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What happens when patients suddenly stop their medications? We study the health consequences of drug interruptions caused by large, abrupt, and arbitrary changes in price. Medicare's prescription drug benefit as-if-randomly assigns 65-year-olds a drug budget as a function of their birth month, beyond which out-of-pocket costs suddenly increase. Those facing smaller budgets consume fewer drugs and die more: mortality increases 0.0164 percentage points per month (13.9%) for each $100 per month budget decrease (24.4%). This estimate is robust to a range of falsification checks and lies in the 97.8th percentile of 544 placebo estimates from similar populations that lack the same idiosyncratic budget policy. Several facts help make sense of this large effect. First, patients stop taking drugs that are both high value and suspected to cause life-threatening withdrawal syndromes when stopped. Second, using machine learning, we identify patients at the highest risk of drug-preventable adverse events. Contrary to the predictions of standard economic models, high-risk patients (e.g. those most likely to have a heart attack) cut back more than low-risk patients on exactly those drugs that would benefit them the most (e.g. statins). Finally, patients appear unaware of these risks. In a survey of 65-year-olds, only one-third believe that stopping their drugs for up to a month could have any serious consequences. We conclude that far from curbing waste, cost sharing is itself highly inefficient, resulting in missed opportunities to buy health at very low cost ($11,321 per life-year). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Consumers typically have a higher preference and trust for traceability products, which makes many online platforms (e.g., JD.com, Tmall Global) and food manufacturers (e.g., BeingMate, Mengniu, Moutai) use blockchain‐enabled traceability to improve product transparency and trust. This paper systematically analyzes the effects of constructing blockchain‐based information traceability systems (BITS) on supply chains led by different members in a dual‐channel supply chain consisting of a manufacturer and an online platform. We studied the optimal operational strategy for dual‐channel members in two scenarios without blockchain technology and different members (i.e., manufacturer and online platform) as leaders in building BITS. We find that BITS adoption can effectively improve the performance of supply chain members, but the value added to blockchain depends on the level of consumer goodwill toward BITS, the level of competition, and the proportion of cost sharing. We show that either the manufacturer or the online platform can be more profitable as a leader in building BITS. Further, we showed that either the manufacturer or the online platform, as the leader of BITS construction, should bear more construction costs so that the nonleader builder can gain more profit to achieve a win‐win result. Interestingly, as the leader of BITS construction bearing more construction costs can achieve higher system total profit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blockchain technology is commonly used in many industries. One current application is that providing supply chain transparency, sellers can disclose product information to consumers for authentication and certification. To examine the supply chain blockchain based transparency‐level strategy and its interact with different refund policies, in a two‐echelon supply chain, we consider a supplier decides on the transparency level and wholesale price, and a retailer decides on retail price and provides full refund (policy F), or partial refund (policy P), or no refund (policy N) policy to consumers. We find the refund policy choice and the transparency‐level strategy have a mutual influence. A lenient refund policy (a higher refund) can generate more demand, which makes the supplier to provide a high transparency level, whereas a high consumer's transparency awareness also promotes the retailer to choose a more lenient refund policy. We find Pareto improvement exists under a cost‐sharing strategy, and the retailer is willing to share part of the adoption cost only when the efficiency of improving the transparency level is moderate. Otherwise, the retailer adopts blockchain technology only when there is no cost sharing. Further, different shipping cost bearers can change the sensitivity of refund policy choice, and the supplier prefers to provide a high transparency level when the retailer covers the shipping cost. When the retailer becomes more socially responsible, the supplier is more willing to provide a higher transparency level, and the retailer is more willing to provide a partial refund policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In supply systems, maintaining stock levels is a major challenge. The purpose of this article is to determine the number of orders in a continuous review model. The demand rate is erratic, as it is dependent on promotional advertising on an ambiguous basis. This article considers learning and memory in an unpredictable setting. The fundamental crisp model is extended with a fuzzy formulation, and learning is included. Demand promotion is included with the complete backlog in models, which are based on finite-horizon time scales. The memory present in real-world situations is represented using Caputo's style of nonintegral ordered calculus. It focuses on the percentage of each process that is devoid of scarcity as well as the overall cycles of replenishment. After analyzing each model numerically, a parametric sensitivity analysis is performed to show the trade-offs and efficacy of the decision criteria. Longer memory and higher learning rates have been found to result in a cheaper total cost. The number of fuzzy learning orders and the overall cost shift in an inversely proportionate manner as learning increases.The fuzzy learning case's total cost decreases rather than the fuzzy case's if the differential fractional order rises within the range. The crisp model, which derives minimal total cost, is relevant as a mathematical bound for the other two realistic models that incorporate demand volatility and are the main goals of this simulation. These models ameliorate the burden of implausibly perfect demand knowledge. This simulation is used to analyze the increases in the inventory system's output for each model. With learning, the inventory and total cost are less than those of a pure fuzzy system: the fuzzy model's delta over the crisp limiter is reclaimed by 62% for the order size and by 39% for the cost over the considered horizon. This accurately simulates how experience leads to better decision-making. A move to shorter memory has twin manifestations in order size: differential memory index generates linear reduction with a mean rolling fall of 10.5% per 0.1 change but the integral index causes a stronger (20%) quadratic reduction. For the total cost, their roles are reversed: both cause quadratic increase with shorter memory but the differential index has the stronger impact - a mean rolling rise of 11% per 0.1 change compared to 6.5% for the integral index. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Marine microplastics, are widely distributed in the global marine environment, posing a challenging issue that requires the joint efforts of global stakeholders. Methods: To effectively address the issue of marine microplastic pollution (MMP) governance and analyze the dynamic changes in governance willingness of various participants under different scenarios, this paper meticulously constructs a game theory framework encompassing polluting enterprises, research institutions, and environmental organizations. Results: (1) On the political level, the implementation of continuous and strong economic penalty mechanisms is an effective means to deter enterprises from evading MMP governance responsibilities. However, the effective execution of this strategy highly depends on the participation and supervision of environmental organizations. Therefore, it is essential to assign more roles and responsibilities to environmental organizations to ensure the thorough execution of governance measures. (2) On the technical level, the effectiveness of research directly determines the functional status of enterprises and research institutions in the MMP governance decision-making system. Weaker entities tend to make decisions following the behavioral preferences of dominant entities. Thus, deepening the integration of industry and research and fully unleashing the effectiveness of research outcomes in