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on History and Philosophy of Economics |
| By: | Hun-Chang Lee (Korea University) |
| Abstract: | Nowadays, the terms economics and political economy are translated in Korea, Japan, and China as Kyeongjaehak(which originally meant statecraft for the people's welfare) and Jeongchikyeongjaehak, respectively. However, the translation of Kyeongjaehak, in fact, originated in the very concept of political economy. The etymology of the translated terms for political economy in India and China actually accords with the original concept of political economy prior to the establishment of modern economics, while that in the Arabic region is congenial to the definition of economy. These terms were born in the heyday of ancient thoughts, and have been reborn in today's definitions with the establishment of modern economics. Originating in the Greek oikonomia, literally "management of household," the adjective political was added to describe the management of polis or state. With the advent of Classical economics, the term political economy became a social science to study of the laws of production and distribution and of the nature of wealth. Later, Neoclassical economists, who sought to establish the study of the economy upon mathematical methodology, and who aimed to analyze behaviors of households and firms regardless of politics, replaced the term 'political economy' with 'economics' without the adjective political. The etymology of Kyeongjaehak, which first appeared as a translated term in an English-Japanese dictionary published in 1862, shares some aspects with the Classical concept of political economy, but is irrelevant to the Neoclassical definition of economics. This term ultimately triumphed over other translations, such as Ejaehak(which originally meant the study of governing wealth), which captured the Classical and Neoclassical concepts more appropriately. In China, where there were more competing translated terms than there were in Japan, the term Kyeongjaehak was generally considered as an inappropriate translation, but was, nonetheless, adopted in the end. As for Korea, strongly influenced by modern sciences from Japan since the 1880s, there was little resistance against the adoption of the Japanese translation. The etymology of political economy, as a subject of translation, along with the innate nature of the early Classical economics' moral philosophy, helped the term Kyeongjaehak to prevail. As people better understood economics, both the Japanese and the Chinese thought that the meaning of Kyeongjaehak was too broad to capture the concept of political economy or economics, while the alternative term, Ejaehak, by contrast, was too confining. At that time, the three, backward East-Asian countries viewed the utility of economic science as serving the development of national economy and this goal was best represented by the Chinese characters Kyeongjaehak, which was the key determinant for its final victory. In sum, the selection of Kyeongjaehak as the translated term for economic science was affected by the evolution of the modern science at the beginning, while, at the finishing point, it reflected the demands of the times. Since the late twentieth century, mainstream economics has extended its fields of study to embrace history, institutions, politics, culture, etc. In that sense, the broad term Kyeongjaehak seems more appropriate for the translation of economics rather than Ejaehak, which is better suited as a term for the confined research-area of Neoclassical economics before the middle twentieth century. |
| Keywords: | Economics, Political economy, Oikonomikos, Translation |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iek:wpaper:0807&r=hpe |
| By: | Alain Chateauneuf (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS : UMR8174 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - Paris I, EEP-PSE - Ecole d'Économie de Paris - Paris School of Economics - Ecole d'Économie de Paris); Michèle Cohen (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS : UMR8174 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - Paris I, EEP-PSE - Ecole d'Économie de Paris - Paris School of Economics - Ecole d'Économie de Paris); Jean-Yves Jaffray (LIP6 - Laboratoire d'Informatique de Paris 6 - CNRS : UMR7606 - Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris VI) |
| Abstract: | This chapiter of a collective book is dedicated to classical decision models under uncertainty, i.e. under situations where events do not have "objective" probabilities with which the Decision Marker agrees. We present successively the two main theories, their axiomatic, the interpretation and the justification of their axioms and their main properties : first, the general model of Subjective Expected Utility due to Savage (Savage, 1954), second, the Anscombe-Aumann (1963) theory, in a different framework. Both theories enforce the universal use of a probabilistic representation. We then discuss this issue in connection with the experimental result known as the Ellsberg paradox. |
| Keywords: | Uncertainty, subjective probability, Subjective Expected Utility, Savage, Anscombe and Aumann, Ellsberg paradox. |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-00348818_v1&r=hpe |
