Weak Independence and Social Semi‐Orders

This paper provides variants of Arrow's impossibility theorem, which states that there exists no non‐dictatorial aggregation rule satisfying weak Pareto, independence of irrelevant alternatives and collective rationality. In this paper, independence of irrelevant alternatives and collective rationality are simultaneously relaxed. Weak independence is imposed instead of independence of irrelevant alternatives. Social preferences are assumed to satisfy the semi‐order properties of semi‐transitivity and the interval‐order property. We prove that there exists a vetoer when the number of alternatives is greater than or equal to six.     

FROM RATIONALITY TO BOUNDED RATIONALITY*

We investigate the role of bounded rationality in asset pricing and information efficiency. We show that the market stays between the weak‐form efficiency and the semi‐strong‐form efficiency in a market with a single asymmetric information and without noise supply. We show the existence of an overall equilibrium in which the publicly available information can be priced and is ‘almost free’, and the majority of the agents choose to stay uninformed. We show the existence of a Nash competitive equilibrium in an information game.     

The informational effects of competition and collusion in legislative politics

We use a mechanism design approach to study the organization of interest groups in an informational model of lobbying. Interest groups influence the legislature only by communicating private information on their preferences and not by means of monetary transfers. Interest groups have private information on their ideal points in a one-dimensional policy space and may either compete or adopt more collusive behaviors. Optimal policies result from a trade-off between imposing rules which are non-responsive to the groups' preferences and flexibility that pleases groups better. Within a strong coalition, interest groups credibly share information which facilitates communication of their joint interests, helps screening by the legislature and induces flexible policies responsive to the groups' joint interests (an informativeness effect). Competing interest groups better transmit information on their individual preferences (a screening effect). The socially and privately optimal organization of lobbying favors competition between groups only when their preferences are not too congruent with those of the legislature. With more congruence, a strong coalition is preferred. Finally, within a weak coalition, interest groups must design incentive compatible collusive mechanisms to share information. Such weak coalitions are always inefficient.     

The Relationship between Australian Mutual Fund Fees and Risk‐Adjusted Performance in Differing Economic Conditions

We find that Australian mutual fund investors should avoid high fee funds as these funds generate relatively low after‐fee risk‐adjusted returns both unconditionally and in weak economic conditions. This result is different from some of the previous findings which showed that US mutual funds with relatively high expense ratios may generate relatively higher risk‐adjusted returns during recessions relative to non‐recessions, although their unconditional alphas may be negative. We find some support for the Glode hypothesis in surviving Australian wholesale funds. High‐fee surviving Australian wholesale funds perform relatively strongly in both weak economic conditions and unconditionally. High‐fee funds in other types of Australian mutual funds generally do not perform strongly either in weak economic conditions or unconditionally. Amongst low‐fee funds, we commonly find that those that perform well unconditionally and well in weak economic conditions do charge more than those that perform well unconditionally and poorly in weak economic conditions. Amongst low‐fee funds, it is often true that those that perform poorly unconditionally but well in weak economic conditions can charge more than those that perform poorly unconditionally and poorly in weak economic conditions.     

The Pro‐Poorness,Growth and Inequality Nexus: Some Findings From a Simulation Study

An income growth pattern is pro‐poor if it reduces a (chosen) measure of poverty by more than if all incomes were growing equiproportionately. Inequality reduction is not sufficient for pro‐poorness. In this paper, we explore the nexus between pro‐poorness, growth, and inequality in some detail using simulations involving the displaced lognormal, Singh–Maddala, and Dagum distributions. For empirically relevant parameter estimates, distributional change preserving the functional form of each of these three‐parameter distributions is often either pro‐poor and inequality reducing, or pro‐rich and inequality exacerbating, but it is also possible for pro‐rich growth to be inequality reducing. There is some capacity for each of these distributions to show trickle effects (weak pro‐richness) along with inequality‐reducing growth, but virtually no possibility of pro‐poorness for growth which increases overall inequality. Implications are considered.     

Asymmetric auctions with resale: An experimental study

We study auctions with resale based on Hafalir and Krishna's (2008) [6] model. As predicted, weak bidders bid more with resale than without, so that average auction prices tend to increase. When the equilibrium calls for weak types to bid higher than their values with resale they do, but not nearly as much as the theory predicts. In other treatments outcomes are much closer to the risk neutral Nash model's predictions. Bid distributions for weak and strong types are more similar with resale than without, in line with the theory.     

