利比亚危机下中国承包商的应对策略——不可抗力影响下的暂停、终止、索赔与没收保函风险防范

2011年2月,席卷阿拉伯世界的动乱在利比亚数个城市爆发,并迅速演变为政府和反政府力量之间的武装冲突。中国在利比亚至少有27个项目遭到袭击和抢劫。为此,中国政府在利比亚迅速而高效地组织了撤侨行动     

Relationships among Perceived Organizational Core Values, Corporate Social Responsibility, Ethics, and Organizational Performance Outcomes: An Empirical Study of Information Technology Professionals

This study is an extension of our recent ethics research in direct marketing (2003) and information technology (2007). In this study, we investigated the relationships among core organizational values, organizational ethics, corporate social responsibility, and organizational performance outcome. Our analysis of online survey responses from a sample of IT professionals in the United States indicated that managers from organizations with organic core values reported a higher level of social responsibility relative to managers in organizations with mechanistic values; that managers in both mechanistic and organic organizations which were perceived as more socially responsible were also perceived as more ethical; and that perceived ethical attitudes and social responsibility were significantly associated with organizational performance outcome measures. Our article discusses research premises, conceptual framework, hypotheses, research methodology, data analysis, recommendations for further research, and conclusions.     

The Incredible Shrinking Black Woman: Implications of Health Policies

Black American women are shrinking in height at a faster rate than other groups, a phenomenon that has consequences for the physical health and economic well-being of black females. Relative to the cohort born from 1955 to 1974, the most recent cohort (1970–1986) of black American women and girls have lost more than half an inch (approximately 0.56) in height. Adult height is a measure of net nutrition acquired during childhood and adolescence and is correlated with a wide variety of economic and health outcomes. Simultaneously, the body mass index (BMI) among blacks has also increased at a faster rate than whites in both the periods of 1988–1994 (1.06 kg/m2) and 1999–2002. Black women and girls, in particular, experienced the greatest increase in BMI since the 1990s. Evidence that black American women are shrinking and BMI is growing highlights the need to examine the nutritional intake of black girls during childhood and adolescence; early nutritional deficiencies have persistent impact over their life course. In this policy brief, we consider several public health policy interventions that affect black girls’ nutritional intake across the life course, particularly during childhood and adolescence.     

Market definition and product segmentation for household credit

This article integrates several basic theoretical ideas on the nature of markets and product substitutability to develop an empirical method for defining markets using price data. The method is illustrated by an example of product market definition for a specific geographic area.     

COMMENT ON "THE IRREDUCIBLE ROLE OF DERIVED MARGINAL UTILITY IN DYNAMIC STOCHASTIC PROGRAMMING"

This comment shows why the Lagrange method can be simpler than dynamic programming in solving dynamic optimization problems.     

Homeownership as a Constraint on Asset Allocation

Personal preferences and financial incentives make homeownership desirable for most families. Once a family purchases a home they find it impractical (costly) to frequently change their ownership of residential real estate. Thus, by deciding how much home to buy, a family constrains their ability to adjust their asset allocation between residential real estate and other assets. To analyze the impact of this constraint on consumption, welfare, and post-retirement wealth, we first investigate an individual’s optimal asset allocation decisions when they are subject to a “homeownership constraint.” Next, we perform a “thought experiment” where we assume the existence of a market where a homeowner can sell, without cost, a fractional interest in their home. Now the housing choice decision does not constrain the individual’s asset allocations. By comparing these two cases, we estimate the differences in post-retirement wealth and the welfare gains potentially realizable if asset allocations were not subject to a homeownership constraint. For realistic parameter values, we find that the homeowner would require a substantial increase in total net worth to achieve the same level of utility as would be achievable if the choice of a home could be separated from the asset allocation decision. The robustness of the analysis is evaluated with respect to the model’s parameters and initial state variables. We find that changes in the values of the constraint (i.e., the value of the home) and the expected real rate of home value appreciation are the only state variables or parameter that is associated with a large change in asset allocation and/or the burden imposed by the housing constraint. This finding suggests the importance of a detailed examination of the impact of inter-regional differences in home prices and expected rates of appreciation on asset allocation and post-retirement wealth.