Instrumental Variable Regression Research Articles

Comparison of Full-Time Equivalent and Clinic Time Labor Input Measures in Productivity Metrics.

A lack of improvement in productivity in recent years may be the result of suboptimal measurement of productivity. Hospitals and clinics benefit from external benchmarks that allow assessment of clinical productivity. Work relative value units have long served as a common currency for this purpose. Productivity is determined by comparing work relative value units to full-time equivalents (FTEs), but FTEs do not have a universal or standardized definition, which could cause problems. We propose a new clinical labor input measure-"clinic time"-as a substitute for using the reported measure of FTEs. In this observational validation study, we used data from a cluster randomized trial to compare FTE with clinic time. We compared these two productivity measures graphically. For validation, we estimated two separate ordinary least squares (OLS) regression models. To validate and simultaneously adjust for endogeneity, we used instrumental variables (IV) regression with the proportion of days in a pay period that were federal holidays as an instrument. We used productivity data collected between 2018 and 2020 from Veterans Health Administration (VA) cardiology and orthopedics providers as part of a 2-year cluster randomized trial of medical scribes mandated by the VA Maintaining Internal Systems and Strengthening Integrated Outside Networks (MISSION) Act of 2018. Our cohort included 654 unique providers. For both productivity variables, the values for patients per clinic day were consistently higher than those for patients per day per FTE. To validate these measures, we estimated separate OLS and IV regression models, predicting wait times from the two productivity measures. The slopes from the two productivity measures were positive and small in magnitude with OLS, but negative and large in magnitude with IV regression. The magnitude of the slope for patients per clinic day was much larger than the slope for patients per day per FTE. Current metrics that rely on FTE data may suffer from self-report bias and low reporting frequency. Using clinic time as an alternative is an effective way to mitigate these biases. Measuring productivity accurately is essential because provider productivity plays an important role in facilitating clinic operations outcomes. Most importantly, tracking a more valid productivity metric is a concrete, cost-effective management tactic to improve the provision of care in the long term.

Board skill diversity and corporate environmental responsibility: the moderating effects of formal and informal pressures

Purpose This study aims to investigate the impact of board skill diversity (BSD) on corporate environmental responsibility (CER). In addition, this study explores the moderating effects of formal regulatory pressure and informal media pressure. Design/methodology/approach This study uses Chinese high polluting companies as the sample and uses regression analysis. Robustness checks, including instrumental variable regression, Heckman two-stage model and propensity score matching method, are performed to test the robustness of the results. Findings The findings suggest that BSD significantly improves CER performance. Both formal regulatory pressure and informal media pressure strengthen the positive impact of BSD on CER. Further channel analyses reveal that BSD improves CER performance by promoting corporate proenvironmental behaviors rather than by restricting environmental violations; skill diversity of executive directors has a more significant effect on CER than that of independent directors. Finally, the moderating effect of regulatory pressure is only significant after the implementation of the Environmental Protection Law, and the moderating effect of media pressure mainly concentrates on negative media coverage. Practical implications The involvement of directors with more diverse skills is essential to improve corporate proenvironmental behaviors. Companies should select qualified directors with different skills to further improve their performance on environmental protection and sustainable development. Social implications Regulators and standard-setters should develop efficient guidelines on corporate board governance to enhance the positive role of companies in environmental and sustainable development. Originality/value This study broadens the research on the determinants of CER by examining the influence of BSD on CER and the moderating roles of various stakeholder pressures, thereby providing a deeper understanding of corporate environmental performance and sustainable development.

Impact of homework time on adolescent mental health: Evidence from China

Fierce competition in China's basic education system results in students spending too much time on homework. However, few studies have explored the mental health effects of homework time. Using data from the China Education Panel Survey (CEPS), this paper empirically examines the impact of homework time on adolescent mental health through the fixed-effects model and instrumental variables regression. Additionally, this study explores the moderating effects of teacher support and parent involvement. The results indicate that homework time has a negative effect on adolescent mental health, but only when the amount of time spent on homework exceeds about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Overall, there is a non-linear relationship between homework time and adolescent mental health. Teacher support, particularly emotional support, can mitigate the adverse mental health effects of excessive homework time, whereas parental involvement does not show the same positive effect. The analysis of heterogeneity reveals that adolescents from rural schools or medium family economic backgrounds experience a more pronounced negative impact from excessive homework time compared to those from urban schools, poorer or richer family backgrounds. Furthermore, students with outstanding academic performance are affected more significantly than their peers with poor academic performance. The empirical results echo the targets of the Chinese "double reduction policy" which requires strict control of homework time. Education policymakers should reasonably regulate homework time and systematically explore education concepts and teaching methods that are compatible with the reduction of homework time.

