Cost savings in unit-based pricing of household waste: The case of The Netherlands

We estimate the effects of four unit-based pricing systems on waste collected in Dutch municipalities. Unit-based pricing is shown to be effective in reducing unsorted and compostable waste and in stimulating recyclable waste. If the estimations are corrected for differences in environmental activism between municipalities the effects are still large but significantly lower. The bag- and weight-based systems perform equally and far better compared with the frequency- and volume-based systems. This is interesting, as administrative costs are significantly lower for the bag-based system. Finally, unit-based pricing has no effect on the amounts of waste collected in surrounding municipalities.     

Beauty contest,bounded rationality,and sentiment pricing dynamics

We present a dynamic asset pricing model that incorporates investor sentiment, bounded rationality and higher-order expectations to study how these factors affect asset pricing equilibrium. In the model, we utilize a two-period trading market and investors make decisions based on the heterogeneous expectations principle and the “sparsity-based bounded rational” sentiment. We find that bounded rationality results in mispricing and reduces it in next period. Investor sentiment produces more significant effects than private signals, optimistic investor sentiment increases hedging demand, thus causing prices to soar. Higher-order investors are more rational and attentive to the strategies of other participants rather than private signals. This model also derives the dampening effect of higher-order expectations to price volatility and the heterogeneity expectation depicts inconsistent investor behavior in financial markets. In the model, investors' expectations about future price is distorted by their sentiment and bounded rationality, so they obtain a biased mean from the signal extraction.     

Environmental protection mechanisms and technological dynamics

The paper proposes a new financial mechanism that could be implemented to protect the environment of a tourist region. For this purpose, we investigate the potential consequences of two financial activities, issued by the local government (G) of a region R, which work like contracts between G and, respectively, visitors of R and firms operating in R. According to these contracts, agents who decide to visit R (firms that decide to adopt an environmental friendly technology) have to buy an option that entitle them to get a partial or total reimbursement if environmental quality in R turns out to be sufficiently low (high), namely, below (above) a given predetermined threshold level.     

Political activism and polarization

I develop a model of activism and polarization in the context of electoral competition. Two candidates simultaneously announce policy platforms and seek the support of ideologically inclined activists. Activists compete to influence electoral outcomes by expending costly support for their respective candidates. The presence of activists always moderates the platform choice of candidates, compared to the case of no activism. The central finding of the paper is that the relationship between partisanship of activists and polarization is ambiguous. As activists become increasingly partisan, polarization of candidate platforms reduces or widens depending on the costs of activism. I present normative conditions under which the presence of activism and increased partisanship among activists are both welfare‐improving for voters. Finally, introducing a public funding option for candidates increases polarization in the political process.     

Environmental sustainability, nonlinear dynamics and chaos

Summary. This paper studies the possibility of nonlinear dynamics in a simple overlapping generations model with the environment – the John-Pecchenino (1994) model. We show that if people's concerns towards greener preferences and the maintenance efficiency relative to degradation are not sufficiently high, cyclically or chaotically fluctuating equilibria are more likely to exist; moreover, under a specific condition, a complicated topological structure might emerge. Our short-run analysis complements John and Pecchenino's long-run analysis and our findings suggest that the associated transition towards an environmentally sustainable state is not trivial. Received: September 10, 1996; revised version: October 2, 1997     

Regulated versus negotiated access pricing in vertically separated railway systems

Journal of Regulatory Economics - We revisit Stigler and Friedland’s (J Law Econ 5:1–16, 1962) seminal paper by examining how competitive generation affects prices, sustainability, and...     

Habit formation in state-dependent pricing models: Implications for the dynamics of output and prices

This paper examines the role of habit formation in a standard state-dependent pricing (SDP) model. Incorporating habit formation helps the SDP model to generate hump-shaped and more persistent output responses under a monetary shock. More importantly, incorporating habit formation causes dramatic changes in firm-level pricing behaviors and, as a result, the aggregate price index.     

Hedge fund activism and corporate innovation

This paper investigates the impact of hedge fund activism on corporate innovating activities. It finds that innovative firms are as likely to be targeted by activist hedge funds as non-innovative firms. Activist hedge funds tend to target innovative firms with low innovation efficiency. Hedge fund interventions are associated with significant improvements in innovation output in both highly competitive and less competitive industries. The improvement is more pronounced in active intervention events. Our results suggest that activist hedge funds are not myopic investors and their interventions enhance innovative activities that benefit innovative firms’ long-term performance.     

软件产品定价的常见问题及定价策略

本篇文章首先对软件产品定价方式进行阐述,从定价模式问题、价格变动问题、定价针对性问题等多个方面,对软件产品定价的常见问题进行分析,并以此为依据,提出软件产品定价策略。     

Modeling economic and agro-environmental dynamics of potato production systems

Crop rotation and other input management practices are of particular interest for their potential impacts on economic and agro-environmental components of potato production. Although crop yield and experimental impacts of rotations of grains, oilseed and legume crops have been published for several experimental studies in Canada there are few models related to the economic and environmental dynamics of potato production. We describe a dynamic model which integrates environmental and economic processes in potato production. The potato rotation model consists of interconnected modules of irrigation and precipitation, soil characteristics, soil erosion, soil water, phosphorus, nitrogen, soil organic matter, farming operations, crop yield and the related calculation of economic return. While not all aspects of crop production have been interlinked, including nitrogen carry-over, this model is the first step in the analysis of experimental data for irrigated potato rotations conducted in southern Manitoba.      

