Business Commons^™

A Rationale For Meeting Quotas Asymmetrically, J. Patrick Meister, Robert S. Main

Robert S. Main

Under certain conditions, otherwise identical, competing firms may find it jointly preferable to face differing degrees of trade barriers on individual products rather than symmetric trade barriers. The key is the ability to reduce marginal production cost via research and development. The economic significance of this insight is that there could be a role for a market for quota allotments. This insight also has applications to Voluntary Export Restraints in which a priori symmetric, restricted firms may prefer to have individual production levels allocated asymmetrically. This indicates the need for detailed studies of how quotas are met by individual firms. …

Incorporating Sustainability Into Principles Of Macroeconomics: A Case Study, Madhavi Venkatesan

Madhavi Venkatesan

Using grant funded resources, this case study explicitly engaged students in a Principles of Macroeconomics course with respect to the impact of sustainability-based values on economic indicators and standard of living parameters, while coincidentally opening discussion to the implicit nature of consumption-based values in the economic assessment of growth. Student assimilation and reaction to the curriculum was documented over the period of the course. Students provided responses to weekly questionnaires, which tracked their changing perceptions, values, and behaviors. Weekly class discussions and individual student assessment of the awareness fostered by reviewing the two divergent value structures also contributed to qualitative …

Axiomatic Social Choice Theory, David Randall Jenkins

David Randall Jenkins

Ordered Relations Theory’s two axioms ultimately enable (individual: society) well-being transitivity inasmuch as they impound Social Choice Theory’s impossibility theorem, impossibility-resolving axioms, and all such further regressive impossibility theorems and impossibility-resolving axioms.

Valuing Beach And Surf Tourism And Recreation In Australian Sea Change Communities, David Anning, Dan Ware, Michael Raybould, Neil Lazarow

Michael Raybould

Many of Australia’s iconic sandy beaches are already under pressure due to coastal development and the impacts of severe storm or flood events. These impacts are likely to be exacerbated by projected climate changes such as elevated water levels and potentially increased storm intensity. Beaches provide important recreation services for both residents and tourists but few studies in Australia have attempted to place economic values on this service. Thus, coastal authorities that are forced to make investment decisions relating to beach protection and restoration have insufficient data to conduct cost-benefit evaluations of projects where recreation values are significant. This paper …

Voice Without Say: Why Capital-Managed Firms Aren’T (Genuinely) Participatory, Justin Schwartz

Justin Schwartz

Why are most capitalist enterprises of any size organized as authoritarian bureaucracies rather than incorporating genuine employee participation that would give the workers real authority? Even firms with employee participation programs leave virtually all decision-making power in the hands of management. The standard answer is that hierarchy is more economically efficient than any sort of genuine participation, so that participatory firms would be less productive and lose out to more traditional competitors. This answer is indefensible. After surveying the history, legal status, and varieties of employee participation, I examine and reject as question-begging the argument that the rarity of genuine …

A Theory Without A Movement, A Hope Without A Name: The Future Of Marxism In A Post-Marxist World, Justin Schwartz

Justin Schwartz

Just as Marx's insights into capitalism have been most strikingly vindicated by the rise of neoliberalism and the near-collapse of the world economy, Marxism as social movement has become bereft of support. Is there any point in people who find Marx's analysis useful in clinging to the term "Marxism" - which Marx himself rejected -- at time when self-identified Marxist organizations and societies have collapsed or renounced the identification, and Marxism own working class constituency rejects the term? I set aside bad reasons to give on "Marxism," such as that the theory is purportedly refuted, that its adoption leads necessarily …

The Shadow Economy, Colin C. Williams, Friedrich Schneider

Colin C Williams

No abstract provided.

Pompeii And The Vesuvian God, David Randall Jenkins

David Randall Jenkins

The paper argues the Vesuvian destruction of Herculaneum and Pompeii in 79 AD engendered the formulation of the Anno Domini and the writing of scripture.

Neoliberalism And The Law: How Historical Materialism Can Illuminate Recent Governmental And Judicial Decision Making, Justin Schwartz

Justin Schwartz

Neoliberalism can be understood as the deregulation of the economy from political control by deliberate action or inaction of the state. As such it is both constituted by the law and deeply affects it. I show how the methods of historical materialism can illuminate this phenomenon in all three branches of the the U.S. government. Considering the example the global financial crisis of 2007-08 that began with the housing bubble developing from trade in unregulated and overvalued mortgage backed securities, I show how the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, which established a firewall between commercial and investment banking, allowed this …

