Shop stewards in the 1990s: a research note

Evidence suggests that the unions suffered badly during the 1980s, but how has this affected the lynch-pin of workplace industrial relations, the shop steward? The evidence of this research is that the shop stewards of the 1990s display remarkable stability in their influence and role when compared to earlier surveys.     

Typologies of shop stewards: a reconsideration

The most comprehensive attempt to relate differences between or typologies of shop stewards to other factors has been the research undertaken by Batstone et alia. This article reconsiders and amends their typology.     

Education and training for shop stewards: a reassessment

New approaches are required in the education and training of shop stewards if it is to equip them with the skills necessary to deal with the conflicting expectations and pressures inherent in their role.     

Workplace participation and employee influence: a study of managers and shop stewards

This article looks at de facto and de jure participation in decision-making, as well as the degree of direct as opposed to indirect influence wielded by the parties involved. It asks whether the perceptions of those on ‘different sides’ of the industrial fence, such as shop stewards and managers, largely differ and on what issues.     

The aims and methods of the education and training of shop stewards: a case study

The author's research indicates that management's objectives in releasing shop stewards for courses and the shop stewards' objectives may be quite different. Views on how far courses should be “education” and how far “training”, and the best structure for courses, also emerged from this study.     

宝瑞通：典当行变形记

在不知不觉中,宝瑞通典当行已经转型成为为中小企业提供快速融资服务的“准金融公司”,正在发挥为商业银行等金融机构拾遗补缺的作用。2009年宝瑞通典当业务达3万多笔,累计放款达30亿元,也就是说宝瑞通为京津地区大量中小企业解决了资金方面的燃眉之急     

Pahl and Lojkine on the state: a comment

La relation entre i'état et le développement social peut entre analysée à partir de trois niveaux interconnectés:

• 1 Au niveau de la théorie et de la méthodologie. C'est ce que font Lojkine et Pahl.
• 2 A un niveau général, mais concernant des types théoriquement differenciés d'organisations sociales (c'est à dire, sociétés capitalistes avancées, sociététés socialistes. etc.). C'est le niveau qui concerne cet auteur le plus.
• 3 Au niveau d'une société donnée, durant une période historique déterminéee. C'est à ce niveau que les autres travaux de Lojkine ont été faits.

La critique faite par Pahl des perspectives marxistes est rejetés comme étant superficielle, par contre il est reconnu que i'?uvre de Poulantzas manque de perspective historique et dialectique. Mais i'analyse marxiste des institutions politiques dépend d'une interprétation correcte de la relation entre structure et superstructure, et ce point est développé par i'auteur. Une critique est faite des théories élitistes et historicistes. La typologie historiciste de Runciman est considérée comme étant inadéquate, car elle ne peut ětre appliquée à la réalité historique, et en dernier lieu, ne peut expliquer pourquoi les relations état-société montrent tant de variations. Les définitions marxistes de i'état sont insuffisantes et ont besoin d'ětre dévéloppées. A propos, les travaux de Lojkine et de Poulantzas sont critiqués comme étant réductivistes et non-dialectiques. La question des origines sociales de la démocratie est introduite afin de développer une perspective analytique satisfaisante qui pourrait prendre en compte les faits historiques des révolutions nationales en Europe de l'Ouest, au Japon et aux Etats-Unis. L'accent est mis sur le role de la classe ouvrière, le concept d'hégémonie, l'exercise du pouvoir hégémonique, et plus précisement quand la classe hégémonique n'est pas dominante. Une bonne analyse marxiste des relations état-société doit pouvoir envisager les tendences et les conditions actuelles de l'accumulation du capital, en conjonction avec les intérěts des groupes monopolistes. Cet essai fini par une brěve discussion des tendences actuelles dans ces domaines.     

Convergence of productivity: a comment

We find that an important programming error was made by Hobijn and Franses ( 2000 ) in conducting multivariate stationarity tests. The empirical results in their paper are subject to errors. Other studies that have used the coded algorithm of Hobijn and Franses are likely to suffer the same problem. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On the generalized principal-agent problem: a comment

Faynzilberg and Kumar (Rev Econ Design 5(1):23–58, 2000) show that the usual Mirrlees–Rogerson conditions to validate the first-order approach in moral hazard agency models are no longer valid in the generalized agency case. They consider the risk-averse agent case and identify one set of technological conditions, where the production technology satisfies the linear distribution function condition in actions and types, that validates ex-ante the first-order approach. With the usefulness of their decomposition approach, we show that the first-order approach in the generalized agency case can be checked ex-ante under the Mirrlees–Rogerson conditions when the agent is risk-neutral but there is a binding limited liability constraint on the agent’s wage.      

试论档案工作中的保密

档案管理就是维护档案的完整与安全。为确保秘密的安全，必须管理好档案，基于档案的涉密情况，保密与利用间的关系等多种因素，使得档案保密工作存在许多困难，文中就此提出了一些合理化建议。     

GRAS versus minimizing absolute and squared differences: a comment

Junius and Oosterhaven (2003) Junius, T. and Oosterhaven, J. 2003. The solution of updating or regionalizing a matrix with both positive and negative entries. Economic Systems Research, 15: 87–96. [Taylor & Francis Online] [Google Scholar] developed the GRAS algorithm that minimizes the information gain when updating input–output tables with both positive and negative signs. Jackson and Murray (2004) Jackson, R. W. and Murray, A. T. 2004. Alternative input–output matrix updating formulations. Economic Systems Research, 16: 135–148. [Taylor & Francis Online] [Google Scholar], however, claim that minimizing squared differences in coefficients produces a smaller information gain, which is theoretically impossible. In this comment, calculation errors are sorted out from differences in measures, and it is shown that the information gain needs to be taken in absolute terms when increasing and decreasing cell values occur together. The numerical results show that GRAS outperforms both sign-preserving alternatives in all but one comparison of lesser economic importance. Moreover, as opposed to the result of Jackson and Murray, they show that minimizing absolute differences consistently outperforms minimizing squared differences, which overweighs large errors in small coefficients.     

Jumps in cross‐sectional rank and expected returns: a mixture model

We propose a new nonlinear time series model of expected returns based on the dynamics of the cross‐sectional rank of realized returns. We model the joint dynamics of a sharp jump in the cross‐sectional rank and the asset return by analyzing (1) the marginal probability distribution of a jump in the cross‐sectional rank within the context of a duration model, and (2) the probability distribution of the asset return conditional on a jump, for which we specify different dynamics depending upon whether or not a jump has taken place. As a result, the expected returns are generated by a mixture of normal distributions weighted by the probability of jumping. The model is estimated for the weekly returns of the constituents of the SP500 index from 1990 to 2000, and its performance is assessed in an out‐of‐sample exercise from 2001 to 2005. Based on the one‐step‐ahead forecast of the mixture model we propose a trading rule, which is evaluated according to several forecast evaluation criteria and compared to 18 alternative trading rules. We find that the proposed trading strategy is the dominant rule by providing superior risk‐adjusted mean trading returns and accurate value‐at‐risk forecasts. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.