| By: | Fehr, Ernst (University of Zurich) |
| Abstract: | In recent years, many social scientists have claimed that trust plays an important role in economic and social transactions. Despite its proposed importance, the measurement and the definition of trust seem to be not fully settled, and the identification of the exact role of trust in economic interactions has proven to be elusive. It is still not clear whether trust is just an epiphenomenon of good institutions or whether it plays an independent causal role capable of shaping important aggregate economic outcomes. In this paper, I rely on a behavioral definition of trust that enables us to relate it to economic primitives such as preferences and beliefs. I review strong biological and behavioral evidence indicating that trusting is not just a special case of risk-taking, but based on important forms of social preferences such as betrayal aversion. Behaviorally defined trust also opens the door for understanding national and ethnic trust differences in terms of differences in preferences and beliefs, and it suggests ways to examine and interpret a causal role of trust. |
| Keywords: | trust, preferences, beliefs, biological basis |
| JEL: | C7 D00 D2 D7 D8 |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3895&r=hpe |
| By: | Engelbert Stockhammer (Department of Economics, Vienna University of Economics & B.A.); Paul Ramskogler (Department of Economics, Vienna University of Economics & B.A.) |
| Abstract: | Post Keynesian Economics (PKE) is at a cross road. The academic climate at universities has become more hostile to survival and the mainstream has become more diverse internally. Moreover, a heterodox camp of diverse groups of non-mainstream economists is forming. The debate on the future of PKE has so far focussed on the relation to the mainstream. This paper argues that this is not an important issue for the future of PKE. The debate has overlooked the dialectics between academic hegemony and economic (and social) stability. The important question is, whether PKE offers useful explanations of the ongoing socio-economic transformation. PKE has generated valuable insights but it offers little on important real world phenomena such as supply-side phenomena like the increasing use of ICT and the globalisation of production, social issues like precarisation and the polarization of income distribution or ecological challenges like climate change. It is these issues that will decide the future of PKE. |
| JEL: | B20 B50 B59 E12 |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwwuw:wuwp124&r=hpe |
| By: | Aoki, Masanao; Yoshikawa, Hiroshi |
| Abstract: | The standard Walrasian equilibrium theory requires that the marginal value product of production factor such as labor is equal across firms and industries. However, productivity dispersion is widely observed in the real economy. Search theory allegedly fills this gap by encompassing apparent disequilibrium phenomena in the neoclassical equilibrium framework. Taking up Lucas and Prescott (1974) as a primary example, we show that the neoclassical search theory cannot explain the observed pattern of productivity dispersion. Non-self-averaging, a concept little known to economists, plays the major role. Empirical observation suggests strongly the presence of disturbing forces which dominate equilibrating forces due to optimizing behavior of economic agents. We must seek a new concept of equilibrium different from the standard Walrasian equilibrium in macroeconomics. |
| Keywords: | Equilibrium, search theory, productivity dispersion, power-law, non-self-averaging |
| JEL: | D50 E50 J64 |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwedp:7454&r=hpe |
| By: | Meacci, Ferdinando |
| Abstract: | The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the terms “working” and “circulating” capital are two different terms for the same concept; or whether they should be considered two different terms for two different concepts. This purpose will be carried out in two steps. The first is devoted to an investigation of the use of the term “working” by the German economist Lowe (The Path of Economic Growth) and by some Austrian economists (Menger, Böhm-Bawerk, Hayek). The second is devoted to Keynes (A Treatise on Money). At the end of each step an assessment is made of the use of this term by these economists with an extension to the relationship between Lowe’s and Keynes’s treatment of their notion of working capital and two preceding streams of thought. These relationships run between Lowe and the Austrians, in the first case; and between Keynes and the classics (in Marx's sense), in the second. These assessments will eventually converge towards the conclusion that the terms “circulating” and “working” capital are not two different terms for the same notion; and that these two notions are different because they belong to two different theories and require two different methods. The paper argues that the two theories are the classical theory of reproduction and the modern theory of fluctuations as a special branch of the modern theory of production; while the two methods are the method of vertical integration and the method of horizontal integration. The identification of these theories and methods will be pursued more keenly than the differentiation of the two notions of “working” and “circulating” capital in that the aim of this paper is not to resort to the “bestiary” of our subject as if it were a “taxonomy”, let alone to the “taxonomy” as if it were a “machine” (see Shackle: The Years of High Theory, 1967, p.293). |
