Local and Personal Networks in Employment and the Development of Labor Markets: Evidence from the Cut Flower Industry in Ethiopia

We examine the roles of local and personal networks in the employment process and the emergence and development of the labor market in Ethiopia’s growing cut flower industry. Using primary survey data of 320 workers randomly sampled from all 64 farms, we find that workers who were recruited informally using the social ties were paid less than the formally-recruited workers at hiring. However, these workers quickly increased their productivity, and the effect of social ties on wages disappeared over time. Further, we find that the development of labor market for this newly-emerged industry took place particularly within the industrial cluster.     

Distance optimization approach to ratio-form efficiency measures in data envelopment analysis

This paper examines the development pattern of the DEA (Data Envelopment Analysis) research field using Social Network Analysis. Nine stylized facts are verified: it is shown that the distribution of research performance is highly skewed, satisfying a power law, and that collaborative research activity is concentrated achieving higher performance. Moreover, economics and OR (operations research)/MS (management science) groups developed without collaboration until the 1980s; however, the merger of the two groups began in 1994 with the collaboration of frontier researchers. Now the two groups have merged significantly, but they are still identifiable. Finally, research hubs and the emergence of new groups are examined. Nine stylized facts show that DEA has developed with unique attributes. Although it shares common characteristics with other academic fields, including a highly skewed distribution of publications and expansion of the network over time, the DEA field has had a pattern of development that is different from those of other academic fields. Independent development and interrelated evolution between economics and OR/MS contributed to the exchange of knowledge of these two separate fields.     

Who are the members of the international club?

This article proposes pragmatic methods that incorporate recent contributions to public good theory to identify the members of the international club and how they select new members. This article also suggests simple applications to the recent problems in international clubs such as the euro and NATO.     

Contagion of Self‐Interested Behavior: Evidence from Group Dictator Game Experiments

We examine how group decision‐making affects other‐regarding behavior in experimental dictator games. In particular, we assess whether the effects of iterated games differ for group and individual decision‐making and whether the difference in decision‐making style (individual or group) changes the perception of social identity. We make two findings on group decision‐making. First, group decisions become more selfish when repeating the game after changing group members. Second, a dictator group donates more to a recipient group at the same university than to a recipient group at a different university. These findings are not true for individual decision‐making.     

Identification and counterfactuals in dynamic models of market entry and exit

This paper addresses a fundamental identification problem in the structural estimation of dynamic oligopoly models of market entry and exit. Using the standard datasets in existing empirical applications, three components of a firm’s profit function are not separately identified: the fixed cost of an incumbent firm, the entry cost of a new entrant, and the scrap value of an exiting firm. We study the implications of this result on the power of this class of models to identify the effects of different comparative static exercises and counterfactual public policies. First, we derive a closed-form relationship between the three unknown structural functions and the two functions that are identified from the data. We use this relationship to provide the correct interpretation of the estimated objects that are obtained under the ‘normalization assumptions’ considered in most applications. Second, we characterize a class of counterfactual experiments that are identified using the estimated model, despite the non-separate identification of the three primitives. Third, we show that there is a general class of counterfactual experiments of economic relevance that are not identified. We present a numerical example that illustrates how ignoring the non-identification of these counterfactuals (i.e., making a ‘normalization assumption’ on some of the three primitives) generates sizable biases that can modify even the sign of the estimated effects. Finally, we discuss possible solutions to address these identification problems.     

Willingness to pay for managerial training: A case from the knitwear industry in Northern Vietnam

Managerial capital has received attention in recent years as one of the major determinants for enterprise productivity, growth, and longevity. While recent empirical studies make it clear that training intervention can improve the management level, it remains unclear why the managers had not made efforts to obtain these basic knowledge. To test the hypothesis that the reason lies in low valuation for obtaining knowledge, we conduct experimental training programs for the managers of SMEs in a knitwear cluster in rural town in Vietnam. We find that the demand for these training was indeed low prior to training, but increased greatly with own learning experience, and that those with a higher prior demand tended to benefit more from the training.     

Potential cost savings of frequent flyer miles for business travel

The mileage redemption strategy is a procedure used by many business firms to reduce air travel costs, in which the frequent flyer miles of traveling employees accumulated during business trips are applied to their future business trips to obtain “free” air tickets. This paper presents a framework that investigates how the frequent flyer miles can be used in the most effective way to reduce air travel costs by those firms that are either using the mileage redemption strategy or considering the use of the strategy. The framework can be implemented quite easily by a spreadsheet software such as Microsoft Excel.     

An Agent that Facilitates Crowd Discussion

Group Decision and Negotiation - Online discussion platforms are perceived as the next-generation method of citizen involvement. Such platforms can collect, integrate, and synthesize opinions to...