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Full-Text Articles in Business

Economic Integration, Political Integration Or Both?, Daniel Brou, Michele Ruta Nov 2011

Economic Integration, Political Integration Or Both?, Daniel Brou, Michele Ruta

Daniel Brou

We study the effects of economic and political integration by presenting a model in which firms compete with each other in both an economic market—where they produce a good and compete for market share—and in a political (rent seeking) market—where they compete for transfers from the government. Growth is driven by firms’ cost-reducing innovation activity and economic and political integration affect firms’ incentive to innovate differently. In this setting, economic and political integration can be seen as complementary. Economic integration, when not accompanied by political integration, can lead to less innovation and slower growth as firms respond to increased competition …


[Review Of The Book Labor Regulation In The Global Economy], Gary Fields Nov 2011

[Review Of The Book Labor Regulation In The Global Economy], Gary Fields

Gary S Fields

[Excerpt] This is a practical and useful volume on labor standards in today’s highly globalized world. An introduction is followed by ten chapters, some of them general, talking about the ILO or the WTO, and some more specific, focusing on the United States and Europe. The general chapters cover the ILO, corporate codes of conduct, efforts to introduce labor standards into the multilateral trade regime, arguments for and against labor standards in trade, and policy implications. The specific chapters cover U.S. initiatives on child labor, labor standards in the bilateral trade agreements entered into by the United States and the …


[Review Of The Book Forecasting Retirement Needs And Retirement Wealth], Gary Fields Nov 2011

[Review Of The Book Forecasting Retirement Needs And Retirement Wealth], Gary Fields

Gary S Fields

[Excerpt] This volume enables researchers to learn about some of the latest research findings on specific issues. It is not the place to seek an introduction to current thinking on retirement, pensions, and Social Security—the papers are too narrowly focused for that. But for current or would-he pension specialists, this volume and the larger series of which it is a part are indispensable resources.


Incentive Contracts And Time Use, Tor Eriksson, Jaime Ortega Oct 2011

Incentive Contracts And Time Use, Tor Eriksson, Jaime Ortega

Jaime Ortega

Empirical studies on incentive contracts have primarily been concerned with the effects on employees' productivity and earnings. The productivity increases associated with such contracts may, however, come at the expense of quality of life at or outside work. In this paper we study the effect on the employees' non-work activities, testing whether incentive contracts lead to a change in the allocation of time across work and non-work activities. In doing so, we distinguish between two effects, a substitution effect and a discretion effect. On the one hand, the introduction of explicit incentives raises the marginal payoff to work, hence employees …


How Do Environmental And Natural Resource Economics Texts Deal With The Simple Model Of The Intertemporal Allocation Of A Nonrenewable Resource, Robert Main Jul 2011

How Do Environmental And Natural Resource Economics Texts Deal With The Simple Model Of The Intertemporal Allocation Of A Nonrenewable Resource, Robert Main

Robert S. Main

Textbooks in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics invariably deal with the problem of allocating a non-renewable resource over time. The simplest version of that problem is the case of a resource that is to be allocated over two periods. The resource has a constant Marginal Extraction Cost (MEC). Most textbooks treat this case before moving on to more complex and realistic cases. This paper suggests the results that should be emphasized and the method that should be used to arrive at those results. It also points out the possible confusions that should be avoided. Finally, it examines how several well-known …


Women’S Decision Making: A Contextual Assessment, Safdar Khan Dec 2010

Women’S Decision Making: A Contextual Assessment, Safdar Khan

Safdar Khan

No abstract provided.


Are Ceos Expected Utility Maximizers?, John List, Charles Mason Dec 2010

Are Ceos Expected Utility Maximizers?, John List, Charles Mason

Charles F Mason

Are individuals expected utility maximizers? This question represents much more than academic curiosity. In a normative sense, at stake are the fundamental underpinnings of the bulk of the last half-century’s models of choice under uncertainty. From a positive perspective, the ubiquitous use of benefit-cost analysis across government agencies renders the expected utility maximization paradigm literally the only game in town. In this study, we advance the literature by exploring CEO’s preferences over small probability, high loss lotteries. Using undergraduate students as our experimental control group, we find that both our CEO and student subject pools exhibit frequent and large departures …


New Models For Book Publishing, Kwanghui Lim Dec 2010

New Models For Book Publishing, Kwanghui Lim

Kwanghui Lim

No abstract provided.


Sheep And Their Herders: Testing The Myth Of Rational Voters – A Latvian Case Study, Daniel Brou, Kirk Collins, Brent Mckenzie Dec 2010

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 …