Harvesting to Extinction: Is It Socially Rational?

This paper presents a critique of the neoclassical view of the optimal use of renewable resources and offers an alternative view based on the method of classical thermodynamics. The presentation is forwarded via the issue of harvesting to extinction. Based on simple models, the traditional theory suggests that society would benefit from wiping out any renewable resource whose intrinsic growth rate, though positive, is smaller than the social rate of time preference. The latter is the rate society is using to discount its future benefits and costs. To bypass this ecologically implausible outcome, the simplistic assumptions have been modified in various ways. For example, either the costs or the benefits of harvesting have been made to depend on the stock of the resource as well as on the yield. The modifications offered make society less prone to wipe out resources intentionally, but they still disregard a more fundamental difficulty: The traditional theory is not consistent with the second law of thermodynamics; it describes a process that defies the second law, which no known system is able to be undergoing. No doubt, the theory should be challenged first and foremost on this ground, but none of the offered modifications is capable of annulling this inconsistency. A deeper change is needed because the social values of the resource as perceived by a society that behaves in manners consistent with the second law and as defined by the traditional theory necessarily differ. The paper identifies the socially consistent value and shows that harvesting to extinction is never optimal socially. Were society to follow the socially inconsistent value, it would always underestimate the importance of self-sustained resources. However, the unlikely refutability of the second law turns this possibility and the socially favored extinctions into arguable outcomes of an untenable theory rather than undesirable outcomes of a sound theory. Potentially growing renewable resources are wiped out in real life for various reasons, but when they are preyed to extinction, their unfortunate fate is an outcome of the dynamics of a socially unregulated system rather than a social objective coming to fruition. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Decreasing Impatience: A Criterion for Non‐stationary Time Preference and "Hyperbolic" Discounting

Despite recent interest in hyperbolic discounting, there has been little discussion of exactly what property of time preferences is instantiated by hyperbolic or quasi‐hyperbolic functional forms. The paper revives an earlier proposal in Prelec (1989) that the key property is Pratt–Arrow convexity of the log of the discount function, which corresponds to decreasing impatience(DI) at the level of preferences. DI provides a natural criterion for assessing the severity of departure from stationarity in that greater DI is equivalent to more choices of dominated options in two‐stage decision problems, as well as greater convexity of the log of the discount function. Inefficient choices may arise as intentional precommitments, or as unintended reversals of preference by “naïve” agents.     

我国生态税费问题分析及对策

目前我国尚未建立以保护生态环境为目的的税收体系,存在着诸如保护生态环境的主体税种缺位、现行制度立法层次低、设计税种时环保因素考虑不够、优惠形式单一等问题。建议开征专门的环保税,改革相关税种,构建以环保税为核心,以相关生态税种和生态税收优惠措施为辅助的生态税收新体系。     

Option Pricing Bounds and the Elasticity of the Pricing Kernel

In this paper we use power functions as pricing kernels to derive option-pricing bounds. We derive option pricing bounds given the bounds of the elasticity of the true pricing kernel. The bounds of the elasticity of the true pricing kernel are closely related to the bounds of the representative investor's coefficient of relative risk aversion. This methodology produces a tighter upper call option bound than traditional approaches. As a special case we show how to use the Black–Scholes formula to obtain option pricing bounds under the assumption of lognormality.     

品牌原产地效应及其市场策略建议--基于欧、美、日、中四地品牌形象调查分析

品牌原产地是国际市场营销领域重要研究议题。在欧、美、日等地区广泛实证和推广 ,但迄今仍缺少对中国市场品牌原产地评价及其对品牌信念及购买的效应的系统研究。本文在文献回顾基础上 ,建立了品牌原产地效应的理论模型 ,提出理论关系假设 ,抽取京、沪、穗、渝四市共 10 0 5个成人消费者样本 ,运用相关分析、T检验等方法进行实证研究。研究测量出中国市场对欧、美、日、中四地的原产地评价 ,发现国产品牌形象评分总体上为负面 ,并低于美日品牌 ,但在某些产品类别已显示出相对优势。研究结论证实了品牌原产地对消费者品牌信念和品牌购买意向的显著性作用。本文讨论上述研究结论对中外企业市场营销策略的借鉴 ,并提出进一步研究的方向。     

Investigating the decision criteria used in electronic components procurement

Previous research has reported that the decision criteria used to evaluate suppliers differs by product category. Rather than investigating the “key buying criteria” across the entire gamut of products and services, this research takes a novel approach by investigating the evaluation criteria used in the procurement of component parts. The survey results suggest that the content and structure of the decision criteria used by business customers to assess their suppliers does not differ across an array of electronic components. The business implication is that business customers that formally track the performance of their suppliers along the critical evaluation criteria will be in a better position to gain a competitive advantage by effectively managing the inbound supply chain.     

促进慈善捐赠的企业所得税政策探析

本文基于企业慈善捐赠动机以及慈善捐赠企业所得税收优惠激励机理分析,针对企业所得税制度影响我国企业慈善捐赠规模和倾向的问题,提出扩大享受税前扣除的捐赠范围、适当扩展结转年度限制、试行差异扣除比例、扩大享受税前扣除资格的慈善组织范围等促进我国企业慈善捐赠的所得税税收优惠政策。     

农民收入多元化与农地产权偏好:约束与动态选择——理论框架与来自赣、苏、桂三省578份农户问卷调查的经验

基于多重约束条件下农民经济行为不确定性和动态选择性的特征,构建了当前中国农民收入多元化与农地产权偏好的理论框架;应用赣、苏、桂三省578份农户问卷调查资料,采用multinomial模型初步检验农民农地产权偏好与收入多元化的相关性.最后提出有关政策建议.     

积极财政政策与高新技术产业发展

有效的财税政策是高新技术产业发展的重要动力。我国扶持高新技术发展的财税政策在广度、深度上尚显不足。应在准确界定高新技术产业内涵的基础上 ,进一步强化税收优惠政策 ,加大财政的支持力度。     

信息不对称下公司流动性偏好的理论与经验

通过研究信息不对称条件下公司资产流动性的偏好问题，用一个简化的“privately-known-prospects”模型，得出信息不对称强度越大，公司越倾向以现金形式持有资产的结论．从而可通过附带保证（collateral pledging）的信号行为实现公司财富最大化。