MMP governance is a key path to enhancing overall governance efficiency and effectiveness. (3) On the economic level, high governance costs often become a significant factor limiting the enthusiasm of all parties to participate. However, when innovative cooperation models achieve cost sharing and benefit sharing, the governance willingness of participants significantly increases. It is evident that optimizing resource allocation, improving the efficiency of fund utilization, and establishing a diversified and sustainable funding guarantee mechanism are crucial for advancing the in-depth progress of MMP governance. Discussion: In summary, this study not only provides profound theoretical insights into the interaction relationships and behavioral choices of multiple stakeholders in MMP governance but also offers practical strategic recommendations for constructing an efficient and collaborative governance system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of top-down control in divergent creativity remains heavily debated. An outstanding question about the state dynamics of creativity concerns acute shifts between heightened and lowered creative states. Particularly, do transitions between creative states incur a "switch cost" as observed in other domains of cognition? Prior research showed that asymmetric switch costs are often incurred such that reaction time is asymmetrically slower when participants switch from a task involving more top-down control to a task involving less top-down control. We tested the hypothesis that frequent acute transitions from creativity-cued responding (associated with heightened creative state) to uncued responding (associated with lowered creative state) would incur an asymmetric switch cost such that uncued responding would be disproportionately impacted by state changes. We utilized the "thin slices" verb generation task in a task-switching paradigm. Consistent with the hypothesis of asymmetric switch costs in shifts between creative states, we observed a substantial switch cost when switching from creativity-cued trials to uncued trials, but no switch cost when switching from uncued trials to creativity-cued trials. These findings provide indirect evidence that heightened creative states may require substantially more top-down control than lowered creative states, supporting the theory that divergent creativity requires increased top-down control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a new method to estimate price-cost margins in the presence of fixed costs of production. By exploiting properties of the primal and dual sales-based and cost-based Solow residuals, we are able to simultaneously estimate price-cost margins and the share of fixed costs in total costs for each input. Ignoring fixed costs in production underestimates price-cost margins and overestimates excess profit shares. Using a thirty-year panel of Belgian firms, we estimate price-cost margins, as a fraction of sales, of 25.4% on average, which can be decomposed between fixed costs of 22.9% and excess profits of 2.5%. Belgian price-cost margins have declined (−5.9%) in the past three decades due to a combination of falling fixed costs (−4.0%) and decreasing excess profits (−1.9%), suggesting that output markets have become even more competitive over time. While large firms have higher profit shares than small firms, they have lower fixed cost shares as well as lower price-cost margins. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Establishing a reasonable cost-sharing and compensation mechanism for air pollution control is a prerequisite for realizing inter-regional cooperative treatment. Taking inter-provincial sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions in China from 2005 to 2019 as the research object, this paper proposes a data-driven approach to establish a cost-sharing index system of regional SO2 treatment in four dimensions and construct a cost-sharing and compensation scheme using the entropy-TOPSIS method. The results revealed that there are significant spatial and temporal differences in the treatment cost of SO2 emission, and the total SO2 treatment costs at the national level increased first and then decreased during the study period, meanwhile, the regional SO2 treatment costs are much higher in the less economically developed regions such as the central and western regions than in economically developed eastern coastal regions. The design of the cost-sharing and compensation mechanism of SO2 treatment should consider the regional differences in abatement capacity, abatement potential, abatement responsibility, and development demands. The economically developed regions should share higher treatment costs according to their historical cumulative abatement responsibilities, and provide economic compensation and technical support to the less economically developed regions. Specifically, the marginal abatement cost in the more economically developed eastern region is much higher than that in the less economically developed central and western areas due to their large abatement responsibility and strong reduction capacity but insufficient abatement potential, so the eastern regions can transfer part of their abatement responsibility to the central and western regions using economic compensation. Reasonable cost sharing and horizontal compensation can help promote regional cooperation and synergistic management in air pollution abatement. Finally, corresponding policy recommendations are given to provide a decision basis for cross-regional cooperation in air pollution control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Supply chain carbon abatement is an important way to promote low-carbon transformation of the social economy and address global climate change. This paper analyzes the issue of supply chain carbon abatement under different power structures, as well as the effect of consumers' low-carbon preference and carbon tax rate on the optimal decisions. This paper constructs five different models, namely ML-NO model, ML-CS model, RL-NO model, RL-CS model and VI model. The research finds that VI model is the most ideal model for promoting supply chain carbon abatement. The optimal abatement efforts, market demand, and total profits in the VI model are all the largest among the five models. Whether the supply chain leader is the manufacturer or the retailer, cost sharing contract can enhance optimal abatement efforts, market demand, and profits of both parties. In any model, the leader in Supply chain earns higher profits than the follower. When consumers' low-carbon preference increases, the optimal abatement efforts, market demand, and profits of both parties will all increase, and the growth rate is gradually accelerating. For the manufacturer with high carbon emissions, when the carbon tax rate increases, the optimal abatement efforts first increase and then decrease. For the manufacturer with low carbon emissions, when the carbon tax rate increases, the optimal abatement efforts will also increase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the Chinese government proposes ambitious plans to promote low-carbon transition, energy storage will play a pivotal role in China's future power system. However, due to the lack of a mature electricity market environment and corresponding mechanisms, current energy storage in China faces problems such as unclear operational models, insufficient cost recovery mechanisms, and a single investment entity, making it difficult to support the rapid development of the energy storage industry. In contrast, European and American countries have already embarked on certain practices in energy storage operation models. Through exploration of key issues such as investment entities, market participation forms, and cost recovery channels in both front and back markets, a wealth of mature experiences has been accumulated. Therefore, this paper first summarizes the existing practices of energy storage operation models in North America, Europe, and Australia's electricity markets separately from front and back markets, finding that perfect market mechanisms and reasonable subsidy policies are among the main drivers for promoting the rapid development of energy storage markets. Subsequently, combined with the actual development of China's electricity market, it explores three key issues affecting the construction of cost-sharing mechanisms for energy storage under market conditions: Market participation forms, investment and operation modes, and cost recovery mechanisms. Finally, in line with the development expectations of China's future electricity market, suggestions are