| Keywords: | Circulating and working capital; reproduction and production; Lowe; Keynes; Austrians |
| JEL: | B12 B13 D24 |
| Date: | 1997–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:11763&r=hpe |
| By: | Meacci, Ferdinando |
| Abstract: | The Austrian notion of stages of production and the related principle of the greater productivity of roundabout methods plus the neo-Austrian notions of vertical integration and vertical division of labour are utilized in this paper in an attempt to reconstruct Smith’s convoluted arguments on the different employment of capitals in Chapter V, Book II, of the Wealth of Nations. Smith’s arguments are first clarified in the light of the two concepts of capital (money capital and productive capital), of the two aspects of productive labour (living labour and dead labour) and of the two viewpoints (of an individual and of society) on which Smith’s theory is based. The results of this clarification are then used to prove that, independently of Smith’s own words but in consistency with his theory, the notions of ‘quantity’ and ‘productivity’ of productive labour have a ‘vertical’ as well as an ‘horizontal’ dimension so that they fit both the input-output scheme and the Austrian framework of time-consuming methods of production. |
| Keywords: | Classical and Austrian capital theory; stages; sectors; vertical integration |
| JEL: | B10 B12 B53 |
| Date: | 2008–07–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:11702&r=hpe |
| By: | Rojhat B. Avsar |
| Abstract: | The purpose of this study is to provide an alternate approach to studies of the rhetoric of policy-relevant economics. Martin Feldstein’s pro-privatization rhetoric relative to Social Security is first analyzed. A subsequent comparison his rhetoric to that of George W. Bush concludes that both the political and the economic rhetoric of Social Security privatization follows diagnostic, prognostic and motivational framing. Just as the political rhetoric of Social Security invokes the authority of ‘ideographs such as ‘personal ownership’ in its motivational frame to draw on a society’s ‘ideological and cultural repertoire’; economic rhetoric employs what we will call ‘economic ideographs’ like ‘deadweight loss’ to resonate with fellow economists through an appeal to the ‘implicit antecedent normative premises’ embedded in the language of economics. In both cases, the motivational frame aims at persuading the targeted persuadee of the merits of the policy proposal or technical choice. |
| Keywords: | Social Security, individual accounts, privatization, ideograph, rhetoric, Feldstein |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uta:papers:2008_23&r=hpe |
| By: | Marco Antonio Ribas Cavalieri (Cedeplar-UFMG) |
| Abstract: | Amidst the economists that are concerned about the method, it is common to make reference on the subject of a new economic methodology. It was from the deception and the abandon of the search toward a unique criterion to give scientific status to research programmes that this new movement came into being. Therefore, among the studies within this innovative trend there’re many patterns of pluralism. All of them reveal different perspectives that can justify the diversity of more or less substitute research programmes within economics. This paper suggests that the ideas of a hermeneutics philosophy’s founding father Wilhelm Dilthey offers an epistemological option to legitimate this state of affairs inside economic science. His thought is chiefly presented as an alternative for Bruce Caldwell’s and Sheila Dow’s pluralisms. |
| Keywords: | history of economic thought, pluralism, hermeneutics, Dilthey |
| JEL: | B00 B40 B41 |
| Date: | 2008–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdp:texdis:td341&r=hpe |
| By: | Gianfranco Tusset (University of Padua) |
| Abstract: | Between 1909 and 1917, Gustavo Del Vecchio built a theory of money as a medium of exchange where organizational and social aspects were investigated in depth, first by means of a conventional static investigation and then by adopting a dynamic perspective. Del Vecchio believed that money, credit, accumulation, and crisis could no longer be theorised with time omitted, and this induced him to formulate dynamic statements which put forward claims about money as a store of value. The organizational and social dimensions of money, time and uncertainty were all important and interconnected aspects in his scientific research, for they all sprang from his conceptualization of money as a medium of exchange. |
| Keywords: | economic organization, monetary services |
| JEL: | B13 B31 |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pad:wpaper:0087&r=hpe |
| By: | Itzhak Gilboa (Eitan Berglas School of Economics, Tel Aviv University and HEC, Paris); Andrew Postlewaite (Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania); David Schmeidler (Tel-Aviv University and Ohio State University) |
