Homeownership is both an individual and society objective, because of the positive neighborhood effects associated with areas of higher homeownership. To help realize these positive effects, the Mexican government has several programs directed to increasing homeownership. Many factors, however, may influence homeownership including shocks experienced by households. Shocks such as death in family, illness or accidents, unemployment, and business, crop, or livestock loss affect homeownership if households are unable to cushion the impact of the shock. Government income support programs, however, may help cushion the effect of a shock. The main objective is to determine how shocks that households’ experience and government income support programs influence homeownership in Mexico. A secondary objective is to determine how socio-demographic variables influence homeownership in Mexico. Based on the Random Utility Model, logit models of homeownership are estimated using data are from the 2002 Mexican National Survey on Living Levels of Households. Two models are estimated; with and without income. Income is excluded because of a large number of households that did not report income. Generally, inferences from the two models are similar. Homeownership appears to not be affected by shocks experienced by households. It appears households are able to cushion the impact of shocks. The two income support programs, the Program of Direct Rural Support of Mexico (PROGRESA) and the Program of Direct Rural Support of Mexico (PROCAMPO), appear to be increasing homeownership. These social welfare programs provide cash transfers to households. For whatever reason, PROGRESA has a larger effect on homeownership than PROCAMPO. Households with older heads have a larger probability of being a homeowner than households with younger heads. No statistically significance relationship exists between education and homeownership. Regional differences are seen in homeownership, with households located in the northwest region having a higher probability of homeownership than other regions. Differences in the significance of variable representing the household head’s gender, marital status, and occupation on homeownership exist between logit models that include and do not include current income. The most likely reason for these differences is interactions between the variables and a wealth effect.

This thesis endeavours to model a trip demand function for recreationalangling in Sweden, including the individual expected per-trip utility of regionalattributes. The analysis is conducted with the use of a Random Utility Model (RUM)for the estimation of ‘site-specific’ utility, and a negative binomial logit model fortrip demand. The site quality variable is stated as expected catch-rates (CR) definedin terms of three different specifications: sample mean CR, individually perfectlyforesighted CR, and an econometrically predicted individual CR. Results indicatethat the econometrically estimated individual catch-rate specification performs wellas an explanatory variable both when modelling discrete site choice and trip demand,while the sample mean and perfectly foresighted CR specifications provide withunintuitive and insignificant parameter values. The inclusive value of the regionchosen by the angler, estimated with the RUM, was subsequently found to be asignificant predicting variable for the number of recreational angling trips conductedby Swedish anglers.

Location-specific amenities have been shown to play an increasingly important role in individual migration decisions. The role certain amenities play in the location decisions of the highly educated may be the cause of persistent regional differences in certain types of human capital, and consequently in regional productivity. This dissertation examines the determinants of the location decisions of new Ph.D. recipients in science and engineering (S&E). A discrete choice random utility model of the city location decisions of new Ph.D.s is developed to estimate preferences for city attributes as well as willingness to pay for improved amenity quality. By estimating the value Ph.D.s place on various urban amenities, the results of this research help inform policymakers as to their ability (or inability) to attract and retain highly educated workers to their region through public investment in amenity quality. To link the choice of city with the geographic attributes of cities, a unique micro dataset is used which reports the planned employment city location of S&E Ph.D. recipients in the U.S. at the time of degree. The primary data comes from the 1997-1999 Survey of Earned Doctorates (SED), administered by Science Resources Statistics of the National Science Foundation. The SED is given to all new doctorate recipients in the U.S. at or near the time of degree, and has a response rate over 90%. The application focuses on approximately 23,000 new Ph.D.s who received their degree in one of twelve S&E fields during the period 1997-1999, and who had made a definite commitment to an employer in a known U.S. metropolitan area. The results consistently suggest that natural amenities, such as summer or winter temperatures, play a larger role in the location decisions of new S&E Ph.D.s than reproducible amenities, such as crime or air quality. The implication is that policymakers have only a limited ability to improve the composition of their workforce through amenity investment. The results also indicate that the influence of amenities on location choice is related to a number of observable characteristics such as age, race, marital status, citizenship, and Ph.D.s’ previous migration behavior.

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The diploma thesis deals with the law of patents and utility models in selected countries. In the first part of this work patents and utility models are characterized in terms of their legislation in the Czech Republic. The main differences and similarities in the laws of patents and utility models in Germany and the United States of America to the czech law are analyzed in the next parts of this work. The aim of this work is to determine, how the issue of patents and utility models is implemented into law in 3 selected countries, the Czech Republic, Germany and the United States of America, with the emphasis on the analysis of differences between the proceedings of patent's grant and proceedings of the utility model's registration into the registers in above mentioned countries. The part of this aim is to find out what tools which support inventions and innovations are being used in these countries and which one is the most effective one. The issue regarding differences in implementing patents and utility models into law is resolved in this diploma thesis -- a special focus was given to the length and complexity of each proceeding as well as the costs needed to gain and keep the rights in force.

