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The article discusses the collection of the German Central Library for Economic Sciences - Leibniz Economics Information Center (ZBW), which is divided between the cities of Kiel and Hamburg, Germany. The author reviews the availability of the various media, emphasizing printed text, for trans-regional distribution to patrons and the conditions surrounding the borrowing of ZBW materials.

Abstract: This paper examines endogenous institutional change in a class of dynamic political games. The political aggregation rules used at date t+1 are instrumental choices under rules at date t. Effectively, rules are “players” who can strategically delegate future policy-making authority to different rules. A political rule is stable if it selects itself. A reform occurs when an alternative rule is selected. The stability of a political rule is shown to depend on whether its choices are dynamically consistent. For instance, simple majority rules can be shown to be dynamically consistent in many common environments where wealth-weighted voting rules are not. The result extends to political rules that incorporate private activities such as extra-legal protests, threats, or private investment. The approach is one way of understanding various explanations of institutional change proposed in the literature. A parametric model of public goods provision gives an illustration. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: We analyze trade between a perfectly informed price setting party (seller) and an imperfectly informed price taker (buyer). Differently from most of the literature, we focus on the case in which, under full information, it would be inefficient to trade goods of sufficiently poor quality. We show that the unique equilibrium surviving D1 is characterized by market breakdown, although trade would be mutually beneficial in some state of nature. This occurs independently of the precision of the information available to the buyer. The model thus implies that signaling through prices may exacerbate the effect of adverse selection rather than mitigate it. Under D1, the seller would always benefit from committing to prices that do not reveal her information. We develop this intuition by analyzing the strategic advantages of price rigidities. We show that price rigidities help restore trade and could even enhance effectiveness of prices as signals of quality. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The objective of this paper is to provide a methodological link between econophysics and economics. I will study a key notion of both fields: uncertainty and the ways of thinking about it developed by the two disciplines. After having presented the main economic theories of uncertainty (provided by Knight, Keynes and Hayek), I show how this notion is paradoxically excluded from the economic field. In economics, uncertainty is totally reduced by an a priori Gaussian framework—in contrast to econophysics, which does not use a priori models because it works directly on data. Uncertainty is then not shaped by a specific model, and is partially and temporally reduced as models improve. This way of thinking about uncertainty has echoes in the economic literature. By presenting econophysics as a Knightian method, and a complementary approach to a Hayekian framework, this paper shows that econophysics can be methodologically justified from an economic point of view. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In this paper we briefly review the work of Wassily Leontief, in respect for his memory and appreciation of his accomplishment. His work encompasses and redirects the entire field of economics, including pure theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: This paper examines the convergence and divergence of results from economic studies of the relationships between land tenure security and agricultural productivity in Africa and how these results have been incorporated into recent agricultural, poverty alleviation, and land policy documents. The paper finds that there are both areas of convergence and divergence in the economics literature. Similarly, the attention given to land tenure and its perceived effects on productivity varies considerably in the policy literature. The significant heterogeneity in findings itself suggests that policy responses must pay attention to local context and the overarching macro and sectoral conditions within which tenure systems operate. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The article presents the results of a study which investigated the question of whether U.S. college courses in political economy provide an introduction to all of the field's major schools of thought. It was found that any given instructor typically did not provide a wide range of views. A broad perspective could be obtained by taking multiple courses in political economy, since most departments offer a fairly diverse set of classes on the subject. It is noted, however, that the average college student is unlikely to take more than one of these, and is therefore likely to receive a lopsided view of the field.

