THE GERMAN POSTAL REFORM OF 1994*

ABSTRACT ** ** Résumé en fin d'article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resúmen al fin del artículo.
: In 1994 the Deutsche Bundespost, Deutsche Bundespost Telekom, Postdienst and Postbank were transformed into three stock companies. This so-called Postal Reform II required an amendment to German Basic Law as well as new laws, which have been condensed in the‘Post and Telecommunications Reorganization Act’of 14 September 1994. This paper reviews the regulations concerning –- among others —the amendments to the Basic Law, the presentation of the stock companies, the minister Post and Telecommunications, the agency, the regulation structure and the personnel.     

THE EFFECTS OF ENVIRONMENTAL TAXES An empirical study of water and solid waste levies in Flanders*

ABSTRACT ** ** Résumé en fin d'article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resúmen al fin del artículo.
: Environmental problems are considered by the majority of economic agents as important factors in making public policy. As a result, economic and market-integrated instruments are increasingly being used as alternatives to traditional environmental policy instruments. This article aims to determine the actual effect of environmental taxes on pollution levels. In particular, a case study of Flemish environmental taxes on water and solid waste pollution is reported. A quantitative model for testing the actual effectiveness of environmental taxes is developed, based on similar studies that analysed Dutch environmental policy. The conclusions of this analysis are extended with a qualitative analysis of information provided by in-depth interviews. Data-driven empirical research of the Flemish situation does not confirm the expected direct relationship between an increase in taxation and a decrease in pollution. In general, industrial firms do not consider the present taxation system a legitimate one for changing their polluting activities. As a result, the greening’of management is limited and environmental taxes are considered by the majority of firms as a mere business taxation rather than a system to create a switch from polluting to non-polluting behaviour.     

MEASURING QUANTITY‐QUALITY TRADE‐OFFS IN REGULATION: THE BRAZILIAN FREIGHT RAILWAYS CASE*

ABSTRACT ** ** Résumé en fin d'article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resumen al fin del artículo.
: The quantity vs. quality trade‐offs in network industries are well known from the theoretical literature and have been the subject of many empirical assessments, although mostly for the telecoms and energy sectors. The purpose of this paper is to expand the evidence for the railway sector by documenting the importance of this trade‐off in the context of the Brazilian freight railway industry reform, the first example of a railway sector in which tariff revisions are subject to joint output and quality performance indicators. The analysis is based on the calculation of the Malmquist productivity index proposed by Färe et al. (1995) . The decomposable nature of this total factor productivity (TFP) index reveals the prevalence of quantity‐quality trade‐offs up to the end of the reform period, but a positive correlation between them during the period just afterwards. This type of information would certainly be useful for regulation purposes, particularly as an alternative way of taking into account quality without introducing complex, and very often ineffective, penalty schemes.     

THE GOVERNANCE OF PUBLIC ENTERPRISES: THE QUEBEC EXPERIENCE

ABSTRACT ** ** Résumé en fin d'article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resumen al fin del artículo.
: Have public enterprises become obsolete policy instruments? Should they be privatized or can their governance be radically transformed so that they could still be used as policy instruments? The world around them has changed and forced governments to move. After a discussion on the arguments in favour of privatization, this article suggests an analysis of three cases in the Canadian province of Quebec. Considering the pressures linked to the liberalization of trade resulting from NAFTA, this article suggests that the governance of public enterprises can be transformed and adapted and that consequently, it is not useful or necessary to privatize them. There is in reality a lot of room in the public enterprise governance to reform them, room that has been neglected over the last decades.     