| Abstract: | Economic theory reduces the concept of rationality to internal consistency. As far as beliefs are concerned, rationality is equated with having a prior belief over a “Grand State Space”, describing all possible sources of uncertainties. We argue that this notion is too weak in some senses and too strong in others. It is too weak because it does not distinguish between rational and irrational beliefs. Relatedly, the Bayesian approach, when applied to the Grand State Space, is inherently incapable of describing the formation of prior beliefs. On the other hand, this notion of rationality is too strong because there are many situations in which there is not sufficient information for an individual to generate a Bayesian prior. It follows that the Bayesian approach is neither sufficient not necessary for the rationality of beliefs. |
| Keywords: | Decision making, Bayesian, Behavioral Economics |
| JEL: | B4 D8 |
| Date: | 2004–03–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pen:papers:08-043&r=hpe |
| By: | Stern, David I |
| Abstract: | This paper develops a classification scheme of the many different definitions of elasticities of substitution and complementarity in the production case based on duality, gross and net substitution, elasticity type, and four different basic concepts of substitution and complementarity is developed. The classic Berndt-Wood dataset is used to show how the various elasticities differ. This variation is considerable and shows that the correct elasticity should be used for the intended purpose – there is no one true elasticity of substitution. The paper also reintroduces and clarifies Pigou’s contributions to the debate on the elasticity of substitution after seventy years of obscurity in which they have not been cited. |
| Keywords: | Microeconomics; history of economic thought; production; substitution; elasticity |
| JEL: | B21 D24 |
| Date: | 2008–12–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:12454&r=hpe |
| By: | Franz R. Hahn |
| Abstract: | Ideologues are quick to explain the current financial meltdown: it's the markets, stupid. Economists agree but add: it's politics too, stupid. Ideologues agree but counter: first and foremost it's capitalism, stupid. Economists agree but reply: §$%&?!, stupid. This is where this short paper takes us: it makes an attempt to give a brief overview of the economists' views on the ongoing financial system crisis explaining "§$%&?!, stupid". |
| Keywords: | financial system crisis, systemic risk, macroeconomic stability, financial regulation |
| Date: | 2008–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wfo:wpaper:y:2008:i:333&r=hpe |
| By: | Oswald, Andrew J. (Department of Economics, University of Warwick); Proto, Eugenio (Department of Economics, University of Warwick); Sgroi, Daniel (Department of Economics, University of Warwick) |
| Abstract: | Little is known by economists about how emotions affect productivity. To make persuasive progress, some way has to be found to assign people exogenously to different feelings. We design a randomized trial. In it, some subjects have their happiness levels increased, while others in a control group do not. We show that a rise in happiness leads to greater productivity in a paid piece-rate task. The effect is large; it can be replicated; it is not a reciprocity effect; and it is found equally among males and females. We discuss the implications for economics. |
| Keywords: | Labor productivity ; emotions ; well-being ; happiness ; positive affect ; experimental economics |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wrk:warwec:882&r=hpe |
| By: | Kohei Kawamura |
| Abstract: | This paper studies information transmission between multiple agents with different preferences and a welfare maximizing decision maker who chooses the quality or quantity of a public good (e.g. provision of public health service; carbon emissions policy; pace of lectures in a classroom) that is consumed by all of them. Communication in such circumstances su¤ers from the agents. incentive to "exaggerate" their preferences relative to the average of the other agents, since the decision maker's reaction to each agent's message is weaker than in one-to-one communication. As the number of agents becomes larger the quality of information transmission diminishes. The use of binary messages (e.g. "yes" or "no") is shown to be a robust mode of communication when the main source of informational distortion is exaggeration. |
| Keywords: | : Communication, Public Good Provision, Cheap Talk, Committee, Non-binding Referendum |
| JEL: | D71 D82 H41 |
| Date: | 2008–06–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:edn:esedps:182&r=hpe |
| By: | Bert Hoffmann (GIGA Institute of Latin American Studies) |
| Abstract: | Albert O. Hirschman’s scheme of “exit and voice,” long a classic in the study of migration and its political implications, was conceived within the framework of “methodological nationalism.” However, the rise of migrant transnationalism is eroding the classic migration paradigm. Combining theoretical considerations with empirical insights from Latin American cases, this paper argues that a critical reappraisal of Hirschman’s scheme provides a helpful heuristic tool for conceptualizing the new character of today’s transnational migration. Whereas in the traditional approach to international migration the options of exit, voice, and loyalty are considered to be mutually exclusive, transnational migration can be defined precisely by the overlapping and simultaneity of these categories. |
