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Queens over Kings: Gender and Socioeconomic Predictors of Competitive Chess Performance among Peruvian Youth
Get PDFThe aim of this research is to determine whether socioeconomic factors can predict the chess performance of young Peruvian players, measured as the probability of winning a medal in a championship. To achieve this, we explore data from a survey conducted by the Peruvian Chess Sports Federation (FDPA) after the XXXI Pan American Youth Hybrid Festival 2021. A binary regression model is estimated assuming a logistic probability distribution. The results indicate that factors such as gender, previous performance, age, internet access quality, having siblings, and academic performance are significant in predicting a player's likelihood of winning a medal in a chess competition. The analysis suggests that the probability of a female player winning a medal is higher than that of a male player by at least 26 percentage points. Oaxaca-Blinder and Nopo decompositions confirm the significant impact of gender on chess performance. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first scientific research on the performance of young Peruvian chess players. Furthermore, its findings can be valuable for identifying players with a high probability of winning in championships and designing strategies to enhance the performance of chess players
L'aide en recul: L'impact des réductions de l'aide américaine et européenne sur l'Afrique subsaharienne
Get PDFOn 28 March 2025, the Trump administration formally notified Congress of its intent to dismantle nearly all remaining positions within the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), including the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). This decision effectively terminates the operations of a key foreign aid institution, concluding over six decades of purported humanitarian and development engagement. USAID has long been a focal point of criticism for both the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). However, the role of US and European aid in Africa has been fraught with contradictions. While framed as a mechanism for development, such assistance has frequently served geopolitical and neo-colonial interests rather than fostering sustainable, autonomous growth. Under the guise of economic liberalisation, aid has been instrumentalised to impose privatisation and deregulation policies, often to the detriment of local economies. USAID, in concert with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank (WB), has prioritised large-scale agribusiness and monoculture production systems, undermining indigenous food sovereignty and displacing traditional agrarian practices. Consequently, African peasants have become increasingly dependent on imported seeds, chemical fertilisers, and industrial farming techniques, a paradigm that disproportionately benefits Western agribusiness conglomerates while exacerbating food insecurity across the continent. Compounding these challenges, concurrent reductions in aid budgets by the UK and EU, driven by militarisation priorities, threaten to inflict severe humanitarian consequences, particularly upon Africa’s most marginalised populations. Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) stands to bear the brunt of these cuts, as critical prevention initiatives, including condom distribution and pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) programs, face imminent discontinuation. The repercussions could reverse decades of progress, particularly in curbing mother-to-child HIV transmission and reducing paediatric HIV mortality. Yet, this crisis also presents a pivotal opportunity: the potential for Africa to reclaim agency over its developmental trajectory, unshackled from external conditionalities and structural dependencies. This juncture could catalyse an era of self-reliance, marked by regional collaboration, endogenous innovation, and economic sovereignty—principles embodied by initiatives such as the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). However, the feasibility of such measures remains precarious, given entrenched elite capture and systemic corruption within many SSA governance structures. The subsequent analysis will demonstrate, drawing upon case studies from South Africa, Nigeria, Zambia, and Ethiopia, the political economy of aid withdrawal often renders transformative alternatives unviable, as ruling elites prioritise self-enrichment over structural reform
Did Slavery Impede the Growth of American Capitalism? Two Natural Experiments Using Farm Values per Acre
Get PDFTwo natural experiments challenge the view that slavery impeded the growth of American capitalism. An event study shows that farm values fell relative to the national average in slave states following abolition. A spatial regression discontinuity design (RDD) then suggests that any negative effects of slavery’s legality on farm values on the free-slave state border were counteracted by the institution’s practical utility. An explanation of these results can also be advanced: slavery provided a relatively cheap agricultural labor force in parts of the South where white Americans preferred not to settle. From this perspective, the growth of American capitalism was promoted rather than impeded by slavery
Симметричная модель экономического равновесия: диалог с искусственным интеллектом
Get PDFThe book Symmetric Model of Economic Equilibrium: Dialogue with Artificial Intelligence is a unique experiment that blends economic theory with cutting-edge technology. It consists of a record of dialogues between the author and the artificial intelligence system Grok 3, with the central theme being the exploration of the Symmetric Model of Economic Equilibrium. This model introduces a novel perspective on the economy as a self-regulating system, where micro- and macro-levels are interconnected through cyclical flows and feedback loops, ensuring its integrity and adaptability.The book includes chat sessions in which the AI evaluates the model’s mathematical rigor, economic logic, and practical significance. It examines the model’s advantages over traditional approaches and its potential applications in economic policy and the development of analytical tools. The dialogue underscores the value of an interdisciplinary approach, integrating economic theory, dialectics, second-order cybernetics, and the capabilities of artificial intelligence. It illustrates how engaging with AI can enhance the understanding of complex economic processes and provide fresh momentum for further research in this field.
