STEINDLIAN MODELS OF GROWTH AND STAGNATION

Following an analysis of the relation between a standard Steindlian model of stagnation and Steindl’s own analysis, we modify the standard model by introducing endogenous changes in the mark‐up and a reformulation of the investment function. These extensions, which address significant weaknesses of the standard model, find support in Steindl’s writing and leave intact some of Steindl’s key results. In a further extension, we add a labour market and analyse the stabilizing influence of a Marxian reserve‐army mechanism. The implications of the extended model for the effects of increased oligopolization are largely in line with Steindl’s predictions.     

A STEINDLIAN MODEL OF CONCENTRATION,DEBT AND GROWTH

Income distribution plays a crucial role in the Kaleckian models of growth. The recent US experience has seemingly turned the Kaleckian argument on stagnationism on its head. Does it, therefore, render the Kaleckian growth framework redundant? We argue that while there is a tendency towards underconsumption, there could be other counteracting tendencies like the wealth effect of the capitalists or the possibility of debt for the workers. But such a growth process, which is primarily driven by the asset price markets, is, by its very nature, iniquitous and extremely volatile and the downturn is far more severe than the normal business cycles.     

A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO ANALYSING CONSUMER COMPLAINTS *

In conjunction with local authorities, and Citizens' Advice Bureaux, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has set up a system for recording and classifying consumer complaints. OFT aggregates statistical returns that are made quarterly to produce national figures showing the pattern of consumer complaints, classified both by type of goods or service and by trading practice. Over 400,000 consumer complaints were recorded and classified for the first full 12-month period during which the system operated, ending in September 1975. The system has two uses. First, it signals areas of difficulty for consumers which should be studied by OFT. Second, the records of individual consumer complaints held by local authorities provide a data base which can be drawn on when OFT is carrying out detailed studies.     

GROWTH,STAGNATION AND STATUS PREFERENCE

We show that an economy grows or stagnates depending on which of three objects people most esteem as tokens of status. If the main object of status preference is consumption, then a steady state with full employment is reached. If it is physical capital (which is a producible asset), then permanent growth with full employment occurs. However, if it is money (which is not a producible asset), stagnation with persistent unemployment arises.     

CONSUMER KNOWLEDGE,RIGHTS AND BEHAVIOUR OF COMMUNITY CONSUMER LEADERS

Research has indicated that the attitudes of teachers are often reflected in their students.¹ If so, then what are the attitudes that potential community consumer educators may pass on to the people in their localities? Is there a relationship between their knowledge of consumer rights and responsibilities, and their opinions and behaviours? The knowledge, opinions and behaviours concerning consumer rights and responsibilities of community consumer educators may be reflected in their effectiveness in conducting community programs. Are they knowledgeable of their consumer rights and responsibilities? Do their own reported marketplace behaviours support their attitudes, or are they different? This study was designed to seek answers to these and related questions.²     

TRADE,DEBT, AND UNEVEN DEVELOPMENT IN A NORTH-SOUTH MODEL

This paper examines a simple model of North-South trade and capital flows along structuralist lines. The South can choose its growth rate, but must finance its growth in excess of its savings by borrowing from the North. The long-run consequences of this process for the process of uneven development and for Southern debt-dependence are explored. The appropriate responses to a debt crisis are considered.     

INVESTMENT,EMPLOYMENT AND WAGES: A BARGAINING APPROACH

This paper analyzes a three stage game between a firm and its unionized workers. In the first period the firm decides the level of its capital stock. In the second period union and firm bargain over how many workers to hire and the wage rate, then production takes place. In the third stage new production occurs after union and firm have bargained over possible changes in the employment level and wage rate. The hiring of workers is associated with sunk training costs. The main result is that distortions in the use of labor due to sunk training costs induce distortions in the use of capital, even in the absence of sunk investment costs. Because of the strategic impact of investment on later stages of the game, the firm will not equate marginal revenue product and rental cost of capital. Underinvestment or overinvestment will result depending on whether the marginal revenue product of labor is an increasing or decreasing function of capital.     

CONSUMER PROTECTION,CONSUMERS AND BUSINESS

This paper is based on a speech given to an OYEZ-IBC Conference in London on 10 November 1979. It argues that U.K. consumers and business generally have benefited from recent changes in the law. The ‘backlash’ against consumer protection legislation by some elements in business is wholly misguided.     

INCOME DISTRIBUTION,CREDIT RATIONING AND HOUSEHOLDS' DEBT

In this paper, we present a model of an economy with household debt, and discuss the conditions under which financial fragility arises. Financial instability is driven by distributive effects. In addition to the income transfers associated with interest payments, the accumulation of debt feeds back with the distribution of income between labour and capital. The model also gives a central role to banks and credit rationing. Contrary to the existing literature, credit supply does not depend on the characteristics of borrowers, but on those of banks. There is a feedback channel between the health of the financial system and the quantity of credit in the economy. We show that there is a diversity of channels through which financial fragility may arise. We identify three channels: a debt–deflation effect à la Fisher, a credit‐financed consumption boom and an exhilarating debt effect.     