Interplay of Status Perception, Visible Inequality, Conspicuous Consumption, and Food Expenditure: Evidence from Consumer Pyramid Household Survey of Indian Households*

This study delves into the intricate interplay between visible inequality, conspicuous consumption, and food consumption in Indian households. Leveraging data from the Consumer Pyramids Household Survey (CPHS) provides significant insights. Through empirical analyses, including panel data analysis and instrumental variable panel data analysis, this study supports the hypothesis that there exists a relationship between visible inequality and conspicuous consumption among Indian households. The positive coefficients linked to conspicuous consumption variability reinforce established theories concerning the impact of status perception on spending behaviour. This study reveals a noteworthy adverse effect of visible inequality on essential expenditures, particularly food consumption, highlighting the delicate balancing act that households navigate between status‐driven spending and meeting fundamental needs. By employing instrumental variable regression models to address endogeneity concerns, this study robustly confirms the relationship between visible inequality and conspicuous consumption. This study emphasises the nuanced relationship between status‐oriented spending, visible inequality, and essential expenses in Indian households.

Mortgage Borrowing and Chronic Disease Outcomes in Older Age: Evidence from Biomarker Data in the Health and Retirement Study.

The medical diagnosis of a disease is common in older age and can carry significant financial costs. For many older adults, equity in a home is their primary component of wealth; however, housing wealth is illiquid. We analyze the relationship between the liquidation of housing wealth through mortgage borrowing on older homeowners' ability to successfully control a disease. We use data on homeowners age 65 and older from the 1998-2016 waves of the Health and Retirement Study (N=3,457). We use biomarkers and physical health indicators to measure disease control following a medical diagnosis of diabetes, heart condition, high blood pressure, lung disease, or cancer. Random effects linear probability and instrumental variable regressions estimate the associations of housing wealth, new mortgage borrowing, and disease control. Descriptively, 28% of older homeowners who borrow against home equity are not controlled on their disease, compared to 33% of non-borrowers. Panel data instrumental variable regressions show that each $10,000 borrowed from home equity after diagnosis is associated with a 17 percentage-point reduction in the probability of the disease not being controlled. Many older adults are not able or willing to liquidate housing wealth, and the ability to borrow also depends on changes in home values. Thus, housing wealth is not a uniform social determinant of health but is shaped by older adults' participation in financial markets.

Intelligentization helps the green and energy-saving transformation of power industry-evidence from substation engineering in China

The coordinated development of intelligence and greening is an intrinsic demand for high-quality economic and social development. Intelligentization and greening are the leading directions of sustainable development of the power industry. This paper directs of sustainable development of the power industry. This paper empirically analyzes the effect and mechanism of intelligence on the green environmental friendliness of electric power substations by using a panel fixed-effects model and instrumental variable regression, using substation engineering data from China southern power grid during 2013–2022. It is found that the level of intelligence significantly promotes the green performance of substation projects, and this conclusion still holds after a series of robustness tests. Intelligence can reduce material waste and pollutant emissions by improving the engineering environmental monitoring capability and the refinement of engineering resource control, thus improving the environmental friendliness of the project. The research in this paper helps to promote the integrated development of intelligent and green power engineering, to better achieve economic and green goals.

The effect of renewable energy aid and governance quality on environmental tax effort in Sub-Saharan Africa

The literature on foreign aid and tax efforts largely overlooks the specific role of environmental aid and taxation. To fill this gap, we examine the effects of renewable energy development assistance (EDA) and governance quality on climate change tax effort, air pollution tax effort, and aggregate environmental tax effort in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Utilizing panel data from 15 SSA countries over 20 years (2000–2019), the sample is divided into two groups based on income levels: seven low-income countries (LIC) and eight middle-income countries (MIC). The instrumental variable generalized method of moments (IV-GMM) regression technique is employed to estimate the parameters of the baseline model specifications. The study also uses the Smoothed Instrumental Variable Quantile Regression (SIVQR) technique to test the robustness of the baseline model. Among middle-income SSA countries, the findings suggest that renewable energy aid inflows reduce climate change tax efforts but increase air pollution and aggregate environmental tax efforts. However, among low-income SSA countries, renewable energy aid negatively impacts all three categories of environmental tax efforts. Governance quality tends to enhance all three categories of environmental tax effort in both low-income and middle-income SSA countries. The implications of these results are discussed.