The book is aimed at economists, AI researchers, and anyone interested in innovative directions for the advancement of economic science
Tradeoffs over Rate Cycles: Activity, Inflation and the Price Level
Get PDFCentral banks often face tradeoffs in how their monetary policy decisions impact economic activity (including employment), inflation and the price level. This paper assesses how these tradeoffs have evolved over time and varied across countries, with a focus on understanding the post-pandemic adjustment. To make these comparisons, we compile a cross-country, historical database of “rate cycles” (i.e., easing and tightening phases for monetary policy) for 24 advanced economies from 1970 through 2024. This allows us to quantify the characteristics of interest rate adjustments and corresponding macroeconomic outcomes and tradeoffs. We also calculate Sacrifice Ratios (output losses per inflation reduction) and document a historically low “sacrifice” during the post-pandemic tightening. This popular measure, however, ignores adjustments in the price level—which increased by more after the pandemic than over the past four decades. A series of regressions and simulations suggest monetary policy (and particularly the timing and aggressiveness of rate hikes) play a meaningful role in explaining these tradeoffs and how adjustments occur during tightening phases. Central bank credibility is the one measure we assess that corresponds to only positive outcomes and no difficult tradeoffs
Repairing a historical mistake in bilateral FDI statistics: A new dataset covering 2001-2022
Get PDFThe statistics on foreign direct investment (FDI) used to be important quantifiers of ownership-based control over foreign companies. However, during the 2008 financial crisis, IMF and OECD changed the FDI definition to obtain more information on intra-company finance activity. They did so by giving cross-border loans between affiliated subsidiaries (within the same parent firm) the same status as acquiring ownership of foreign firms. The change became effective in 2013. The paper shows that it resulted in a systematic drop of quality and consistency of FDI statistics, while causing massive double counting. It made comparison between pre- and post-2013 FDI statistics impossible. We propose a methodology to repair this historical mistake by emulating the pre-2013 FDI definition, which was based primarily on FDI assets. The paper provides a full proof-of-concept with a dataset holding bilateral FDI between 232 jurisdictions over the period 2001-2022. The dataset is strictly based on reported data; it uses no estimation or imputation. The new dataset is evaluated quantitatively by a comparison with the original source data. The paper also quantifies the dimensions and the country structure of 'phantom FDI' that resulted from current double-counting practices
Asymmetric Price Adjustment over the Business Cycle
Get PDFStudies of micro-level price datasets find more frequent small price increases than decreases, which can be explained by consumer inattention because time-constrained shoppers might ignore small price changes. Recent empirical studies of the link between shopping behavior and price attention over the business cycle find that consumers are more (less) attentive to prices during economic downturns (booms). These two sets of findings have a testable implication: the asymmetry in small price changes should vary over the business cycle—it should diminish during recessions and strengthen during expansions. We test this prediction using a large US store-level dataset with more than 98 million weekly price observations for the years 1989–1997, which includes an 8-month recession period, as defined by the NBER. We compare price adjustments between periods of recession (high unemployment) and expansion (low unemployment). Focusing on small price changes, we find, consistent with our hypothesis, that there is a greater asymmetry in small price changes during periods of low unemployment compared to the periods of high unemployment, implying that firms’ price-setting behavior varies over the business cycle
Granularity Shock: A Small Perturbation Two-Factor Model
Get PDFThis paper proposes a small perturbation two-factor model designed to capture granularity risk, extending the classical Vasicek Asymptotic Single Risk Factor (ASRF) portfolio loss model. By applying the Lyapunov Central Limit Theorem, we demonstrate that, for small Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) values, granularity risk – conditional on market risk – is approximately proportional to a standard normal random variable. Instead of analyzing heterogeneous portfolios directly, we focus on a homogeneous portfolio subject to a small perturbation induced by granularity risk. We propose the Vasicek-Herfindahl portfolio loss distribution, which extends the Vasicek portfolio loss distribution to account for portfolio concentration. Utilizing this distribution, we derive closed-form granularity adjustments for the probability density function (PDF) and cumulative distribution function (CDF) of portfolio loss, as well as for Value at Risk (VaR) and Expected Shortfall (ES). We compare our primary results with existing findings and validate them through Monte Carlo simulations
In “Sustainability” We Trust?: The Need for a New Approach to Resource Preservation
Get PDFSustainability is a buzzword that has gained traction around the world. It is linked to, or synonymous with, environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles. The advocacy for sustainability has led many individuals, corporations and governments to incorporate ESG principles into their operations and processes, and communicate to stakeholders how they are meeting sustainability expectations and its role in the value creation process in society. Despite these strides, a critical mind would ask some important philosophical questions: Does “society” need sustainability? The answer is yes. Is the sustainability agenda good for the world? The answer is yes. But is sustainability the only way to conserve environmental, social and governance resources to make it available for the present and future generations? The answer is, no? This article discusses sustainability and argues that sustainability is a way to achieve the goal of resource preservation and continuity for the present and future generations, but it is not the only way. It critique attempts to present sustainability as the only way to achieve the goal of resource preservation. While this study does not offer an alternative way to achieve the goal of resource preservation for the present and future generations, it call on scholars to explore alternative ways to achieve the goal of resource preservation for the present and future generations
Renewable Energy Reduces Infant Mortality in the Developing World
Get PDFThis paper estimates the effect of renewable energy growth on infant mortality by exploiting variation in renewable energy penetration driven by global technological progress and heterogeneous regional potential for renewables. Using
data covering seven million births across 427 subnational regions in 54 developing countries, we find that a 10-percentage-point increase in the share of renewables
in electricity generation reduces infant mortality by 1.99 deaths per 1,000 live births. Our results imply that the growth of renewable energy in these countries averted 1.2 million infant deaths from 1990 to 2020, corresponding to 8.23% of the total decline in infant mortality. The mortality decline is disproportionately concentrated among disadvantaged subpopulations and thus reduces inequality in infant mortality. Mechanism analysis indicates that air pollution abatement and local income growth serve as key channels