A Simple Two-Sector Model of Outsourcing

Outsourcing has become an increasingly contentious subject ever since N. Gregory Mankiw remarked in 2004 that outsourcing is just another way of doing international trade, and must be beneficial to the nation, including the workers. We construct a simple two-sector specific-factor model and explore the validity of Mankiw's remarks. We find his ideas are valid when the country does not produce any outsourced factor's work at home in that both the laborers and the nation benefit. But when some outsourced factor cum intermediate good is also produced at home, the nation still benefits but the workers may suffer.     

Farmers,Middlemen and Exporters: A Model of Market Power,Pricing and Welfare in a Vertical Supply Chain

Markets for cash‐crops in developing countries are typically characterized by a concentration of buyer power at different levels of the supply chain. For instance, small‐scale coffee farmers sell their produce to a middleman, who in turn sells the coffee onward to an exporter, often a foreign multinational, with monopsony power in the hands of the purchasers at both levels. We analyze pricing behavior and welfare with different assumptions regarding market power. In particular, we show that a more powerful exporter is likely to benefit the producers and may even lead to higher welfare for the producer country as a whole.     

政治关联、利益交换与地方政府环境业绩评价

由于政治关联的存在,地方政府与部分具有政治关联的被规制企业易形成利益共同体,从而损害第三方居民的利益,甚至引发环境事件。建立地方政府的环境业绩评价体系是解决这一问题的有效方式之一。分析地方政府、被规制企业与居民三者之间利益交换关系,从生态权益、环境质量与环境治理三个维度构建的地方政府环境业绩评价体系,可以全面反映地区生态环境情况,从而提高地方环境管理业绩,改善地方环境,并为评价地方政府环境业绩提供了有效参考。     

Context-Sensitive Benefit Transfer Using Stated Choice Models: Specification and Convergent Validity for Policy Analysis

Benefit transfer has been an important, practical policy tool appealing to government agencies, especially when time or budget is constrained. However, the literature fails to support convergent validity of benefit transfer using the stated-preference method. This empirical study conducts four convergent validity assessments of benefit transfer using the choice modeling method and data from Rhode Island and Massachusetts, regarding coastal land management. The comparisons evaluate how individual characteristics improve benefit transfer and yield insights relevant to research specifications to produce studies adaptable for transfer applications. Empirical tests show benefit transfer using choice modeling may be acceptable, and even empirically valid, depending on the policy objectives and the context.     

区域生态经济评价模型及实证研究

生态效率是基于环境一经济系统相互关系的定量描述，搭建了经济效益和环境效益之间的桥梁。基于区域生态效率增长与环保投入的平衡关系，本文构建了区域生态经济评价模型，以反映一个地区在一定环保投入条件下的环境改善效果，并对中国30个城市的经济环境协调状况进行综合评价，力求为现阶段中国区域生态经济状况提供新的可行评价方法。     

产品包装废弃物的污染与回收利用

产品包装废弃物对生态环境产生严重影响：使城市的生态环境污染加剧．占用大量的耕地，使蚊蝇滋生，造成资源的大量浪费。产品包装废弃物的回收与利用可产生巨大的经济效益和社会效益，但必须解决如下几个问题：地方政府职能缺位、法律体系不健全和有法不依、国民环境意识淡薄及企业社会责任缺失。     

Path Dependence, Agency and Technological Evolution

The notion of path dependence is regularly deployed to account for the way past commitments have an important bearing on current choices. We make a distinction between the notions of past and path dependence and focus on path dependence as two types of event sequences: selfreinforcing and reactive. We then address the issue of how the notion of path dependence can be reconciled with a temporal-relational perspective on agency. These notions are tested and refined using a longitudinal case study of ICI's move away from chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and the decision to build three plants to produce one CFC alternative (HFC-134a) for the global refrigeration market. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of path dependence for research on technological and firm evolution.     

Appropriability,services and reputation

The appropriability regime (Teece 1986) that innovating service firms face is generally weaker than what firms in manufacturing sectors face. An important means to appropriate benefits from innovation that service firms can use is their reputation. This conceptual paper offers insights into how a firm’s reputation helps in appropriating value from innovation. Depending on the nature of a service, different kinds of third parties come into play in establishing reputation. In helping firms establish a reputation, such third parties influence customer decisions to acquire a service. While ‘to produce a service is to organise a solution to a problem’, and thus does not involve a third party, is true for pure services in particular, for a service firm to benefit from innovation such others are involved.     

Organizational structure, redistribution and the endogeneity of cost: Cooperatives, investor-owned firms and the cost of procurement

As an organizational type, cooperatives are in general not the dominant form of enterprise. Nevertheless, cooperatives and cooperative-like organizations do play important roles in a number of sectors, suggesting that in some circumstances they are more efficient than other business forms. This paper explores the importance of membership goals on the relative efficiency of the cooperative form of organization. The cooperative cost (and hence production efficiency) advantage is directly linked to the goal alignment between the cooperative and its members, and is influenced by the extent of income redistribution between members and the degree of rent seeking that takes place in the organization. When there is no aversion to income inequality, the members produce at their first best levels. However, as aversion to inequality rises, the production profile of the members converges to the production profile generated when the members face an IOF. Regarding rent seeking, if the more (less) efficient members are able to get their profits valued more, total output is increased (decreased). As a consequence, consumers may benefit from the lobbying that occurs inside a cooperative where the powerful members are the most efficient agents.     