玻产债权能否抵消未出资到位的注册资金？

A公司与B公司作为股东共同成立了M有限责任公司，注册资金100万元。B公司应出资38万元，A公司应出资62万元。M公司成立后，B公司只出资20万元，尚有18万元资金未到位。现M公司因资不抵债申请破产。在M公司破产清算债权债务过程中，B公司称，M公司尚欠其贷款41万元，该债权与股款相抵可补足未到位的出资。[编者按]     

SOLAR ENERGY: STANDARDS AND CONSUMER PROTECTION

Solar heating systems provide an independent source of energy at the consumer's own premises. It is thus appropriate that national standards in this field should be framed with particular regard for the ‘consumer dimension’. as well as giving guidance to the industry on technical matters. The forthcoming British Standard Code of Practice on Solar Heating Systems for Domestic Hot Water provides an example of how this might be done.     

REPRODUCTION AND TEMPORARY DISEQUILIBRIUM: A CLASSICAL APPROACH

We build a bisector reproduction model with Classical features in which the capitalists aim at maximizing accumulation. At variance with gravitation models, it is assumed that they invest their profits in their own industry. Their plans are based on actual productions and expected prices. Effective prices and effective allocations of resources are determined by a market‐clearing mechanism. A law on the formation of expectations allows us to define the dynamics of disequilibria, which let appear endogenous self‐sustained fluctuations around a long‐run path. The long‐run rate of growth and the amplitude of the fluctuations depend on the initial conditions.     

PRICING AND HEDGING DOUBLE-BARRIER OPTIONS: A PROBABILISTIC APPROACH

Barrier options have become increasingly popular over the last few years. Less expensive than standard options, they may provide the appropriate hedge in a number of risk management strategies. In the case of a single-barrier option, the valuation problem is not very difficult (see Merton 1973 and Goldman, Sosin, and Gatto 1979). the situation where the option gets knocked out when the underlying instrument hits either of two well-defined boundaries is less straightforward. Kunitomo and Ikeda (1992) provide a pricing formula expressed as the sum of an infinite series whose convergence is studied through numerical procedures and suggested to be rapid. We follow a methodology which proved quite successful in the case of Asian options (see Geman and Yor 1992,1993) and which has its roots in some fundamental properties of Brownian motion. This methodology permits the derivation of a simple expression of the Laplace transform of the double-barrir price with respect to its maturity date. the inversion of the Laplace transform using techniques developed by Geman and Eydeland (1995), is then fairly easy to perform.     

INTEREST RATE,DEBT, DISTRIBUTION AND CAPITAL ACCUMULATION IN A POST‐KALECKIAN MODEL

In the present paper we extend Lavoie's (Metroeconomica, 1995, vol. 46, pp. 146–177) ‘Minsky–Steindl’ model, building our analysis on a Kaleckian distribution and growth model which has already taken into account distribution effects of interest rate variations on the short‐run equilibrium. Into this model the effects of debt and debt services are explicitly introduced and the effects of interest rate variations on the short‐ and the long‐run equilibrium are derived. It is shown that the effects of interest rate variations on the endogenously determined equilibrium values of the model not only depend on the parameter values in the saving and investment functions but also on the interest elasticity of distribution and on initial conditions with respect to the interest rate and the debt–capital ratio.     

CONSUMER INFORMATION SYSTEMS IN VIDEOTEX: DESIGN AND ACCEPTANCE

Comprehensive information about complex products with frequent product changes is delineated as an area where consumer information systems in videotex could be most promising. Four psychological principles for the design of such systems are presented and applied to construct an information system to support automobile purchases. Results from an empirical study show very favourable evaluations of this information system by videotex users. Several possible determinants of acceptance are discussed.     

THE CONSUMER MOVEMENT AND ITS DOCUMENTATION

This review of the literature of the consumer movement discusses the history of the development of resources. It also considers contemporary sources throughout the world.     

CONSUMER SATISFACTION AND LOCAL REDRESS ALTERNATIVES

Local consumer protection agencies have proliferated in the United States in the last decade. Attention is given to the need for maximizing the efficiency and effectiveness of these systems in order to better serve the consumer. The overall objective of this study is the assessment of the effectiveness of two major systems of consumer redress, the Better Business Bureau and the Small Claims Court. The study documents the nature of the formal third party consumer complaint system at the local level with empirical data from the two major consumer redress systems in a large, eastern, metropolitan area of the United States. Significant differences are found in the complaint characteristics and the redress probabilities of the two systems. Significant differences in consumer satisfaction with the two systems are discussed.     

ON HIGH-SKILL AND LOW-SKILL EQUILIBRIA: A MARKOV CHAIN APPROACH

In this paper we propose to study the dynamics of human capital accumulation by means of a Markov chain. We identify the conditions for the emergence of ergodic and nonergodic dynamics, and relate them to various characteristics of an economic system. The model may generate high-skill and low-skill equilibria as well as intermediate situations. Policy implications are also discussed.     

DEMAND THRESHOLD,ZERO EXPENDITURE AND HIERARCHICAL MODEL OF CONSUMER DEMAND

Consumer expenditure surveys often show households reporting zero consumption of some commodities. Three reasons for this are recognized in the literature: (i) infrequency of purchase, (ii) a strong brand preference for differentiated products and (iii) misreporting. However, sometimes the number of households reporting zero consumption is seen to decline with income. To capture this phenomenon, which does not fall into any of the categories mentioned above, we propose a hierarchical preference structure and identify a class of recursive utility functions representing this structure. An empirical illustration based on Indian consumer expenditure data is provided.