Generation dynamics in computer-integrated manufacturing systems

The application of generation dynamics, a methodology for technological forecasting, is widespread in computer-integrated manufacturing systems (CIMS). Experts' opinions about the past and future generations of technology are summarized for computer hardware, computer software, industrial robots, computer vision, computer-aided process planning, and the entire automated factory. The concept of generation dynamics has also been applied to products to be produced by CIMS and to the industrial environment of CIMS. Although experts in the same area do not completely agree with one another, their acceptance of experts' opinions on generation dynamics in other areas to be integrated by CIMS helps the forecasts to be mutually reinforcing and self-fulfilling. On the other hand, such relatively unquestioned acceptance, if and when experts' opinions in other areas become outdated, leads to assumption drag in forecasting.     

Collective knowledge production costs and the dynamics of technological systems

Technological knowledge can be understood as a collective good only when its production requires the absorption and integration of external knowledge. Such external knowledge is the outcome of R&D investments that cannot be fully appropriated by firms and generate spillovers. The exploitation of such knowledge spillovers requires specific investments in knowledge communication and absorption, which brings about specific costs. These costs are affected by the structural and dynamic characteristics of technological systems in terms of the knowledge base, the variety of actors and the communication infrastructures and processes. This paper analyzes the costs of collective knowledge production and their implications for the way in which the firm chooses the mix of internal and external knowledge. This choice in turn shapes the evolution of technological systems.     

Empirical demand systems incorporating intertemporal consumption dynamics

This article presents and estimates demand systems by explicitly incorporating intertemporal consumption behavior as summarized by the Euler equation. Demand systems are characterized by two indirect utility functions which are effectively globally regular and can better approximate nonlinear Engel curves. Furthermore, an exact and nonlinear Euler equation is derived without a log approximation. This equation is estimated jointly with the demand functions by a careful implementation of the orthogonality conditions using generalized method of moments. We illustrate the techniques by estimating the demand system and Euler equation for Australian aggregate data. Results generally indicate that the proposed methods are promising. The estimated rate of time preference is fairly small while the restrictions producing the moment equations are not rejected. Estimated Frisch price elasticities, which are relevant in an intertemporal setting, appear reasonable, and the intertemporal elasticity of substitution for consumption is found to be small, which are consistent with the findings in earlier studies.     

Loss-leader pricing and upgrades

A new theory of loss-leader pricing is provided in which firms advertise low (below cost) prices for certain goods to signal that their other unadvertised (substitute) goods are not priced too high. The theory is applied to the pricing of upgrades. The results contrast with most existing loss-leader theories in that firms make a loss on some consumers (who buy the basic version of the good) and a profit on others (who buy the upgrade).     

A study of political activism in labour courts

We analyse 1234 judicial decisions to estimate political activism amongst judges arbitrating dismissal disputes in Australian labour courts. The political colour of the appointing political party and judges’ work background affect probability of employee success by about 10% points.     

The impact of provincial marketing boards on price relations and pricing dynamics in the North American slaughter hog market

Canadian Provincial hog marketing boards act as sales agents for hog producers. The hypothesis that the introduction of marketing boards in Alberta. Manitoba and Saskatchewan between 1969 and 1972 created seller side market power is tested and supported:their hog prices rose to levels comparable to Ontario where a marketing board had been in place. Organized sellers can also influence pricing dynamics because of the linked spatial oligopsonistic nature of the hog packing industry. Cointegration tests and variance decompositions indicate that establishing boards in the surplus producing western provinces made them relatively less isolated from pricing innovations in deficit producing eastern Canada.     

Cointegration relationships and hedonic pricing of differentiated commodities: an application to price dynamics in the US dairy sector

This study investigates the implications of hedonic pricing for price dynamics of differentiated commodities. A conceptual model of hedonic pricing is developed under a Leontief technology, showing how commodity prices reflect the underlying value of their components. Implications for the existence of cointegration relationships among commodity prices are derived. An application to the pricing and dynamics of selected US dairy commodities is presented. It provides evidence on the role of component valuation in the dynamics of dairy commodity prices in the short run as well as in the long run. Distinguishing between market regime and government regime (when the government price support is active), the analysis finds significant differences in dairy price dynamics between the two regimes.     

Cryptocurrencies and asset pricing

We demonstrate that investors obtain abnormal returns by trading cryptocurrencies daily on the London Stock Exchange from 2014–2017. Excess returns persist once we account for systematic risk, size, value, momentum, profitability and investment. Investor abnormal returns in cryptocurrencies implies inefficiency.     

Beliefs and arbitrage pricing

This paper investigates the necessary restriction on investor beliefs implied by a no-arbitrage price system. In addition, Stone's theorem is invoked to study the existence of equivalent probability measures, and to relate our approach to the existing literature.