|
on Knowledge Management and Knowledge Economy |
|
Issue of 2007‒01‒02
four papers chosen by Emanuele Canegrati Catholic University of the Sacred Heart |
| By: | Peter Kuhn (University of California, Santa Barbara and IZA Bonn); Carol McAusland (University of Maryland) |
| Abstract: | We consider the welfare effects of the emigration of workers who produce a public good (knowledge). We distinguish between the knowledge diversion and knowledge creation effects of such emigration, and show that the remaining residents of a country can gain from emigration, even when tastes for knowledge goods exhibit a kind of ‘home bias’. In contrast to existing models of beneficial brain drain (BBD), our results do not require agglomeration economies, education-related externalities, remittances, return migration, or an emigration "lottery". Instead, they are driven purely by the public nature of knowledge goods, combined with differences in market size that induce greater knowledge creation by emigrants abroad than at home. BBD is even more likely in the presence of weak sending-country intellectual property rights (IPRs), or when source country IPR policy is endogenized. |
| Keywords: | brain drain, international migration, international factor mobility, knowledge workers, intellectual property rights |
| JEL: | F22 J61 |
| Date: | 2006–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp2493&r=knm |
| By: | Fiorenza BELUSSI; Luciano PILOTTI; Silvia Rita SEDITA |
| Abstract: | The work offers an integrated view on how knowledge is developed in localised systems of specialised firms (industrial districts - IDs), through informal social networks (communities of practice - CoPs), and firms networks, in an osmotic process between the internal to the district knowledge and the external to the district knowledge. Contrary to the Marshallian consolidated tradition, we describe the functioning of the modern industrial district emphasising not just the role of the local “industrial atmosphereâ€, but the modern aspect of “learning at the boundariesâ€, where local actors mix sources of knowledge located inside the district (exploitation of local resources) with external sources (exploration of global knowledge). Our empirical work, based on the analysis of three Italian industrial districts, shows that, in relation to the aspect of exploitation of local resources, the investment (both direct and indirect) of firms in augmenting their capabilities is juxtaposed to the activity organised by the district meta-organisers of cultivating local resources; furthermore, in relation to the exploration of global knowledge, internal/external switchers allow the exploration of global knowledge flows. It is a process that combines forms of localised learning with learning at the boundaries, through the access to pipelines (FDI, firms networks, distant KIBS) and boundary spanning actors (external CoPs). |
| Keywords: | Industrial Districts, Learning, Communities of Practice, Networks |
| JEL: | D83 M54 R12 |
| Date: | 2006–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mil:wpdepa:2006-40&r=knm |
| By: | Dubois, Pierre; Hernandez-Perez, Adriana; Ivaldi, Marc |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the demand and cost structure of the French market of academic journals, taking into account its intermediary role between researchers, who are both producers and consumers of knowledge. This two sidedness feature will echoes similar problems already observed in electronic markets - payment card systems, video game consoles, etc. - such as the chicken and egg problem, where readers won’t buy a journal if they do not expect its articles to be academically relevant and researchers, that live under the mantra 'Publish or Perish', will not submit to a journal with either limited public reach or weak reputation. After the merging of several databases, we estimate the aggregated nested logit demand system combined simultaneously with a cost function. We identify the structural parameters of this market and find that price elasticities of demand are quite large and margins relatively low, indicating that this industry experiences competitive constraints. |
| Keywords: | differentiated products models; media industry; two-sided platforms |
| JEL: | L11 L82 |
| Date: | 2006–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:5990&r=knm |
| By: | Lensberg, Terje (Dept. of Finance and Management Science, Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration); Schenk-Hoppé, Klaus Reiner (Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds) |
| Abstract: | This paper complements theoretical studies on the Kelly rule in evolutionary finance by studying a Darwinian model of selection and reproduction in which the diversity of investment strategies is maintained through genetic programming. We find that investment strategies which optimize long-term performance can emerge in markets populated by unsophisticated investors. Regardless whether the market is complete or incomplete and whether states are i.i.d. or Markov, the Kelly rule is obtained as the asymptotic outcome. With price-dependent rather than just state-dependent investment strategies, the market portfolio plays an important role as a protection against severe losses in volatile markets. |
| Keywords: | Evolutionary finance; portfolio choice; asset pricing; genetic programming |
| JEL: | C63 G11 |
| Date: | 2006–12–19 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:nhhfms:2006_023&r=knm |