Attracting the Rival’s Customers in a Model with Switching Costs

We consider the option of a firm’s honouring the rival’s coupons in a duopoly model in which products are differentiated by both characteristics and a switching cost. A firm may honour its rival’s coupons to increase its market share only if its previous market share is less than one‐half but not too low and, as a result, the market share is increased but only up to one‐half. JEL Classification Number: D13.     

Sentimental fools: a critique of Amartya Sen’s notion of commitment

Commitment is problematic because one sometimes pursues it against one’s interest. To solve it, the paper proposes a distinction between ‘non-binding’ and ‘binding’ commitments. Non-binding commitment is about ambition, such as becoming a great chef, which bolsters welfare in the pecuniary sense as well as self-respect. In contrast, ‘binding commitment’ is about honesty. While it diminishes welfare, it augments self-integrity. The neoclassical view reduces both commitments to interest, while the multiple-self approach separates both commitments from interest. The separation permits the confusion of sentimental fools, who enter commitments without regard to interest, with rational sentimentalists, who take interest into consideration.     

论对外贸易在中国经济增长中的地位和作用

建国特别是改革开放以来，中国对外贸易发展取得了巨大成就。通过对中国对外贸易发展与国民经济增长的相关性进行分析，证明对外贸易极大地促进了我国经济增长。对外贸易是经济增长的发动机，在我国经济增长中具有重要的地位和作用，我们应加强对外贸易的发展。     

经济增长过程中工资分配的变动——基于中国经济数据的实证分析

工资分配是居民共享经济增长成果的具体体现.工资分配的变动与技术进步使用偏向有关,本文认为,技术进步偏向利用资本、节约劳动时,工资分配比重呈下降趋势;技术进步偏向利用劳动、节约资本时,工资分配的比重呈上升趋势.并通过实证分析指出,我国工资分配比重下降是技术进步偏向于使用资本、节约劳动造成的,进而揭示提高居民工资分配比重,必须推动我国技术进步的使用偏向由利用资本、节约劳动向使用劳动、节约资本的方向转变.     

Rational dictators and the killing of innocents: Data from Stalin’s archives

We posit a rational choice model of dictatorship to explain the tendency of dictators to repress innocent citizens. This model demonstrates that, when the quality of information about regime enemies is low, a rational dictator will knowingly kill and imprison citizens who are not real enemies. We use the formerly secret Stalin archives to test this proposition against the stylized facts of Stalin’s three major repressions.     

产业升级中的本土市场规模效应

在产业升级过程中,本土市场的互动效应、市场规模的诱致效应与本土规模市场的终端需求效应能对其产生重要影响。这种影响集中体现为互动效应能够引导产业升级的需求发现,需求发现通过市场规模的相互催化为产业升级提供运营支持,终端需求效应通过参与式合作有助于发展产业升级所需的技术能力。我国市场规模巨大,产业升级应充分利用本土市场规模效应。这就需要建立正确的市场激励机制、加快本土市场发展,鼓励本土企业根植于国内经济的创新,推动本土企业与外来资本联合研发等。     

Effect of Corporate Economic Performance on Firm-Level Environmental Performance in a Transition Economy

This paper analyzes the effect of corporate economic performance, as measured by value added, on firm-level environmental performance in a transition economy. In particular, it analyzes this economic performance effect using an unbalanced panel of Czech firms for the years 1995–1998. It assesses whether successful economic performance begets or undermines good environmental performance. This connection seems especially important in transition economies since firms are dramatically restructuring their economic management approaches during transitional periods. A majority of the analytical results indicate that successful economic performance undermines good environmental performance, possibly indicating that more focused managerial efforts to improve economic outcomes may distract efforts to manage environmental matters better.     

经济全球化对发展中国家经济发展的影响与对策

随着经济全球化的发展,经济全球化自身存在的诸多不足与局限也日益显现.这些不足和局限对发展中国家的经济发展也带来了多方面的消极影响.对此,发展中国家需要在国内和国际两个层面建立起有效的发展机制,才能实现自己的经济发展目标.     

What’s Causing Overreaction? An Experimental Investigation of Recency and the Hot‐hand Effect

A substantial body of empirical literature provides evidence of overreaction in markets. Past losers outperform past winners in stock markets as well as in sports markets. Two hypotheses are consistent with this observation. The recency hypothesis states that traders overweight recent information; they are too optimistic about winners and too pessimistic about losers. According to the hot‐hand hypothesis, traders try to discover trends in the past record of a firm or a team, and thereby overestimate the autocorrelation in the series. An experimental design allows us to distinguish between these hypotheses. The evidence is consistent with the hot‐hand hypothesis.     

On Okun’s law in OECD countries: An analysis by age cohorts

This study investigates Okun’s law in OECD countries by examining estimates for male and female age cohorts for the period 1998–2012. We find that the estimated Okun coefficients are not always statistically significant for each subgroup of the population. Our results also highlight a general common pattern of higher Okun coefficients for the youngest cohorts. This suggests that the young population, and particularly the young male population, tends to be most exposed to the business cycle in both developed and emerging OECD countries.     

