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on Central and Western Asia |
| By: | S. Bakhtiari; A. Minniti; A. Naghavi |
| Abstract: | This research sheds light on the role of product scope on the innovation activity of multinational multi-product firms. We use patent citation data to break down innovation into two types by measuring the degree to which innovation performed by firms is fundamental and the extent to which the output of the R&D can be spread across different product lines. We focus on two features in multinational production: (i) fundamental innovation is geographically more difficult to transfer abroad to foreign production sites, (ii) learning spillovers can occur from international operations. The results reveal that the second effect is more likely to dominate when a firm is active in more product lines. We argue that a more diversified portfolio of products increases a firm’s scope of learning from international operations, thereby enhancing its ability to engage in more fundamental research. In contrast, firms with less product lines that geographically separate production from innovation shift the innovation activities towards more specialized types of innovation. |
| JEL: | F12 F23 O31 O32 |
| Date: | 2013–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bol:bodewp:wp879&r=cwa |
| By: | D. Del Boca; C. Monfardini; C. Nicoletti |
| Abstract: | While a large literature has focused on the impact of parental investments on child cognitive development, very little is known about the role of child's own in- vestments. Information on how children invest their time separately from parents is probably little informative for babies and toddlers, but it becomes more and more important in later stages of life, such as adolescence, when children start to take decisions independently. By using the Child Development Supplement of the PSID (Panel Study of Income Dynamics), we model the production of cognitive ability of adolescents and extend the set of inputs to include the child's own time investments. Looking at investments during adolescence, we find that child's investments matter more than mother's investments. On the contrary, looking at investments during childhood, it is the mother's investments that are more important. Our results are obtained accounting for potential unobserved child's and family's endowments and are robust across several specifications and samples, e.g. considering and not considering father's investments and non-intact families. |
| Keywords: | time-use, cognitive ability, child development, adolescence |
| JEL: | J13 D1 |
| Date: | 2012 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cca:wchild:5&r=cwa |
| By: | Antonella Nocco; Gianmarco I. P. Ottaviano; Matteo Salto |
| Abstract: | After some decades of relative oblivion, the interest in the optimality properties of monopolistic competition has recently re-emerged due to the availability of an appropriate and parsimonious framework to deal with firm heterogeneity. Within this framework we show that non-separable utility, variable demand elasticity and endogenous firm heterogeneity cause the market equilibrium to err in many ways, concerning the number of products, the size and the choice of producers, the overall size of the monopolistically competitive sector. More crucially with respect to the existing literature, we also show that the extent of the errors depends on the degree of firm heterogeneity. In particular, the inefficiency of the market equilibrium seems to be largest when selection among heterogeneous firms is needed most, that is, when there are relatively many firms with low productivity and relatively few firms with high productivity. |
| Keywords: | monopolistic competition, product diversity, heterogeneity, selection, welfare |
| JEL: | D4 D6 F1 L0 L1 |
| Date: | 2013–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp1206&r=cwa |
| By: | Maria Letizia Guerra; Carlo Alberto Magni; Luciano Stefanini |
| Abstract: | In investment appraisal, uncertainty can be managed through intervals or fuzzy numbers because the arithmetical properties and the extension principle are well established and can be successfully applied in a rigorous way. We apply interval and fuzzy numbers to the Average Internal Rate of Return (AIRR), recently introduced for overcoming the problems of the traditional Internal Rate of Return (IRR). In the setting of interval and fuzzy arithmetic, we establish relations between the interim capitals invested, the profits and the cash flows, which are the ingredients of the AIRR, and shed lights on the different ways uncertainty propagates depending on which variable is known and which one is derived. The relations between fuzzy AIRR and fuzzy Net Present Value are also investigated. |
| Date: | 2012–06–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:col:000463:009641&r=cwa |
| By: | David McKenzie (World Bank, BREAD, CEPR, CREAM, and IZA); Melissa Siegel (Maastricht Graduate School of Governance and UNU-MERIT) |
| Abstract: | Most migration surveys do not ask about the legal status of migrants due to concerns about the sensitivity of this question. List randomization is a technique that has been used in a number of other social science applications to elicit sensitive information. We trial this technique by adding it to surveys conducted in Ethiopia, Mexico, Morocco and the Philippines. We show how, in principal, this can be used to both give an estimate of the overall rate of illegal migration in the population being surveyed, as well as to determine illegal migration rates for subgroups such as more or less educated households. Our results suggest that there is some useful information in this method: we find higher rates of illegal migration in countries where illegal migration is thought to be more prevalent and households who say they have a migrant are more likely to report having an illegal migrant. Nevertheless, some of our other findings also suggest some possible inconsistencies or noise in the conclusions obtained using this method, so we suggest directions for future attempts to implement this approach in migration surveys. |
| Keywords: | Illegal migration; List Randomization; Item Count Method; Survey Techniques |
| JEL: | F22 C83 J61 K42 |
| Date: | 2013–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:1310&r=cwa |
| By: | Maria Alipranti (University of Crete); Emmanuel Petrakis (Department of Economics, University of Crete, Greece) |
| Abstract: | The present paper investigates the firms' incentives to invest in comparative advertising in a spatially differentiated duopoly market characterized by network externalities. We show that for a wide range of locations, determined by the interaction between the transportation cost, the network effects and the effectiveness of advertising, firms have incentives to invest in comparative advertising with their investment levels to be positively related to the transportation cost and negatively related to the network effects. Further, comparing the equilibrium results of our model with the benchmark case without advertising activities and the case without network externalities, we show that the firms' location distance increases in the presence of network externalities, while it decreases in the presence of comparative advertising. |
