Refine
This thesis contributes to the economic literature on India and specifically focuses on investment project (IP) location choice. I study three topics that naturally arise in sequence: geographic concentration of investment projects, the determinants of the location choices, and the impact these choices have on project success.
In Chapter 2, I provide the analysis of geographic concentration of IPs. I find that investments were concentrated over the period of observation (1996–2015), although the degree of concentration was decreasing. Additionally, I analyze different subsamples of the data set by ownership (Indian private, Indian public and foreign) and project status (completed or dropped). Foreign projects in all industries are more concentrated than private and public, while for the latter categories I identify only minor differences in concentration levels. Additionally, I find that the location patterns of completed and dropped investments are similar to that of the overall distribution and the distributions of their respective industries with completed IPs being somewhat more concentrated.
In Chapter 3, I study the determinants of project location choices with the focus on an important highway upgrade, the Golden Quadrilateral (GQ). In line with the existing literature, the GQ construction is connected to higher levels of investment in the affected non-nodal GQ districts in 2002–2016. I also provide suggestive evidence on changes in firm behavior after the GQ construction: Firms located in the non-nodal GQ districts became less likely to invest in their neighbor districts after the GQ completion compared to firms located in districts unaffected by the GQ construction.
Finally, in Chapter 4, I investigate the characteristics of IPs that may contribute to discontinuation of their implementation by comparing completed investments to dropped ones, defined as abandoned, shelved, and stalled investments as identified on the date of the data download. Controlling for local and business cycle conditions, as well as various investor and project characteristics, I show that projects located in close proximity to the investor offices (i.e., in the same district) are more likely to achieve the completion stage than more remote projects.
Issues in Price Measurement
(2022)
This thesis focuses on the issues in price measurement and consists of three chapters. Due to outdated weighting information, a Laspeyres-based consumer price index (CPI) is prone to accumulating upward bias. Therefore, chapter 1 introduces and examines simple and transparent revision approaches that retrospectively address the source of the bias. They provide a consistent long-run time series of the CPI and require no additional information. Furthermore, a coherent decomposition of the bias into the contributions of individual product groups is developed. In a case study, the approaches are applied to a Laspeyres-based CPI. The empirical results confirm the theoretical predictions. The proposed revision approaches are adoptable not only to most national CPIs but also to other price-level measures such as the producer price index or the import and export price indices.
Chapter 2 is dedicated to the measurement of import and export price indices. Such indices are complicated by the impact of exchange rates. These indices are usually also compiled by some Laspeyres type index. Therefore, substitution bias is an issue. The terms of trade (ratio of export and import price index) are therefore also likely to be distorted. The underlying substitution bias accumulates over time. The present article applies a simple and transparent retroactive correction approach that addresses the source of the substitution bias and produces meaningful long-run time series of import and export price levels and, therefore, of the terms of trade. Furthermore, an empirical case study is conducted that demonstrates the efficacy and versatility of the correction approach.
Chapter 3 leaves the field of index revision and studies another issue in price measurement, namely, the economic evaluation of digital products in monetary terms that have zero market prices. This chapter explores different methods of economic valuation and pricing of free digital products and proposes an alternative way to calculate the economic value and a shadow price of free digital products: the Usage Cost Model (UCM). The goal of the chapter is, first of all, to formulate a theoretical framework and incorporate an alternative measure of the value of free digital products. However, an empirical application is also made to show the work of the theoretical model. Some conclusions on applicability are drawn at the end of the chapter.
