One goal of the new European legislation set out in WEEE Directive 2012/19/UE is the promotion of WEEE re-use schemes. However, some authors are rather sceptical about the contribution of WEEE re-use schemes to improve resource efficiency. In order to evaluate and to design adequate policy instruments, some authors recommend the cost-benefit analysis (CBA) as a compulsory first step. In this context, the main contribution of this paper is to enlarge the empirical literature by providing a CBA of re-use schemes versus recycling processes of PCs. The analysis is made for Spain by quantifying in monetary terms the social damages of environmental impacts such as climate change, human toxicity, particulate matter formation, metal depletion, etc. Our results suggest that promoting re-use against recycling (and consequently the need for manufacturing a new PC from raw materials) may reduce environmental costs by 45.20€ per PC. Those social benefits are mainly generated in the re-use preparation process and distribution activities, whereas the re-use scenario displays a worse performance in energy consumption. The difference in the distribution stage during the second life cycle originates from the fact that the ready to re-use product is produced locally, while the brand new product is manufactured and distributed from abroad, mainly Asia. These results provide valuable information to policymakers and think tanks willing to design support schemes for re-use over recycling operations.

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. www.econstor.eu The Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn is a local and virtual international research center and a place of communication between science, politics and business. IZA is an independent nonprofit organization supported by Deutsche Post Foundation. The center is associated with the University of Bonn and offers a stimulating research environment through its international network, workshops and conferences, data service, project support, research visits and doctoral program. IZA engages in (i) original and internationally competitive research in all fields of labor economics, (ii) development of policy concepts, and (iii) dissemination of research results and concepts to the interested public. Terms of use: Documents in D I S C U S S I O N P A P E R S E R I E SIZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available directly from the author.IZA Discussion Paper No. 8302 July 2014 ABSTRACT Household Asset Holding Diversification in Australia *We explore asset holding diversification by Australian households, in particular, the household asset diversification participation decision (whether or not to diversify at all) is jointly estimated with the decision of how much to diversify. In so doing, recent literature on the modelling of proportions is combined with the growing body of research concerning household financial decision making. Our findings are consistent with the participation of households operating in diverse financial markets being constrained by ineffective information conduits, influencing the decision of whether or not to diversify. We further find that short term concerns over job security or health are associated with less participation in, as well as a lower extent of, asset holding diversification.JEL Classification: J3, J7

EKC literature usually dismiss the major influence of energy prices. (2) Relative energy prices invalidate the evidence in favor of the EKC hypothesis. (3) Results may explain some contradictory observations found in the EKC literature. (4) Nowadays reduction in energy prices may break decarbonization trends. (5) Direct action by policymakers is required to break the positive GDP-CO 2 link.

The tourism and hotels and restaurants industries fall within the service sector and employ many people with different skills and capacities. As in other sectors, it is important to monitor employment and working conditions in this sector. However, there has not been any empirical systematic research into employment and wage conditions in the Spanish hotels and restaurants sector, partly because of the complexity and size of the sector. All studies that exist on salary levels in the tourism industry emphasize the fact that the hotels and restaurants sector is among the lowest paid business sectors and it employs a large proportion of women and nonqualified labor. Such characteristics generate lower pay and greater risk of gender discrimination. The aim of this article is to analyze these two negative aspects of labor market conditions in the hotels and restaurants industry in Spain and to discuss regional differences comparing tourism regions and nontourism regions. We show that low-wage incidence in the hotels and restaurants industry disappears with the tourism development of the sector, that is, it is lower in the tourism regions. Nevertheless, gender discrimination does not depend on the tourism or nontourism characterization of regions.

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