Risk Preferences and Gender Differences in Union Membership in Late Nineteenth-Century Swedish Manufacturing

Women are generally seen as less inclined to join trade unions. This study matches firm–worker data from the Swedish cigar and printing industries around 1900 and examines information on men and women holding the same jobs; such data are rare but important for understanding gender gaps. The results explain the gender gap in union membership among compositors, but not among cigar workers. Differences in union membership varied considerably across firms, with the largest differences found in low-union-density cigar firms where indirect costs (that is, uncertainty and risk) accrued in particular to women workers. The lack of gender differences in mutual aid membership indicates that women were not hard to organize but avoided organizations associated with greater risk for employer retaliation and uncertain returns according to a cost–benefit analysis.     

Developing a financial conditions index for a post-transition country: the case of Croatia

The interconnection between financial and business cycles and the importance of surveillance over financial markets emphasise the need for the development of indicators that could trace financial conditions in a country. In this paper, we focus on developing a financial conditions index for a post-transition country – Croatia. Since financial conditions indices for post-transition markets differ from those for developed markets due to differences in the development of their financial systems and the availability of data, we show that financial conditions indices constructed for post-transition markets need to be tailored to the specifics of such markets.     

The time‐varying performance of UK analyst recommendation revisions: Do market conditions matter?

This study examines the time‐varying performance of investment strategies following analyst recommendation revisions in the UK stock market, with specific emphasis on the impact of changing market conditions. We find a negative relationship between the recommendation performance and market conditions as measured in terms of past market return and market volatility. In particular, the upgrade (downgrade) portfolio generates significantly positive (negative) net abnormal returns in bad market conditions (e.g., the dot‐com bubble burst in 2000 and the credit crisis in 2007), but not in other periods of time. Moreover, our non‐temporal threshold regression analysis shows that the reported negative relationship disappears when market conditions become better, i.e., when the past market return (market volatility) is higher (lower) than a certain level, indicating the importance of taking non‐linearity into account in the long sample period as examined in this study. Our time‐series bootstrap simulations further confirm that the superior recommendation performance in bad market conditions is not due to random chance; analysts have certain skills in making valuable up/downward revisions in bad markets.     

The reverse tragedy of the commons: an exploratory account of incentives for under-exploitation in an open innovation environment*

This paper presents an empirical account of a phenomenon that we refer to as the ‘reverse tragedy of the commons’ in open innovation. The name signifies the ‘under-exploitation’ of intellectual property (IP) under weak appropriability. The name is this graphic because the tragedy is costly, and can also render IP effectively worthless and block innovation in the short to medium term. We propose that the tragedy is borne out of the interaction between enterprise characteristics, a competitive setting and the framework that is set by the policy intervention. This finding is pertinent to policy-makers with regard to the design of research, development and innovation instruments, as well as managers who must determine how to implement open practices in innovation.     

节事价值共创的非对称性及影响因素——基于观众和演职人员主体

主体间的价值共创是节事活动创新与发展的重要推力,既有研究指出价值共创机制受参与主体和多种因素的共同影响,但是各因素聚类特征、充要条件及共创路径稳健性之间的影响机理尚存争议。文章基于观众和演职人员价值共创的主体间性,调研了720份有效样本,基于三因素理论和结构模型定量研究节事价值共创参与度、原真性和地方依恋因素的非对称性及影响机理,得到如下结论:(1)因素聚类的非对称性是导致主体内行为策略非对称性的主因;(2)因素聚类的非对称性又是导致价值共创充要条件非对称性的主因;(3)主体间价值共创的充要条件影响共创路径的稳健性;(4)应重视研究价值共创机制中因素聚类、充要条件及共创路径稳健性之间的理论关系。     

Ronald Jones's duality analysis as a foundation for applied general‐equilibrium modeling

Ronald Jones made seminal contributions to general‐equilibrium theory, moving away from an emphasis on the existence of equilibrium to algebraic formulations which enabled us to characterize key relationships between parameters and variables, such as that between tariffs and domestic factor prices and welfare. But the analysis remained limited in value for policy evaluation: the analysis was local, it provided only qualitative results, it was limited to very small models, and strictly interior solutions had to be assumed. The contribution of this paper is largely pedagogic and methodological. I show how the tools and approach pioneered by Jones can be generalized via the use of duality, complementarity and the Karush–Kuhn–Tucker theorem into a global, quantitative analysis of large changes in high‐dimensional models which also allows for regime changes and corner solutions. I then show how the resulting nonlinear complementarity problem directly translates into a numerical model using the General Algebraic Modeling System (GAMS).     

Land rental in a multi-ethnic society: Insights from Southwest China

This study presents detailed evidence on the characteristics, processes, and consequences of land rental practices in a multi-ethnic rural society in Yunnan Province, Southwest China, which have rarely been explored. It contributes to the existing literature on land rental and control by considering the dimension of ethnicity. The findings show the following: Interethnic land rental is a very common and noteworthy feature in the selected Han-Jingpo multi-ethnic rural society. Han ethnic households rented and accumulated a large proportion of farmland and forestland from neighbouring Jingpo ethnic households. This was done to expand cash crops and timber forest, as opposed to the activities of Jingpo ethnic households. Interethnic land rental was mainly triggered by different development capabilities and attitudes towards agricultural commercialization supported by differences in resource assets due to ethnic living patterns and other dynamic socio-political reasons. Consequently, Jingpo ethnic households are experiencing an increasing income gap due largely to declines in farmland and forestland, while possibilities for positive interethnic interactions were found. These findings are relevant for rethinking land rental policies in China and also provide useful insights for rural sustainability in any multi-ethnic area where interethnic interactions of land or other resources coexist.     

General existence of competitive equilibrium in the growth model with an endogenous labor–leisure choice

We prove the existence of competitive equilibrium in the canonical optimal growth model with elastic labor supply under general conditions. In this model, strong conditions to rule out corner solutions are often not well justified. We show using a separation argument that there exist Lagrange multipliers that can be viewed as a system of competitive prices. Neither Inada conditions, nor strict concavity, nor homogeneity, nor differentiability are required for existence of a competitive equilibrium. Thus, we cover important specifications used in the macroeconomics literature for which existence of a competitive equilibrium is not well understood. We give examples to illustrate the violation of the conditions used in earlier existence results but where a competitive equilibrium can be shown to exist following the approach in this paper.     

Internal habits formation and optimality

In a very influential model with internal habits, Carroll et al., (2017, 2000), establish that an increase in economic growth may cause a positive change in savings. The optimality of this result, and of many other contributions using a similar framework, has been questioned by some authors who have observed that the parametrization used in these models always implies a utility function not jointly concave in consumption and habits. In this paper, we revisit the optimality issue and, using advanced techniques in Dynamic Programming, we answer the following long-standing open questions: (i) Is the solution found in Carroll et al., (2017, 2000) optimal? (ii) Is it also unique or do other optimal solutions exist?     

Collateral requirements of SMEs: The evidence from less-developed countries

This paper aims to investigate the determinants of collateral requirements for loans that are extended to small and medium-sized enterprises in less-developed countries. Our primary data source consists of the results from firms in Eastern Europe and Central Asia from the Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey, which is compiled by the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. The results show that borrower-specific variables are more important than country-specific variables in determining collateral requirements on loan contracts. The strongest evidence in our paper emphasises the importance of borrower risk and loan cost in collateral determinants.