C25 - Single Equation Models; Single Variables: Discrete Regression and Qualitative Choice Models; Discrete Regressors; Proportions; ProbabilitiesReturn

The main objective of this study is to determine the effects of economic and social inequalities on academic success and to test whether the cycle of inequality is active through education. This objective is accomplished using classical and Bayesian discrete choice models for the sample obtained from Türkiye. The results reveal that students' economic and social characteristics affect their academic success and that these characteristics are possible sources of inequality in education. According to the findings obtained from models employed in the study, income, private school education, parental education level, region of residence, neediness to work, and the level of happiness with the family were found to have statistically significant effects on student success in getting into the desired university department and university placement ranking. Additionally, the results are compatible with the studies that report that the Bayesian approach yields more stable and appropriate results with smaller standard errors and confidence intervals.

We examine central banks' involvement in inflation forecast targeting by means of an index-based analysis and ordered logistic regression. The research encompasses the Bank of England, the Czech National Bank, the National Bank of Poland and the Sveriges Riksbank. They produce conditional or unconditional macroeconomic forecasts. Hence, two paths have been used to examine them. We examine whether the four central banks follow their forecasts to some extent. We have found that the CNB and SR are highly consistent in terms of compatibility of their decisions with the forecasts, timing of decisions, and communication by means of forecasts. The NBP follows its forecast much less consistently, while the BoE ignores it altogether. As some of the results for the BoE and NBP are unambiguous, we remain cautious while interpreting them. This paper contributes to the literature on the empirical evaluation of inflation forecast targeting.

Arrangements to cooperate on innovation facilitate access to external sources of knowledge. By using panel data derived from the five waves of Community Innovation Survey in the Czech Republic, we examine whether firms engage in these arrangements persistently or rather revert to other behaviour. Econometric estimates of dynamic random effects and multivariate probit models provide strong support to the thesis of persistence, particularly of linkages with the university sector and suppliers. The results are robust to the initial conditions problem and serial correlation in idiosyncratic errors. Government programmes initiating cooperation on innovation therefore have the potential to induce durable changes in the innovative behaviour of firms.

The aim of this paper is to find out determinants which affect the commercial banks' decision to lend on the interbank market in the Visegrad countries. The data cover the period from 2000 to 2011. The net interbank position of individual banking sectors significantly differs. Results of the probit model showed that banks' decision to lend in interbank market is determined both by bank-specific and macroeconomic factors. Bank liquidity, capital adequacy and quality of the loan portfolio are important bank-specific factors. Growth rate of the gross domestic products, unemployment rate, financial crisis and level of interest rates matter among macroeconomic factors. Although the Visegrad countries have a lot in common, different factors determined the banks' decision in individual countries. Moreover, the direction of influence of some factors may also differ.

In this paper I explain individual propensity to herding behaviour and its relationship to time-pressure by conducting a laboratory experiment. I let subjects perform a simple cognitive task with the possibility to herd under different levels of time pressure. In the main treatments, subjects had a chance to revise their decision after seeing decisions of others, which I take as an indicator of herding behaviour. The main findings are that the propensity to herd was not significantly influenced by different levels of time pressure, although there could be an indirect effect through other variables, such as the time subjects spent revising the decision. Heart-rate significantly increased over the baseline during the performance of a task and its correlation to the subjectively stated level of stress was positive but very weak, which suggests that time pressure may not automatically induce stress but increase effort instead.

During different GDP growth regimes, the dynamics of global financial markets impacts the Slovenian stock exchange with varying intensity. We propose a smooth transition regression model to explain Slovene stock exchange index returns employing financial and macroeconomic variables. According to our model, the reaction of the stock market to several of the explanatory variables depends on the magnitude of GDP growth. The weaker relationship between Slovene stock exchange index returns and S&P 500 returns in the period of lower or negative GDP growth could be explained by less developed financial market in Slovenia and therefore not closely linked interchange of securities.

This paper analyses the crucial factors determining the foreign direct investment (FDI) going to the privatized glass sector in the Czech Republic. In our research we felt that there was a scant evidence in Central and Eastern Europe of the determinants of foreign direct investments (FDI) at the micro level and we were aware of the endogeneity issue of FDI. The aim of this paper is to fill these gaps. The choice of the glass sector allows for an analysis of a firm's micro characteristics that attract foreign direct investors in an industrial sector, while reducing the impact of macroeconomic factors in their choice. Our econometrical analysis, using original panel data from 1990 to 2006, gives strong evidence that foreign direct investors in the glass sector in the Czech Republic have chosen larger and more profitable firms that were intensively restructured and privatized at the beginning of the transition. Our results support the relevance of the endogeneity issue in the choice of foreign direct investors in transition countries.

Long-term growth convergence has extensively been investigated based on economic variables. Indicators of social development and health status are generally focused on their contribution to growth or on assessing national health care systems. Yet, as a general yardstick of well-being, life expectancy should be regarded as a criterion to measure crosscountry development patterns over long periods. Following a review of two approaches to estimating convergence, hypotheses and findings of recent studies on public health and growth are examined. Reformulating the analytical framework of both strands of research, discrete choice and parametric and semi-parametric Poisson regressions are applied to a three-decade panel of 132 countries. Determinants of achievements tend to impact differently across countries, with this distinction occurring particularly between negative and positive counts. Indications of convergence are tempered by results accounting for possible non-linear relationships, which further highlight the discrepancy between country groups with average life expectancy losses and gains.