Objective: One of the existing methods to assess the transferability of economic evaluations is the model of Welte, which is a decision-chart method that includes general and specific knockout criteria and a transferability checklist. This study aims to test Welte's model with the help of a case study. Methods: In this study, foreign studies were transferred to The Netherlands and then compared with a Dutch reference study. In the case study, the cost-effectiveness of physiotherapy was compared with a multidisciplinary treatment. With the help of a systematic search, several foreign studies could be identified. Based on these foreign studies, two different predictions were produced for The Netherlands. In the “all studies prediction,” all foreign studies were used. In the “Welte's model prediction,” only the foreign studies were used, which passed the general and specific knockout criteria. Both predictions were compared with the Dutch reference case. Results: A total of 14 non-Dutch studies were identified. Seven studies did not pass the general knockout criteria and one study did not pass the specific knockout criteria. As a result, 14 studies were included in the “all studies prediction” and 6 studies in the “Welte's model prediction.” The predictions yielded different results and the “Welte's model prediction” proved better on costs than the “all studies prediction.” Discussion: The application of Welte's model does influence cost and effects estimates when transferring economic data between countries. However, more cases should be subjected to the Welte transferability model before a final conclusion can be drawn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides an analysis of the work of Francisco Solano Constâncio (1777–1846), a Portuguese author who lived in Paris for most of his life. He had a very colourful and diversified career, which included the practice of medicine, political agitation, scientific journalism, diplomacy, linguistics, history, and the popularisation of political economy. As far as this last aspect is concerned, Constâncio is particularly well known for his translation into French of the famous works written on political economy by David Ricardo and Thomas Malthus. He was also a very active editor of learned journals published in Paris in the 1820s, in which he discussed and criticised the writings of Jean-Baptiste Say and Simonde de Sismondi, among others. The article shows that Constâncio's sound knowledge of political economy was a basic condition for his critical acceptance of abstract theoretical principles and general policies that could not be applied to the study of national economic realities and specific social problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a simple model to characterize explicitly the role that an intervening third party plays in raising the cost of rebellion in an intrastate conflict. Extending the Gershenson-Grossman (2000) framework of conflict in a two-stage game to the case involving outside intervention in a three-stage game as in Chang et al. (2007b), we examine the conditions under which an outside party optimally intervenes such that (i) the strength of the rebel group is diminished or (ii) the rebellion is deterred altogether. We also find conditions in which a third party optimally intervenes but at a level insufficient to deter rebellion. Such behavior, which improves the incumbent government's potential to succeed in conflict, is overlooked in some conflict studies evaluating the effectiveness of intervention. One policy implication of the model is that an increase in the strength of inter-governmental trade partnerships increases the likelihood that third-party intervention deters rebellion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research on financial market development has focused on the nature of the legal system. The law and finance literature, however, exclusively focuses on the abuse of management power as a major cause of shareholder expropriation. We examine the role of the administrative capability of the state in providing and guaranteeing the institutional foundations for financial market development. The characteristic feature of bureaucracy is predictable, calculable and methodical performance. Our analysis of the linkage between bureaucratic quality and financial market development confirms our hypothesis that arm's length finance not only needs a reliable legal environment, but also bureaucratic effectiveness (1) We provide evidence that state bureaucratic performance plays a crucial role in determining financial market development; (2) We find that legal origin plays an indirect role, as it affects the financial market development through the channel of the quality of state bureaucratic performance, but it does not exert a direct and independent effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Radical uncertainty is a concept currently debated, for example, in the economics literature to theorize the impossibility of foreseeing the outcomes of scientific and technological development work. The purpose of this study is to extend the concept to articulate and theorize the minute-to-minute transactions in scientific laboratories. Empirical materials resulting from five years of ethnographic work in one laboratory focusing on fish vision are used to show how scientists produce a material continuity between some natural phenomena and the way they are represented in scientific discourse. Because the outcomes of scientists' actions (i.e., observations) sometimes turn out to be uncertain, the material (practical) actions that produce this continuity themselves retroactively become uncertain. Scientists may at any one point determine that what they had done is not what they thought and said to have done. Actions and the objects they produce therefore stand in a dialectical relationship: they produce, mutually presuppose, and in their respective materiality, stabilize one another. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reader subscription pricing mechanism is the dominant method by which the publication of scholarly journals in economics is funded. This occurs despite the fact that the use of an author charge pricing mechanism, when used in conjunction with a reader charge pricing mechanism, is described in the neoclassical economics literature as a more efficient method for financing journals. The division between the actual financing of economics journals and the theoretical understanding of how journals should be financed highlights deficiencies within the neoclassical economists' understanding of the financing of scholarly journals. In this paper I discuss this divergence in theory and practice in how economists finance their scholarly communication process and the brief attempt by some neoclassical economists to bridge this divide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keynesian concepts of probability and uncertainty emphasize the basis of knowledge available to economic decision makers. Conditions of uncertainty, which involve missing evidence or doubtful arguments, are distinguished from probable risk. Beyond this, on the basis of the claim that the future is yet to be created, some authors argue for further distinctions among different kinds of uncertainty. The paper reviews this particular argument, distinguishing it from Keynesian uncertainty theory generally, and provides a critique of its implication that, due to innovation, objective distributions of possible events do not generally exist at the time of economic decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the paper is to explore the potential for using fuzzy logic to analyse economic decision-making under Keynesian uncertainty, and in particular in circumstances where variety of opinion is important. Fuzzy logic is shown to apply where expectations may differ because the nature of the subject matter impedes any 'crisp' way of describing the underlying variables. The particular case of the speculative demand for money is considered, since it explicitly reflects variety of opinion as to whether interest rates are 'high' or 'low'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The economics literature on mercantilism tends to emphasize gold hoarding and external barriers to trade as defining characteristics. Medieval institutions, however, included a host of internal barriers to trade as well as external ones, and monopoly privileges and high offices were often for sale. In this paper, we analyze how a stable unitary government''s regulatory policies may be affected by revenues and other services generated by the efforts of rent seekers. Competition for monopoly privilege can be a significant source of government revenue that augments tax revenues, especially in settings in which collecting ordinary tax revenues is problematic. A revenue-maximizing government encourages greater monopolization than is compatible with economic efficiency, but sells monopoly privileges in a manner that promotes innovation and partially accounts for the deadweight losses associated with monopolized markets. Our analysis provides a possible public finance explanation for relatively successful authoritarian states that have relatively little corruption, but many internal and external barriers to trade. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Many developing countries' exports tend to be highly concentrated in terms of sectors and even products. In particular, they are strongly specialized in self-contained sectors. Recent economic literature has shown that institutions contribute to explaining this pattern. In this paper, we argue that the degree of self-containment itself is endogenous to institutions. Ceteris paribus a given sector will therefore have different levels of interactions with the rest of the economy across countries depending on the quality of institutions. We provide supportive evidence using a simultaneous equation approach on data on sectoral trade, country-specific input-output linkages, and institutional strength. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Technological change is usually considered a necessary albeit not sufficient condition for a transition to sustainability. However, the empirical analysis of the determinants to environmental technological change has not received too much attention in the environmental/ecological economics literature and many open questions remain in this context. Based on a careful review of the literature, this paper argues that further analysis should address several issues at different levels: i.e., regarding the conceptual framework, the thematic scope of the studies, some methodological issues and other aspects related to the environmental policy variable. First, an integrated conceptual framework which takes into account the interplay between relevant variables influencing environmental technological change (i.e., factors internal and external to the firm and characteristics of the environmental technologies) and all the stages of this process, with a greater emphasis on the invention stage, should be developed. Other aspects should then be tackled, including a focus on several themes (i.e., a greater attention to cross-sectoral technologies, the barriers to different types of environmental technologies, the international dimension of environmental technological change and environmental technological change in small and medium size enterprises), methodological issues (combination of case studies and econometric modelling) and several issues related to the environmental policy variable. