{"title":"A Comprehensive Model of Determinants of Property Tax Assessment Quality: Evidence in New York State","authors":"T. Eom","doi":"10.1111/j.1540-5850.2008.00897.x","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5850.2008.00897.x","url":null,"abstract":"This study proposes and examines a comprehensive model for the determinants of property tax assessment quality. In addition to providing evidence in support of reform of property tax administration by institutionalizing the full market value standard, a specific revaluation cycle, and county or statewide assessment functions, this study examines the impact of the monitoring pressure of residents on the quality of assessment. The empirical results reveal that the median tax share, the median property value as a share of median income, the ratio of state aid to total expenditures, and the share of adults with college or higher education have significant impacts on the quality of property tax assessment.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"239 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2008-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131771789","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Individual Contacts, Collective Patterns - Prato 1975-97, a Story of Interactions","authors":"G. Fioretti","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.346483","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.346483","url":null,"abstract":"This article presents an agent-based model (ABM) of an Italian textile district where thousands of small firms specialize in particular phases of fabrics production. It is an empirical model because it reconstructs the communications between firms when they arrange production chains. In their turn, production chains reflect into the pattern of road traffic in the geographical areas where the district extends. It is a methodological model because it aims to show that ABMs can be used to reconstruct a web of movements in geographical space. ABMs are proposed as a tool for Hagerstrand’s “time-geography”.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"8 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2008-02-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125324684","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Assessing Urban Crime and its Control: An Overview","authors":"P. Cook","doi":"10.3386/W13781","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W13781","url":null,"abstract":"Urban crime rates in the United States fell markedly during the 1990s and remain at historically low levels. The statistical evidence presented here indicates that that decline, like the crime surge that preceded it, has been largely uncorrelated with changes in socioeconomic conditions across cities. The ups and downs of crime have a considerable effect on residential location and property values. The police represent the largest public expenditure in city-level crime control efforts, and they are increasingly held accountable for reducing crime rates. Indeed, there is considerable evidence that an increase in police expenditures does pay off in the form of lower crime rates. This is an incomplete story, however. Assessments of police effectiveness typically neglect the considerable role of private and community-level protection and control efforts, not to mention the vital importance of (uncompensated) private inputs into police investigations. In areas with endemically high violence rates, the reluctance of witnesses to cooperate remains a serious problem.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"27 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2008-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124497730","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Capacity Cost Structure, Welfare and Cost Recovery: Are Transport Infrastructures with High Fixed Costs a Handicap?","authors":"B. de Borger, F. Dunkerley, S. Proost","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1084816","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1084816","url":null,"abstract":"In this paper, we consider a region that invests in infrastructure used by both local demand and through transport. We then compare transport systems that have, for a given capacity, the same total infrastructure cost but vary in the proportion of fixed costs and variable capacity costs. We show, first, that infrastructure which has (ceteris paribus) a higher share of fixed costs leads to higher welfare for the regional government building it. Contrary to what is commonly believed, it therefore requires less, rather than more, federal subsidies. Second, we find that, even for capacity characterized by, ceteris paribus, very high shares of fixed costs, financing of infrastructure is generally not an important issue as long as regions are allowed to toll through traffic. Third, if member states cannot toll through traffic, or if a federal authority (such as the EU or the USA) can impose pricing at the global marginal social cost, our analysis shows that this reduces investment incentives for the individual regions, and subsidies may be needed. We discuss the policy implications of these findings and illustrate all theoretical results numerically.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"9 5 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2008-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131661447","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Transfer of Development Rights (TDR) for Urban-Rural Coordinated Development in China","authors":"F. Deng, Jian Lin, Yunzhong Liu","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1081042","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1081042","url":null,"abstract":"Against the background of current public policy of urban-rural coordinated development, a key land policy issue is how to deal with the conflict between urban expansion and farmland protection. By analyzing three major types of externality in urban-rural land use and the current trial of urban-rural hook-up land use policy, we propose establishing markets for transfer of development rights (TDR) at both regional level and metropolitan level. In this way, market mechanism and land use planning are integrated. In the regional market the quotas for urban-rural hook-up trial or some land use quotas are traded; at the metropolitan level, the market participants are peasant collectives who trade the development rights. Some technical details and policy implications are also discussed in the paper.