ITALIAN STATE-OWNED HOLDINGS,PRIVATIZATION AND THE SINGLE MARKET*

ABSTRACT ** ** Résumé en fin d'article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resúmen al fin del artículo.
: Italy's state industry is in a strategic transition, the result of which was not foreseen in the reforms approved by Parliament in the 1990s. Privatization pressures and opposite trends aimed at rejuvenating the state-owned holdings (the major ones being Iri and Eni) coexist in the Italian mixed economy. However, in the absence of a clear strategic intent, the functions of Iri and Eni are destined to whither away, in spite of the success achieved by them in both national and international markets. New pressures are menacing public enterprises. The attitudes of the European Commission, the trends of the European Union's industrial policy, and the drive towards the construction of a single market challenge the competitive skills of Iri and Eni, which in 1992 became joint stock companies.     

Bargaining Credibility and the Limits to Within‐firm Pensions

Abstract ** ** Résumé en fin d’article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resúmen al fin del artículo. : A simple bargaining model highlights the role of commitment to a low‐risk investment policy for firms which offer within‐house pension and health insurance schemes. The roles of this commitment level plus bargaining power, and the ability of a failing firm to misappropriate pensions funds, are studied and their influence on the equilibrium pension determined.     

COMMENT EXPLIQUER LA PRÉSENCE D'ORGANISATIONS A BUT NON LUCRATIF DANS UNE ECONOMIE DE MARCHÉ? Une théorie socio-économique des organisations non lucratives

RÉSUMÉ ** ** Abstract at the end of the article: Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resúmen al fin del artículo.
: Le secteur à but non lucratif constitue un secteur non néligeable de notre écommie qui reste cependant sous exploré tant sur leplan empirique que théorique. De récents travaux anglo-Saxons et français permettent de mieux cerner cette réalité. Le programme de recherche du secteur à but non lucratif traite deux types de problématiques: la problématique de l‘origine (pourquoi les organisations à but non lucratif existent elles?) et la problématique du comportement (en quoi se différencient-elles d‘autres formes d‘organisations?). Une approche socio-économique des organisations non lucratives est auancée à partir du problème de la coordination de l‘action. On peut en effet considérer que les institutions sont créées afin d‘aider les agents éonomiques à résoudre les problèmes rècurrents de coordination auxquels ils ont à faire face. Dam cette perspective l'organisatwn rwn lucrative peut être comprise comme un mécanisme de compromis permettant de gérer les tensions entre quatres logiques de coordination: les logiques marchande, domestique, solidaire et civique.     

FRONTIÈRE DE PRODUCTION ET MESURE DE L'EFFICACITÉ TECHNIQUE: Le cas de 1‘électricité dans dix entreprises subsahariennes*

RÉSUMÉ ** ** Abstract at the end of the article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resúmen al fin del artículo.
: Mesurer la performance globale des entreprises publiques est wte tâche ardue en raison des multiples objectifs konomiques et sociaux qui sod habituellemeni assignés à ces organisatwns. L'article s'attmhe à appécier un aspect particulier mais néanmoins important de laperformance éonomique: l‘efficience techruque. Une frontiére des possibilités de production est dérwée de l'estimation d'une fonction de production de type Cobb-Douglas sur un éhantillon de dix sociétés africaines pmductrices d‘éectricité. La principale conclusion qui se dégage de l’analyse économétrique est la suivante: l‘écart relatif d‘efficience entre les dew soeiétés extrêmes de la distribution est de l'odre de20%, avant comme aprè correction Cle l'efficience pour l'action de factews d'environnement exogènes à la gestion des sociitb.     

On the emergence of non‐profit orchestras

In the market for live classical music, a symphony orchestra typically has fixed costs that are high relative to demand, so that the demand curve lies entirely below the average cost curve (Baumol & Bowen, 1966)—a situation in which a for‐profit enterprise cannot survive. The present study aims to explain how a non‐profit orchestra can survive in such an adverse market environment by relying on private donations, even in the absence of altruism. We argue that a financially distressed orchestra may employ a strategy to impose a non‐profit distribution constraint on itself—thus becoming a non‐profit, tax‐deductible organization—and use its member musicians' worker surplus to produce donor privileges, which enables the orchestra to induce donations from an individually rational audience by taking advantage of a tax deduction scheme. With this strategy, the orchestra can successfully extract consumer surplus from the audience to offset its loss.     

