Reserves and cash flows under stochastic retirement

Uncertain time of retirement and uncertain structure of retirement benefits are risk factors for life insurance companies. Nevertheless, classical life insurance models assume these are deterministic. In this paper, we include the risk from stochastic time of retirement and stochastic benefit structure in a classical finite-state Markov model for a life insurance contract. We include discontinuities in the distribution of the retirement time. First, we derive formulas for appropriate scaling of the benefits according to the time of retirement and discuss the link between the scaling and the guarantees provided. Stochastic retirement creates a need to rethink the construction of disability products for high ages and ways to handle this are discussed. We show how to calculate market reserves and how to use modified transition probabilities to calculate expected cash flows without significantly more complexity than in the traditional model. At last, we demonstrate the impact of stochastic retirement on market reserves and expected cash flow in numerical examples.     

The combined impact of managerial and relational capabilities on innovation in firms

In this paper, a survey of more than 1600 firms in the five largest city regions of Norway is described in order to examine how a firm's innovative capacity is affected by three types of factors: factors related to the manager, the structure of the firm and the broader geographical location. By combining perspectives from the fields of management and economic geography in a logistic regression analysis, we find that the two key drivers of firm-level innovation in Norway are the presence of open-minded managers and evidence of collaboration with international partners. Moreover, these two factors are mutually reinforcing, as firms with open-minded managers also tend to engage more with international partners and vice versa.     

An economic evaluation of market development programmes for US dairy products

‘This study measured the effectiveness of US dairy export promotion programmes on increasing foreign demand and enhancing producers’ revenues. An import demand equation based on panel data was used to test whether export promotion has a positive and significant impact on US dairy exports. The effects of various promotion scenarios on the dairy market were then simulated, and benefit–cost ratios (BCRs) for these programmes were estimated. There were three key findings. First, the combined effort of public and private dairy export promotion expenditures had a positive and statistically significant impact on demand for US dairy products in the world market. The findings indicated that export promotion stimulated total dairy exports by 4.14 billion pounds, on average, per year, which represented 55.8% of total exports. Second, US dairy export promotion has been highly profitable for the nation’s dairy farmers. The calculated BCRs, based on assumed elasticity of supply, ranged from a low of 8.54 for the most elastic assumption to a high of 30.12. Third, from an optimality standpoint, dairy farmers are underinvesting in export promotion. The marginal BCRs ranged from a low of 3.79 to a high of 15.22, which means that, at the margin, increasing export promotion expenditures would be profitable for dairy farmers.     

药品平行进口的影响及政策取向分析

专利药品平行进口对药品专利权人及消费者利益产生不同的影响。根据药品平行进口产生的原因及我国的国情,我国应坚持区别对待的适度平行进口政策。     

中国农村反贫困指标评价新体系的构造

从中国国情出发,中国农村反贫困效益应由生态效益指标、经济效益指标、社会效益指标组成。在遵循综合性、可行性和易操作性的原则下,在借鉴现行中国农村反贫困效益指标的基础上,增加生态、生活福利等指标,才能成为较完整的中国农村反贫困效益指标体系。     

灰色关联理论运用于农民收入分析的研究

灰色关联理论是灰色理论的一个重要组成部分,是对一个系统发展变化态势的定量描述和比较的方法,是灰色聚类分析和灰色决策的基础。改革开放20多年来,农民收入不断增长,农民收入构成也发生了很大的变化,但近年来农业增速放缓,农民增收乏力,成为制约国民经济稳健发展的瓶颈。本文利用灰色关联理论分析影响农民收入的主要因素,并提出增加农民收入的政策建议。     

The optimal asset allocation of the main types of pension funds: a unified framework

The existing literature deals with the optimal investment strategy of defined benefit (DB) or defined contribution (DC) pension plans. This article’s objective is to compare the optimal policies of different types of pension plans. This is done by first defining an original framework, which is based on the distinction between the nature of the guarantee—which can be internal or external—offered by or to a pension fund. This framework allows to establish links between optimization programs of DC, DB and targeted money purchase schemes. The case of an internal guarantee appears as a standard portfolio insurer’s problem. The second kind of guarantee, not analyzed in the literature yet with regard to the resulting optimal policy, is characterized by the existence of an option in the final wealth definition. Four funds are present in the internal guarantee optimal allocation: the speculative component, the preference independent guarantee- and contribution-hedge terms and the preference dependent state variable-hedge fund. The external guarantee program, solved with an original method using the principles of standard options theory, yields an optimal policy incorporating the delta of the option embodied in the final wealth definition. The conclusion is that the resulting optimal portfolio policy becomes riskier.

关系型交易对审计费用的影响——基于经营风险理论视角

关系型交易模式可能会在议价能力、关系专用性投资成本转换等方面加剧上市公司的经营风险,进而影响审计费用。已有研究主要集中于关系型交易对审计行为的影响,鲜有文献关注其中的作用机制。本文基于经营风险理论视角,选取2008~2017年沪深A股制造业上市公司的相关数据,实证分析了关系型交易对审计费用的影响,结果表明:关系型交易显著加剧了企业经营风险的集聚,进而提升审计费用,即经营风险在关系型交易对审计费用的影响中起到了中介作用。进一步研究,在区分了产权性质以及耐用品特征后,实证结果显示关系型交易与审计费用的正相关关系在非国有企业以及耐用品行业的企业中较为显著,为审计师进行合理审计定价提供了经验证据支持。     

江西能源消费结构与经济发展的灰色关联分析——基于低碳经济的视角

能源是人类赖以生存和发展的重要物质基础,能源消费与经济发展有着十分密切的关系。江西作为能源资源匮乏的省份,发展低碳经济是弥补劣势的重要手段。利用灰色关联分析方法具体分析了江西省能源消费结构与经济发展的关系。结果表明,江西省应改善以煤炭为主的能源消费结构,大力发展低碳经济,逐步优化产业结构和能源消费结构。     

香港联系汇率制度的现实启示及未来挑战

本文针对香港联系汇率制度的形成历史以及原因,总结出香港的联系汇率制度形成的偶然性申的必然性,分析香港联系汇率割度的优势和弊端,以及此项制度对于香港金融市场的重大意义。针对日新月异的国际资本市场,香港也面临着挑战,香港也必须与时俱进,加强和人民币之间的联系,进而形成合理的汇率机制。本文最后勾画了香港汇率制度未来的发展前景。