proposed from four aspects: Market environment construction, electricity price formation mechanism, cost sharing path, and policy subsidy mechanism, to promote the healthy and rapid development of China's energy storage industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the interplay between the information strategy of an e‐commerce platform and the selling mode strategy of a manufacturer within a co‐opetitive supply chain, as well as the identification of the optimal supply chain strategy. We develop a supply chain model where a platform outsources production of its private label product to a manufacturer, who also sells its national brand product through the platform. The platform must decide whether to acquire consumer quality preference information at a cost and share it with the manufacturer, while the manufacturer needs to choose between the reselling mode or the agency selling mode for its national brand product. The two driving effects (competition‐intensification effect and mode differentiation effect) are identified. Our findings show that the platform will acquire and share information when the acquisition cost is sufficiently low, leading to the "competition‐intensification effect." Additionally, the manufacturer prefers the agency selling mode when cost‐quality efficiency is low, and the reselling mode otherwise, driven by the "mode differentiation effect." In cases where information sharing is absent, the manufacturer is more likely to choose the agency selling mode. Interestingly, when the cost‐quality efficiency of the manufacturer's product is moderate and the information acquisition cost is low, the "competition‐intensification effect" and the "mode differentiation effect" offset each other, resulting in the expansion of the region where the manufacturer chooses the reselling mode due to the platform's information‐sharing strategy. As a result, this enhances a cooperative relationship between the manufacturer and the platform. We also derive the optimal supply chain strategy, providing insights into both the manufacturer's selling mode and the platform's information strategies in online retailing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A major issue regarding biodiversity offset schemes is uncertainty about conservation and its costs. Although the demand for market expansions for biodiversity banking has increased in the past few decades, they may increase the degree of uncertainty regarding the completion of offsets. Therefore, stipulating the rights and responsibilities of stakeholders about the implementation of offsets is important. However, researchers have overlooked the behavioral aspects of market participants regarding responsibility and uncertainty. This study experimentally investigates the effect of uncertainty and market structure change on credit trading behavior in biodiversity banking. First, we verify that uncertainty regarding additional conservation costs provides significant disincentives for bankers to engage in trading when they are directly responsible for the costs, leading to the over-reduction of transactions. Since developers share the payment for the additional costs through the increase in credit prices, it is important to determine the way of sharing the responsibility for the costs between market participants and the public/society. Second, the provision of insurance to alleviate the uncertainty for bankers may not influence efficiency. Therefore, it may be reasonable for the public sector to incorporate insurance schemes into biodiversity banking programs. Third, increases in the number of bankers and developers improve efficiency, and this lowers the possibility of over-reduction of transactions. Therefore, when market expansions increase degrees of uncertainty, responsibility sharing schemes should be linked and revised according to the expansions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The vehicle-road collaborative intelligence approach has become an industry consensus. It can efficiently tackle the technical hurdles and reduce the performance requirements and costs of on-board perception and computing devices. There is a need for in-depth quantitative studies to optimize the allocation of vehicle-road intelligent capabilities for collaborative intelligence. However, current research tends to focus more on qualitative analysis, and there is little research on the redistribution of vehicle and roadside intelligent capabilities. In this paper, we present a model for distributing perception and computing capabilities between vehicle-side and roadside, ensuring to meet the needs of various autonomous driving levels. Meanwhile, the collaborative intelligence approach will also introduce the costs of intelligent infrastructure deployment, energy, and maintenance. Different roads have varying scene characteristics and usage intensities. It is necessary to conduct a cost-effectiveness analysis of the intelligent deployment of different road types. A vehicle-road cost allocation model is developed based on the lifecycle traveled distance of vehicles and the lifecycle traffic flow of various roads to evaluate the function-cost effectiveness. Our study presents several vehicle-road intelligent schemes that meet the needs of various autonomous driving levels and selects Beijing for case analysis. The results indicate that primary intelligent infrastructure can reduce the lifecycle cost of the vehicle-side intelligent scheme for intermediate autonomous driving from ¥65,301 to ¥37,703, and advanced intelligent infrastructure can reduce the lifecycle cost for advanced autonomous driving from ¥126,938 to ¥42,180. Considering the distributed cost of vehicle-side and roadside, urban roads in Beijing have higher function-cost effectiveness compared to highways, especially urban expressways, which are expected to generate 43.3 times the vehicle-function-cost benefits after the advanced intelligent upgrades. The corresponding research findings can serve as a reference for city managers to make decisions on intelligent road deployment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data sharing serves to maximize the efficiency of data resources by facilitating their full utilization and reducing associated costs. However, existing data-sharing schemes are confronted with issues such as data loss, data tampering, difficulties in privacy protection, and high sharing costs. To address these issues, this paper proposes a blockchain-based security-oriented data-sharing scheme. Firstly, an architecture that separates data from data ownership is employed to enhance the security of the scheme and reduce storage overhead. Secondly, a lightweight on-chain and off-chain collaborative data security algorithm based on ECC and ECDHE is designed to ensure confidentiality during data sharing. Finally, a mechanism for tracking the circulation of shared data is proposed, which records the data flow in non-fungible tokens (NFTs), thereby improving the traceability of the proposed scheme. We designed relevant experiments to evaluate the proposed solution, and the results demonstrate that the data-sharing scheme devised in this paper performs well in terms of both security and usability, effectively achieving secure data sharing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To examine the temporal relationship between the anti-discrimination rules of the Affordable Care Act, which took full effect in 2017, and the incidence of commercial claims for gender-affirming care, as well as cost sharing for these services. We used a previously described algorithm to define a cohort of gender-diverse adults in the MarketScan Commercial Claims and Encounters Database. Claims for gender-affirming medical and surgical care were identified using International Classification of Diseases and Current Procedural Terminology codes plus pharmacy data; the annual incidence of surgical claims was calculated. Interrupted time series analyses were used to evaluate the temporal relationship between claims and anti-discrimination legislation. Claims data were also used to evaluate the patient contribution towards services. There were 70,733 gender-diverse adults included in the study and 36,702 (51.9%) of them filed claims for gender-affirming care. The incidence of persons with claims for gender-affirming surgery increased from 0.002% in 2009 to 0.012% in 2021. Interrupted time series analyses demonstrated a greater year-to-year increase in claims after anti-discrimination policy influences took effect. This change was greatest for transmasculine chest procedures. The median lifetime net payment for gender-affirming surgery was $12,429.10 and