Despite the growing attention to the impact of culture on socio-economic indicators, there is a lack of causality evidence. Scholars have noted that cultural values or norms, as well as, a vibrant cultural environment can have a positive impact on GDP growth, labour productivity, the attraction of human capital and the improvement of human well-being. However, the issue of endogeneity is not thoroughly debated. Not only can culture impact economic development, but socio-economic environment also affects the cultural indicators. Therefore, it is essential to identify the causal effects of culture. This article aims to assess whether culture has a causal impact on socio-economic variables. The Granger procedure is utilised to evaluate causal relationships, describing the cultural environment with a comprehensive set of 45 cultural indicators across 30 European countries. This enables the comparison of the relationship between culture and socio-economic variables using the same method across different countries. Additionally, cultural indices are constructed. The research is extended by employing a panel vector autoregression (VAR) model. The key finding of this article demonstrates a causal impact of culture on socio-economic indicators, confirmed by both the Granger procedure and panel VAR estimations. JEL Code: Z1

In this study, we examined the impact of crypto assets on the risk-return characteristics of portfolios consisting of traditional assets. First, we examined the optimal portfolio for maximising the Sharpe ratio and found that the Sharpe ratio improves when CMC Crypto 200 Index (CMC) are incorporated to a certain extent into a portfolio consisting of traditional stocks, bonds and commodity indices. In addition, we focused on individual assets comprising crypto assets instead of CMC and incorporated individual crypto assets into a portfolio of conventional traditional assets and found that the Sharpe ratio improved for the majority of individual crypto assets. This is an interesting result as it indicates that crypto assets may contribute to improving the risk-return characteristics of the portfolio. Second, we examined the optimal portfolio for minimising volatility and found that the percentage of crypto assets held was small. This may be due to the fact that the volatility of crypto assets is higher than that of other assets. In this sense, investing in cryptocurrencies is not suitable for investors who want to keep volatility low. JEL Codes: G10, G11, G12

In this article, network analysis has been employed to study the dynamic evolution of the cryptocurrency market from 1 January 2020 to 1 January 2024. This approach facilitates an in-depth exploration of the market’s response to several major events during this period, including the coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and the bankruptcy of FTX, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges. The study focuses on analysing key network characteristics of the cryptocurrency market, namely: (a) degree centrality, (b) betweenness centrality, (c) clustering coefficient and (d) average path length. Additionally, we explore the co-movements within the market, categorising cryptocurrencies into functional groups for a comparative analysis. This approach enables us to examine shifts in the cryptocurrency network topology, providing insights into how different groups of cryptocurrencies interact with and influence each other. Through this network analysis, we aim to shed light on the intricate interrelationships among cryptocurrencies. The findings of this study are intended to provide investors with valuable insights, potentially guiding the development of more informed and strategic diversification strategies in the dynamic and evolving landscape of the cryptocurrency market. JEL Codes: G11, G12, D85

Green transition by reducing CO 2 emissions and curtailing the exploitation of natural resources while increasing renewable energy use and generation is one of the most important targets in sustainable development. This study investigated the impacts of women’s empowerment in politics on the green transition in developing countries. We applied a fixed-effects model to the panel data for 131 developing countries from 2000 to 2019. Our findings indicated that higher levels of participation by women in politics are likely to reduce CO 2 emissions and reliance on natural resources. However, there was no statistically significant effect of women’s political empowerment on renewable energy consumption. Women’s political participation enhanced the transition towards sustainable energy sources such as geothermal and wind energy. We also found that the effects of women’s political participation on CO 2 emissions were greater in countries with better political stability, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law, control of corruption, and voice and accountability. This study contributes to the growing literature in feminism and environmentalism on the achievement of sustainable development. JEL Codes: J16, O13, P48

Data gathered in Samoa before and after the declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic on 11 March 2020 compare and contrast the nature and extent of ‘structural violence’ perpetrated by ‘egoistic’ bilateral development assistance. Despite much higher risks and costs to aid recipients than under normal circumstances, during the pandemic, donor control in ‘increasingly detailed and encompassing ways’ and donor use of ‘technical discourse’ to conceal ‘hidden purposes of bureaucratic power or dominance’ both increased significantly. Pandemic-induced opportunistic abandonments by donor governments of neoliberal policy principles did not ameliorate such structural violence. Individual differences among donor officials affected how control was exercised and whether host-government ‘ownership’ and ‘leadership’ of development assistance was flouted peremptorily, or denied more subtly and politely (with ‘warm regards’); and they influenced the volume and complexity of ‘interpretive labour’ required of resistance. But donor domination and control were undiminished by any of this. ‘Bullshit’ jobs and the blind allegiance of their (donor) incumbents were crucial to the realisation of such ends. The findings reconfirm the embeddedness of the neoliberal order and shed light on the character of its deep-seated bureaucratic resistance to change. JEL: F35, F54, F55, O19, O20, O22, P48

