Decentralization via Federal and Unitary Referenda

This paper studies a model where the power to set policy (a choice of project) may be assigned to central or regional government via either a federal or unitary referendum. The benefit of central provision is an economy of scale, while the cost is political inefficiency. The relationship between federal and unitary referenda is characterized in the asymptotic case as the number of regions becomes large, under the assumption that the median project benefit in any region is a random draw from a fixed distribution, G. Under some symmetry assumptions, the relationship depends only on the shape of G, not on how willingness to pay is distributed within regions. The relationship to Cremer and Palfrey's “principle of aggregation” is established. Asymptotic results on the efficiency of the two referenda are also proved.     

Interest Groups, Referenda, and the Political Process: On the Efficiency of Direct Democracy

We argue that the institutionalization of direct democratic elements in a constitution will tend to enhance the efficiency of an economy. In a model of direct democracy it is shown that—contrary to the political process in a representative democracy—efficient projects will always be politically accepted and the degree of inefficiency of inefficient projects will be reduced. These effects stem from a more intense competition among small interest groups and the pressure to improve the cost-benefit ratio of a project. Furthermore, contestable decision markets, that is the co-existence of direct and indirect forms of democracy, will always work in favor of higher efficiency.     

在“一带一路”背景下公共服务供给通过外资对县域经济转型的影响机制

公共服务不仅是反映人们生活水平的重要指标,还是反映一座城市的发展水平的重要指标.以县域经济发展为研究对象,对县域公共服务进行科学分析,从贸易便利和政府发展两个角度,深入探讨公共服务供给通过外资对县域经济转型的影响机制.同时,选取"一带一路"沿线的17个省、自治区及直辖市1126个县的经济数据,进行数据分析和计量检验,结果发现:在县域经济的发展转型中,直接公共服务的促进作用并不明显,但却能通过引入外商投资等方式间接产生比较明显的促进作用;此外,借助"一带一路"倡议的政策优势,提升了直接公共服务对县域经济转型中的正向效应;社会性和经营性公共服务通过外资影响县域经济转型时产生了正向溢出,导致本地聚集过多的资源,产生"虹吸效应",从而对周边县域的经济发展产生了负面影响.     

Learning Under Ambiguity

This paper considers learning when the distinction between risk and ambiguity matters. It first describes thought experiments, dynamic variants of those provided by Ellsberg, that highlight a sense in which the Bayesian learning model is extreme—it models agents who are implausibly ambitious about what they can learn in complicated environments. The paper then provides a generalization of the Bayesian model that accommodates the intuitive choices in the thought experiments. In particular, the model allows decision-makers' confidence about the environment to change—along with beliefs—as they learn. A portfolio choice application compares the effect of changes in confidence under ambiguity vs. changes in estimation risk under Bayesian learning. The former is shown to induce a trend towards more stock market participation and investment even when the latter does not.     

Consistent Planning Under Uncertain Lifetime

This paper considers the problem of intertemporal planning when changing tastes result in inconsistent plans. This problem has been considered in the literature under the assumption of a lifetime certainty. Some of the solutions proposed in the literature exhibit certain undesirable properties such as incoherence and lack of Pareto-optimality. This paper proposes a procedure for solving the intertemporal dilemma when lifetime is uncertain. The proposed solution is coherent and Pareto-optimal, and is, in fact, valid for the case of certain as well as uncertain lifetime. [020]     

Legislative Organization Under Separate Powers

Existing theories of legislative organization attribute thestrong committee system in the U.S. Congress to members' distributive,informational, or partisan needs. But legislators elsewhereshare these same motivations, yet not all have chosen to organizethemselves in a similar fashion. Therefore the strong committeesystem must derive to some extent from the larger constitutionalcontext, including plurality winner elections, bicameralism,and our focus, the system of separate powers. In particularwe argue that committees established in part to oversee executiveagencies will have preferences biased against those of the executive.Thus committees serve as contrary outliers, acting as a counterweightto executive branch policy making. We find support for thisprediction with data drawn from all standing committees fromthe 80th to 102nd Congresses. We also find that each of theseemingly incompatible theories of legislative organizationpredicts well patterns of committee composition in differentissue areas.     

Licensing Under Bertrand Competition Revisited

This note indicates that the derivation of the royalty contract for licensing in Wang and Yang (Australian Economic Papers, 39 (1999) 106–119) is not correct. As a consequence, the profits of the innovator in the case of royalty licensing are underestimated.     