cost sharing was $1019.20 (8.6%). Commercial claims for gender-affirming surgery increased temporally with respect to implementation of anti-discrimination legislation and cost-sharing was reasonably low. However, many gender-diverse persons did not have claims for gender-affirming care, which may indicate continued out-of-pocket payment for these services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recommendation models are deployed in a variety of commercial applications to provide personalized services for users. However, most of them rely on the users' original rating records that are often collected by a centralized server for model training, which may cause privacy issues. Recently, some centralized federated recommendation models are proposed for the protection of users' privacy, which however requires a server for coordination in the whole process of model training. As a response, we propose a novel privacy-aware decentralized federated recommendation (DFedRec) model, which is lossless compared with the traditional model in recommendation performance and is thus more accurate than other models in this line. Specifically, we design a privacy-aware structured client-level graph for the sharing of the model parameters in the process of model training, which is a one-stone-two-bird strategy, i.e., it protects users' privacy via some randomly sampled fake entries and reduces the communication cost by sharing the model parameters only with the related neighboring users. With the help of the privacy-aware structured client-level graph, we propose two novel collaborative training mechanisms in the setting without a server, including a batch algorithm DFedRec(b) and a stochastic one DFedRec(s), where the former requires the anonymity mechanism while the latter does not. They are both equivalent to probabilistic matrix factorization trained in a centralized server and are thus lossless. We then provide formal analysis of privacy guarantee of our methods and conduct extensive empirical studies on three public datasets with explicit feedback, which show the effectiveness of our DFedRec, i.e., it is privacy aware, communication efficient, and lossless. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper shows that OECD's Pillar Two may increase employment and investment in low-tax countries due to the Substance-based Income Exclusion (SBIE). The SBIE allows to tax-deduct payroll costs and user costs of tangible assets twice from the tax base of the top-up tax owed by subsidiaries in low-tax countries. Consequently, it implies that a 15% minimum corporate tax for low-taxed subsidiaries is not achieved if the SBIE is positive. We show that Pillar Two dampens tax-motivated transfer pricing, but changes the employment, investment and import incentives, and that for a sufficiently large cost share of labor and/or capital, the SBIE is equivalent to a production subsidy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban last-mile express delivery in China encounters several challenges. This paper presents the establishment of a sharing logistics center aimed at enhancing the overall efficiency of urban last-mile express delivery while optimizing the utilization of essential resources. The successful implementation of shared delivery within sharing logistics center necessitates the creation of a robust collaborative mechanism. Recognizing that cooperative benefit allocation is dynamically influenced by factors such as resource input, operational efficiency, risk management, and other cost-related considerations, this study introduces a multi-weight H-Shapley value method for benefit allocation. By conducting empirical analyses of urban last-mile express delivery in Beijing within a sharing logistics service framework, our findings reveal that the revised benefit allocation model better aligns with the interests of participating entities and positively correlates with their contributions. Analyzing the impact of delivery volume and express operational costs changes, it is found that when the delivery volume and express operational costs of the sharing logistics center change, the benefits of participating enterprises move in the same direction. The benefit allocation model established in this study enriches the existing body of research in the field of shared delivery and offers valuable insights for benefit allocation issues that necessitate consideration of the dynamic effects of multiple parameter variations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Key Points: Question: Is cost sharing associated with nondispensing of naloxone prescriptions (abandonment)? Findings: This cross-sectional analysis of 2020-2021 data from a national pharmacy transactions database used a regression discontinuity approach to evaluate the association between cost sharing and abandonment, exploiting the fact that deductibles typically reset at the beginning of the year in commercial insurance plans and in Medicare plans. The findings suggest a decision by commercial and Medicare plans to increase naloxone cost sharing by $10 would be associated with a 3.1- and 2.3-percentage-point increase in the probability of abandonment, respectively. Meaning: Cost sharing may be a barrier to dispensing of naloxone prescriptions in commercially insured and Medicare patients. Importance: Increasing access to naloxone (an opioid antagonist that can reverse overdose) could slow the US opioid epidemic. Prior studies suggest cost sharing may be a barrier to dispensing of naloxone prescriptions, but these studies were limited by their cross-sectional designs and use of databases that do not capture prescriptions that are not filled (abandoned). Objective: To evaluate the association between cost sharing and naloxone prescription abandonment (nondispensing of naloxone prescriptions). Design, Setting, and Participants: This cross-sectional, regression discontinuity analysis exploited the fact that deductibles typically reset at the beginning of the year in commercial and Medicare plans. The included data were derived from the 2020-2021 IQVIA Formulary Impact Analyzer (a pharmacy transactions database that represents 63% of prescriptions at US pharmacies). The analysis included claims for naloxone nasal spray among commercially insured patients and Medicare patients that occurred during the 60 days before January 1, 2021, through 59 days after January 1, 2021. Exposure: Cost sharing, which is defined as the amount patients would have to pay to fill prescriptions. Main Outcomes and Measures: Local linear regression models were used to assess for abrupt changes in cost sharing and the probability of prescription abandonment on January 1, 2021. To estimate the association between cost sharing and prescription abandonment, a fuzzy regression discontinuity analysis was conducted. Results: These analyses included naloxone claims for 71 306 commercially insured patients and 101 706 Medicare patients (40 019 [56.1%] and 61 410 [60.4%], respectively, were female). The commercially insured patients and Medicare patients accounted for 73 311 and 106 076 naloxone claims, respectively. On January 1, 2021, the mean cost sharing per claim increased by $15.0 (95% CI, $13.8-$16.2) for commercially insured patients and increased by $12.3 (95% CI, $10.9-$13.6) for Medicare patients and the probability of abandonment increased by 4.7 (95% CI, 3.2-6.2) percentage points and 2.8 (95% CI, 1.6-4.1) percentage points, respectively. The results from the fuzzy regression discontinuity analysis suggest a decision by commercial and Medicare plans to increase naloxone cost sharing by $10 would be associated with percentage-point increases of 3.1 (95% CI, 2.2-4.1) and 2.3 (95% CI, 1.4-3.2), respectively, in the probability of abandonment. Conclusions: The elimination of cost sharing might be associated with increased naloxone dispensing to commercially insured and Medicare patients. This study evaluates the association between cost sharing and naloxone prescription abandonment (nondispensing of naloxone prescriptions) in commercial insurance and Medicare plans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article deals with the obligation of private doctors in Hesse to contribute to the costs of the medical on-call service. A private doctor in private practice was exempted from participating in the on-call service, but the cost sharing obligation remains. The Social Court dismissed the lawsuit, but the State Social Court overturned the court decision. The appeal of the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians was successful, as the decision regarding cost sharing is lawful. The State Social Court has ruled that private doctors in private practice are obliged to contribute to the costs of the medical on-call service according to the Hessian Health Professions Act. [Extracted from the article]