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The paper argues that co-operative firms play a set of roles in market economies, based on the co-operative values and principles that are rarely noted in economic literature. Among other, those roles are to internalize market externalities, to serve as laboratories for social innovation, to espouse social entrepreneurship, to promote ethical business practices, and to aid in development. While economic literature has been focused primarily on the ownership and control structure as a source of the difference, we argue that this focus paints an incomplete picture. The principles of co-operation may supply additional insights in addressing questions why co-operatives may thrive in areas of low labour mobility, prevalent market failures, oligopoly markets, and labour intensive industries. They may also offer insights into strategies and survival in global markets of successful co-operative firms. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In the last decade, the port economics literature has given great emphasis to the Supply Chain Management approach as the new paradigm for the definition of port competitiveness. SCM supports the development of partnerships between the actors of the supply chain and considers the integration of activities and resources along business processes as source of competitive advantage. Nevertheless, the application of SCM approach to the port is particularly compiex given the traditional hostile relationships between port actors. In the effort to overcome such complexity, some authors have considered ports as Logistics Service Providers and interpreted their role within supply chains through the integrative practices undertaken by Global Players-mainly Shipping Companies and Terminal Operators-in the supply of integrated logistics services. Even tough these actors are crucial for the port competitiveness, they determine a passive role of port in the new competitive scenario. The definition of a potential and pro-active role of port in the supply chains is the objective of this paper that presents, through a literature review on SCM and port competitiveness, a new framework for port competitiveness. According to this framework, that is based on the value constellation concept value is generated by joint effort of port actors in the satisfaction of clients' needs, through the exploitation of different I mterdependencies (serial, pooled and reciprocal) between supply chains. In this context, Port Authority has a I fundamental role in identifying those resources-the so called critical assets-that encourage the development of inter-organisational relationships between port actors in the value generation process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies both pecuniary and non-pecuniary factors affecting happiness—an issue that has sparked a great deal of interest in the economic literature. Using an ordered Probit model and the 1998 general social survey (GSS) data, the paper empirically demonstrates the extent to which socioeconomic and demographic variables along with faith and emotionally based factors may determine happiness. The 1998 survey was conducted nearly at the conclusion of one of the longest economic expansion—a high income low inflation era in the US history. However, the findings tend to suggest that the absolute value of nominal income insignificantly, but non-pecuniary elements (faith and emotionally based factors including financial security) significantly determine happiness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Public health professionals assert that parents could prevent a substantial portion of infant mortality due to unintentional injury (IMUI) by creating a safe environment for the infant. Examples of safe parenting behaviors include attending to a bathing infant, properly securing a child safety seat in a motor vehicle, and removing soft pillows from a crib. The contraction of regional economies, an ambient phenomenon previously reported to affect salutary behaviors, may distract parents from these routine infant monitoring tasks. I test this distraction hypothesis that the monthly incidence of IMUI will vary inversely with the performance of the economy. I retrieve economic data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and use data from the Birth Cohort File on 2618752 infants in all 26 metropolitan areas of California. Results support the hypothesis in that a 1% decline in employed persons coincides with an 8% increase of IMUI in that month. Findings remain robust to control for individual covariates that could confound observed associations. I discuss my findings in relation to the literature concerned with parental distraction, describe other mechanisms through which the economy may affect IMUI, and recommend further investigation. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This economics literature review article addresses important developments in the literature during calendar year 2007. This is not a list or detailed documentation of papers that were published during 2007. Instead, the discussion focuses on two broad categories. The first category addresses the literature either directly or indirectly related to environmental policies and sustainable development or is mainly concerned with the following subjects: sustainable development; watershed management; climate change and disaster risk management; environmental policies management; and fisheries development. The second category addresses literature related to economic policies. This section addresses the following; political economy and conflict; water supply policies; water consumption; water price regulation and valuation. It should be noted that assigning articles to these categories was done to help organize this review, but points made in many of the articles discussed below relate to many topics across categories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exploring how the release of new economic data affects asset prices in the stock, bond, and foreign exchange markets, the authors find that only a few announcements--the