Keynes and Sraffa's 'Difficulties with J. H. Hollander'

The paper reports on Jacob H. Hollander's cooperation with John Maynard Keynes and Piero Sraffa in the preparation of the latter's edition of The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo. The report is based on archive material from various sources, including the unpublished papers of Edwin Cannan, Piero Sraffa, Jacob H. Hollander, John Maynard Keynes, and Jacob Viner, and the archive of the Royal Economic Society. The archive material consulted by us shows that, put mildly, Jacob H. Hollander did not promote Sraffa's editorial project: he held back material which he had received from Frank Ricardo and did not disclose to Sraffa that he owned several important letters which he had privately purchased. Moreover, Sraffa was refused access to Ricardiana even after he had traced them down in laborious detective work to be in Hollander's possession. Hollander's unwillingness to cooperate with Sraffa considerably delayed the publication of the Ricardo edition.     

Removing an ‘insuperable obstacle’ in the way of an objectivist analysis: Sraffa's attempts at fixed capital *

Abstract

The paper discusses Sraffa's consecutive attempts in the late 1920s and early 1940s to tackle a problem which endangered his objectivist, surplus-based approach to the theory of value and distribution aimed at reviving the standpoint of the classical economists. Whilst with circulating capital the value transfer to the product and the physical ‘destruction’ of the input are one and the same thing, with fixed capital this is not so. Sraffa eventually overcame the difficulty in terms of the joint products-method. This allowed him to explain relative prices and the rate of profits strictly in ‘material terms’.     

Some theoretical and methodological suggestions for studies examining accountants' professional judgments and earnings management

The objective of this paper is to provide theoretical and methodological suggestions to guide future research on the controversial topics of accountants' professional judgments and earnings management. Based on an evaluation of prior research, this paper provides four suggestions. First, it is suggested that a focus on the influence of personality variables is likely to provide sharper insights into judgments of individuals. Two relevant personality variables have been selected for this paper, namely, Construal of Self and Regulatory Focus Theory. Both Construal of Self and Regulatory Focus Theory have been, primarily in psychology literature, proven as valid and relevant for judgments, decisions and behavior. Second, prior literature conducted studies on earnings management and ethical issues to a large extent in the United States, often assuming that findings are generalizable and transferable to other countries. Given the importance of contextual factors and of gaining insights from global perspectives, the examination of nations with different contextual environments and particularly of countries in which ethical issues have not been rigorously examined, is suggested. Third, prior research has largely relied on simplistic unidimensional ethics measures that are unlikely to capture the complexity of accountants' professional judgments. It is suggested that a combination of a unidimensional measure and ‘Multidimensional Ethics Measure’ (MEM) provides richer insights into judgments. Fourth, this paper also suggests measuring “holier-than-thou” perception bias. “Holier-than-thou” perception bias means that individuals consider themselves as more ethical than their peers. This bias is important because it may foster an unethical organizational culture. Some of the suggestions included in this paper may provide useful guidance for future studies examining accountants' professional judgments and earnings management.     

The projected costs and benefits of water diversion from and to the Sultan Marshes (Turkey)

The Sultan Marshes in the Develi Basin, Anatolia, one of twelve internationally important wetlands of Turkey, have been severely affected by the construction of an irrigation project in 1988. Intensive use of surface and ground water in irrigation has caused more than a 1 m decline in water levels and has affected the wetlands' ecological characteristics. Previous studies indicate that Sultan Marshes will need more water to restore viable ecological conditions. In this study, we analyze how economic benefits from agriculture and wetlands would be affected if moderate amounts of water were diverted from agriculture back to wetlands in the Develi Basin. By estimating total and marginal costs and benefits associated with water diversions, we determined the optimum or economically-efficient amount of water diversion. When only direct-use values of the wetland (animal grazing, plant harvesting, and ecotourism) were included in the analysis, the optimum amount of water diversion to the wetlands was found to be 5.2 million m³ year^− 1 (165 L sec^− 1), which compares to about 62 million m³ year^− 1 (1,957 L sec^− 1) used in irrigation. When wastewater treatment benefits (an indirect-use value) were added, the optimum amount rose to 7 million m³ year^− 1. Overall, the analysis showed that water diversion from agriculture to the Sultan Marshes is economically preferable.     

Perspektiven und Optionen einer wachstumsorientierten Finanzpolitik

Nachdem sich die Lage der Staatsfinanzen in den vergangenen Jahren deutlich verbessert hat, wird derzeit kontrovers über den Kurs der Finanzpolitik diskutiert. Soll sie weiterhin vorrangig auf Konsolidierung oder eher auf die vielfach als notwendig erachtete Steigerung des Wachstumspotenzials abzielen? Welche M?glichkeiten für eine verst?rkt wachstumsorientierte Finanzpolitik er?ffnen sich und wie sollten sie genutzt werden? Heinz Gebhardt, 55, Dipl.-Volkswirt, ist wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter in den Kompetenzbereichen „Wachstum und Konjunktur“ sowie „?ffentliche Finanzen“ des Rheinisch-Westf?lischen Instituts für Wirtschaftsforschung (RWI) in Essen; Dr. Lars Siemers, 34, ist wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter im Kompetenzbereich „?ffentliche Finanzen“ des RWI Essen. Die Autoren danken Roland D?hrn, Rainer Kambeck, Tanja Kasten, Christoph M. Schmidt und Joachim Schmidt für kritische Anmerkungen und hilfreiche Kommentare.     

Research on target costing: past,present and future

Although target costing is an extensively studied topic in the management accounting literature, a holistic investigation into its methodological development is missing. Therefore, an extensive state-of-the-art analysis is conducted that focuses on articles in highly rated journals. We determine nine distinct research streams that encompass further developments of the traditional target costing methodology. By grouping these streams into three research scopes, we outline the achieved progress as well as remaining tasks for further enhancements. Due to the abundance of these tasks, we align them with six future themes of management accounting that we identified as being particularly influential to target costing. As a result, six promising topics for researchers to advance target costing are determined. Additionally, our findings reveal to managers of which issues they should be particularly aware with respect to the performance of their target costing processes.     

Environmental Taxation and Induced Structural Change in an Open Economy: The Role of Market Structure

Abstract. Studies of structural change induced by environmental taxation usually proceed in a perfect-competition framework and typically find structural change to be quite moderate under realistic emission reduction scenarios. By observing that some of the industries affected are likely to operate under imperfect rather than perfect competition, additional mechanisms emerge which may amplify structural change beyond the extent identified as yet. Especially, changes in economies of scale may arise which weaken or strengthen the competitive position of industries over and above the initial cost effect. Using a computable general equilibrium model for Germany to examine the effects of a unilaterally introduced carbon tax, we find that induced structural change is more pronounced under imperfect competition than under perfect competition. At the macroeconomic level, we find that aggregate losses in economies of scale are larger than aggregate gains, implying that the total costs of environmental regulation are higher under imperfect competition than under perfect competition.