Upstream privatization and downstream licensing

This study attempts to investigate the impact of downstream foreign licensing on upstream privatization policy in a vertically related market, in which a public firm and a domestic private firm supply exclusively to downstream domestic and foreign firms, respectively. We show that downstream licensing occurs when the cost differential between downstream duopolists is small, and the optimal strategy under licensing is upstream partial privatization. In addition, downstream foreign licensing facilitates upstream privatization. We further show that downstream licensing improves (reduces) local welfare when the cost differential is large (small).     

Optimal zoning of managerial duopoly

This paper investigates optimal zoning of two managerial firms in an unconstrained linear city. Comparing with the case in which firms are not managerial type, the strategic delegation increases the incentives of one firm to locate farther from the rival. Then, a welfare function is introduced to highlight zoning regulation as an influential competition policy tool. Depending on the regulator's objective function and the timing of location choice, we provide a new mechanism that allows the regulator to attain the optimal locations of managerial firms and can lead to strong or weak competition.     

Engineering the revolution? Imagining the role of new digital technologies in infrastructure work futures

Contemporary imaginations of the impact of new digital technologies (NDTS) are dominated by utopian visions of a ‘revolution’ in productivity and efficiency, contrasted with dystopian views of declines of work and human skills, and distrust of artificial intelligence's efficacy. This article explores imaginations of digital futures in the infrastructure sector through case study research of a global engineering organisation. Drawing on a practice approach, a typology is generated from interviews with engineers and managers to reveal that three broad imaginations compete within the organisation: technodeterminism; technoscepticism; and human-centric, all with utopian and dystopian variants. Clear relationships exist between the diverse imaginary positions taken by employees with their different roles, biographies and levels of the organisational agency. Those with relatively higher levels of agency tended towards technocentric utopianism while those with lower levels of agency displayed a resolutely dystopian version. Conversely, while the outward-facing image of the organisation promotes a utopian imagination of a technologically driven future, those with the very highest levels of the organisational agency remain technosceptic. This means that real change is slow. However, an encouraging manifesto for the future is suggested by those who are innovating NDTS to reimagine alternative infrastructure futures through improved human-centric social outcomes.     

Corporate profit tax,firm entry with unemployment,and income inequality

In this paper, we provide a general equilibrium analysis of corporate profit tax on income distribution, unemployment, and wage inequality. With firm dynamics in industrial sector, we identify a new channel through which profit tax affects income and wage inequality: profit tax cut will widen not only the wage gap between skilled and unskilled labor, but also exacerbate the wage inequality of unskilled labor among different sectors. The welfare effect of profit tax cut depends on unemployment deepening (labor-distortion effect) and more manufacturing firms enter the market (business-creation effect), eroding the market share of incumbent firms (business-stealing effect).     

Taxation,Network Externalities,Consumer Suffering,and Profit-Raising Entry: A Cautionary Note

Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade - Conventional wisdom is that higher competition, implying more active firms, benefits consumers but hurts producer surplus. Under unit taxation/subsidy,...     

What role should public firms play in the upstream market?

We investigate the upstream public firm's desirable option of production timing in the vertically related upstream market. We find that multiple equilibria may exist, including the Cournot-type and Stackelberg-type, with different degrees of privatization in the presence of upstream firms' efficiency gap. These equilibrium outcomes are also influenced by the intensity of downstream market competition. We further show the corresponding optimal degree of privatization in different phases of gradual privatization.