This study investigates how consumers' willingness-to-pay (WTP) for green products affects the decisions made by the green supply chain players. Through the application of game theory and uncertainty theory, our findings show that a higher consumer WTP for green products usually leads to a higher retail price and market share of green products, which motivates retailers and manufacturers to invest more in green technology. We also find that an increased WTP for green products can spur retailers to reduce the optimal green cost-sharing rate due to the pressure of increasing costs. In addition, we find that retailers are willing to lower the cost sharing rate when the confidence level increases. Regarding the contributions made by this study, it is one of the first to explore the transmission mechanisms involved in the management of the green supply chain by linking consumers' WTP for green products to strategic decisions made by green supply chain players under conditions of uncertainty. Furthermore, our study could help green supply chain players to optimise the cost sharing mechanisms they use to generate more revenue, due to the increase in WTP for green products, which will in turn help to facilitate a low carbon economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This summary discusses the potential risks associated with stablecoins and proposes a method for estimating the cost of insuring stablecoins against losses. Stablecoins, which are crypto assets designed to maintain a stable value, have gained popularity but also raised concerns about financial stability. The article suggests that insuring stablecoins, similar to bank deposits, could mitigate these risks. Using option pricing methods, the authors estimate the cost of guaranteeing stablecoins against losses for 90 days, which ranges from nearly zero to almost $0.13 per dollar of stablecoins. The estimates vary based on the volatility of stablecoin prices and the issuers' balance sheets. The article provides useful information for policymakers considering stablecoin insurance. [Extracted from the article]

With the acceleration of energy storage construction, investors are paying attention to how the costs of storage projects can be recovered. Market rules and incentive policies affect the dissemination of energy storage costs. This article simulates the interactive behavior of multiple agents based on evolutionary game theory, taking into account market factors such as prices, capacity, and incentive policies. It views the dissemination of storage costs as an interactive decision-making problem involving multiple agents' adoption of technology, and analyzes how market factors influence the outcomes of cost dissemination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How to optimize the business environment is a very difficult issue. Now the stability of the timing control of the power grid is poor and the energy cost is high. This paper uses literature reviews and case studies to study the optimization of the business environment of the timing control of the power grid. Through collecting and analyzing relevant literature and combining actual cases, the current business environment problems of timing control of power grids are discussed, and corresponding solutions are proposed. The research results show that the stability of the power grid of this technology is up to 99%, and the continuous optimization of the business environment of the power grid timing control can reduce energy costs. It is necessary to conduct business interconnection and share timing signals, and through the formulation of unified technical standards, data security protection, management and supervision mechanism improvement, and fair investment and cost sharing mechanism, enhance the efficiency of power grid timing control and energy exploitation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information security outsourcing has become an emerging trend in the operations of information security, but the relation between information assets of firms and attack modes of hackers have failed to be considered. Through building a game-theoretic model, this article analyzes security outsourcing of two firms who share their information resource with each other and are confronted with opportunistic attacks and targeted attacks. We find that in the case of security decisions in-house, the firms may obtain a lower expected cost and the hacker may derive a lower expected benefit under targeted attacks than under opportunistic attacks, even though targeted attacks are widely deemed to be more harmful to the firms. When outsourcing security operations to a MSSP (Managed Security Service Provider), we reveal that under targeted attacks the MSSP can reap a higher expected benefit and the hacker can still derive a lower expected benefit. Finally, we examine the effects of key security elements and find some interesting results. In particular, the MSSP may or may not benefit from the degree of resource sharing, and the hacker may suffer from its learning ability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Residential owned solar panels mounted on roof-tops generated 1.4% of the U.S. electricity supply in 2022. Utilities compensate residential customers using a net metering system by which each kilowatt-hour generated by the customer reduces the customer's bill by the amount the utility charges for one kilowatt. Despite the small impact of roof-top solar on the total market, in 2022, thirty-two states conducted ninety-four proceedings investigating whether to change the net metering system. In these proceedings, utilities advocated changing the rates to discourage residential investment in solar panels. Utilities argue that net metering provides a subsidy to solar customers because the rate the utility pays is greater than the avoided cost of energy. That excess payment allows solar customers to avoid paying for the distribution network. The cost of the distribution network is shifted to non-solar customers. This article will evaluate these claims. It will show that if the social cost of carbon were in the calculation, it would generate a Kapp cost shift from solar customers to non-solar customers. The size of the Kapp cost shift is greater than the cost of distribution networks, reversing any private cost shift that utilities have estimated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes capacity restricted cooperative purchasing (CRCP) situations in which a group of cooperating purchasers face two suppliers with limited supply capacity. To minimize the total purchasing costs, we show that two extreme policies have to be compared: order everything at one supplier and the possible remainder at the other. Interestingly, as order quantities increase, various policy switches can occur. To find suitable cost allocations of the total purchasing costs, we model a CRCP-situation as a cost sharing problem. As increasing order quantities also imply concavity breaks due to a forced change in supplier, the corresponding cost function is piecewise concave. For cost sharing problems with concave cost functions, we show that the serial cost sharing mechanism satisfies two desirable properties, unit cost monotonicity (UCM) and monotonic vulnerability for the absence of the smallest player (MOVASP). However, these properties are lost in the setting of piecewise concave cost functions. We develop a new context specific class of piecewise serial rules based on claims rules. We show that the proportional rule is the only claims rule for which the corresponding piecewise serial rule satisfies UCM. Moreover, the piecewise serial rule corresponding to the constrained equal losses rule satisfies MOVASP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider directed tree networks with a single source, where there exists a positive probability of a disruptive event at any node. Such networks model security considerations in pipelines as well as in unidirectional digital networks. If a disruptive event occurs at a certain node, that node and its downstream nodes incur economic losses. Users thus have an incentive to invest in upstream locations as well as their own sites to reduce the probability of a disruptive event. The initial model we develop to reduce the expected investment plus disruption costs is a multiplicative model for which closed‐form solutions cannot be obtained in general. We overcome this problem with an additive model that we show closely approximates the initial formulation. This model reduces the security problem to a public goods setting where we minimize the total expected cost at each node. The users then need to share these costs in an equitable fashion, which gives rise to a set of cooperative games. For the case where disutilities to all users are identical, the Shapley value can be computed efficiently, along the lines of an Airport Game. We also treat the case where risk reduction and disutility vary across the network. Finally, we prove that the cooperative game is concave in this general case, which guarantees that the core of the game is nonempty and that the Shapley value is an element of the core. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copay accumulator programs, which exclude the benefit of manufacturer patient assistance from annual maximum out‐of‐pocket costs, shift costs for expensive oncology drugs from plans to patients. Legislation is ongoing to protect patients from these potentially harmful redefinitions of cost‐sharing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Consumers may need help using an inherently complex product after purchase. This article studies a manufacturer's and a retailer's incentives to provide presales service and after-sales support in a distribution channel. The authors consider a model in which a manufacturer makes wholesale price and channel service decisions. Subsequently, a retailer makes retail price and channel service decisions. They find that, in equilibrium, both channel members provide presales service. If the fixed-cost investment needed to enhance the effectiveness of after-sales support is small, the manufacturer lets the retailer provide after-sales support. Yet when it is above a threshold and the retailer becomes unwilling to invest in providing after-sales support, the manufacturer steps in and does so. As expected, when the fixed cost is too large, the manufacturer also opts out of providing after-sales support. Interestingly, when the retailer provides after-sales support, the level of presales service and the demand for after-sales support can simultaneously be the highest among all configurations. Finally, the authors demonstrate the robustness of their main results by studying alternative channel service configurations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study explores the strategic pricing and quality improvement decisions under uncertain demand in a three-layer textile and garment supply chain. According to whether the fabric manufacturer (FM) invests in quality or not and whether the garment manufacturer (GM) or garment retailer (GR) is willing to share the costs or not, five game models are constructed to investigate the impact of different members' cost sharing on the optimal decisions and profits. By conducting a theoretical and numerical analysis, we find that: (1) The GM's or GR's cost sharing plays a positive effect on the quality improvement, as for whose cost sharing performs better in improving the quality depending on the proportion of cost sharing, and the quality improvement is highest with both members share the costs simultaneously. (2) The FM receives the highest profit when both members share the costs simultaneously, however, whose cost sharing is more profitable for the FM is also related to the proportion of cost sharing; in short, the FM always benefits from the cost sharing, no matter one member does this or two members do this. (3) The GM (GR) gains the highest profit when only the GR (GM) shares the costs, and the results indicate that if one member has shared the costs, whether the other member engaging in cost sharing could benefit the former depending on their proportions. Specifically, when the GM (GR) chooses to share the costs and the proportion is relatively low, the GR(GM) joining in cost sharing is beneficial to the former; otherwise, is harmful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Road traffic injuries cause considerable financial strain on health care systems worldwide. We retrospectively analyzed injury-related costs of 252 severely injured (New Injury Severity Score, NISS ≥ 16) patients treated at Tampere University Hospital (TAUH) between 2013 and 2017, with 2-year follow-up. The costs were divided into direct treatment, indirect costs, and other costs. We analyzed various injury- and patient-related factors with costs. The total costs during the 2-year study period were 20 million euros. Median cost was 41,202 euros (Q1 23,409 euros, Q3 97,726 euros), ranging from 2,753 euros to 549,787 euros. The majority of costs (69.1%) were direct treatment costs, followed by indirect costs (28.4%). Other costs were small (5.4%). Treatment costs increased with the severity of the injury or when the injury affected the lower extremities or the face. Indirect costs were higher in working age patients and in patients with a higher level of education. The relative proportions of direct and indirect costs were constant regardless of the amount of the total costs. The largest share of costs was caused by a relatively small proportion of high-cost patients during the 1st year after injury. Combined, this makes planning of resource use challenging and calls for further studies to further identify factors for highest costs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper employs a multidimensional fixed effects model and examines the impact of the digital economy on the performance of firms in traditional industries. We have identified a pattern similar to the "IT productivity paradox" observed in the United States during the 1980s. Using data from A-share listed Chinese firms from 2011–2019, we find that the digital economy significantly reduces the short-term performance of firms by intensifying market competition and increasing adjustment costs. On the contrary, the digital economy improves firms' long-term performance through accumulation of human capital and greater innovation capability. Competitive strategies strengthen the effect of the digital economy on the long-term performance of firms. Additionally, our research demonstrates that technology-intensive firms and small firms experience more pronounced negative effects in the short term but firms with high-tech titles suffer smaller shocks than other technology-intensive firms. These findings presents novel perspectives on the influence of the digital economy on firm performance, offering valuable insights for managers, investors, and policymakers involved in economic decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the sharing mode selection and optimal pricing for an electric vehicle manufacturer (EVM). We evaluate three sharing modes, i.e. Mode N, car sales business only, Mode S, car sales business and car-sharing service provided by a self-built sharing platform, and Mode T, car sales business and car-sharing service provided by a third-party sharing platform. Further, we consider two types of government subsidy policies: purchase and production subsidies. We find that for purchase subsidies, the EVM should select Mode S if the transaction cost per sharing service is low, and select Mode T otherwise; for production subsidies, the EVM should select Mode S. Regardless of the subsidy policy, the optimal sales prices of EVs under Mode N and Mode S are the same, but both are lower than that under Mode T. The optimal rental price of EVs under Mode S is lower than that under Mode T. