Urban Geographies of Hesitant Transition: Tracing Socioeconomic Segregation in Post‐Ceauşescu Bucharest

Scholars have raised concerns about the social costs of the transition from state socialism to capitalism in Central and Eastern Europe, and geographers are particularly interested in the spatial expressions and implications of these costs, including apparently increasing residential segregation. Applying a range of segregation measures to 1992 and 2002 census data, this contribution studies socio‐occupational residential segregation in Bucharest. The conclusion is that Bucharest was relatively socio‐spatially mixed at both times; in fact, a modest, yet fully legible, decreasing overall trend is observable. This is at odds with many popular assumptions of the past 20 years.     

The tortoise and the hare: the impact of employment instability on firm performance

The main objective of this study is to assess the influence of employment instability on firm performance in a sample of publicly traded firms. Competing theoretical arguments are considered with regard to likely outcomes associated with employment instability. A large sample of cross‐sectional time‐series data is then analysed using generalised estimating equations (GEE) regression techniques. Results indicate that employment instability is negatively associated with firm performance, although the relationship is also demonstrated to be quadratic (an inverse U‐shaped relationship). This suggests that the main relationship varies depending upon the level of employment instability. Industry characteristics are also examined as moderators of this main effect. The results suggest a disordinal interaction effect for industry differentiation, where employment instability is negatively associated with firm performance for firms in highly differentiated industries and positively associated in less differentiated industries.     

干旱区绿洲全要素农业水资源利用效率时空分异研究——以新疆为例

选取2004—2014年新疆14个地州市际面板数据,基于投入导向的超效率DEA模型,依托共同前沿理论方法,采用全要素水资源效率测度思路,对新疆地州市以及分区域农业水资源利用效率进行测度,并对其开展时空分异研究。研究结果表明,新疆地州市农业水资源利用效率呈现不断增长趋势,三大区域农业水资源利用效率呈现出北疆、东疆及南疆依次递减规律;南疆主要地区、乌鲁木齐市与阿勒泰地区农业用水处于无效率状态,伊犁州直属县(市)、博尔塔拉自治州农业用水处于低效率状态,克拉玛依市、昌吉回族自治州、塔城地区、巴音郭勒自治州、和田地区、吐鲁番地区等农业用水处于高效率状态。     

Competitive strategies,innovation, and firm performance: an empirical study in a developing economy environment

This paper studies the relationships between competitive strategies, innovation, and firm performance within the context of Turkish manufacturing companies. The data were collected from top management of the firms via Computer Assistant Telephone Interviewing method. One hundred and forty manufacturing firms operating in various sectors including textile, automotive supply, computer and electronics provide the basis for this empirical research. In order to test our model, we employ structural equation modelling using partial least squares. The results show that competitive strategies such as cost-leadership and differentiation can lead to innovation, which, in turn, increase firm performance. Managers implement cost-leadership and differentiation strategies to take part in competitive market conditions; however, they should put additional importance on innovation that plays a significant role as a bridge between competitive strategies and firm performance.     

关于研究所职业卫生管理工作的探讨——建立标准化的职业卫生管理系统

国家对企业承担职业健康安全管理的主体责任提出了新的、更高的要求,职业病的防治成了安全管理的重要板块.本文借鉴质量体系、职业健康安全管理体系、安全标准化的管理模式,寻求建立一套完整有效、持续改进的标准化职业卫生管理系统.     

Quality in competitive fresh produce supply chains with application to farmers' markets

Fresh produce supply chains have special characteristics, notably, that the quality of the product (fruit or vegetable) deteriorates continuously over time, even under ideal conditions. In this paper, we begin with explicit formulae for fresh produce quality deterioration based on chemistry and temperature and provide a path-based framework. We then focus on farmers' markets, the popularity of which has been growing due to consumers' greater awareness of and interest in product quality and emphasis on health. Farmers' markets, as examples of direct to consumer channels and shorter supply chains, are studied in the framework of game theory in both uncapacitated and capacitated versions. A case study of apples in Massachusetts, under various scenarios, including production disruptions, provides quantitative evidence of the applicability of our supply chain network approach.     

农地城市流转前后农民福利变化研究——基于农民分化的视角

农地城市流转是土地资源要素在城市化进程中重新配置的必然过程。为探明异质化日益明显的农民群体的福利水平在此过程中是否发生了差异性变动,采用湖北省武汉市所辖6个远城区的问卷调查数据,运用模糊积分评价方法对纯农业生产者、半工半农者和经商兼农者等3种分化类型农民在农地城市流转前后的福利变动情况进行了实证研究。结果表明,农民整体福利水平在农地城市流转后略有上升;3种分化类型农民的福利水平均有所改善,但改善程度存在差异,改善幅度由大至小依次为经商兼农类农民、半工半农类农民和纯农业生产类农民;提升纯农业生产者和半工半农者这两个分化类型的福利水平是改善农民整体福利状况的关键;此外,影响这两类群体福利水平的因素集中在家庭经济状况、社会保障状况、心理感受以及环境条件4个方面。     

Marginal Economy: Growth Strategies for Post-Growth Societies

A sharp problem focus sharpens the problem. Sustainably growing bodies of literature on degrowth are not the key to post-growth scenarios because evocations of the limits of growth reinforce rather than transcend the economic principle, which is in the observation of scarcity. Therefore, I focus on alternative forms of growth rather than alternatives to growth. My form-theoretical analysis of growth dismoralizes growth and disembeds it from the economic medium in which it is preferably drawn. I suggest that the key to a post-growth society is in a regrowth of interest in growth in, so far, neglected non-economic function systems.     

An inventory reservation problem with nesting and fill rate-based performance measures

In many inventory settings companies wish to provide customer-differentiated service levels. These may, for example, be motivated by differences in the perceived customer lifetime value or by specific contractual agreements. One approach to provide differentiated service levels is to reserve some portion of the available inventory exclusively for specific customer classes. Existing approaches to inventory reservation are typically based on the assumption that a company can assign a customer specific revenue or penalty cost to any order or unit of demand filled or unfulfilled. In practice, however, it is usually extremely difficult to accurately estimate (especially long term) monetary implications of meeting or not meeting customer demand and corresponding service level requirements. The research presented in this paper addresses the problem of setting appropriate inventory reservations for different customer classes based on fill rate-based performance measures. We model a single period inventory reservation problem with two customer classes and nesting. We develop exact expressions for two conflicting performance measures: (1) the expected fill rate of high priority customers and (2) the expected loss in the system fill rate induced by inventory reservation. With these expressions a decision maker can analyze the tradeoff between the loss in overall system performance and the higher expected fill rates for prioritized customers. We provide analytical insights into the effects of nesting and the impact of relevant problem parameters on these two performance measures. The analytical insights are illustrated and highlighted through a set of numerical examples. Although we limit our analysis to a single period inventory reservation problem, we expect that our results can be utilized in a wide range of problem settings in which a decision maker has to ration a perishable resource among different classes of customers.     

Innovative restaurants in a mass-tourism city: Evidence from Antalya

This paper is about innovative restaurants in the single-asset (sun-sea-sand) mass-tourism city of Antalya, and focuses on the supply side of the restaurant market. The broader aim of the paper is to show that the mass-tourism city of Antalya is more differentiated than one might expect. The specific aim of the paper is to find out what types of restaurants are more innovative than others and in what types of tourism places in the city they are located. The empirical research is based on interviews with 54 managers and chefs, the results of which are analysed with quantitative methods of relational analysis such as correspondence- and chi-square analysis. The main result of the empirical research is that high-quality restaurants, visited by a mix of locals and tourists, and are located in a specific urban places, are most innovative.