Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Viktoria Kahui
Author-Name-First: Viktoria
Author-Name-Last: Kahui
Author-Email: viktoria.kahui@otago.ac.nz
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of Otago, New Zealand
Author-Name: Claire W. Armstrong
Author-Name-First: Claire W.
Author-Name-Last: Armstrong
Author-Email:
Author-Workplace-Name: University of Tromso, Norway
Title: Search and destroy: a bioeconomic analysis of orange roughy fisheries on seamounts in New Zealand
Abstract: This paper develops a bioeconomic model that captures the underlying incentives driving the serial depletion of pristine seamounts. The determinants under New Zealand's Quota Management System relate to unit cost savings from bottom trawling for orange roughy on seamounts, where catch rates are high, for a constrained yearly catch, yielding superior rent and driving the continued search for pristine seamounts. Despite known patterns of seamount depletion, catch and effort data collected by the New Zealand Ministry of Fisheries lack information on the bathymetry of harvesting locations. We provide descriptive statistics of the Ministry's data on catch, effort and location between 2001 and 2010, which examine associations between high catch rates and pristine seamounts. The bioeconomic model formalises the expected gains of unit cost reductions and shows that bottom trawling activity on pristine seamounts ceases only when the expected reduction in harvest costs is equal to the search cost per unit of harvest. We contend that New Zealand's policies to date to protect seamounts do not address the spatial determinants of rent appropriation under the quota system and that the imposition of a 'seamount' fee levied on the bottom trawlers' harvest activities may provide a way to internalise the cost of seamount destruction more effectively. Such a policy has a number of advantages, the most important of which is that the fee ties the impacts of habitat destruction to the choice of fishing method, thereby providing an impetus to develop and adopt more selective fishing practices.
Length: 27 pages
Creation-Date: 2012-06
Revision-Date: 2012-06
File-URL: http://www.otago.ac.nz/economics/research/otago076652.pdf
File-Format: Application/pdf
File-Function: First version, 2012
Number: 1201
Classification-JEL: 
Keywords: orange roughy; seamount; bioeconomic model; policy
Handle: RePEc:otg:wpaper:1201

Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Simona Fabrizi
Author-Name-First: Simona
Author-Name-Last: Fabrizi
Author-Email: s.fabrizi@massey.ac.nz
Author-Workplace-Name: School of Economics and Finance, Massey University, New Zealand
Author-Name: Steffen Lippert
Author-Name-First: Steffen
Author-Name-Last: Lippert
Author-Email: steffen.lippert@otago.ac.nz
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of Otago, New Zealand
Title: Corruption and the Public Display of Wealth
Abstract: We build a principal-agent-client model of corruption, allowing for heterogeneity in the value of public projects relative to the cost of monitoring their execution and for uncertainty of corruptors regarding the value of a project conducted. We derive the conditions under which officials with low-value projects have an incentive to signal their projects' type, and thereby facilitate their corruption, by means of public displays of wealth. While such public displays reduce the probability with which bribes are offered to officials conducting high-value projects, they increase the probability with which these officials accept bribes sufficiently to offset any positive effect.
Length: 26 pages
Creation-Date: 2012-06
Revision-Date: 2012-06
File-URL: http://www.otago.ac.nz/economics/research/otago076653.pdf
File-Format: Application/pdf
File-Function: First version, 2012
Number: 1202
Classification-JEL: D73, D82
Keywords: Corruption, Incentives, Signaling, Public Displays of Wealth
Handle: RePEc:otg:wpaper:1202

Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Simona Fabrizi
Author-Name-First: Simona
Author-Name-Last: Fabrizi
Author-Email: s.fabrizi@massey.ac.nz
Author-Workplace-Name: School of Economics and Finance, Massey University, New Zealand
Author-Name: Steffen Lippert
Author-Name-First: Steffen
Author-Name-Last: Lippert
Author-Email: steffen.lippert@otago.ac.nz
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of Otago, New Zealand
Author-Name: Clemens Puppe
Author-Name-First: Clemens
Author-Name-Last: Puppe
Author-Email: clemens.puppe@kit.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
Author-Name: Stephanie Rosenkranz
Author-Name-First: Stephanie
Author-Name-Last: Rosenkranz
Author-Email: s.rosenkranz@uu.nl
Author-Workplace-Name: Utrecht School of Economics, The Netherlands
Title: Suggested retail prices with downstream competition
Abstract: We analyze vertical relationships between a manufacturer and competing retailers when consumers have reference-dependent preferences. Consumers adopt the manufacturer's suggested retail price as their reference price and perceive losses when purchasing above the suggested price and gains when purchasing below it. In equilibrium, retailers undercut price suggestions and the manufacturer suggests a retail price if consumers are sufficiently bargain-loving and perceive retailers as sufficiently undifferentiated. The manufacturer engages in resale price maintenance otherwise. Consumers can be worse off with suggested retail prices than with resale price maintenance, prompting a rethinking of the current legal treatment of suggested retail prices.
Length: 23 pages
Creation-Date: 2010-04
Revision-Date: 2012-08
File-URL: http://www.otago.ac.nz/economics/research/otago076654pdf.pdf
File-Format: Application/pdf
File-Function: Revised version, 2012
Number: 1203
Classification-JEL: D03, D43, K21, L42
Keywords: suggested or recommended retail prices, resale price maintenance, reference-dependent preferences, vertical restraints, competition law and policy
Handle: RePEc:otg:wpaper:1203

Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Mathias Sinning
Author-Name-First: Mathias
Author-Name-Last: Sinning
Author-Email: mathias.sinning@anu.edu.au
Author-Workplace-Name: Australian National University, RWI and IZA
Author-Name: Steve Stillman
Author-Name-First: Steve
Author-Name-Last: Stillman
Author-Email: steven.stillman@otago.ac.nz
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of Otago, New Zealand
Title: Where Should I Live? The Locational Choices of Australians and New Zealanders
Abstract: This paper exploits the existence of the trans-Tasman travel agreement and the availability of comparable census data in Australia and New Zealand to examine the extent to which individuals respond to different labour market conditions in the two countries (and their subregions), as well as measures of local amenities and cost of living when deciding where to live. Our findings suggest that the trans-Tasman travel agreement did contribute to a mutual exchange of migrants with many similarities regarding the size and human capital endowment of migration flows in both directions. However, considerable differences between the two countries remain with regard to internal, trans-Tasman and other international migration.
Length: 49 pages
Creation-Date: 2012-09
Revision-Date: 2012-09
File-URL: http://www.otago.ac.nz/economics/research/otago076655.pdf
File-Format: Application/pdf
File-Function: First version, 2012
Number: 1204
Classification-JEL: F22, F55, R23
Keywords: International Migration; International Agreements; Regional Labour Markets
Handle: RePEc:otg:wpaper:1204

Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Dan Farhat
Author-Name-First: Dan
Author-Name-Last: Farhat
Author-Email: dan.farhat@otago.ac.nz
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of Otago, New Zealand
Title: Artificial Neural Networks and Aggregate Consumption Patterns in New Zealand
Abstract: This study uses artificial neural networks (ANNs) to reproduce aggregate per-capita consumption patterns for the New Zealand economy. Results suggest that non-linear ANNs can outperform a linear econometric model at out-of-sample forecasting. The best ANN at matching in-sample data, however, is rarely the best predictor. To improve the accuracy of ANNs using only in-sample information, methods for combining heterogeneous ANN forecasts are explored. The frequency that an individual ANN is a top performer during in-sample training plays a beneficial role in consistently producing accurate out-of-sample patterns. Possible avenues for incorporating ANN structures into social simulation models of consumption are discussed.
Length: 26 pages
Creation-Date: 2012-12
Revision-Date: 2012-12
File-URL: http://www.otago.ac.nz/economics/research/otago076656.pdf
File-Format: Application/pdf
File-Function: First version, 2012
Number: 1205
Classification-JEL: F22, F55, R23
Keywords: International Migration; International Agreements; Regional Labour Markets
Handle: RePEc:otg:wpaper:1205