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This study uses quarterly longitudinal data to examine the cost efficiency of 20 New Zealand District Health Boards between 2011 and 2018. A random-effects dynamic stochastic frontier model is applied to estimate the persistence of Health Boards' cost efficiency while considering both observed and unobserved heterogeneity. The findings reveal that New Zealand Health Boards, on average, spent approximately 7.5% more than the estimated costs of efficient operation, primarily due to high persistence in cost inefficiency. Notably, Health Boards serving rural areas faced even higher levels of long-run cost inefficiency, resulting in an overspending of about 15% of annual budgets. The results of this study highlight that most Health Boards demonstrated excellent short-term performance relative to the long-run equilibrium level of cost inefficiency. However, the more significant concern lies in high long-run cost inefficiency within the sector attributed to structural and regulatory issues. Policymakers are urged to address these underlying problems to improve overall cost efficiency in the health sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using Bayesian Structural Time Series analysis, this study examines the causal impact of loan‐to‐value (LTV) restrictions imposed by the Reserve Bank of New Zealand in October 2013. By incorporating state‐space components, such as local linear trend, seasonality and regression, counterfactual values of house price indices are predicted. Surprisingly, the study reveals that the implementation of LTV restrictions had no significant effect on national house price indices, contradicting prior Central Bank studies that reported a nearly 3 percentage‐point decrease in housing cost inflation. This contradictory evidence challenges existing perceptions of the effectiveness of LTV restrictions in curbing house price inflation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study is to explore the trade‐off between technical efficiency and the quality of hospital services when the state is the sole provider. Data from 20 New Zealand District Health Boards from 2011 to 2017 is used to estimate technical efficiency using the data envelopment analysis technique, which employs an additive inverse formulation for undesirable outcomes. The estimated average quality‐adjusted technical efficiency score is 0.69. In comparison, when the quality variable was removed, the efficiency declined to 0.66. More importantly, the ranking of district health boards stays consistent across both models, indicating that there is very little trade‐off between quality and efficiency. A sensitivity analysis also confirms the lack of a trade‐off between quality and efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2006.01.005 Byline: Tessa M. Webb, John R. Beech, Kate M. Mayall, Antony S. Andrews Keywords: Reading development; Visual cues; Featural analysis; Word naming Abstract: The relative importance of internal and external letter features of words in children's developing reading was investigated to clarify further the nature of early featural analysis. In Experiment 1, 72 6-, 8-, and 10-year-olds read aloud words displayed as wholes, external features only (central features missing, thereby preserving word shape information), or internal features only (central features preserved). There was an improvement in the processing of external features compared with internal features as reading experience increased. Experiment 2 examined the processing of the internal and external features of words employing a forward priming paradigm with 60 8-, 10-, and 12-year-olds. Reaction times to internal feature primes were equivalent to a nonprime blank condition, whereas responses to external feature primes were faster than those to the other two prime types. This advantage for the external features of words is discussed in terms of an early and enduring role for processing the external visual features in words during reading development. Author Affiliation: School of Psychology, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 9HN, UK Article History: Received 20 June 2005; Revised 24 January 2006

Using yearly panel data from 2011 to 2017 on New Zealand District Health Boards (DHBs), this study combines principal component analysis and data envelopment intertemporal analysis with the double-bootstrap approach to estimate the technical efficiency of health care providers along with the trend of efficiency performances. The results show that although most large DHBs have improved their level of technical efficiency between 2011 and 2017, the majority of medium- and small-sized DHBs have not seen any noticeable improvement in their level of technical efficiency. The results also show that large and tertiary DHBs operate at a high level of technical efficiency. In contrast, most of the medium- and small-sized DHBs posted some of the lowest technical efficiency scores. Furthermore, the results show that medium- and small-sized DHBs have a higher average length of hospital stays which is found to be associated with decreasing levels of technical efficiency scores. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study uses quarterly data from 2011 to 2018 to evaluate the technical efficiency of New Zealand District Health Boards (DHBs) in providing hospital services. It examines how efficiency is affected by various patient structures and contextual factors. An intertemporal data envelopment analysis and bootstrap approach are used to compute the bias-corrected technical efficiency scores, followed by highly flexible beta regression to assess the relationship between technical efficiency and related factors. The results indicate that the technical efficiency levels of New Zealand DHBs have not improved since 2011, and on average DHBs could increase their provision of hospital services by approximately 12%. Furthermore, most of the poor performing DHBs operate in the area of high socio-economic deprivation. The results from beta regression show that DHBs providing hospital services in highly deprived areas are associated with a decreasing level of technical efficiency as the proportion of surgical, acute, Māori and Pacific inpatient increases. However, an increase in capital to labour ratio improves the technical efficiency of these DHBs. Therefore, policymakers need to formulate comprehensive strategies involving a longer time horizon that facilitates capital investments in critical technology and capacity development to improve the long-run efficiency performance of DHBs operating in the area of high deprivation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inefficiency persistence is often ignored in empirical studies that assess school efficiency levels. Using longitudinal data on state and state‐dependent private schools from 62 New Zealand territories, a dynamic random‐effect stochastic frontier model is employed to obtain the magnitude of inefficiency persistence along with the measure of cost efficiency estimates. The results show that a naive non‐dynamic model incorrectly shows New Zealand schools to be highly cost‐efficient in short run. However, the dynamic model exposes the fact that New Zealand state schools face high persistence in cost inefficiency, which is limiting their ability to provide cost‐efficient schooling in long run. Furthermore, an estimated 9% of the annual state school funding is lost due to the persistence in cost inefficiency. The findings of this study indicate that cost inefficiency among New Zealand schools appears to be long run, requiring significant policy change from the national government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]