| Keywords: | migration, transnationalism, "exit and voice," Latin America, "methodological nationalism" |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gig:wpaper:91&r=hpe |
| By: | Meyer, Thomas K. |
| Abstract: | There is an ostensible relationship between whether or not a nation is developed and the interpretation and collection of data in this nation. For instance, if a country is developing, it is difficult to collect figures, though much simpler to interpret them. The opposite is the case in a developed nation: the gathering of data is undemanding, however, the explanation for this data is difficult. Such a relationship has a quite pressing effect on economic performance, and this will be examined using a model assuming Rational Expectations, Adaptive Expectations and certain postulates of Price Theory. |
| Keywords: | Economic Data; Price Theory; Rational Expectations; Adaptive Expectations. |
| JEL: | C10 B22 D80 C80 |
| Date: | 2008–12–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:12118&r=hpe |
| By: | Capolupo, Rosa |
| Abstract: | In this work we update the reviews on endogenous growth theories, after two decades of theoretical and empirical contributions in order to explore whether recent empirical studies have become more supportive of their main predictions. Among the core topics studied in the growth econometric framework, namely, convergence, identification of growth determinants and factors responsible for growth differences in the data, the primary focus of this paper is on the last two. We will review, from macro growth regressions, studies that test primarily the performance of endogenous models in terms of significance and robustness of the coefficients of growth determinants. By highlighting methodological issues and critical discussion, we argue that: (i) causal inference drawn from the empirical growth literature remains highly questionable, (ii) there are estimates for a wide range of potential factors but their magnitude and robustness are still under debate. Our conclusion, however, is that, if properly interpreted, the predictions of endogenous growth models are increasingly gathering empirical support. |
| Keywords: | Endogenos growth, growth regressions, convergence |
| JEL: | C31 O41 O47 |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwedp:7403&r=hpe |
| By: | Johannes Schwarze |
| Abstract: | This paper provides evidence that subjective measures of individual well being can be used to study the impact of income uncertainty from an ex ante point of view. Two different measures of subjective well being are under study: Satisfaction with household income and the income evaluation question as developed by Van Praag. It can be shown that satisfaction with income is more affected by ex ante than by ex post volatility of income. The ordinal version of the Van Praag approach might be biased if income uncertainty is essential. The paper was written in 1994. |
| Keywords: | Income uncertainty, subjective well-being, satisfaction, income evaluation |
| JEL: | C23 D12 D81 I31 |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwsop:diw_sp149&r=hpe |
| By: | Ruane, Frances (ESRI) |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:esr:wpaper:wp267&r=hpe |
| By: | John Bryant (Vocat International) |
| Abstract: | This paper develops further a model of the economic process, first set out as part of a paper by the author in 2007, concerning the application of thermodynamic laws to economics. The paper sets out relationships between economic output and capital, labour, resource and waste stocks, with specific reference to energy, and is backed up analysis of data of world energy resources and climate change. The paper conculdes that both energy resource availability and climate change will have significant, limiting effects on the forward path of world economic developoment. |
| Keywords: | Thermodynamics, economics, entropy, energy, exergy, peak oil, gas, coal, climate change |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:voc:wpaper:ten62008&r=hpe |
| By: | Bruno S. Frey; Susanne Neckermann |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes awards as a means of motivation prevalent in the scientific community, but so far neglected in the economic literature on incentives, and discusses their relationship to monetary compensation. Awards are better suited than performance pay to reward scientific tasks, which are typically of a vague nature. They derive their value, for instance, from signaling research talent to outsiders. Awards should therefore be taken seriously as a means of motivating research that may complement, or even substitute for, monetary incentives. While we discuss awards in the context of academia, our conclusions apply to other principal-agent settings as well. |
| Keywords: | Awards; Money; Incentives; Academia; Research |
| JEL: | C93 J33 M52 |
| Date: | 2008–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cra:wpaper:2008-32&r=hpe |