ADVANCING THE THEORY OF THE COOPERATIVE ORGANIZATION: THE COOPERATIVE AS A TRUE HYBRID

ABSTRACT: What is a cooperative? Is it a form of vertical integration, an independent organization or an intermediate form of governance between the market and the hierarchy? This paper contributes to the economic theory of the cooperative organization by examining it from a comparative economic perspective. Departing from Williamson's one‐dimensional continuum of governance structures, the paper adopts the view that governance structures exhibit multiple dimensions and true hybrids are market‐like on some of these dimensions while hierarchy‐like on others. I show that the cooperative blends market‐like attributes with hierarchy‐like mechanisms and thus should be viewed as a true hybrid rather than as an intermediate form. The paper concludes with a discussion about the usefulness of this approach and potential avenues for future research.     

Imposing Capital Controls on Credit Unions: An Analysis of Regulatory Intervention in Australia

Abstract ** ** Résumé en fin d’article; Zusammenfassung am Ende des Artikels; resumen al fin del artículo.
: What impacts would minimum capital requirements have on mutual institutions lacking the ability to raise equity capital? Can the response of credit unions to capital controls be explained by internal member bonding? The imposition of capital controls on credit unions by the Australian Financial Institutions Commission is studied as a Box‐Tiao time series quasi‐experiment. Time series intervention and trend analyses are performed on a sample of 150 credit unions over the period 1987 to 1997, together with cross‐sectional regressions of the estimated responses. The results demonstrate that the capital controls had a significant impact on credit union behavior. Consistent with theoretical expectations, the response of individual credit unions is found to be a function of initial capital levels and internal member bonding.     

The Impact of Payoff Interdependence on Trust and Trustworthiness

Abstract. In one‐shot investment games where each player's payoff is a convex combination of own and other's profit, we measure trust by the amount given to the trustee and trustworthiness by the amount returned to the trustor by the trustee. Does the degree of payoff interdependence increase both trust and trustworthiness or one but not the other or neither of them? According to our experimental data, trust remains unaffected by the extent of interdependence whereas trustworthiness reacts positively to it.     

PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT IN SOLIDARITY ECONOMY ORGANIZATIONS: THE CASE OF FAIR TRADE SHOPS IN ITALY

ABSTRACT: The aim of this paper is to introduce a multidimensional assessment model for organizations that have multiple goals and are not driven exclusively by profit. Therefore, it is an assessment method particularly suitable for social enterprises. In order to measure the efficiency of production units in each dimension, the Data Envelopment Analysis non‐parametric method is applied. Our case study is concerned with Fair Trade shops and members of the consortium Altromercato for which we collected variables that could be associated with input and output for the economic, socio‐cultural and organizational dimensions. The results of the analysis confirm the presence of economies of scale in the economic dimension but not in the socio‐cultural dimension. Moreover, our organizational analysis confirmed a low general professionalization. Our results also confirm, on the one hand, the more pronounced capacity of cooperatives to sell Fair Trade products compared to associations, which, on the other hand, have the tendency to achieve proportionately better results in the socio‐cultural dimension.     

From profit margins to income distribution: Joan Robinson's odyssey from marginal productivity theory

The point of departure for this paper is a 1941 Note on profit margins co-authored by Joan Robinson and Nicholas Kaldor that remained unpublished until 2000. Robinson's reviews of Henry Clay's The Problem of Industrial Relationships, Bresciani Turroni's The Economics of Inflation, and Roy Harrod's Towards a Dynamic Economics, along with her 1965 Cambridge Inaugural Lecture, may be interpreted as analogous documents that develop her critique of neoclassical wage theory and identify the money wage as the economy's ‘key’ price. These publications were critical steps toward the wage mark-up hypothesis and Post-Keynesian support of incomes policy to contain inflation. Robinson's Harrod review anticipated her later ideas about economic growth. With Kalecki's notion of ‘the degree of monopoly’ and her own concept of neo-mercantilism (from the Inaugural Lecture), these themes are nascent in the Robinson–Kaldor Note on profit margins.     