Exchange in a general market with indivisible goods

We show how to restrict trades in exchange markets with heterogeneous indivisible goods so that the resulting restricted exchange markets, the fixed deal exchange markets, have a unique core allocation. Our results on fixed deal exchange markets generalize classical results on the Shapley-Scarf housing market, in which each agent owns one good only. Furthermore, we define the class of fixed deal exchange rules for general exchange markets, and prove that these are the only exchange rules that satisfy strategyproofness, individual rationality, and a weak form of efficiency.     

Environmental Policy Theory Given Bounded Rationality and Other-regarding Preferences

Established environmental policy theory is based on the assumption of homo economicus. This means that people are seen as fully rational and acting in a self-regarding manner. In line with this, economics emphasizes efficient policy solutions and the associated advantages of price incentives. Behavioral economics offers alternative, more realistic views on individual behavior. In this paper we investigate opportunities to integrate bounded rationality and other-regarding preferences into environmental policy theory to arrive at recommendations for more effective policies. For this purpose, we will address decisions made under risk and uncertainty, intertemporal choice, decision heuristics, other-regarding preferences, heterogeneity, evolutionary selection of behaviors, and the role of happiness. Three aspects of environmental policy are considered in detail, namely sustainable consumption, environmental valuation and policy design. We pay special attention to the role of non-pecuniary, informative instruments and illustrate the implications for climate policy.     

Monopolistic Screening with Boundedly Rational Consumers*

In this paper, I revisit the monopolistic screening problem with two types assuming that consumers are boundedly rational. Bounded rationality implies that the revelation principle does not apply and the choice of the selling mechanism entails a loss of generality. I show that if the monopolist restricts attention to the mechanisms that offer menus of two choices, the profits are lower than in the case of fully rational consumers by the term of order ln λ/λ, where λ is the degree of rationality of the consumers. The monopolist, however, can approximate the profits earned when consumers are fully rational by using a more elaborate message game.     

DOES NEAR‐RATIONALITY MATTER IN FIRST‐ORDER APPROXIMATE SOLUTIONS? A PERTURBATION APPROACH

This paper studies first‐order approximate solutions to near‐rational dynamic equilibrium models. Under near‐rationality, agents' subjective beliefs are distorted away from rational expectations via a change of measure process which fulfills some regularity conditions. In most applications, the beliefs distortion process is also directly observed by (a subset of) the decision‐makers – e.g., ambiguity‐averse households or policy‐makers with a concern for robustness – and therefore included into their optimization problems. We investigate conditions for existence and local uniqueness of solutions under endogenous distortions, as well as the relation with their rational expectations counterparts. We show that linearly perturbed solutions may well be affected by the presence of distorted beliefs, depending on the underlying model economy. In particular, while directly affecting first‐order decision rules, near‐rationality may also induce failure of the certainty equivalence principle. Moreover, the martingale representation of distorted beliefs might prove non‐unique, pointing to a subtle form of equilibrium indeterminacy.     

A simple preference foundation of cumulative prospect theory with power utility

Most empirical studies of rank-dependent utility and cumulative prospect theory have assumed power utility functions, both for gains and for losses. As it turns out, a remarkably simple preference foundation is possible for such models: Tail independence (a weakening of comonotonic independence which underlies all rank-dependent models) together with constant proportional risk aversion suffice, in the presence of common assumptions (weak ordering, continuity, and first stochastic dominance), to imply these models. Thus, sign dependence, the different treatment of gains and losses, and the separation of decision weights and utility are obtained free of charge.     

A finite-life private-information theory of unsecured consumer debt

We present a theory of unsecured consumer debt that does not rely on utility costs of default or on enforcement mechanisms that arise in repeated-interaction settings. The theory is based on private information about a person's type and on a person's incentive to signal his type to entities other than creditors. Specifically, debtors signal their low-risk status to insurers by avoiding default in credit markets. The signal is credible because in equilibrium people who repay are more likely to be the low-risk type and so receive better insurance terms. We explore two different mechanisms through which repayment behavior in the credit market can be positively correlated with low-risk status in the insurance market. Our theory is motivated in part by some facts regarding the role of credit scores in consumer credit and auto insurance markets.     

INSUFFICIENT ENTRY OF EMPLOYEE‐CONTROLLED FIRMS IN A FREE‐ENTRY OLIGOPOLY

This study is a theoretical examination of whether employee‐controlled firms (ECFs) enter a free‐entry oligopolistic market excessively or insufficiently, from the viewpoint of welfare maximization. The excess entry theorem is well known in oligopoly theory. According to this theorem, a greater number of profit‐maximizing firms enter a free‐entry oligopolistic market than is optimal for welfare maximization. We demonstrate the possibility that insufficient entry arises when ECFs compete in a free‐entry market. In particular, we show that if both the demand and cost functions are convex, insufficient ECF entry necessarily occurs. Our results suggest that competition among firms seeking purposes other than profit might lead to insufficient entry because differences in competing firms’ objectives affect the intensity of market competition.     