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to develop and simulate a green automotive supply chain model (ASC) consisting of one supplier, one manufacturer, and two types of products (green and non-green) under disruption risks (DRs). The greening effort (i.e., electric vehicle production) is considered for both the supplier and the manufacturer. In our modeling, we include the local government intervention (GI) and their incentivization of manufacturers to produce greener products. Moreover, the effectiveness of centralized versus decentralized supply chain integration strategies in coping with disruption consequences was explored. A mathematical pricing model based on game theory is designed to maximize the total profit for both integrated and decentralized systems. The model examines the effects of the greening effort on the supply chain (SC) members with eight disruption scenarios, including Extra Production and Surplus Inventory. Simulating numerical examples reveals that the Extra Production type of disruption increase the profitability in different scenarios. Conversely, the Surplus Inventory disruption reduces profitability. Moreover, a channel coordination through cost sharing contract in the presence of disruption sharing was developed. GI and the cost-sharing contract increase the SC profit. The managerial implications of our findings are also discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While there is much research on coordinating the dual‐channel supply chain using the revenue‐sharing contract, it is unclear if there is a better mechanism design in the buy‐online‐and‐pickup‐in‐store (BOPS) mode. In this channel integration environment, the customer service provided by the bricks‐and‐mortar store is critical to the chain's success. Based on a stackable game model, we analyze the contract methods for the cases of revenue sharing and no revenue sharing, where the latter is classified into two types: All the credit goes to the offline or online channel. Focusing on improving consumer service and supply chain performance in the BOPS mode, we observe that revenue sharing is not necessarily the best contract type, while the non‐revenue‐sharing contract of a lump‐sum subsidy plus quantity discount can coordinate the supply chain. We also analyze the impacts of some endogenous parameters and derive the conditions for the equilibrium outcomes. We find that revenue sharing cannot effectively stimulate the offline channel to improve its service effort as the offline channel is more concerned about service cost sharing than revenue sharing. The results are similar to those of revenue allocation to the online or offline channel in the BOPS mode, but the conditions are slightly different. Conducting numerical studies to gain insights from the analytical findings, we find that the subsidy contract is better than the revenue‐sharing approach under various market conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digitally enabled higher education involves the in-depth use of new-generation digital technology, which has subverted and innovated the traditional teaching mode, driven the development of high-quality teaching and learning, and improved teachers' teaching experience, and increased efficiency. Based on ecosystem theory, this paper constructs a higher education ecosystem with the government, enterprises, and universities as the core participating subjects. It considers the participating subjects' effort level and the ecosystem's overall benefits under the three scenarios of noncooperative research and development (R&D), cost sharing, and cooperative R&D. The results show that (1) the service innovation effort level of the three parties increases with increasing human resource level and technology maturity, and the government's benefit decreases with increasing cost of fulfilling social responsibility. (2) The government's cost subsidies to universities and enterprises can enhance the service innovation level of both parties and increase the optimal returns of the three parties and the ecosystem as a whole. (3) In the cooperative R&D game scenario, the effort level of the three parties and the total ecosystem returns are greater than those in the noncollaborative R&D scenario, and after determining the subsidy coefficients of the government, Pareto optimality of the three parties and the ecosystem as a whole can be achieved. The conclusions of this study can aid in understanding the dynamic evolution mechanism of digitally enabled higher education and provide a realistic decision-making reference for higher education ecosystem managers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study aimed at investigating the experiences of graduate students who experience, for the first-time, cost-sharing policies in Saudi public universities. The study used the explanatory sequential mixed methods approach, involving a two-phase data collection. First, quantitative data were collected through a questionnaire administered to graduate students of education from 24 out of the 29 public universities, where 384 participants responded. Then, qualitative data were collected through semi-structured interviews conducted with 28 participants who voluntarily signed up for a follow-up interview. The main findings show that 66.4% of participants support the introduction of cost-sharing in public universities. However, there are no student financial aid mechanisms to guarantee equal opportunity for all candidates. Even though 90.4% of participants pay their due shares on time, students who faced financial hardships were not allowed to register for classes until they paid. Further, except for the contract signed during the admission process, there was no informative and accessible cost-sharing policy document to help potential candidates make the right decision before joining a program. Moreover, the cost-sharing programs are not flexible for working students. Participants' perceptions on cost-sharing and financial aid mechanisms do not differ based on gender and education level but do strongly significantly differ based on cost-sharing policy support. Based on these findings, the researchers suggest five recommendations for policy and practice for the cost-sharing policy to be effective and equitable for all potential candidates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To determine the distribution and quantity of ophthalmic care consumed on Affordable Care Act (ACA) plans, the demographics of the population utilizing these services, and the relationship between ACA insurance coverage plan tier, cost sharing, and total cost of ophthalmic care consumed. This cross-sectional study analyzed ACA individual and small group market claims data from the Wakely Affordable Care Act (WACA) 2018 dataset, which contains detailed claims, enrollment, and premium data from Edge Servers for 3.9 million individual and small group market lives. We identified all enrollees with ophthalmology-specific billing, procedure, and national drug codes. We then analyzed the claims by plan type and calculated the total cost and out-of-pocket (OOP) cost. Among 3.9 million enrollees in the WACA 2018 dataset, 538,169 (13.7%) had claims related to ophthalmology procedures, medications, and/or diagnoses. A total of $203 million was generated in ophthalmology-related claims, with $54 million in general services, $42 million in medications, $20 million in diagnostics and imaging, and $86 million in procedures. Average annual OOP costs were $116 per member, or 30.9% of the total cost, and were lowest for members with platinum plans (16% OOP) and income-driven cost sharing reduction (ICSR) subsidies (17% OOP). Despite stable ocular disease distribution across plan types, beneficiaries with silver ICSR subsidies consumed more total care than any other plan, higher than platinum plan enrollees and almost 1.5× the cost of bronze plan enrollees. Ophthalmic care for enrollees on ACA plans generated substantial costs in 2018. Plans with higher OOP cost sharing may result in lower utilization of ophthalmic care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have recently witnessed the emergence of many farm certification schemes whose common objective is to identify and promote certain agroecological practices with a view to attaining environmental goals and meeting consumer expectations. Our study evaluated how farmers are economically impacted when adopting France's voluntary high environmental value (HEV) certification scheme. Focusing on multiple crop types and interacting with multiple stakeholders, we estimated the added costs and coordination requirements engendered by HEV certification. Our results show that these costs can increase in a crop-dependent manner. Thus, to further encourage the spread of the HEV certification scheme, it is essential to improve coordination and cost-sharing among value-chain stakeholders. In its latest CAP Strategic Plan, France proposed supporting HEV-certified farms via the European Union's eco-scheme instrument, which should provide an additional boost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider a class of optimization problems defined over trees with unary cost terms and shifted pairwise cost terms. These problems arise when considering block coordinate descent (BCD) approaches for solving inverse problems with total generalized variation (TGV) regularizers or their nonconvex generalizations. We introduce a linear-time reduction that transforms the shifted problems into their nonshifted counterparts. However, combining existing continuous dynamic programming (DP) algorithms with the reduction does not lead to BCD iterations that compute TGV-like solutions. This problem can be overcome by considering a box-constrained modification of the subproblems or smoothing the cost terms of the TGV regularized problem. The former leads to shifted and box-constrained