Prospects In The Academic Labor Market For Economists, Ronald G. Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] American colleges and universities are increasingly substituting nontenure track full-time and part-time faculty for full-time tenured and tenure track faculty. Moreover, institutions of public higher education, where almost two-thirds of the full-time faculty members at four-year institutions are employed, are under severe financial pressure. The share of state budgets devoted to public higher education is declining. The salaries of economics department faculty members at public higher education institutions have fallen substantially relative to the salaries of their counterparts at private higher education institutions, and it is becoming increasingly difficult for the publics to compete for top faculty in economics. …

The Changing Distributions Of New Ph.D. Economists And Their Employment: Implications For The Future, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Academic careers are no longer the be-all and end-all for economics Ph.D. students, and the findings and background provided by Siegfried and Stock help to explain why this is so. The median age at which individuals receive economics Ph.D.'s in the Siegfried and Stock sample is 32. While they are somewhat surprised at this finding, it parallels the experiences of many other fields. Increasingly, students are working before proceeding to doctoral studies. Often Ph.D. students in economics enter their programs after having spent several years working for government agencies or research consulting companies—work that has whetted their appetites for …

My Life And Economics, Ronald G. Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Age 51 is a bit early to be writing a retrospective about one's career as an economist and one's life. This is especially true for me since I am not on track to win a Nobel Prize, to be admitted to the National Academy of Science, or even to be elected a Fellow of the Econometric Society. Nonetheless, as I write this essay during the fall of 1997, I look back on the 28 years I have spent as a PhD economist and see a record of accomplishment of which I am proud and a number of messages worth …

Do Economics Departments With Lower Tenure Probabilities Pay Higher Faculty Salaries?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Paul Pieper, Rachel Willis

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

The simplest competitive labor market model asserts that if tenure is a desirable job characteristic for professors, they should be willing to pay for it by accepting lower salaries. Conversely, if an institution unilaterally reduces the probability that its assistant professors receive tenure, it will have to pay higher salaries to attract new faculty. Our paper tests this theory using data on salary offers accepted by new assistant professors at economics departments in the United States during the 1974-75 to 1980-81 period, along with data on the proportion of new Ph.D.s hired by each department between 1970 and 1980 that …

Policy Decisions And Research In Economics And Industrial Relations: An Exchange Of Views: Comment, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Daniel S. Hamermesh, George E. Johnson

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] John Dunlop has presented what are certainly some of the most provocative remarks to appear in a scholarly journal in the labor field in many years. We find much to agree with in his remarks; however, we also find many areas where we feel he condemns research because of his overly optimistic expectations about its ability to contribute to the policy process, and other areas where he appears to be unaware that research in labor economics has already contributed fairly directly to policy decisions.

Involving Undergraduates In Research To Encourage Them To Undertake Ph.D. Study In Economics, Ronald G. Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Recent evidence suggests that the growing use of part-time and full-time non-tenure-track faculty nationwide adversely influences American college students’ graduation rates (Ehrenberg and Liang Zhang, 2005). I have become concerned that the increased usage of non-tenure track faculty members also likely adversely influences the propensity of undergraduate students to go on for Ph.D.s in economics for two reasons. First, many students enter college with the expressed intent of becoming doctors or lawyers, getting an MBA, or going on for advanced degrees in the sciences or humanities. However, with the exception perhaps of the small number of high-school students who …

A Comparison Of Anti-Manipulation Rules In U.S. And Eu Electricity And Natural Gas Markets: A Proposal For A Common Standard, Shaun D. Ledgerwood, Dan Harris

Shaun D. Ledgerwood

In this paper, we describe the development and current status of anti-manipulation rules as they apply to wholesale electricity and natural gas markets in the United States and the European Union, including the institutions that are responsible for overseeing these rules. We then compare and contrast these jurisdictions to discuss similarities, differences, and potential gaps in coverage within and across their internal markets. We note that while the behavior prohibited by the U.S. and EU statutes is remarkably similar, there is in fact no common standard for defining market manipulation. The absence of a common EU/U.S. framework for examining manipulative …

The Historical Background Of The Communist Manifesto, George R. Boyer

George R. Boyer

[Excerpt] The Manifesto of the Communist Party, published 150 years ago in London in February 1848, is one of the most influential and widely-read documents of the past two centuries. The historian A. J. P. Taylor (1967, p. 7) has called it a "holy book," and contends that because of it, "everyone thinks differently about politics and society." And yet, despite its enormous influence in the 20th century, the Manifesto is very much a period piece, a document of what was called the "hungry" 1840s. It is hard to imagine it being written in any other decade of the 19th …

The Poor Law, Migration, And Economic Growth, George R. Boyer

George R. Boyer

The loss to the English economy caused by decreased migration resulting from relief payments to agricultural laborers is estimated. I conclude that, at worst, the Poor Law had a small negative impact on national product. If poor relief and wages were substitutes, the Poor Law may have had a positive impact on capital formation and economic growth.

