Browsing by Author "Alba, Michael M."

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    A mathematical theory of social institutions: with an illustration on the pure agricultural contracts
    (1987-10) Alba, Michael M.; Montes, Manuel F.
    A theory of social institutions is derived by depicting social problems that recur systematically as supergames. The equilibrating process -- institutionalization -- is modelled as an expanded Estes Learning Model in which the possible institutions are the absorbing states. When applied to agricultural production, the model, because of its feature of informational asymmetry between players, points to the risk attitudes of agents or owners of production factors as determining the type of institution that emerges. When players are risk neutral, all contracts (fixed wage, sharecropping, and fixed rent) have equal chances of becoming institutions. In a risk averse regime, however, sharecropping turns out to be the most probable institutional solution.
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    Discrete choice modelling: an application to immunization demand
    (1995-03) Ferriol, Kathleen Leilani R.; Alba, Michael M.
    In a developing country such as the Philippines, there will always be many government projects which need funding that can improve the quality of life of the citizen's. Among these government priorities, health will always occupy a vital place for with good health usually comes individual productivity and, consequently, the economic growth of the nation as a whole. Above all, good health is really a goal in itself. Among the health services, preventive care such as immunization plays a fundamental role. This particular study focuses on the estimation of demand for immunization services. The questions that this study wants to answer are: who demands immunization and how much immunization is demanded. The answers can help achieve better targeting of the service which can, in turn, optimize the government's already scarce resources. Moreover, fewer children will suffer from the immunizable diseases (measles, polio, tuberculosis, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus) and society will benefit from better health. To measure the economic relationships, the demand for immunization is modelled as a demand for preventive health care which is available only in discrete quantities. The implied regression model is the ordered probit which takes into account the ordinal nature of the dependent variable. One of the leading factors which encouraged the development of this kind of analysis (called qualitative choice analysis) is the increasing availability of good survey data on households and firms.