nonfarm payroll numbers, the GDP advance release, and a private sector manufacturing report--generate price responses that are economically significant and measurably persistent. Bond yields show the strongest response and stock prices the weakest. The authors' analysis of the direction of these effects suggests that news of stronger-than-expected growth and inflation generally prompts a rise in bond yields and the exchange value of the dollar [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bibliographic databases (including databases based on open access) are routinely used for bibliometric research. The value of a specific database depends to a large extent on the coverage of the discipline(s) under study. A number of studies have determined the coverage of databases in specific disciplines focusing on interdisciplinary differences; however, little is known about the potential existence of intradisciplinary differences in database coverage. Focusing on intradisciplinary differences, the article documents large database-coverage differences within two disciplines (economics and psychology). The point extends to include both the uneven coverage of specialties and research traditions. The implications for bibliometric research are discussed, and precautions which need to be taken are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dual role of price, as a product attribute signaling quality and as a measure of sacrifice, serving as a benchmark for comparing the utility gains from superior product quality, is now well established in the marketing and economic literature. However, knowledge about their long-run impact and the influence of competition on these effects still remains very sparse. In the current paper, with reference to a dynamic and competitive framework, an analytical model is proposed to help determining optimal decision rules for price incorporating both roles. The main results are as follows: (i) The optimal pricing policy is determined as a Nash equilibrium strategy. (ii) The resulting equilibrium price is higher than an equilibrium that disregards the carryover price effects. (iii) For a symmetric competition, we provide normative rules on how firms should set prices as a function of the perceived quality; particularly, how the price should be set initially, when there is little product familiarity and the perceived quality is low, and how this price should vary as the perceived quality increases. (iv) At steady state, we find that the level of equilibrium margin, in percentage terms, decreases with the elasticity of demand with respect to the brand price, but this decrease is moderated by the elasticity of demand with respect to the brand perceived quality, the cross elasticity of demand with respect to the competitor's perceived quality and the effect of the competitor's current price on the firm's perceived quality deterioration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: I suppose that people react with anger when others show themselves not to be minimally altruistic. With heterogeneous agents, this can account for the experimental results of ultimatum and dictator games. Moreover, it can account for the surprisingly large fraction of individuals who offer an even split with parameter values that are more plausible than those that are required to explain outcomes in these experiments with the models of Levine [Levine, D.K., 1998. Modeling altruism and spitefulness in experiments. Review of Economic Dynamics 1, 593–622], Fehr and Schmidt [Fehr, E., Schmidt, K.M., 1999. A theory of fairness, competition and cooperation. Quarterly Journal of Economics 114, 817–868], Dickinson [Dickinson, D.L., 2000. Ultimatum decision making: a test of reciprocal kindness. Theory and Decision 48, 151–177] and Bolton and Ockenfels [Bolton, G.E., Ockenfels, A., 2000. ERC: a theory of equity, reciprocity, and competition. American Economic Review 90, 166–193]. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper compares public and private information certification in a simple class of communication games with one sender and two receivers. It is shown that, contrary to the cheap talk setting of [Farrell, J., Gibbons, R., 1989. Cheap talk with two audiences. American Economic Review 79, 1214–1223], allowing certifiable statements excludes mutual discipline (i.e., full information revelation in public but not in private) but allows for mutual subversion (i.e., full information revelation in private but not in public). In the latter case, the sender is always better off with public communication, while in other situations he may prefer either private or public communication. Compared to the previous models of strategic information revelation the paper also emphasizes the role of the “common belief ” consistency condition of the strong version of sequential equilibrium. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The evolution of leisure services marketing in the USA has passed through five stages in the past half-century: pre-marketing (activity/custodial focus), selling, user benefits orientation, community-wide benefits orientation and repositioning. The first two stages were supplanted by the user benefits orientation in the late 1970s. The user benefits focus transitioned into the leisure field from the business literature and remained pre-eminent until the mid-1990s. It was superseded because it had two conceptual flaws. First, it failed to address the notion of equity. Second, its focus on being responsive to individual users was inconsistent with the broader mandate of public leisure agencies to provide community-wide services. The emergence of credible scientific research in the past decade to support advocates' claims of community-wide benefits has facilitated emergence of the most recent evolutionary stage of leisure services marketing which is repositioning. Repositioning seeks to connect community-wide