低碳经济背景下企业实施绿色化生产的经济绩效研究

绿色化生产是发展低碳经济的基本要求,绿色化发展更是大势所趋.但是,目前国内有许多企业对企业绿色化发展还停留在改善企业形象、树立企业道德观、是做广告的另一种方式等低层次的认识上,有的甚至认为企业经济效益与绿色化发展是对立的.在这样的背景下,文章以企业实施绿色化生产经营行为的收益成本结构为研究的切入点,解释企业实施绿色化生产的绩效来源,从而澄清企业实施绿色化生产的思想误区,确立了企业实施绿色化生产的成本收益结构,为企业实施绿色化生产的决策提供理论支持和方法指导.     

从地方政府经济行为角度谈绩效评价机制设计

相对于中央政府，地方政府的从属地位决定了其经济行为取向受制于中央的政策期望和评价激励机制。不同时期的中央政策期望和评价机制决定了地方政府经济行为的不同特征。当前中央政府对地方政府评价制度的不完善，导致了宏观经济政策微观力量的缺失和负面外部效应的不断累积，建设完善的绩效评价机制是当务之急。     

On the Economic Meaning of Machina's Fréchet Differentiability Assumption

This note shows that M. J. Machina's (1982, Econometrica50, 277-323) assumption that preferences over lotteries are smooth has some economic implications. We show that Fréchet differentiability implies that preferences represent second order risk aversion (as well as conditional second order risk aversion). This implies, among other things, that decision makers buy full insurance only at the absence of marginal loading. We also show that with constant absolute and relative risk aversion, expected value maximization, second order risk aversion, and Fréchet differentiability are equivalent. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Number: D81.     

The effect of a magazine’s free digital content on its print circulation: Cannibalization or complementarity?

We examine how offering digital content affects demand for print magazines. Using a searchable website archive, we measure the digital content offered by a sample of US consumer magazines from 1996 to 2001. We find strong evidence that digital content cannibalizes print sales. On average, a magazine’s print circulation declines about 3–4% when it offers a website. However, the effect varies with the type of digital content offered. Offering digital access to the entire contents of the current print magazine reduces print sales by about 9%. We find no evidence that digital content complements print magazines. These results are robust to including controls for unobserved magazine, category, and time effects, as well as controls for the impact of contemporaneous price changes and other factors.     

从上市公司绩效看中国经济增长的可持续性

本文对近年来中国经济增长速度肛主其与企业微观绩效之间的关系进行了理论和实证性的分析。研究结果表明,首先,我国近年来的经济增长数据基本可靠,Rawski(2001)等人对中国经济增长速度的质疑大部分都是站不住脚的;第二,我国宏观和微观经济之间并不存在本质性的背离,所谓“悖论”之说缘于错误地将经济规模指标与孕利指标相比较,错误地将净资产收益率等孕利指标等同于企业经营绩效,无视资本成本的变化,研究表明,我国经济增长的基本特征是：规模快速增长,企业孕利水平下降,企业绩效（资本孕利和资本成本之差）提高,我国企业在孕利能力下降的情况下还能维持持续的增长,主要得益于资本成本的下降,最后,中国经济的增长能否继续如现状持续下去,很大程度上取决于资本成本能否继续下降。     

The impact of China’s WTO accession on trade and economic relations across the Taiwan Strait

This paper evaluates the impact of China’s World Trade Organisation (WTO) accession on trade and economic relations across the Taiwan Strait and its implications for the rest of the world by a recursive dynamic, 17‐region, 25‐sector computable general equilibrium (CGE) model according to actual market access commitments that China and Taiwan have made to date. The simulation results show that both China and Taiwan will substantially benefit from their WTO memberships, and their economic interdependence and their dependence within the rest of the world will further deepen. The rest of the world may also benefit because of the expansion of world trade and improvement of their international terms of trade, but some developing countries with an endowment structure similar to China, like those in South America and Southeast Asia, may experience keener competition in labour‐intensive exports and lower prices for their products. JEL classification: F1, F02, C68, P52.     

论河南经济可持续发展的政策保障系统

在建立社会主义市场经济过程中,结合河南省情,构建可持续发展的保障系统即科学的社会经济政策,不仅必要而且紧迫,前提是探寻可持续发展纳入社会经济政策的对策,关键在构建河南可持续发展的政策架构。     

The Economic Performance of the States and Territories of Australia: 1861–1992

This paper examines the economic performance of the States and Territories of Australia from 1861 to 1992. Original estimates of real per capita output for each State are constructed and used to determine whether, for selected periods, the material standards of living of the States converged. Whilst the data suggest that this was the case for the selected subperiods up to the mid 1970s, it appears that from this period the per capita income gap between the richest and poorest States probably widened. The most important factor driving this phenomenon is the ability of States to successfully adapt to national and international sectoral changes.