Smart Meter-Angebote: Eine empirische Untersuchung von Kundenpräferenzen

The implementation of smart meters in German households by 2032 is a major step in the transition towards an intelligent and connected energy system. Despite of federal legislation providing a structured plan for the nationwide smart meter rollout including basic product requirements, actors within the energy market have the opportunity to take an active part in shaping the market through appealing product offers and hence to create competitive advantage. This study identifies relevant features of smart meters from literature und business practice, and measures customer’s preferences for these features. Results indicate predominantly positive customer evaluations of smart meter features, amongst which the availability of consumption data, the installation price and rental charges as well as time variable tariffs contribute most to overall utility of smart meters. Finally, findings suggest targeting customers by defining strategies to address privacy concerns, to educate about saving potentials as well as to create differentiated pricing schemes.     

In the Eye of the Beholder: An Exploration of Managerial Courage

There is growing interest in the positive organizational literature in the complex interplay between the positive and negative facets of organizations, individuals, and situations. The concept of courage provides fertile ground to study this interplay, since it is generally understood to be a positive quality that is manifested in challenging situations. The empirical study presented here looks at courage in a strategic decision-making context and takes an interpretive perspective; it focuses on the cognitive structures and subjective understandings of managers and administrators involved in merger projects as a way to understand the dynamics surrounding managerial courage. Our study makes several contributions: it shows that managers consider courage to have a moral dimension, e.g., to be a positive and ethical response to a risky or difficult situation in which there is an interplay between organizational and personal interests; it identifies two kinds of managerial moral courage; it proposes a conceptual model with which to understand how evaluations of what is courageous and what is not are made; and finally, it offers four schemas developed from the data that add to our understanding of moral courage in management.     

Legislative protection from discrimination in access to employer‐provided training

This article provides an analysis of laws across all 193 United Nations countries that protect workers from discrimination in access to employer‐provided training. We assessed the overall level of protection and the characteristics most commonly protected, as well as the extent of variation across geographic regions and country income. Overall, 60% of countries were found to offer specific protections from discrimination in access to training for at least one of the seven protected characteristics, which was significantly less than the percentage of countries offering protections from discriminatory hiring or terminations. Gender was the most commonly protected characteristic, whereas sexual orientation was least commonly protected. These findings suggest that employer‐provided training is less well‐protected from discrimination when compared with other aspects of employment and that there is variation in protection across socio‐demographic characteristics and geographic regions. Additional legislation may be needed to ensure equitable access to training for all workers.     

Preliminary Evidence for the Neurophysiologic Effects of Online Coupons: Changes in Oxytocin,Stress, and Mood

Coupon use saved consumers $2.9 billion on packaged goods in 2012 with over 90 million Americans using online coupons. Besides saving money, why is coupon use so widespread? An experiment was run where participants (N = 90) shopped online and one‐half received a coupon worth $10. It was found that those who received a coupon had a 14% increase in oxytocin (OT), an 8% decrease in the stress hormone adrenocorticotropin, a 4% decrease in heart rate (HR), a 27% decrease in respiration, a 4% decrease in skin conductance levels, and a 90% increase in high‐frequency HR variability. These factors showed almost no change for those who did not receive a coupon. The findings indicate that coupons elicit physiological reactions similar to having a positive social interaction. In addition, self‐reported happiness correlated with the change in OT (r = 0.43). These findings provide new insights into why online coupon use is so pervasive.     

Strommarktdesign: Zur Ausgestaltung der Auktionsregeln an der EEX

This paper studies the design of power exchanges in liberalized electricty markets. We analyze several pricing rules for day ahead trading and show that a uniform price mechanism has quite desirable properties as compared to its alternatives. We then discuss how the particular cost structure of electricity generation can be accounted for by appropriate bid formats. We moreover analyze the effects of bid caps and price floors in electricity auctions on market performance, as well as several other aspects of electricity market design. In particular, we discuss linkage of independently operating markets for electricity, reserve energy and transmission capacities, coupling of national power exchanges, and the effects of transparency on the outcome of electricity markets.     

Ein Vergleich ausgewählter europäischer Strombörsen

We study the rules of selected european energy exchanges and compare their institutional design. In most countries (except for the UK) a uniform price mechanism is used. The rules differ, however, in the possibilities to express complementary cost components in the bids. Also the degree of international coupling of markets is very different across countries. Our comparison of the markets allows to identify attractive trading rules and yields insights on an effective electricity market design.     

Patientenschulung nicht vergessen!

Akut dekompensierte Herzinsuffizienz - Rund zwei Millionen Menschen in Deutschland leiden an einer Herzinsuffizienz. Vor allem Dekompensationen des Krankheitsbildes gef?hrden die Patienten und führen zu wiederholten Krankenhauseinweisungen. Ursache: Oft falsche Medikamenteneinnahme oder die mangelnde Umsetzung von Verhaltensrestriktionen. Pflegekr?fte müssen bei ihrer Arbeit daher verst?rkt auf Aspekte der Patientenedukation setzen.     

Sequential versus Bundle Auctions for Recurring Procurement

We compare sequential and bundle procurement auctions in a framework of successive procurement situations, where current success positively or negatively affects future market opportunities. We find that in bundle auctions procurement cost is lower and less risky than in sequential standard auctions, but still higher than in the optimal sequential auction. Only a sequential second price auction leads to the efficient outcome.     

Public Investment and Income Taxation: Redistribution vs. Productive Performance

This paper deals with government investment in a static two-type self-selection model of optimum income taxation. It is shown that the second-best investment rule is consistent with efficient production, provided that public investment has no influence on relative factor prices. Otherwise, however, redistributive income taxation implies that optimal investment expenditures exceed (or fall below) the efficient level as long as they raise (or decrease) the wage rate of the unskilled individuals relative to the wage rate of the skilled individuals.