Does Cultural Embeddedness on Cigarette Packages Mitigate Environmental Information Credibility? Evidence from China

ABSTRACT Drawing on the behavioral consistency theory, we examine whether cultural embeddedness on cigarette packages as a sinful behavior window dressing affects environmental information credibility, and further investigate the moderating role of high-quality external audit (Big4 auditors). Using hand-collected data from China, our findings reveal that cultural embeddedness on cigarette packages at the province level is significantly negatively associated with corporate environmental information credibility, suggesting that cultural embeddedness on cigarette packages shapes unethical social atmosphere around firms, triggers managers to cover up environmental misconducts, and eventually mitigates environmental information credibility. Moreover, Big4 auditors weaken the negative relation between cultural embeddedness on cigarette packages and environmental information credibility. Above findings are robust to a variety of sensitivity tests using alternative proxies for cultural embeddedness on cigarette packages and environmental information credibility, and further our conclusions are still valid after using the propensity score matching method, two-stage instrumental variable OLS-TOBIT regression procedures, and Heckman two-stage regression approach to address the endogeneity issues. Furthermore, cultural embeddedness on cigarette packages significantly positively induces greenwashing. Lastly, our main findings are more pronounced for firms without pollution control departments, with lower investment in environmental technologies, with less media coverage and in provinces with lower legal enforcement.

GOVERNMENT ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE READINESS AND BRAIN DRAIN: INFLUENCING FACTORS AND SPATIAL EFFECTS IN THE EUROPEAN UNION MEMBER STATES

In the swiftly advancing field of Artificial Intelligence (AI), a field where every country aims to keep pace, significant disparities are observed in how different nations adopt AI. This study explores the deep, yet insufficiently studied, effects of AI on societal, economic, and environmental aspects. It particularly examines how brain drain influences governmental AI implementation capabilities, addressing a gap in existing literature. The study investigates the interplay between government AI implementation and brain drain, factoring in macroeconomic conditions, governance quality, educational levels, and R&D efforts. Utilizing 2022 data from European Union countries, the research employs instrumental-variables regressions (2SLS and LIML) to counteract endogeneity and uses clustering methods for categorizing countries based on their government AI levels, alongside spatial analysis to detect cross-national spillovers and interactions. The findings reveal brain drain’s detrimental effect on governmental AI preparedness, highlight clustering tendencies, and identify spatial interdependencies. This paper underscores the need for strategic policy-making and institutional reforms to bolster government AI capabilities. It advocates for a paradigm shift in government frameworks post-New Public Management era, tailored to the new challenges posed by AI. The research, however, is limited to a single year and region, with constraints on data availability and indicator breadth.

Does Financial Inclusion Matter to Population Health? Insight From a Global Dataset

Currently, extensive empirical studies exist on the impact of financial inclusion on socio-economic outcomes such as economic growth, inequality, and poverty. However, research on financial inclusion and population health is limited and still at the infant stage. Therefore, this article adds to knowledge by inquiring into the health implications of financial inclusion using a global panel dataset for 121 countries between 2004 and 2020. After accounting for endogeneity with heteroskedasticity-based instrumental variable regression and cross-sectional dependency with the Driscol–Kraay estimator, we documented that financial inclusion improves population health outcomes. We found that the effect of financial inclusion on population health outcomes also depends on the level of information and communication technology penetration and existing socio-economic conditions in a country. Following this, we showed that financial inclusion improves population health outcomes in countries with lower income inequality and higher GDP per capita, mobile and internet penetration. We further found heterogeneity in the results across geographical regions and income groups. Following these findings, we suggest that financial inclusion policies could enhance population health.

Bank Lending Channel of Monetary Policy: Empirical Evidence from Bank Level Data of Selected Emerging Economies

Examining the effects of monetary policy on the bank lending channel is the main objective of this study on a sample of 18 emerging economies from 2006 to 2021 by using bank-level data. Research shows that the bank lending channel does operate and is functional in the banking sectors of the developing countries that were selected for the sample. The econometric models used in the study include sys-GMM, fixed effects, and instrumental variable regression. In particular, results suggest that monetary policy (or monetary tightening) negatively affects whereas economic growth positively influences bank lending. The specific characteristics of bank variables (i.e., liquidity and size) also expand bank lending. One of the most important factors in reducing the negative impact of monetary policy is the size and liquidity of banks. It has been reported through the robustness check exercise that the results largely remain robust when instrumental variable regression is used and when pandemic years are eliminated from the data sample. This research includes significant implications for policy for the selected emerging economies.

