoods in the US. We also highlight promising adaptive measures. The challenge will be choosing which adaptive strategies to implement, given limited resources and time. We suggest using dynamic balance sheets or accounts of natural capital and natural assets to prioritize and evaluate national and regional adaptation strategies that involve ecosystem services. © The Ecological Society of America.
The Effects of Corporate Governance on the Innovation Performance of Chinese SMEs
Date: 2013-03-10
Creator: Yao Tang, Daniel Shapiro, Miaojun Wang, Weiying Zhang
Access: Open access
- We investigate the degree to which corporate governance and ownership affects the innovation performance of firms in China with a particular focus on privately owned small and medium enterprises (SMEs). We hypothesize that (1) board-related governance measures will enhance innovation because they improve monitoring and provide access to necessary resources; (2) ownership concentration initially facilitates innovation because large shareholders are more likely to commit to the long-term nature of innovation, and have the incentive to monitor managers whose time horizon may be shorter; however we argue that these effects weaken as large shareholders becomes entrenched at higher levels of concentration; and (3) hiring an external CEO will enhance innovation both by ensuring professional management of the company, and by alleviating the entrenchment possibilities associated with large shareholders. These hypotheses are tested using a unique sample of 370 mostly private and relatively small Chinese firms in Zhejiang province, for the period 2004 to 2006. The results suggest that for this sample, corporate governance and ownership affect innovation activity when measured by patenting activity, but not when measured by new product sales.
The efficiency of voluntary incentive policies for preventing biodiversity loss
Date: 2011-01-01
Creator: David J. Lewis, Andrew J. Plantinga, Erik Nelson, Stephen Polasky
Access: Open access
- Habitat loss is a primary cause of loss of biodiversity but conserving habitat for species presents challenges. Land parcels differ in their ability to produce returns for landowners and landowners may have private information about the value of the land to them. Land parcels also differ in the type and quality of habitat and the spatial pattern of land use across multiple landowners is important for determining the conservation value of parcels. This paper analyzes the relative efficiency of simple voluntary incentive-based policies in achieving biodiversity conservation objectives. This topic is important not just for biodiversity conservation but for any effort to provide a public good requiring coordination across multiple decision-makers who have some degree of private information. We develop a method that integrates spatially explicit data, an econometric model of private land-use decisions, landscape simulations, a biological model of biodiversity as a function of landscape pattern, and an algorithm that estimates the set of efficient solutions. These methods allow us to simulate landowner responses to policies, measure the consequences of these decisions for biodiversity conservation, and compare these outcomes to efficient outcomes to show the relative efficiency of various policy approaches. We find substantial differences in biodiversity conservation scores generated by simple voluntary incentive-based policies and efficient solutions. The performance of incentive-based policies is particularly poor at low levels of the conservation budget where spatial fragmentation of conserved parcels is a large concern. Performance can be improved by encouraging agglomeration of conserved habitat and by incorporating basic biological information, such as that on rare habitats, into the selection criteria. © 2010 Elsevier B.V.
Economic-based projections of future land use in the conterminous United States under alternative policy scenarios
Date: 2012-04-01
Creator: V. C. Radeloff, E. Nelson, A. J. Plantinga, D. J. Lewis, D., Helmers, J. J. Lawler, J. C. Withey, F. Beaudry, S. Martinuzzi
Access: Open access
- Land-use change significantly contributes to biodiversity loss, invasive species spread, changes in biogeochemical cycles, and the loss of ecosystem services. Planning for a sustainable future requires a thorough understanding of expected land use at the fine spatial scales relevant for modeling many ecological processes and at dimensions appropriate for regional or national-level policy making. Our goal was to construct and parameterize an econometric model of land-use change to project future land use to the year 2051 at a fine spatial scale across the conterminous United States under several alternative land-use policy scenarios. We parameterized the econometric model of land-use change with the National Resource Inventory (NRI) 1992 and 1997 land-use data for 844 000 sample points. Land-use transitions were estimated for five land-use classes (cropland, pasture, range, forest, and urban). We predicted land-use change under four scenarios: business-as-usual, afforestation, removal of agricultural subsidies, and increased urban rents. Our results for the business-as-usual scenario showed widespread changes in land use, affecting 36% of the land area of the conterminous United States, with large increases in urban land (79%) and forest (7%), and declines in cropland (\-16%) and pasture (\-13%). Areas with particularly high rates of land-use change included the larger Chicago area, parts of the Pacific Northwest, and the Central Valley of California. However, while land-use change was substantial, differences in results among the four scenarios were relatively minor. The only scenario that was markedly different was the afforestation scenario, which resulted in an increase of forest area that was twice as high as the business-as-usual scenario. Land-use policies can affect trends, but only so much. The basic economic and demographic factors shaping land-use changes in the United States are powerful, and even fairly dramatic policy changes, showed only moderate deviations from the business-as-usual scenario. Given the magnitude of predicted land-use change, any attempts to identify a sustainable future or to predict the effects of climate change will have to take likely land-use changes into account. Econometric models that can simulate land-use change for broad areas with fine resolution are necessary to predict trends in ecosystem service provision and biodiversity persistence. © 2012 by the Ecological Society of America.
With age comes immaturity: Do countries with older populations issue shorter maturity debt?
Date: 2021-12-01
Creator: Gonca Senel, Mark L.J. Wright
Access: Open access
- Recent work has found that countries with older populations face steeper yield curves and issue shorter maturity debt than do younger countries. We reexamine these findings using a new database of public debt maturity and yields for OECD countries. We first show that the behavior of eurozone countries in the pre-euro period drives these results. Next, including more recent data from the post-euro period, we show that the relationship between population age, maturity, and yield curve slopes disappears. This finding is robust to excluding high-credit-risk countries. Last, we show that these patterns reemerge after the European debt crisis, suggesting that eurozone capital markets have resegmented.