Welfare analysis of rent control with side payments: a natural experiment in Cairo, Egypt

Anecdotal evidence suggests that bribery is a common means of obtaining rent controlled apartments. Increased tenant maintenance is a less often noted, but potentially important, phenomenon in controlled markets. Previous empirical studies of the effects of rent control have neglected these side payments, presumably for lack of data. This paper presents evidence on their size and incidence for the controlled market of Cairo, Egypt, as well as estimates of effects such side payments have on welfare gains and losses from controls.     

Buying cooperation in an asymmetric environmental differential game

We consider a two-player asymmetric differential game of pollution control. One player is non-vulnerable to pollution, or unwilling to consider damages when choosing her production policy in a non-cooperative game. We characterize the feedback-Nash equilibrium and the cooperative solution. We establish conditions under which the vulnerable player can buy the cooperation of the non-vulnerable player to control her emissions. We further use the Nash bargaining solution to allocate the total cooperative dividend between the two players and propose a time-consistent decomposition overtime of the total payoff.     

Export restraints in a model of trade with capital accumulation

This paper examines the impact of voluntary export restraints (VERs) in an international duopoly modeled as a differential game. With a Ramsey capital accumulation dynamics, the game admits multiple steady states, and a VER cannot be ‘voluntarily’ employed by the foreign firm in case of Cournot behavior in demand substitutes. Hence, the dynamic framework confirms the results of the VERs literature with static interaction in output levels. In the case of price behavior, the adoption of an export restraint may increase the profits of both firms if products are substitutes and the steady state is ‘market-driven’. However, contrary to the acquired wisdom based upon the static approach, the dynamic analysis also admits an equilibrium outcome, identified by the Ramsey golden rule, where the incentive to adopt a VER is ruled out, irrespective of whether firms are quantity- or price-setters.     

Debt stabilization games in the presence of risk premia

As a result of the recent financial crisis and the ensuing economic recession, fiscal deficits have soared in many OECD countries. As a consequence, government debt has been on the rise again after a period of stable or declining government debt. In this paper we analyze debt stabilization in a country that features endogenous risk premia, imposed by financial markets that evaluate the probability of debt default by governments. Endogenous risk premia arise by assuming, e.g., simple linear relations between risk premia and the level of debt. As a result the real interest rate on government debt can be written as a constant (measuring the risk-free real interest rate corrected for real output growth) plus an endogenous risk premium that depends on the debt level. We bring such an endogenous risk premium into Tabellini (1986) model and analyze the impact of it. This gives rise to a non-linear differential game. We solve this game for both a cooperative setting and a non-cooperative setting. The non-cooperative game is solved under an open-loop information structure. We present a bifurcation analysis w.r.t. the risk premium parameter.     

On the optimal taxation of common-pool resources

Recent research developments in common-pool resource models emphasize the importance of links with ecological systems and the presence of non-linearities, thresholds and multiple steady states. In a recent paper Kossioris et al. (2008) develop a methodology for deriving feedback Nash equilibria for non-linear differential games and apply this methodology to a common-pool resource model of a lake where pollution corresponds to benefits and at the same time affects the ecosystem services. This paper studies the structure of optimal state-dependent taxes that steer the combined economic-ecological system towards the trajectory of optimal management, and provides an algorithm for calculating such taxes.     

我国电子商务环境中的电子支付方式比较分析

文章认为在电子商务快速发展的今天,国内推出了多种类型的电子支付方式以解决电子商务长期以来的支付瓶颈问题,目前主要有银行卡在线转帐支付、第三方平台结算支付、虚拟货币支付和移动支付,这4种方式各有其优缺点,对于组织和个人适合选择什么样的方式进行支付是一个值得分析的问题。     

解读2005年中国国际收支平衡表

国际收支平衡表不仅综合记载了一国在一定时期内与世界各国的经济往来的情况和在世界经济中的地位及其消长对比情况,而且还集中反映了该国的经济类型和经济结构。2005年,中国的国际收支巨额顺差,具有鲜明特色.透过国际收支平衡表,可以发现中国国际收支的结构特征、问题所在,进而提出改进措施和政策建议。     

“唐斯定律”的对城市道路管理方式的启示——以上海为例

近年来,我国城市纷纷采用供给方管理的方式,通过增加道路来缓解民用汽车迅猛增长所导致的交通拥堵。在这样的情况下,研究城市道路管理的方式的合理性具有突出的理论与现实意义。本文通过对城市道路的提供方式与提供数量的分析,认为：基于城市道路消费的特殊性,其供给方管理导致的诱增交通在长期会使交通状况更加恶化,与“唐斯定律”相符。随后通过对上海地区的实证研究从客观交通状况的演变及城市道路使用者的主观需求变化角度分别对该结论作进一步验证。     

A note on the evaluation of information in zero-sum repeated games

Two players play a zero-sum repeated game with incomplete information. Before the game starts one player receives a private signal that depends on the realized state of nature. The rules that govern the choice of the signal are determined by the information structure of the game. Different information structures induce different values. The value-of-information function of a game associates every information structure with the value it induces. We characterize those functions that are value-of-information functions for some zero-sum repeated game with incomplete information.     

中国三大地域间供需双向溢出-反馈效应研究

研究目标：研究中国东、中、西三大地域间需求侧综合、分需求类型及部门的产出、增加值和劳动报酬溢出-反馈效应,供给侧综合及分部门的产出、消费、资本形成、出口和总需求溢出-反馈效应。研究方法：基于三大区域投入产出模型建立供需双向溢出-反馈效应指标,编制相应投入产出表进行实证分析。研究发现：各地区各类溢出和反馈效应在2002~2010年总体上升,但仍须提高。东部各类溢出乘数明显小于中部和西部。同一区域不同效应的主导部门往往差异很大。不同区域的同类需求侧主导部门通常明显不同,但同类供给侧主导部门却很相似。研究创新：测算和比较需求侧和供给侧多种区域间溢出-反馈效应。研究价值：深化同类研究并为区域协调发展提供科学决策依据。     

Factors Determining the Development of Non-cash Payments in Rural Areas in Poland

This article aims at characterization and assessment of the financial behaviors of rural dwellers on non-cash payment markets and identification of factors determining the intensity of using individual methods of payment by the inhabitants of rural areas. The main source of data used for analysis and inference was information originating from the authors＇ own investigations conducted in 2013 on a group of 500 rural households and on a group of 150 trade and service points operating in non-urbanized areas. This work made use of statistical summary measures and Z2 independence test. According to the results of the conducted studies, forms of payment used by rural dwellers depend on many variables, of demographic, economic, and psychological character. Cash payments are more frequently used by persons possessing vocational or secondary education, elderly people, old-age pensioners, annuitants, or households with lower incomes. Also, persons who do not trust financial institutions or do not perceive benefits resulting from the use of non-cash instruments prefer cash. It is a group of households which require urgent educational activities in the area of non-cash payment instruments. A significant barrier to using non-cash payment instruments by rural dwellers was a limited access to non-cash channels. It is connected in the first place with a poorer development of financial infrastructure in rural areas （banks or cash points）, insufficient Internet access conditioning a possibility to use electronic banking points, and also a worse development of credit card acceptance network. As has been demonstrated by the results of conducted studies, the main reason for a lack of point of sale （POS） terminals in retail and service-providing points operating in rural areas, in the opinion of their owners, is the very high interchange fee （50% indications）, which under Polish conditions is one of the highest in the European Union （EU）.