The Impact of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) on Pesticides Use of Potato Farmers in Indonesia

Reducing pesticides is an important driver in preserving a healthy and sustainable environment and protecting human health. In the digital era, understanding the role of information and communication technology (ICT) on pesticide use in crucial. Therefore, This study aim to estimate the impact of ICT on farmers’ pesticide used. This study uses a cross-sectional data from a survey to 150 farmers in Indonesia. Furthermore, the data is analyzed by ordinary least square (OLS) and instrumental variable quantile regression (IVQR). The main results indicate that ICT has an essential impact on pesticide used reduction. Farmers who has access on the ICT tend to use lower pesticide that the farmers who did not use the ICT. The IVQR results, make the claim more robust, which is show a negative and significant impact of ICT on farmers pesticide use in all quartile groups. Therefore, this finding implies that there is a need to develop agriculture related ICT continuously among smallholder farmers to reduce the pesticide use.

Income and electricity consumption issue: evidence from European households

Research on electricity consumption plays an important role in the development of sustainable national strategies and mitigation of global climate change. With global economic development in general, and Europe in particular, the demand for electricity in households is increasing. Therefore, based on demand theory, this study evaluates the impact of income on electricity consumption in European households. Data were collected from 35 European countries and analyzed. The instrumental variable regression results indicate that income positively impacts electricity consumption in European households. The electricity consumption of European households provides evidence that supports the prediction of demand theory, as an increase in household income as well as a decrease in price leads to a rise in overall consumption. However, the effect of price is not statistically significant. The findings also show that population growth and inflation positively influence household electricity consumption. The outcomes of this study have theoretical and practical implications for improving energy efficiency and effective electricity use in European households. Therefore, it is necessary to continue implementing energy-saving strategies at the household level in the context of increasing electricity consumption in Europe.

Investment by maternal grandmother buffers children against the impacts of adverse early life experiences

Exogenous shocks during sensitive periods of development can have long-lasting effects on adult phenotypes including behavior, survival and reproduction. Cooperative breeding, such as grandparental care in humans and some other mammal species, is believed to have evolved partly in order to cope with challenging environments. Nevertheless, studies addressing whether grandparental investment can buffer the development of grandchildren from multiple adversities early in life are few and have provided mixed results, perhaps owing to difficulties drawing causal inferences from non-experimental data. Using population-based data of English and Welsh adolescents (sample size ranging from 817 to 1197), we examined whether grandparental investment reduces emotional and behavioral problems in children resulting from facing multiple adverse early life experiences (AELEs), by employing instrumental variable regression in a Bayesian structural equation modeling framework to better justify causal interpretations of the results. When children had faced multiple AELEs, the investment of maternal grandmothers reduced, but could not fully erase, their emotional and behavioral problems. No such result was observed in the case of the investment of other grandparent types. These findings indicate that in adverse environmental conditions the investment of maternal grandmothers can improve child wellbeing.

Bank competition, government interest in green initiatives and carbon emissions reduction: An empirical analysis using city-level data from China

Finance plays a pivotal role in the transition to a sustainable economic development model. In China, the banking sector, a key component of its financial landscape, operates within an increasingly competitive environment, exerting profound effects on the efficient allocation of resources. This paper employs instrumental variables regression and text analysis techniques to meticulously examine the impact of bank competition on carbon emissions and elucidate the underlying mechanisms. We also investigate the synergistic influence of government engagement in green initiatives and bank competition on carbon emissions reduction, drawing insights from data encompassing Chinese cities during the years 2006 to 2019. Our empirical analysis unveils a significant carbon emissions reduction effect resulting from bank competition. This effect is primarily driven by the facilitation of green innovation and the promotion of manufacturing servitization. Notably, this impact is more pronounced in cities that are not dependent on resource extraction and those situated outside regional financial centers. Additionally, the level of government interest in green initiatives amplifies the carbon reduction effect of bank competition. This paper contributes to the enhancement of the banking market structure, aligning it with eco-friendly development goals.