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-12-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129940061","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Real Estate Brokers: Do They Inflate Housing Prices? The Case of France","authors":"Arnaud Simon","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1073882","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1073882","url":null,"abstract":"The article discusses a study which investigates the impact of real estate brokers on the price of residential properties sold in 2077 in France. The results show that brokers modify the prices of properties they sell. It stresses that the price impact of brokers varies by the property size and the socio-occupational categories of the buyer. It also suggests that the age, the localization,and the construction period are the main determinants of the decision to use real estate brokers.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"46 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-12-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115223935","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Subprime Outcomes: Risky Mortgages, Homeownership Experiences, and Foreclosures","authors":"Kristopher Gerardi, A. Shapiro, P. Willen","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1073182","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1073182","url":null,"abstract":"This paper provides the first rigorous assessment of the homeownership experiences of subprime borrowers. We consider homeowners who used subprime mortgages to buy their homes, and estimate how often these borrowers end up in foreclosure. In order to evaluate these issues, we analyze homeownership experiences in Massachusetts over the 1989-2007 period using a competing risks, proportional hazard framework. We present two main findings. First, homeownerships that begin with a subprime purchase mortgage end up in foreclosure almost 20 percent of the time, or more than 6 times as often as experiences that begin with prime purchase mortgages. Second, house price appreciation plays an important role in generating foreclosures. In fact, we attribute much of the dramatic rise in Massachusetts foreclosures during 2006 and 2007 to the decline in house prices that began in the summer of 2005.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"34 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-12-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121731722","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Constantina Kottaridi, Marina Papanastassiou, C. Pitelis
{"title":"Determinants of MNE Subsidiaries Decision to Set Up Own R&D Laboratories - Theory and Evidence","authors":"Constantina Kottaridi, Marina Papanastassiou, C. Pitelis","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1053581","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1053581","url":null,"abstract":"We explore the determinants of MNE subsidiaries decisions to set-up own R&D laboratories drawing on evidence from UK regions. In this context, we also test for the interaction between firm's internal and external environments. We also integrate extant IB and strategic management literatures and incorporate recent debates in New Economic Geography (NEG) in specifying the 'external environment'. We find support for the role of firm's 'productive opportunity' and predictions of the NEG on the basis of an analysis of primary data. We discuss implications for managerial practice and government regional policies.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"116 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124061199","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"School Finance Reform: Assessing General Equilibrium Effects","authors":"D. Epple, M. Ferreyra","doi":"10.3386/W13524","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/W13524","url":null,"abstract":"In 1994 the state of Michigan implemented one of the most comprehensive school finance reforms undertaken to date in any of the states. Understanding the effects of the reform is thus of value in informing other potential reform initiatives. In addition, the reform and associated changes in the economic environment provide an opportunity to assess whether a simple general equilibrium model can be of value in framing the study of such reform initiatives. In this paper, we present and use such a model to derive predictions about the effects of the reform on housing prices and neighborhood demographic compositions. Broadly, our analysis implies that the effects of the reform and changes in the economic environment are likely to have been reflected primarily in housing prices and only modestly on neighborhood demographics. We find that evidence for the Detroit metropolitan area from the decade encompassing the reform is largely consistent with the predictions of the model.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"31 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123400139","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Effect of Consumers' Expectations in a Booming Housing Market: Space-Time Patterns in the Netherlands, 1999-2000","authors":"J. Rouwendal, S. Longhi","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1023652","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1023652","url":null,"abstract":"Even though economic models have been relatively successful in explaining the long run patterns of house prices, they have more difficulties in explaining short run developments of the housing markets. However, the fact that during such 'bubbles' the spatial pattern of house prices, which can mainly be attributed to accessibility differences, usually remains unchanged, suggests that the irrational forces that are presumably responsible for unexplained movements in house prices obey some regularities: they seem to affect the level of house prices, but not their spatial pattern. This suggests that it is worthwhile to consider the explanatory power of psychological variables like those reflecting general (nation wide) feelings of optimism or pessimism. This paper considers the development of Dutch house prices in the years 1999 and 2000, when house prices increased fast. Existing explanations of the long run development of Dutch house prices on the basis of economic fundamentals (notably income and the mortgage interest rate) would suggest a much more modest development of house prices over these years. We also show that commonly used housing market indicators, notably the number of vacancies (houses for sale) and the time on the market, are unable to explain the development of house prices during this period. However, we find a strong relationship between the development of house prices and the Dutch index of consumer confidence.","PeriodicalId":393862,"journal":{"name":"Urban Economics & Regional Studies (Forthcoming)","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133311842","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}