benefits the agency has the potential to deliver with an issue that is important to taxpayers and elected officials. It is argued that repositioning is the key to the future viability of public leisure agencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines changing conceptions of culture and nation in business literature from the early 1990s to the present. In the early 1990s the growth of literature concerned with depicting the cultural differences between national varieties of capitalism and business systems seemingly betokened an interest in diversity in the business world. This seeming interest in cultural diversity, however, concealed an implicit neo-liberal teleology which implies a convergence hypothesis and change in the cultural role of the nation state to that of a 'location manager', whose role is merely to guarantee favourable conditions for business with the minimum of state intervention. This reconceptualisation of the nation leads to the ultimate stage in this teleology, the discourse of the 'brand state', in which 'culture' is seen as just equivalent to those aspects of a country's 'brand equity' which meet the requirements of instant recognisability to the outside world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a highly selective review of the voluminous literature on the economic analysis of local housing markets. It is suggested that, although it often appears that mainstream economics is more concerned with improving technical elements of the modelling approach than enhancing our understanding of how markets function, there is in fact a rich literature that is largely concerned with explaining market processes and dynamics and with the impact of policy interventions on the workings of the market. The housing economics literature is more methodologically diverse than many housing analysts might expect and, in the UK and Europe in particular, this has helped stimulate several new developments in local market analysis. These advancements have been associated, in part, with improvements in statistical techniques and conceptual models. This has resulted in renewed interest in the treatment of neighbourhood segmentation and complex spatial processes in local market analysis. It is argued that further progress might be made by abducting insights from qualitative analysis in order to improve the specification of models and in their refinement and development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the development of domestic sourcing by foreign-owned subsidiaries (FOS) in the UK. The regional development and international-business literatures are used to develop a conceptual framework on the links between autonomy, the use of networks, and domestic sourcing. Data from a survey of German, French, and US FOS in the UK is used to test the model. The results indicate that increased use of networks and increased operational decision-making autonomy are associated with increased domestic sourcing, but that only a minority of FOS are increasing their use of domestic sourcing. The growing importance of global sourcing is considered as a possible explanation for the low proportion of FOS that are increasing their use of domestic sourcing. The implications for regional-development policy of the findings are also assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the economic theory regarding public sector information and, in particular, the arguments for free vs. priced distribution of official statistics. It is based on a review of the literature conducted under contract to Statistics Canada in 2007, which is available online [1]. That review examined economics literature and the economic arguments put forward in government studies and policy documents, with a particular emphasis on the literature on the economics of information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A list of books received by the publication is presented, including "Coming of Age in a Globalized World: The Next Generation," by J.M Adams and A. Carfagna, "Economics Transformed: Discovering the Brilliance of Marx," R. Albritton, and "Empire of Debt: The Rise of an Epic Financial Crisis," by B. Bonner and A. Wiggin.

The use of income distribution indicators in the economics literature has increased considerably in recent years. Using household surveys from 18 Latin American and Caribbean countries, this article seeks to explore what is behind the numbers, and what information they convey. We find that the way in which countries rank according to inequality measured in a conventional way is, to a large extent, an illusion created by differences in characteristics of the data and on the particular ways in which the data are treated. Our main conclusion is that there is an important story behind each number. This story influences our judgment about how unequal countries are, but it is seldom told or understood. Perhaps other statistics commonly used in economics also have their own interesting story, and it might be worth trying to find out what it is. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We comment on the Shoham, Powers, and Grenager survey of multi-agent learning and game theory, emphasizing that some of their categories are important for economics and others are not. We also try to correct some minor imprecisions in their discussion of the economics literature on learning in games. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This rejoinder demonstrates that the arguments made in AT (2006) are not robust and the case against non-monotonic HRSWF and their empirics remain overwhelming. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: In a recent paper in this journal Abasolo and Tsuchiya [Abasolo, I., Tsuchiya, A., 2004. Exploring social welfare functions and violation of monotonicity: an example from inequalities in health. Journal of Health Economics 23, 313–329] have strongly argued for the use of a non-monotonic health related social welfare function. This note discusses both the limitations of the measure proposed by Abasolo and Tsuchiya [Abasolo, I., Tsuchiya, A., 2004. Exploring social welfare functions and violation of monotonicity: an example from inequalities in health. Journal of Health Economics 23, 313–329] and the problems associated with their empirics. We are able to show how non-monotonicity may lead to paradoxical results and policies. Further we examine the empirics of Abasolo and Tsuchiya [Abasolo, I., Tsuchiya, A., 2004. Exploring social welfare functions and violation of monotonicity: an example from inequalities in health. Journal of Health Economics 23, 313–329] and provide an alternative explanation to the observed patterns in the data that do not violate monotonicity. Finally we briefly mention why the Atkinson-Sen framework may be more appropriate as a way forward. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Economic modelling is increasingly being used to evaluate the cost effectiveness of health technologies. One of the requirements for good practice in modelling is appropriate application of rates and probabilities. In spite of previous descriptions of appropriate use of rates and probabilities, confusions persist beyond a simple understanding of their definitions. The objective of this article is to provide a concise guide to understanding the issues surrounding the use of rates and probabilities reported in the literature in economic models, and an understanding of when and how to transform them appropriately. The article begins by defining rates and probabilities and shows the essential difference between the two measures. Appropriate conversions between rates and probabilities are discussed, and simple examples are provided to illustrate the techniques and pitfalls. How the transformed rates and probabilities may be used in economic models is then described and some recommendations are suggested. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The hospital sector in the Province of Ontario has recently completed a large scale restructuring marked by wide ranging hospital closures, mergers and program transfers. Given a generally inconclusive economics literature, regulators used an accounting, as opposed to an economic, approach when predicting gains to consolidations. This paper uses an economic cost function to examine economies of scale and scope in the years preceding restructuring, where there was little doubt that economies were possible. Issues relating to output aggregation, functional form, and scale and scope testing are addressed and an equilibrium cost function is derived from an estimated short run function to measure the cost concepts of interest. Using index and direct approaches, we examine a variety of potential reconfigurations and conclude that there were indeed large scale unexploited gains to strategic consolidation in the hospital sector. Furthermore, these gains may not have been detected using standard approaches in the literature. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper examines the distribution of economic research as catalogued in the Journal of Economic Literature across countries of the world and attempts to explain those patterns. We report the number of articles published on each country and estimate a series of regressions to understand this pattern. We find that measures of a country's size (physical and economic), connections with the outside world and data availability explain much of the pattern of research. We also find that tourism receipts, whether English is an official language, and the number of economic research institutions are significantly correlated with the amount of research done on a country. After controlling for all the variables, we find only three regions (all in Africa) with significantly less research published by economists in Journal of Economic Literature cataloged articles than North America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Despite the pervasiveness of the efficient markets paradigm in the academic finance literature, the use of various moving average (MA) trading rules remains popular with financial market practitioners. This paper proposes a stochastic dynamic financial market model in which demand for traded assets has both a fundamentalist and a chartist component. The chartist demand is governed by the difference between current price and a (long-run) MA. Our simulations show that the MA is a source of market instability, and the interaction of the MA and market noises can lead to the tendency for the market price to take long excursions away from the fundamental. The model reveals various market price phenomena, the coexistence of apparent market efficiency and a large chartist component, price resistance levels, long memory and skewness and kurtosis of returns. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This article illustrates the key findings from the economics literature on education investment, in particular the findings focused on early child investment. The article shows the impact of early investment, particularly evidence from experimental programmes on later life outcomes such as labour market performance and societal position. It demonstrates how investment in children is both an important investment for the child but also an important tool for economic and social policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is customary to analyze transport industry structure using two indices: (1) economies of density and (2) economies of scale with variable network size. The latter has been defined to analyze the behavior of costs when output and network size expand simultaneously. After reviewing in detail what is intended with the calculation of RTS under this definition, we show analytically that, when the spatial aspects underlying transport production are taken into account, the seemingly reasonable conditions imposed on the aggregate output descriptions and the network variable conceal implicit output expansions that are not uniquely defined: they happen to depend on the specification of variables and on the evaluation point. Furthermore, most of the multiple output expansions analyzed correspond to cases that are hardly instructive. We conclude that this index is inherently ambiguous, hardly contributes to an adequate analysis of transport industry structure, and should be replaced by the calculation of economies of spatial scope (Journal of Economic Literature L91, L11, D40). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: While some core theories on volunteer labor supply decisions can be found in the economic literature, little efforts were made so far to operationalize these models and verify their implications in an empirical context. This paper aims at narrowing the research gap between the theoretical economic literature on volunteer motivations and the empirically observed motivations for volunteer labor supply. A common indicator ‘voluntary contributions by others’ linking the theories of public goods, private consumption and investment has been identified and examined on the basis of structural equation modeling and regression analysis. Using representative micro data collected for volunteers in Bangladesh, Ghana, Poland and South Korea, the paper finds that this indicator significantly influences an individual''s motivation. Particularly, observed findings are in accordance with theoretical predictions. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Transmission planning in a restructured electricity market becomes increasingly complicated. To bridge the gap between economic and engineering considerations, this survey paper suggests a framework to clarify the interactions among various economic and engineering issues by reviewing recent theoretical and practical progress in transmission investment and transmission planning methodology. Thus, the paper makes economic literature more accessible to the engineering community and engineering literature more accessible to the economic community interested in the subject. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This essay examines the association and possible lines of influence between John Ruskin's work on Gothic architecture in "The Stones of Venice" and Georges Bataille's recasting of economy in "The Accursed Share." Bataille explores an association between the squandering of economic resources and a resistance to reification, while Ruskin emphasizes the redemptive significance of Gothic architecture. The association of these works may seem implausible, and at worst contradictory. Bataille's religious commitment was short-lived, while Ruskin looked to the Christian cultural legacy of feudal Europe.

This article explores some of the main bibliographical dimensions of economic literature at a time when there was much interest in economic matters but no discipline of economics. By looking at what was published in the round much economic literature is shown to be short, ephemeral, unacknowledged, polemical, and legislatively orientated. This fluidity is underscored by the uncertaintities about what constituted key works of economic literature and by the failure of attempts to make sense of that literature through dictionaries and histories. Economic literature in the period was, consequently, more unstable and uncertain than has often been acknowledged. It cannot, therefore, be simply characterized as either ‘mercantilist’ or nascent ‘political economy’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the importance of Zannetos’ 1966 book for the development of maritime economic thought. The main contributions of the book are recounted, and the empirical work in the book is reviewed. The analysis of the present paper is a citation research on the maritime economics literature that refers to the book. Of the 42 papers in the set, about one-third refers to the book in general. A total of 35 papers refer to one or more elements of the book, with an equal number of references to: (1) the term structure of freight rates; (2) the empirical findings on the form of the supply curve; and (3) on the verification of his results. The general conclusion of the citation analysis is that, apparently, a number of elements of his work are still very valid for current maritime economics thinking, while maritime economists have disregarded several other elements. The latter seems unjustified for some of the business structure observations that are made in the book, such as the notion that the ship is the firm, and the elasticity of expectations. The former observation is the basis for virtually all empirical work in maritime economics that is based on individual contract data (all freight rate analysis is of this nature), and the second is the basis for the analysis of investment behaviour in shipping, investigations of cyclicality and so on. Zannetos can definitely be seen as the initiator of the important field of term structure analysis in maritime economics. In addition to this, there are several topics in the 1966 book that are as yet unexplored, and deserve empirical scrutiny. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Preface to the second edition of his Theory of Political Economy (1879), W. Stanley Jevons announced an extraordinary turn in his analysis as he abandoned much of the explanatory framework used in the body of the text to explain cost of production and distribution. It is shown here that, when the Theory is read in the context of the objective and structure of Jevons' distribution analysis, the turn can be explained as Jevons' response to the realization that he was only able to reconcile his analysis of cost of production and of distribution in a special case. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]