How internet access impacts rural households’ income in China: evidence from the China family panel survey

ABSTRACT Internet access in China has sharply increased, but the potential effect of internet access on rural households’ income and inequality in developing countries could be more complex. To fill in this gap, this study uses data from the China Family Panel Survey in 2014, 2016 and 2018 to examine the impact of internet access on rural households’ income. Ordinary least squares and instrument variable regression results reveal that internet access is correlated with increasing rural households’ income, and this effect among wealthy rural households is smaller than that among poor households. The mechanism analysis reveals that internet access increases labour supply and the probability of working in secondary industry. In addition, internet access changes rural residents’ subjective assessment of employment and social security, and internet access related to learning, working, social interaction, entertainment and business positively affects income. Furthermore, internet access has a larger effect for small families. Finally, the impact of internet access does not change across regional disparities. Our findings indicate that improving rural internet infrastructure, reducing the cost of internet usage and guiding rural households to use the internet can help enhance internet access among rural households, subsequently increasing households’ income.

Economic uncertainty, households’ credit situations, and higher education

In this paper, we study the relationship between economic uncertainty, households’ credit situations, and educational outcomes. Using the System Generalized Methods of Moments (SYS-GMM) on educational and economic data from the World Bank and IMF, we find that economic uncertainty and households’ access to credit have positive impacts on higher education. Further analyses suggest that economic uncertainty and households’ access to credit have heterogeneous effects on educational outcomes at the tertiary level, by gender and development status. Specifically, we find that economic uncertainties expand enrollments in developed countries and contract them in developing economies. In addition, access to credit has a more pronounced positive impact on educational outcomes in developing nations compared to developed ones. Furthermore, our analysis indicates that household credit coupled with economic uncertainty decreases women’s educational outcomes in higher education, posing a serious threat to gender equality in higher education. Lastly, we find that monetary policy appears to play a role in these results. These findings remain robust to alternative proxies of economic uncertainty and approach such as the Instrumental Variable (IV) regression method, which uses a political database on government changes and ideological gaps between cabinets as instruments. In general, the findings emphasize the enduring influence of economic uncertainties, typically associated with business cycles, on long-term aspects such as education.

Empirical Asset Pricing with Many Test Assets

Abstract We formulate the problem of estimating risk prices in a stochastic discount factor (SDF) model as an instrumental variables regression. The IV estimator allows efficient estimation for models with non-traded factors and many test assets. Optimal instruments are constructed using a regularized sparse first stage regression. In a simulation study, the IV estimator is close to the infeasible GMM estimator in a setting with many assets. In an empirical application, the tracking portfolio for consumption growth appears strongly correlated with consumption news. It implies that consumption is a priced factor for the cross-section of excess equity returns. A similar regularized regression, projecting the SDF on test assets, leads to an estimate of the Hansen–Jagannathan distance, and identifies portfolios that maximally violate the pricing implications of the model.

ESG performance and corporate fraudulence: Evidence from China

By adopting a large sample of Chinese public listed firms from 2014 to 2021, we examine whether firms' ESG performance inhibits corporate fraud. Using panel data regression techniques, we find that high ESG performance mitigates corporate fraudulence. After conducting a series of robustness tests, including propensity score matching (PSM) model, Heckman two-step sample selection model, instrumental variable (IV) and 2SLS regression model, and firm fixed effect model, the results remain unchanged. Further analyses suggest that this negative relationship is more pronounced in non-state-owned enterprise (non-SOE) firms and firms that voluntarily disclose ESG information. The mechanism analysis suggests that high-quality ESG engagement improves firms' governance performance and inhibits managerial myopia, which thereby mitigates corporate fraud. Overall, our findings provide incremental evidence on the role of ESG in filling institutional voids in emerging economies. Our findings also provide significant policy implications to regulators and policy makers who seek to promote fair information disclosure and mitigate corporate fraud risk.

An Analysis of Female Empowerment and Its Role in Mitigating Intimate Partner Violence in Ecuador

ABSTRACT This research article aims to analyze the effect of female empowerment on gender-based intimate partner violence against women in Ecuador, a country where levels of violence stand out in the region. We apply an instrumental variable regression model using official data from the 2019 National Survey on Family Relations and Gender Violence against Women. We found a negative association between women empowerment and intimate partner violence, that is, greater empowerment of women is associated with lower manifestations of intimate partner violence. We also find a positive reverse association between manifestations of intimate partner violence against women and empowerment. This means that a woman who has been a victim of intimate partner violence will be more willing to embrace ideals that empower women. From a public policy perspective, government engagement with promotion of female empowerment will reduce intimate partner violence against women and the costs associated with it.