Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 406-432).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Hong Kong, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 406-432) Also available in print.

This paper analyzes the link between relative market value of representative subsets of athletes in the National Basketball Association (NBA) and individual wages. NBA athletes are categorized with respect to multiple performance characteristics utilizing the k-means algorithm to cluster observations and a group's market value is calculated by averaging real annual salaries. Employing GMM estimation techniques to a dynamic wage equation, we find a statistically significant and positive effect of one-period lagged relative market value of an athlete's representative cluster on individual wages after controlling for past individual performance. This finding is consistent with the theory of prototype heuristic, introduced by Kahneman and Frederick (2002), that NBA teams' judgment about an athlete's future performance is based on a comparison of the player to a prototype group consisting of other but comparable athletes. / Series: Department of Economics Working Paper Series

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Diss. (sammanfattning)--Umeå : Umeå universitet, 2009. / Härtill 4 uppsatser. Även tryckt utgåva.

This thesis evaluates experiences, effects, and costs of abdominal massage for people with constipation. The thesis comprises four papers: Paper I is a literature review of health economic analysis of nursing practice. Paper II and III is a prospective randomized controlled trial that evaluates abdominal massage in terms of effects and costs. Paper IV uses a qualitative approach to illuminate the experiences of receiving abdominal massage. Paper II and III included 60 participants who were constipated in accordance with Rome II criteria. Paper IV included nine participants. Paper I investigated the application of economic evaluation in studies of nursing practice. Systematic database searches were performed and gave nearly 600 papers that were screened and 115 studies were relevant according to stipulated inclusion criteria. The result showed that there was a trend of increased publications from the year 2000. Few studies reported the health economic methods used and the perspective of the economic analysis. There was a large variability in number of included cost items. Because the methodological weaknesses in many studies, it was difficult to use some studies as ground for discussion of resource distribution. Paper II investigates the effects of abdominal massage on gastrointestinal function and laxative intake on persons with constipation. The questionnaire Gastrointestinal Symptom Rating Scale (GSRS) was used and data were analyzed using multiple linear regression. The results showed that after eight weeks of abdominal massage the intervention group experienced significantly fewer gastrointestinal symptoms and had significantly more bowel evacuation compared with the control group. There were no differences in laxative intake. Paper III evaluated the change in health-related quality of life (HRQoL) for people with constipation when receiving abdominal massage and estimates the cost-effectiveness of two alternative implementation scenarios: 1) abdominal massage given by enrolled nurses in a department; and 2) participants giving themselves abdominal massage after receiving training in self-massage. Both scenarios imply that all participants received abdominal massage for eight weeks and those who found the treatment effective continued to receive treatment for eight more weeks. EQ-5D was used to assess HRQoL and for calculating QALY. The intervention group had after eight weeks of abdominal massage significantly higher HRQoL assessed with EQ-5D VAS compared with the control group. No significant differences were assessed with the EQ-5D index. Abdominal massage is initially expensive, but for those who respond favourably abdominal massage can be a cost-effective long-term treatment. Paper IV examines the experiences of receiving abdominal massage when having constipation. Four themes were formulated: being on one’s guard, becoming embraced by safe hands, feeling touch to body and mind, and being in a fragile state. Receiving abdominal massage was described as comfortable and lead to decreased problems with constipation. The improvement was described as easily disturbed and it was associated with demands to continue massage to maintain the new state. Conclusion: Abdominal massage is a pleasant treatment that provides significantly fewer gastrointestinal symptoms and increased health-related quality of life. As a long- term treatment, abdominal massage can be a cost-effective treatment.

In the last two decades, more than half of the countries in the world have introduced a reform process in their power industries and billions of dollars have been spent on liberalizing electricity markets around the world. This thesis presents a doctoral research concerned with the cross-country empirical analysis of the electricity market reforms. The thesis is in three-paper format; that is, we present three independent but related stand-alone papers. The first paper focuses on the impact of power market reforms on electricity price-cost margins and industrial/residential price ratios. It investigates this issue by looking at the impact of the electricity industry reforms on residential and industrial electricity price-cost margins and their effect on industrial/residential price ratios. Using panel data from 63 developed and developing countries covering the period 1982–2009, empirical models are developed and analysed. The results suggest that each individual reform step has different impact on price-cost margins and industrial/residential price ratios for each consumer and country group. That is to say, our findings imply that similar reform steps may have different impacts in different countries, which supports the idea that reform prescription for a specific country cannot easily be transferred to another one with similar success. The second paper explores whether the question of why some countries are able to implement more extensive reforms is closely related to the question of why some countries have better institutions than others. It analyses this question by using an empirical econometric model based on Poisson regression with cross-section data covering 51 states in US, 13 provinces in Canada and 51 other countries. The study concludes that both the background of the chairperson and the minister/governor and institutional endowments of a country are important determinants of how far reforms have gone in a country. Considering the fact that ideological considerations, political composition of governments and educational/professional background of leaders have played and will play a crucial role throughout the reform process; the third paper attempts to discover the impact of political economic variables on the liberalization process in electricity markets. It develops and analyses empirical models using panel data from 55 developed and developing countries covering the period 1975–2010. The results suggest that a portion of the differences in the reform experiences of reforming countries in the past three decades can be explained by differences in the political structure, in the ideology of the government and in the professional and educational backgrounds of the political leaders.