subproblems, for which we propose a linear-time reduction to their unconstrained counterpart. The latter naturally leads to problems with smooth unary and pairwise cost terms. With this in mind, we propose two novel continuous DP algorithms that can solve (convex and nonconvex) problems with piecewise quadratic unary and pairwise cost terms. We prove that the algorithm for the convex case has quadratic worst-case time and memory complexity, while the algorithm for the nonconvex case has exponential time and memory complexity, but works well in practice for smooth truncated total variation pairwise costs. Finally, we demonstrate the applicability of the proposed algorithms for solving inverse problems with first-order and higher-order regularizers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Firm characteristics like value, momentum, quality, or low volatility help explain the cross section of stock returns and have become core pillars in the practice of factor investing. When practically implementing factor strategies, however, transaction costs can significantly impact the corresponding factor portfolios' performances. Using proprietary trading data from a large institutional asset manager, the authors construct a realistic transaction cost model to investigate how to optimally implement factor portfolios with transaction costs. The authors provide a framework to optimize factor performance net of transaction costs but do not overly sacrifice factor exposure at the expense of lower transaction costs. They show that their analysis can be readily extended to a multi-factor setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a need for a paradigm shift to circular, sustainable textile systems. The transition will have impacts on people and businesses around the world, yet research on the circular economy has been overly focused on the economic and environmental dimension, lacking in the social dimension. Without design for comprehensive justness, the transition can reproduce or lead to novel injustices. We use distributive, procedural, and recognative justice dimensions to analyze and uncover justness aspects related to the circular transition in the textile industry in Tamil Nadu, India. Our qualitative analysis is based on interviews with stakeholders of the industry. We uncover several justness tensions related to economic, social, power, value, epistemic, and governance issues. For the just circular transition to succeed, the tensions should at the very least be acknowledged, and ameliorated or dealt with when possible. The building blocks for this process are, for example, codesign of private governance systems, sharing the costs of the transition more equally and inclusion of various voices in knowledge production. As a step forward from the current situation in which a circularity focused approach and a justness focused approach emphasize different aspects, we present a new framework for designing just circular transitions, one that bring these important perspectives together. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, scientific big data management is generally faced with the problems of scattered data resources, inconsistent data standards, and the inability to share and circulate data safely. Research personnel attaches great importance to whether sharing the first-hand property is secure under clear ownership and whether it can contribute to the large society. The isolation of the data management system is the obvious obstacle to collecting and managing across-disciplinary data. To a large extent, sharing and trading scientific big data is the primary purpose to realize the clarity of property rights, secure data sharing, and the value of the data assets step by step. We propose to construct a public platform for scientific big data management. The system is managed to unify and authorize the on-chain data, on which data sharing and trading is tracked throughout the process. Smart contracts are executed with vital functions and guarantee price matching in data transactions. We design the incentive mechanism which measures the incentive yield of data cost quality based on Evolutionary Game Theory and Data Quality Control Theory (EGQCY), considering how the cost of data quality performs in controlling and impacting the rational release of the incentive yields in the sharing and trading process. The experiments found that the design of incentive yield and incentive coefficients only significantly affected the transition from low-quality data to medium-quality data. Both parameters converged to fixed values as the cost of data quality increased. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For an unbalanced cooperative game, its grand coalition can be stabilized by some instruments, such as subsidization and penalization, that impose new cost terms to certain coalitions. In this paper, we study an alternative instrument, referred to as cost adjustment, that does not need to impose any new coalition-specific cost terms. Specifically, our approach is to adjust existing cost coefficients of the game under which (i) the game becomes balanced so that the grand coalition becomes stable, (ii) a desired way of cooperation is optimal for the grand coalition to adopt, and (iii) the total cost to be shared by the grand coalition is within a prescribed range. Focusing on a broad class of cooperative games, known as integer minimization games, we formulate the problem on how to optimize the cost adjustment as a constrained inverse optimization problem. We prove NP -hardness and derive easy-to-check feasibility conditions for the problem. Based on two linear programming reformulations, we develop two solution algorithms. One is a cutting-plane algorithm, which runs in polynomial time when the corresponding separation problem is polynomial time solvable. The other needs to explicitly derive all the inequalities of a linear program, which runs in polynomial time when the linear program contains only a polynomial number of inequalities. We apply our models and solution algorithms to two typical unbalanced games, including a weighted matching game and an uncapacitated facility location game, showing that their optimal cost adjustments can be obtained in polynomial time. History: Accepted by Area Editor Andrea Lodi for Design & Analysis of Algorithms—Discrete. Funding: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grants 72022018 and 72091210]; the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong SAR, China [Grant 16210020]; Hong Kong Polytechnic University [Grant P0032007]; and the Youth Innovation Promotion Association, Chinese Academy of Sciences [Grant 2021454]. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/ijoc.2022.0268. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We discuss horizontal mergers in a homogeneous good industry where firms compete à la Bertrand with increasing marginal production costs. We show that profitable mergers can occur even for lower post-merger prices with respect to the pre-merger scenario, thus implying an increase in consumer surplus. The driving force of the result is the ability of the merged entity cutting production costs by sharing the output among its plants. This output rationalization effect can compensate for the revenue loss due to the merged entity producing less than the cumulated pre-merger production of the merging parties. • Mergers can be profitable for lower post-merger prices compared to the pre-merger case. • They can increase consumer surplus without creating any merger-induced synergy. • They can be profitable and welfare enhancing in a coalition proof market structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We study queueing problems with an endogenous number of machines, the novelty being that coalitions not only choose how to queue, but on how many machines. After minimizing the processing costs and machine costs, we share the proceeds of this cooperation, and study the existence of stable allocations. First, we study queueing problems, and examine how to share the total cost. We provide an upper bound and a lower bound on the cost of a machine to guarantee the non-emptiness of the core. Next, we study requeueing problems, where there is an existing queue. We examine how to share the cost savings compared to the initial situation, when optimally requeueing/changing the number of machines. Although stable allocations may not exist, we guarantee their existence when all machines are considered public goods, and we start with an initial queue in which agents with larger waiting costs are processed first. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]