Strategyproof Cost Sharing of Multiple Excludable Public Goods

In a model of cost sharing of multiple excludable public goods, we examine the properties of mechanisms satisfying strategyproofness, no subsidy, outcome non‐bossiness, budget balance, individual rationality and consumer sovereignty. We show that such mechanisms in general will not satisfy the equity property of equal treatment of equals. This contrasts with the single excludable public good case.     

Mechanism design with side payments: Individual rationality and iterative dominance

We investigate the collective decision with incomplete information and side payments. We show that a direct mechanism associated with the social choice function that satisfies budget balancing, incentive compatibility, and interim individual rationality exists for generic prior distributions. We consider the possibility that a risk-averse principal extracts full surplus in agency problems with adverse selection. With regard to generic prior distributions, we show that there exists a modified direct mechanism associated with the virtual social choice function, which satisfies budget balancing and interim individual rationality, such that truth telling is the unique three times iteratively undominated message rule profile.     

INEQUALITY AVERSION CAUSES EQUAL OR UNEQUAL DIVISION IN ALTERNATING‐OFFER BARGAINING

A solution to Rubinstein (1982)'s open‐ended, alternating‐offer bargaining problem for two equally patient bargainers who exhibit similar degrees of inequality aversion is presented. Inequality‐averse bargainers may experience envy if they are worse off, and guilt if they are better off, but they still reach agreement in the first period under complete information. If the guilt felt is strong, then the inequality‐averse bargainers split a pie of size one equally regardless of their degree of envy. If the guilt experienced is weak, then the agreed split is tilted away from the Rubinstein division towards a more unequal split whenever the degree of envy is smaller than the discounted degree of guilt. Envy and weak guilt have opposite effects on the equilibrium division of the pie, and envy has a greater marginal impact than weak guilt. Equally inequality‐averse bargainers agree on the Rubinstein division if the degree of envy equals the discounted degree of guilt. As both bargainers' sensation of inequality aversion diminishes, the bargaining outcome converges to the Rubinstein division.     

Deterministic versus stochastic mechanisms in principal-agent models

This paper shows that, contrary to what is generally believed, decreasing concavity of the agent's utility function with respect to the screening variable is not sufficient to ensure that stochastic mechanisms are suboptimal. The paper demonstrates, however, that they are suboptimal whenever the optimal deterministic mechanism exhibits no bunching. This is the case for most applications of the theory and therefore validates the literature's usual focus on deterministic mechanisms.     

农药企业社会责任指标体系与评价方法

企业社会责任评价体系是企业履行社会责任的指南和准则,是引导和规范企业行为的信息工具,是农药企业社会责任从定性研究到定量评价、从理论到实践的桥梁和纽带。本文在构建指标体系原则指导下,设计了农药企业社会责任综合评价指标体系,从经济效益、创新能力、产品质量、售后服务、环境保护、员工权益、社区关系和慈善公益八个方面设计指标反映农药企业社会责任评价所包含的主要内容,并利用层次分析法确定了不同子目标和指标的权重,同时就企业间横向比较和单一企业纵向比较两种情形,分别给出了社会责任综合评价的方法。     

Goals,rationality criteria and market functioning ∗

The behaviours of economic operators may be directed by goals and rationality criteria other than those postulated by neoclassical theory. Under certain conditions, the existence of deviant goals and rationality criteria, far from being eliminated by the process of ‘natural selection’, has a profound effect on market functioning. It alters the ‘natural selection’ criterion and thereby influences the market trajectory. It can also favour the development of specific mechanisms of co-ordination. Our hypothesis is illustrated by an analysis of the cultural markets.     

TESTING STRICT STATIONARITY WITH APPLICATIONS TO MACROECONOMIC TIME SERIES

We propose a model‐free test for strict stationarity. The idea is to estimate a nonparametric time‐varying characteristic function and compare it with the empirical characteristic function based on the whole sample. We also propose several derivative tests to check time‐invariant moments, weak stationarity, and pth order stationarity. Monte Carlo studies demonstrate excellent power of our tests. We apply our tests to various macroeconomic time series and find overwhelming evidence against strict and weak stationarity for both level and first‐differenced series. This suggests that the conventional time series econometric modeling strategies may have room to be improved by accommodating these time‐varying features.