| Keywords: | Comparative Advertising, Network Effects, Location |
| JEL: | L13 D43 M37 |
| Date: | 2012–08–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crt:wpaper:1306&r=cwa |
| By: | Maria Alipranti (University of Crete); Emmanuel Petrakis (Department of Economics, University of Crete, Greece) |
| Abstract: | The present paper examines the firms' incentives to adopt a new cost reducing technology in vertically related markets, as well as, the effects of the vertical relations on the firms' timing of adoption. It demonstrates that in vertically related industries, independently of the upstream market structure (either upstream separate firms or upstream monopoly), downstream firms always have strong incentives to adopt the new technology, while in equilibrium there is technology diffusion. Further, comparing the speed of the firms' technology adoption in one-tier and two-tier industries, we show that, independently of the upstream market structure, technology adoption may occurs earlier in two-tier than in one-tier industries depending on the intensity of the final market competition, the drasticity of the new technology and the bargaining power distribution in the market. |
| Keywords: | Technology adoption, Vertical relations, Two-part tariffs, Product Differentiation |
| JEL: | L13 O31 L22 L41 |
| Date: | 2012–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crt:wpaper:1307&r=cwa |
| By: | Anaïs Carlin; Sébastien Verel; Philippe Collard |
| Abstract: | We start from the observation that theoretical studies of luxury consumption are relatively rare in the economic analysis. In fact, while homothetic preferences simply cannot address the issue of luxury consumption, the use of non-homothetic preferences is restricted, at least in standard models, by the absence of consensus about the nature of luxury goods. Using the agent-based computational economics methodology, we, therefore, choose to dene a luxurious item by its ability to display social statute. We, rst, put our analysis in perspective via a short revue of the main contributions about consumption behavior in social context. Through this revue, we identify a few social phenomenons involved in the formation of individual preferences: imitation, dierentiation and innovation. Second, building on these simple social behaviors, we develop a model of luxury preference formation, in which preferences evolve endogenously. Third, we explore the emerging properties of the model, especially, under which conditions we observe a specialization of consumption by social classes. |
| Keywords: | Preference formation, Consumption, Luxury good, Agent-based model, Income classes |
| JEL: | B52 D01 D11 |
| Date: | 2013–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gre:wpaper:2013-13&r=cwa |
| By: | Jesus Gonzalez-Feliu (LET - Laboratoire d'économie des transports - CNRS : UMR5593 - École Nationale des Travaux Publics de l'État [ENTPE] - Université Lumière - Lyon II) |
| Abstract: | This paper aims to unify concepts and to describe the multi-stage transport systems and their integratyion to supply chain management. Multi-stage distribution systems are common logistics management, and often they are assimilated to multi-stage transport strategies. However, transport is often considered as an external operation or a specific stage, even when it is a multi-stage system. First, the paper presents the main concepts of multi-stage transport systems by defining the concept an making a typology of transport schemes. Then, an optimization analysis using the concept of accessibility is proposed to show the advantages and limits of such strategies. Then, an interview-based analysis includes a conceptual framework for the integration of multi-stage transport on supply chain management and a simulation shows the impacts of multi-stage transport on supply chain global costs and quality indicators. |
| Keywords: | multi-stage freight transport; multi-echelon logistics; just-in-time; bundling; combinatorial optimization |
| Date: | 2013–04–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-00796714&r=cwa |
| By: | Priscilla Man (School of Economics, The University of Queensland); Shino Takayama (School of Economics, The University of Queensland) |
| Abstract: | In Man and Takayama (2013) (henceforth MT) we show that many classical impossibility theorems follow from three simple and intuitive axioms on the social choice correspondence when the set of social alternatives is finite. This note extends the main theorem (Theorem 1) in MT to the case where the set of social alternatives is a compact metric space. We also qualify how versions of Arrow's Impossibility Theorem and the Muller-Satterthwaite Theorem (Muller and Satterthwaite, 1977) can be obtained as corollaries of the extended main theorem. A generalized statement of the Muller-Satterthwaite Theorem for social choice correspondences with weak preferences on a compact metric social alternatives domain under a modified definition of Monotonicity is given. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper to document this version of the Muller-Satterthwaite Theorem. This note is mainly technical. Readers interested in the motivations and discussions of our axioms and main theorem should consult MT. |
| JEL: | D71 |
| Date: | 2013–05–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qld:uq2004:477&r=cwa |
| By: | Daniel Levy (Emory University, USA; Bar-Ilan University, Israel; RCEA, Italy); Avichai Snir (Department of Banking and Finance, Netanya Academic College, Israel) |
| Abstract: | If producers have more information than consumers about goods’ attributes, then they may use non-price (rather than price) adjustment mechanisms and, consequently, the market may reach a new equilibrium even if prices don't change. We study a situation where producers adjust the quantity per package rather than the price in response to changes in market conditions. Although consumers should be indifferent between equivalent changes in goods' prices and quantities, empirical evidence suggests that consumers often respond differently to price changes and equivalent quantity changes. We offer a possible explanation for this puzzle by constructing and empirically testing a model in which consumers incur cognitive costs when processing goods’ price and quantity information. |
| Keywords: | Quantity Adjustment, Cognitive Costs of Attention, Information Processing |
| JEL: | L11 L15 L16 M21 M31 M37 M38 K20 E31 D21 D22 D40 D83 |
| Date: | 2013–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rim:rimwps:20_13&r=cwa |
| By: | Hathroubi, Salem |
| Abstract: | This paper aims to study corruption as an epidemic phenomenon using the epidemic diffusion model of Kermack and Mc-Kendrick (1927). We seek to determine the dynamics of corruption and its impact on the composition of the population at a given time. We determine a threshold epidemiological corruption based on the approximation of the honest population. -- |
| Keywords: | Corruption,Epidemiology,SIR model |
| JEL: | C6 D72 D73 K42 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:esprep:73558&r=cwa |