Yardstick regulation requires the utilization of benchmarking, a valuable tool for improving public service delivery, especially in developing countries where inefficiencies translate into negative health impacts and social unrest. However, benchmarking must account for both the cost and the quality of service. Using data from 38 Peruvian water utilities (1996 to 2001), the paper evaluates qual...

Starting from the quasar sample of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) for which the Civ line is observed, we use an analysis scheme to derive the z-dependence of the maximum mass of active black holes, which overcomes the problems related to the Malmquist bias. The same procedure is applied to the low redshift sample of SDSS quasars for which Hβ measurements are available. Combining with the r...

BACKGROUND China began to implement the national medical and health system and public hospital reforms in 2009 and 2012, respectively. Anhui Province is one of the four pilot provinces, and the medical reform measures received wide attention nationwide. The effectiveness of the above reform needs to get attention. This study aimed to master the efficiency and productivity of county-level public...

This thesis consists of two self-contained empirical essays. Essay I investigates the impact of labor subsidies on TFP, and profit per employee is included as a second outcome. Coarsened exact matching (CEM) is performed on the key variables. After matching, a difference-indifference (DID) model is applied. The study shows that firms employing workers with wage subsidies experience negative and...

Data envelopment analysis (DEA) is a widely used benchmarking technique. Its strength stems from the fact that it can include several inputs and outputs of not necessarily same type to evaluate efficiency scores. Indeed, aforesaid method based on mathematical optimization. This paper constructs second-order conic optimization problem unifying DEA models. Moreover, presents an algorithm solves f...