Transferability of computer technology across asian cultures

Though somewhat handicapped by relatively late entry into the computer age, serious attempts are now being made by several Asian countries to take a more active role in the development and export of computer technology, long dominated by the United States and West European countries. Japan, for one, embarked on all-out efforts in the early 1980s to develop the powerful fifth generation computer; it ranks second in the world in the number of computers in use, and has accumulated considerable knowledge and knowhow in the design and use of computer-based Management Information Systems (MIS).This article presents findings from a study conducted in Japan and Hong Kong on the transferability of computer technology, specifically its behavioural aspect, across Oriental cultures.     

Illustrating extraordinary shocks causing trend breaks

Structural breaks in a trending variable have been specified as changes in the drift parameter in the trend component, but extraordinary shocks causing these breaks have not been explicitly formulated. In this paper, the Hodrick–Prescott filter is extended by assuming two kinds of variance for the system noise driving the trend component: the larger one adopted in a point of time causing a trend break, and the smaller one adopted for remaining sequences. The number and location of structural breaks are determined by information criteria. In the proposed method, extraordinary shocks themselves can be illustrated. A Monte Carlo study shows the efficacy of the proposed model. Empirical results suggest that except for the UK, extraordinary shocks in quarterly time series of industrial production are detected for remaining six developed countries. Finally, it is shown that the proposed method considerably outperforms the other competing methods in correctly detecting business cycles.     

Theoretical and experimental investigations of the performance of keyword auction mechanisms

Two keyword auction mechanisms, the Generalized Second‐Price auction (GSP) and the Vickrey‐Clarke‐Groves mechanism (VCG), were compared theoretically and experimentally. The former is widely used in practice; the latter is not, but it has a dominant strategy equilibrium where all participants bid their true values. In the theoretical investigation, by applying the “locally envy‐free Nash equilibrium” to the VCG, we found that the allocations are efficient and that upper and lower bounds of the auctioneer's revenue coincide in the two mechanisms. A laboratory experiment, in which the revenues and efficiencies were similar in both mechanisms, supported this result.     

Decomposition of new venture growth into firm age,survey period and vintage effects

Firm data are accumulated on a yearly basis. In view of the linear relationship of firm age?+?foundation year?=?survey year, the fluctuations of firm data classified by age and period cannot be decomposed into age, period and cohort (foundation year) effects. Three decomposition methods are briefly reviewed and applied to Japanese data on new ventures founded since 1995. Regarding sales and employment growth, the age effect is the largest with a downward trend, and the cohort effect is negligible. Regarding labour productivity, the age effect indicates upward movements, and the cohort effect is negligible. The reason of the negligible cohort effect is discussed.     

The equilibrium relationship among money,income, prices,and interest rates: evidence from a threshold cointegration test

The long-run equilibrium relationship among money, income, prices, and interest rates in Japan is investigated by the threshold cointegration test, which allows for asymmetric adjustment, introduced by Enders and Siklos (2001 Enders, W and Siklos, PL. 2001. Cointegration and threshold adjustment. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 19: 166–76. [Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). The threshold cointegration approach provides clear evidence of the cointegration relationship characterized by asymmetric adjustment. By allowing for asymmetric adjustment, results are obtained showing the stability of the money demand function, similar to Lucas (1988 Lucas, RW Jr. 1988. Money demand in the United States: a quantitative review. Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, 29: 137–68.  [Google Scholar]), who pointed out that the money demand function is stable if unit income elasticity is imposed. In particular, the estimated results show that the adjustment process toward equilibrium is highly persistent above an appropriately estimated threshold, whereas the adjustment process toward equilibrium quickly converges below it. This finding indicates that deviations from equilibrium resulting from increases in money or decreases in income and prices are highly persistent.     

Identifying uncertainty shocks using world diffusion index

ABSTRACT

In this study, a world diffusion index is developed to measure how uncertainty shocks have diffused among 179 economies and caused contractions in the world growth cycles. This index is simply defined as the percentage share of the number of expanding countries. It identifies four uncertainty shocks: the oil crisis of 1973; the bursting of the information technology bubble in 2000; the credit crunch of 2007; and the European debt crisis of 2010. To overcome the problem of data unavailability in emerging market economies, the annual GDP values of 179 economies are transformed through temporal disaggregation, and the dating of quarterly growth cycles is implemented as per the OECD method. The empirical findings indicate that each of the uncertainty shocks caused severe contractions in the advanced economies but that the emerging market economies experienced such contractions only during the credit crunch of 2007. Policy implications are also discussed.     

Differentiating between business cycles and growth cycles: evidence from 15 developed countries

Growth cycles are often mistaken for business cycles, although these two have different statistical properties. In order to differentiate between them in a statistically satisfactory manner, the Bayesian information criterion-(BIC) based model-selection approach is presented. Business cycles are described by the cyclical trend model, and growth cycles are described by the trend-plus-cycle model. Whether the observed time series is derived from business cycles or from growth cycles is determined as a result of model selection. It is shown via data-based simulations that the proposed method works well in most situations. Empirical results obtained for 15 countries suggest that the business cycle model is selected for five countries, the growth cycle model is selected for two countries and the trend-plus-noise model is selected for eight countries.     

A cohort analysis of household vehicle expenditure in the U.S. and Japan: A possibility of generational marketing

This paper shows the usefulness of cohort analysis for generational marketing. Aggregate data classified by age and period are decomposed into age, period, and generational cohort effects. We compare two cohort-analysis models, the constrained multiple regression model and the Bayesian cohort model. The empirical results that are common to the household vehicle expenditure ratio in the U.S. and Japan are as follows: (1) among a total of three effects, the period effect is the smallest; (2) with the exception of the latest birth cohort, the cohort effect shows a clear upward trend; (3) the age effect decreases in the 20s and 30s, and next increases with a peak detected in the late 50s, and finally decreases. We provide marketing implications for cohort segmentation and forecasting.     

A Comparative Study of U.S. and Japanese Meat Consumption Using Age-Period-Cohort Decomposition

Household life cycle has been widely used as a determinant of consumer behavior and a basis for market segmentation. Repeated cross-section data on the meat share in household consumption in the United States and Japan, classified by age and period, are decomposed into age, period, and birth cohort effects. Empirical evidence suggests the following: (a) the cohort effect is the largest in the United States, whereas the age effect is the largest in Japan; (b) the U.S. age effect increases for the age group 15–34, whereas the Japanese age effect decreases for the age group 25–34; (c) the Japanese period effect reveals a clear downward trend; and (d) the U.S. cohort effect decreases for the birth cohort 1900–1949. Furthermore, implications for meat producers and sellers are provided.