| By: | Cardoso, Ana Rute (IAE Barcelona (CSIC)); Guimaraes, Paulo (University of South Carolina); Zimmermann, Klaus F. (IZA, DIW Berlin and Bonn University) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the early research performance of PhD graduates in labor economics, addressing the following questions: Are there major productivity differences between graduates from American and European institutions? If so, how relevant is the quality of the training received (i.e. ranking of institution and supervisor) and the research environment in the subsequent job placement institution? The population under study consists of labor economics PhD graduates who received their degree in the years 2000 to 2005 in Europe or the USA. Research productivity is evaluated alternatively as the number of publications or the quality-adjusted number of publications of an individual. When restricting the analysis to the number of publications, results suggest a higher productivity by graduates from European universities than from USA universities, but this difference vanishes when accounting for the quality of the publication. The results also indicate that graduates placed at American institutions, in particular top ones, are likely to publish more quality-adjusted articles than their European counterparts. This may be because, when hired, they already have several good acceptances or because of more focused research efforts and clearer career incentives. |
| Keywords: | graduate programs, research productivity |
| JEL: | A23 J44 A11 A14 A10 |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3898&r=hpe |
| By: | David L. Anderson (Queen's University); John Tresler (University of Waikato) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we examine, in some depth, the research practices of New Zealand’s academic economists. To date, virtually all published work in this area has focussed on the overall productivity of the country’s economics departments. However, such rankings give little information on the research performance of various sub-groups of economists. In order to address this situation, we utilize descriptive statistics to assess research output by academic rank, gender, educational attainment, and publication source. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the performance of individual researchers. |
| Keywords: | economics departments; department rankings; research output; economics research |
| JEL: | A10 A14 C81 J24 |
| Date: | 2008–08–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wai:econwp:08/20&r=hpe |
| By: | Aschhoff, Birgit; Sofka, Wolfgang |
| Abstract: | Valuable knowledge emerges increasingly outside of firm boundaries, in particular in public research institutions and universities. The question is how firms organize their interactions with universities effectively to acquire knowledge and apply it successfully. Literature has so far largely ignored that firms may combine different types of interactions with universities for optimizing these knowledge sourcing strategies. We argue conceptually that firms need diverse (broad) and highly developed (deep) combinations of various interactions with universities to maximize returns from these linkages. Our empirical investigation rests upon a survey of more than 800 firms in Germany. We find that both the diversity and intensity of interactions with universities propel innovation success. However, broadening the spectrum of interactions is more beneficial with regard to innovation success. In an exploratory step we go beyond breadth and depth of interactions by identifying four distinct patterns of interaction. Our findings show that formal forms of interaction (joint/contract) research provide the best balance between joint knowledge development and value capture. |
| Keywords: | Technology transfer, industry-science links, open innovation, university knowledge |
| JEL: | C30 D83 O32 |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:zewdip:7441&r=hpe |
| By: | Parsons, Christopher A. (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill); Sulaeman, Johan (Southern Methodist University); Yates, Michael C. (Auburn University); Hamermesh, Daniel S. (University of Texas at Austin) |
| Abstract: | We explore how umpires' racial/ethnic preferences are expressed in their evaluation of Major League Baseball pitchers. Controlling for umpire, pitcher, batter and catcher fixed effects and many other factors, strikes are more likely to be called if the umpire and pitcher match race/ethnicity. This effect only exists where there is little scrutiny of umpires' behavior – in ballparks without computerized systems monitoring umpires' calls, at poorly attended games, and when the called pitch cannot determine the outcome of the at-bat. If a pitcher shares the home-plate umpire's race/ethnicity, he gives up fewer hits, strikes out more batters, and improves his team's chance of winning. The general implication is that standard measures of salary discrimination that adjust for measured productivity may be flawed. We derive the magnitude of the bias generally and apply it to several examples. |
| Keywords: | strategic interactions, worker evaluation, wage equations, economics of sports |
| JEL: | J44 J71 |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3899&r=hpe |