In 1959, Ragnar Frisch prompted Georg Rasch to formalise a separability theorem that continues today to serve as the basis of a wide range of theoretical and applied developments in psychological and social measurement. Previously unnoted are the influences on Rasch exerted by Frisch’s concerns for data autonomy, model identification and necessary and sufficient conditions. Although Rasch acknowledged Frisch’s prompting towards a separability theorem, he did not acknowledge any substantive, intellectual debt to him, nor to Irving Fisher, but only to Ronald Fisher. Rasch appears to have developed a special interest in sufficiency and identified models when studying with Frisch in 1935, and in 1947, when Rasch accompanied Tjalling Koopmans to the University of Chicago and the Cowles Commission for Research in Economics. I. Fisher’s separation theorem continues to be relevant in econometrics, and interest in Rasch’s separability theorem is growing as the measurement models based on it are adopted in metrological theory and practice. The extensive interrelations between measurement science, metrological standards and economics suggest paths towards lower transaction costs and more efficient markets for individualised exchanges of human, social and natural capital. Equally, if not more, surprising are the implications for a poetic art of complex, harmonised relationships played out via creative improvisations expressed using instruments tuned to shared scales. JEL: B41, C10, C13, C20, C42, D70, E60, H54, I11, I21, I31, P11

This study tests the association between weight status and depression in Italy using the Second Wave of the European Health Interview Survey (EHIS2) microdata, which also provide information on weight/height and eight depressive symptoms. Using a probit regression, the empirical results show a strong positive association between weight status, proxied by body mass index, and sleep troubles and eating disorders, with females suffering more than males. In addition, low interest is negatively associated with medium and high sources of income, while depressive mood and sense of failure are negatively associated with employment status. Individuals in midlife (45–54 years old) suffer from all depressive symptoms more than those in other age classes, with females suffering more than males, with the exception of low interest and depressive mood. Furthermore, individuals with a higher level of education have a lower likelihood of suffering from all depressive symptoms. These findings suggest that policies aimed at reducing obesity rates could also reduce new and emerging types of depressive symptoms correlated with overweight/obesity, such as sleep troubles and eating disturbances. JEL: J24, I12, I1, C25

Households behave systematically in family planning and intra-household resource allocation. A neglected area in historical health studies is the relationship between body mass index (BMI), health and family size. Using robust statistics and a large nineteenth-century BMI data set, this study uses an overlapping generations model to explain resource allocation within the household and illustrates that there is a positive relationship across the BMI distribution with family size. There is also a positive relationship between BMIs and average wealth, and an inverse relationship between BMI and inequality. After controlling for family size and wealth characteristics, there was a positive relationship between BMI and worker’s agricultural rural status. JEL: N3, D1, I1

Traditional Mincer-type hedonic wage equations typically fail to account for the effect of psychological capital, in part because such factors are often regarded as unobservable. This article incorporates a measure of psychological capital (specifically, self-esteem) that has been validated in the psychology literature into an otherwise typical hedonic wage model. Then, the sample is divided into race and gender subgroups and estimates are compared. The results suggest that self-esteem does play a role in determining wages for Whites (White men, in particular), but it has no detectable effect on the wages of African-Americans. Data are drawn from the 1979 National Longitudinal Study of Youth. JEL: D (‘Microeconomics’), J (‘Labor and demographic economics’), J31 (‘Wage levels and structure, wage differentials’)

The concepts of cultural relativism (introduced by Franz Boas) and hedonic relativism (introduced by Richard Easterlin) are reference points of a theory that addresses international differences in per capita incomes and variations in the contribution of income to happiness. The pivotal concept in this study is diligence. Painstaking effort, that is, diligence, is needed to produce high quality goods and services. The downside of such efforts lies in the psychological burden that comes with the necessary high level of self-control of the individual worker and the required organisational feedback mechanisms in firms. We present two competing views concerning the determination of diligence. The first, anthropologically inspired, hypothesis states that a society’s cultural forces such as cognitive styles, organisational traditions and religion determine the level of diligence. One implication of this perspective is that societies can have income levels that are either too high or too low relative to the welfare optimum. The second view holds that diligence is determined in a maximising way, balancing the gains and pains of diligence in the economic realm. Cross-country data are studied in order to assess the two competing views. The econometric evidence indicates that it is the maximising view that can explain key aspects of the data. JEL: D63, P5, Z1