Defense and Welfare Under Rivalry

Two small countries facing a constant probability of war with each other import arms for consumption goods from the rest of the world. The defense good, produced by combining arms and army, is a public good. The reaction curve depicting the optimal supply of the defense good turns out to be backward-bending. Nevertheless, at least one of the reaction curves is positively sloped at the unique Nash equilibrium. Several comparative statics results are derived. For example, if one country's reaction curve is negatively sloped, military aid to the rival leads to a decline in its optimal supply of the defense good.     

On Licensing Under Bertrand Competition

This paper considers licensing by an innovating firm to its competitor in a differentiated duopoly with Bertrand competition. A principal finding is that royalty licensing may be superior to fee licensing for the innovating firm both when the innovation is drastic and when the innovation is non-drastic.     

On Sustained Growth Under Uncertainty

We analyze a stochastic one‐sector model of economic growth and investigate the conditions under which long‐run growth occurs almost surely. In contrast to the deterministic version of the model, the utility function plays a crucial role in determining the long‐run behavior of output.     

On Price Caps Under Uncertainty

This paper shows how standard arguments supporting the imposition of price caps break down in the presence of demand uncertainty. In particular, though in the deterministic case the introduction or lowering of a price cap (above marginal cost) results in increased production, increased total welfare, decreased prices, and increased consumer welfare, we show that all of the above comparative statics predictions fail for generic uncertain demand functions. For example, for price caps sufficiently close to marginal cost, a decrease in the price cap always leads to a decrease in production and total welfare under certain mild conditions. Under stronger regularity assumptions, all of the monotone comparative statics predictions from the deterministic case also do not hold for a generic uncertain demand if we restrict attention to price caps in an arbitrary fixed interval (as long as the price caps are binding for some values in that interval).     

Bowley Duopoly Under Vertical Relations

Compared to the well‐known oligopoly models such as those of Cournot, the so‐called Bowley duopoly is less known, and almost ignored in the literature. This neglect reflects the assumption that as a leader–leader model incorporating apparent excess rivalry it is presumably untenable, at least in theory. However, it is, in fact, observable in practice. Furthermore, the predicted excess competition is not only observable empirically but also accountable theoretically. We show how excess competition emerges when an upstream monopolist offers the downstream retailers a compensated game in which each acts as a leader. The outcome is not only stable but also benefits all involved actors, including consumers under vertically‐related markets, such as those presided over by a monopolist producer. This result of emergent stability shows that the Bowley duopoly should be considered alongside other oligopoly models.     

Multidimensional Bargaining Under Asymmetric Information

A buyer with private information regarding marginal valuation bargains with a seller to determine price and quantity of trade. Depending on parameter values, a high‐valuation buyer wants either to reveal information to create value or to conceal it to capture value. In the first case, equilibrium trades are efficient. In the second case, the low‐valuation buyer purchases less than her efficient quantity, and there can be a one‐period delay in trade. The quantity distortion is the only inefficiency that persists when time between offers approaches zero. There exist equilibria that are independent of the seller's prior beliefs.     

Money and Prices Under Uncertainty

We study whether monetary economies display nominal indeterminacy: equivalently, whether monetary policy determines the path of prices under uncertainty. In a simple, stochastic, cash-in-advance economy, we find that indeterminacy arises and is characterized by the initial price level and a probability measure associated with state-contingent nominal bonds: equivalently, monetary policy determines an average, but not the distribution of inflation across realizations of uncertainty. The result does not derive from the stability of the deterministic steady state and is not affected essentially by price stickiness. Nominal indeterminacy may affect real allocations in cases we identify. Our characterization applies to stochastic monetary models in general, and it permits a unified treatment of the determinants of paths of inflation.     

On Endogenous Growth Under Uncertainty

This paper incorporates uncertainty in two distinct models of endogenous growth. In both models the representative agent is uncertain about the productivity of knowledge creation, as represented by a probability measure over the relevant parameter. The main purpose of this paper is to analyze the effects of risk or volatility in productivity of knowledge creation on the decision variables and the expected long-run growth rate. Both the first and the second models may explain part of the observed negative link between volatility and growth.     

网络环境下的关系营销

网络经济和电子商务的发展，赋予关系营销全新的内涵和特征，为关系营销的进一步发展带来前所未有的机遇。选择正确的网络关系营销策略，是一个企业成熟的表现，也是提高企业整体竞争力的关键。