As the world's most populous country, with more than 16 million births every year, China has emerged as a large importer of baby formula. China's relaxation of the one-child policy, which was announced in 2015, is expected to increase the number of births significantly and therefore increase the demand for Chinese and imported baby formula. While information on parent preferences for baby formula is very important for understanding and predicting China's import demand for baby formula and other products used to produce baby formula, like milk powder, there are very limited empirical studies on Chinese parent preferences for baby formula in the literature due to data limitation and other reasons. This research collects primary data from China through a parent survey, uses the data to analyze parent preferences and willingness to pay (WTP) for selected baby formula attributes, and derives implications for U.S. dairy product exports. Specifically, with detailed data from a total of 433 respondents, this study first examines parent purchase behavior of baby formula through descriptive analysis, then assesses parent preferences and WTP for selected baby formula attributes through the estimation of a random utility model, and finally derives implications for U.S. exports of milk powder, whey, and other dairy products. The descriptive analysis suggests that education level and income play an important role in parent purchase behavior of baby formula. The estimation results of the random utility model differed according to whether the survey was administered online or as a hardcopy. The results from the online survey indicate that imported, organic, and more reputable brands of baby formula are more attractive to respondents than domestic, non-organic, and less reputable brands. While respondents who completed the hardcopy survey also indicated a preference for organic baby formula from a reputable brand, they preferred domestic baby formula to imported formula. Further analysis of the WTP from the online survey for baby formula showed that parents have a strong preference and are willing to pay significantly more for baby formulas produced in Australia and the U.S. as compared to that produced in China. They are willing to pay more for organic baby formula and baby formula with an excellent reputation. The WTP results from the hardcopy survey indicate that parents are willing to pay more for domestic baby formula. They are also willing to pay more for organic baby formula and baby formula with an excellent reputation. China's emerging demand for imported baby formula, milk powder, and whey may bring more opportunities for the U.S. dairy industry, but U.S. dairy products are also facing increasing competition from similar products from other nations in the Chinese market. More studies are needed to identify the comparative advantages of U.S. baby formula and other dairy products in the Chinese market and to develop effective trade policies for enhancing U.S. exports to China.

In this study, we address the long-term project pricing problem for a company that operates in the defense industry. The pricing problem is a bid project pricing problem which includes various technical and financial uncertainties, such as estimations of workhour content of the project and exchange &amp / inflation rates. We propose a Robust Optimization (RO) approach that can deal with the uncertainties during the project lifecycle through the identification of several discrete scenarios. The bid project&rsquo / s performance measures, other than the monetary measures, for R&amp / D projects are identified and the problem is formulated as a multi-attribute utility project pricing problem. In our RO approach, the bid pricing problem is decomposed into two parts which are v solved sequentially: the Penalty-Model, and the RO model. In the Penalty-Model, penalty costs for the possible violations in the company&rsquo / s workforce level due to the bid project&rsquo / s workhour requirements are determined. Then the RO model searches for the optimum bid price by considering the penalty cost from the Penalty-Model, the bid project&rsquo / s performance measures, the probability of winning the bid for a given bid price and the deviations in the bid project&rsquo / s cost. Especially for the R&amp / D type projects, the model tends to place lower bid prices in the expected value solutions in order to win the bid. Thus, due to the possible deviations in the project cost, R&amp / D projects have a high probability of suffering from a financial loss in the expected value solutions. However, the robust solutions provide results which are more aware of the deviations in the bid project&rsquo / s cost and thus eliminate the financial risks by making a tradeoff between the bid project&rsquo / s benefits, probability of winning the bid and the financial loss risk. Results for the probability of winning in the robust solutions are observed to be lower than the expected value solutions, whereas expected value solutions have higher probabilities of suffering from a financial loss.

This thesis explores extensions of Random Utility Models (RUMs), providing more flexible models and adopting a computational perspective. This includes building new models and understanding their properties such as identifiability and the log concavity of their likelihood functions as well as the development of estimation algorithms. / Engineering and Applied Sciences

Presented here are consumption and production related asset pricing models which seek to explain stock market behaviour through the stock premium over risk-free bonds and to do so using parameter values consistent with theory. Our results show that there are models capable of explaining stock market behaviour. For the consumption-based model, we avoid many of the suggestions to artificially boost the predicted stock premium such as modelling consumption as leverage claims; instead we use the notion of surplus consumption. We find that with surplus consumption, there are models including the much-maligned power utility model, capable of yielding theory consistent estimates for the discount rate, risk-free rate as well as the coefficient of relative risk aversion, y. Since real business cycle theory assumes a risk aversion coefficient of 1, we conclude that our model which gives a value close to but not equal to 1, provides an indication of the impact of market imperfections. For production, we present many of the existing models which seek to explain stock market behaviour using production data which we find to be generally incapable of explaining stock market behaviour. We conclude by presenting a profit based formulation which uses deviations of actual from expected profits and dividends via stock price reaction parameters to successfully explain stock market behaviour. We also conclude that the use of a profit based formulation allows for a link to investment, output and pricing decisions and hence link consumption and production.

Conventionally, the focus during supplier evaluation has been to assess cost, quality and delivery effectiveness due to their impact on profitability. In recent years, there has been increased emphasis on promoting more sustainable business practices that focus on reducing environmental impact and improve societal well-being, in addition to economic benefits. However, most of the existing supplier evaluation methods in literature as well as those used by leading companies fall short of comprehensively assessing suppliers from a Triple Bottom Line (TBL) perspective. TBL defined as holistically looking at the economic, environmental, and societal aspects of an entity. This paper presents a review and selection of metrics for economic, environmental and societal sustainability evaluation. In addition, this work proposes a methodology for combining the scores into a comprehensive score that can be used to compare two entities performance relative to the TBL.