MODELING INTERNAL DECISION MAKING PROCESS: AN EXPLANATION OF CONFLICTING EMPIRICAL RESULTS ON BEHAVIOR OF NON‐PROFIT AND FOR‐PROFIT HOSPITALS

This article develops multiobjective models of hospital decision making that incorporate the internal decision process in both a for‐profit and a non‐profit hospital (NPH). Predicted output and quality for an NPH differ from those for a for‐profit hospital under some conditions but converge under others. Convergence may be the result of a complex internal decision structure with decision control primarily by physicians, similar objectives across different organizational forms, or differing constraints. The mechanisms underlying these outcomes provide explanations for conflicting results in empirical studies of non‐profit and for‐profit hospitals and provide a different rationale for convergence than non‐profit response to competition from for‐profit hospitals. Understanding the source of convergence is important for policies directed toward the tax treatment of NPHs.(JEL D21, D23, I11, L3, L21)     

A MODEL OF ENDOGENOUS PAYOFF MOTIVES AND ENDOGENOUS TIMING IN A MIXED DUOPOLY*

A model of endogenous payoff motives and endogenous order of moves is analysed in a mixed duopoly. We find that, when a non‐negative price constraint is imposed on public and private firms' quantity choice, both firms always choose to be relative‐payoff‐maximisers, and both simultaneous move and sequential move can be sustained in equilibrium. In contrast, when non‐negative absolute profit constraint is imposed, public and private firms always choose to be absolute‐payoff‐maximisers, and only sequential move can be sustained in equilibrium.     

Did tax flattening affect RRSP contributions?

In 1988 marginal personal income tax rates changed in Canada, for some individuals by reasonably substantial amounts. In this note a large sample of tax‐filer data is examined and the conclusion is drawn that, when attention is paid to the possible confounding of marginal tax rate and non‐linear income effects, there is no convincing evidence that the tax rate changes affected contributions to Registered Retirement Saving Plans (RRSPs). Est‐ce que l'aplatissement des taux d'imposition influence les contributions au REER? En 1988, les taux marginaux d'imposition du revenu personnel ont changé au Canada, et, pour certaines personnes, ces changements ont été substantiels. Cette note examine un grand échantillon de rapports d'impôts et en arrive à la conclusion que, quand on prend en compte le mélange possible des effets du taux marginal d'imposition et des effets de revenu non‐linéaires, il n'y a pas de résultats qui montrent de façon probante que les changements dans les taux d'imposition ont influencé les contributions au REER.     

A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF ALLOCATION OF DECISION‐MAKING ACROSS STAKEHOLDER GROUPS: THE CASE OF PERSONAL CARE INDUSTRIES

ABSTRACT 1 : The article compares the allocation of decision‐making across stakeholder groups in for‐profit, nonprofit and local government personal care facilities in one state in the United States. We analyze detailed survey data on nursing homes, childcare centers and group homes. We find that in comparison to nonprofit and government organizations, for‐profit firms delegate more decision‐making power to executives and owners, and less to their employees, consumers, families, boards of directors, and community representatives. The differences, although generally small, support the hypothesis that decision‐making is allocated to different groups in accord with the broad objectives of the organization.     

Value and exploitation: a comment

Abstract

This paper comments on a recent paper by Ernesto Screpanti (2003) Screpanti, E. 2003. Value and exploitation: a counterfactual approach. Review of Political Economy, 15: 155–171. [Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar], in this journal, on Marxian theories of value and exploitation. The paper argues, in opposition to Screpanti, that the labour theory of value is the most suitable foundation for a realistic and historically determined vision of society; that labour values provide a unique coherent conceptual framework for understanding the nature of profit; that the inconsistency of labour values is only apparent, as it disappears with a judicious choice of numéraire; and that prices of production explain much less than labour values and are therefore an inadequate substitute for the latter.