New Estimates Of British Unemployment, 1870-1913, George R. Boyer, Timothy J. Hatton

George R. Boyer

We present new estimates of the British industrial unemployment rate for 1870- 1913, which improve on the Board of Trade's prior estimates. We use similar sources, but our series includes additional industrial sectors, allows for short-time working, and aggregates the various sectors using appropriate labor-force weights from the census. The resulting index suggests a rate of industrial unemployment that was generally higher, but less volatile, than the board's index. We then adjust our series to an economywide basis, and construct a consistent time series of overall unemployment for 1870-1999.

Restoring The Natural Law: Copyright As Labor And Possession, Alfred C. Yen

Alfred C. Yen

In this Article, Professor Yen explores the problems associated with viewing copyright solely as a tool for achieving economic efficiency and advocates for the restoration of natural law to copyright jurisprudence. The Article demonstrates that economics has not been solely responsible for copyright’s development and basic structure, but has rather developed along lines suggested by neutral law, despite modern copyright jurisprudence. The Article considers the consequences of extinguishing copyright’s natural law facets in favor of the blind pursuit of efficiency and concludes by exploring the implications of restoring natural law thinking to copyright jurisprudence.

Income Mobility, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

Income mobility means different things to different people. This article explains the six different mobility concepts used in the literature, reviews the various indices used in the mobility literature to measure these concepts, summarizes the difference the use of different mobility concepts and measures makes in practice, presents the axiomatic approach to income mobility, and discusses a number of other issues that arise in the mobility literature.

The Balanced Scorecard: An Intentional Academic Fraud?, David Randall Jenkins

David Randall Jenkins

The Kaplan and Norton 1992 Balanced Scorecard was intentionally structured to aid an Informal Capital Market Cartel in search of the next John Maynard Keynes.

Collective Choice, Justin Schwartz

Justin Schwartz

This short nontechnical article reviews the Arrow Impossibility Theorem and its implications for rational democratic decisionmaking. In the 1950s, economist Kenneth J. Arrow proved that no method for producing a unique social choice involving at least three choices and three actors could satisfy four seemingly obvious constraints that are practically constitutive of democratic decisionmaking. Any such method must violate such a constraint and risks leading to disturbingly irrational results such and Condorcet cycling. I explain the theorem in plain, nonmathematical language, and discuss the history, range, and prospects of avoiding what seems like a fundamental theoretical challenge to the possibility …

Sheep And Their Herders: Testing The Myth Of Rational Voters – A Latvian Case Study, Daniel Brou, Kirk Collins, Brent Mckenzie

Daniel Brou

Through the use of a simple behavioural political economy model, we cast doubt on the assumption that voters behave in predictable ways dependent on their expected support for government policies. We show that under certain conditions an unfavourable (i.e. welfare reducing) policy may result, even with well-informed, welfare maximising voters. While true that voter behaviour may align with government policies, this alignment has more to do with a perceived lack of influence, rather than policy support. The case of Latvia's accession to the European Union is used as a case study to evaluate the government's policy in terms of voting …

The Importance Of Financial Market Development On The Relationship Between Loan Guarantees For Smes And Local Market Employment Rates, Ben Criag, William Jackson, James Thomson, Craig Armstrong

James B Thomson

We empirically examine whether a major government intervention in the small firm credit market yields significantly better results in markets that are less financially developed. The government intervention that we investigate is SBA guaranteed lending. The literature on financing small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) suggests that small firms may be exposed to a particular type of market failure associated with credit rationing. And, SMEs in markets that are less financially developed will likely face a greater degree of this market failure. To test our hypothesis we use the level of bank deposits per capita as our relative measure of …

Ordered Conflict Resolution, David R. Jenkins

David Randall Jenkins

Ancient philosophers resolved Arrovian impossibility through a marriage of ethics and economics. Ordered conflict resolution is the competent social choice theory threshold necessary condition.

Ceo Compensation At Tarp Institutions, Karl T. Muth

Karl T Muth

This is a PowerPoint presentation given at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business on March 10, 2010. It requires the newest version of Microsoft PowerPoint.

September 11th, John Maynard Keynes, Kenneth J. Arrow, And Me: The Nexus, David Randall Jenkins

David Randall Jenkins, Ph.D.

Judicial Martial Law - Appendix, David Randall Jenkins

David Randall Jenkins

No abstract provided.

Judicial Martial Law, David Randall Jenkins

David Randall Jenkins

No abstract provided.