试论绿色旅游的实现形式

开展绿色旅游是旅游资源和旅游业可持续发展的有效途径。培育绿色观念，推行绿色标准，实行绿色开发，生产绿色产品，开展绿色经营，是实现绿色旅游的有效形式。     

Account-based retiree medical plans: what's good for your pension plan may be good for your retiree medical plan

Many of the same forces that caused employers to gravitate toward account-based pension plans are beginning to spark similar changes in retiree medical plans. As medical costs continue to escalate, account-based retiree medical plans offer a new way to manage company outlays, while preserving an important benefit for retirees.     

陕西省南郑县户用沼气池经济效益分析

本文通过对陕西省南郑县产用沼气泡成本、收益和经济效益的分析评价，希冀以效益促进户用沼气池的推广。通过投入要土的企敏度分析，指出户用沼气池推广的关键因土，并提出对策性建议。     

生态与利润对峙的终结——企业从“经济人”到“社会人”的蜕变

文章从分析企业作为"经济人"与作为"社会人"入手,对企业"经济人"追求利润与生态环境的对峙进行了经济学阐释。指出企业作为"经济人"不能为社会带来真正的经济发展。并论述了企业作为"社会人",保护生态环境会使企业获益匪浅。文章最后探讨了企业应如何实现从"经济人"到"社会人"的蜕变。     

海峡旅游合作区的构建与发展模式及对策研究

区域旅游合作已为实践所证明是旅游业发展到一定阶段的必然趋势,是实现旅游业可持续发展的重要方式。海峡两岸旅游资源既有相似,又可互补,具备区域旅游合作的基本条件。文章在分析海峡旅游合作区构建背景的基础上,认为合作必须从时间、空间、关系三个维度综合考虑构建。最后提出了海峡旅游合作的创新对策,以期对合作实践有所裨益。     

Intraindustry trade in intermediate goods

Since intermediate goods play such a vital role in foreign trade, this paper develops a model that explains the benefits from intraindustry trade in differentiated intermediate goods. In comparison with a situation of autarchy, this type of trade causes an increase in the number of intermediate good varieties. In this way, the producers of final goods will benefit from intermediate good varieties, which are closer to the ideal for a specific production process. At the same time, the producers of intermediate goods will, under conditions of international division of labor, benefit from economies of scale.     

Reading and understanding employee benefit plan financial statements

If your employee benefit plan has more than 100 participants, chances are you've had to work your way through the audited financial statements you're required to include with your Form 5500 filing. These statements contain a wealth of information about the financial health of your plan, and understanding them is an important fiduciary responsibility. To strengthen your grasp of financial statements, this article gives an overview that will make a plan's financial statements more informative, explains their basic structure and provides information on some of the more arcane aspects (such as actuarial tables). While this article focuses on Taft-Hartley (multiemployer) plans, much of it applies to other types of employee benefit plans.     

沈阳市老年人理财探究

通过了解沈阳市老年人平均收入情况,结合非理性购买理论的知识,发现沈阳市老年人由于受对投资方式的信息了解不足、低卷入等方面影响易产生非理性购买行为。并通过不同投资方式的分析,结合沈阳市老年人的特点,得出老年人较适合投资基金和将其资金存放在银行获取少量利息的结论,认为这样能够提高老年人生活质量。     

The choice between civil service and entrepreneurship in the presence of credit rationing

This article examines the role of opportunities to be civil servants in determining both an individual’s ability to borrow to be an entrepreneur and his career choices that are related to the endowment of wealth. It is assumed that the civil servants are hired to produce the public goods or services that benefit all the entrepreneurs hiring workers to produce private goods. In considering the case where the position of a civil servant is randomly up for grabs without rent-seeking, it is known that the effect of a rise in the number of civil servants to be hired on an individual’s ability to borrow is mainly based on the improved efficiency and a rise in the wage due to an increase in the demand for workers. When the position of a civil servant is secured through rent-seeking, it is found that an improvement in the financial environment will lower the cost of rent-seeking if the welfare of the civil servant is not too high.     

Political Processes in Management,Organization and the Social Shaping of Technology

The notion of path dependence is regularly deployed to account for the way past commitments have an important bearing on current choices. We make a distinction between the notions of past and path dependence and focus on path dependence as two types of event sequences: selfreinforcing and reactive. We then address the issue of how the notion of path dependence can be reconciled with a temporal-relational perspective on agency. These notions are tested and refined using a longitudinal case study of ICI's move away from chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and the decision to build three plants to produce one CFC alternative (HFC-134a) for the global refrigeration market. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of path dependence for research on technological and firm evolution.