Social networks and labor market transitions

We study the influence of social networks on labor market transitions. We develop the first model where social ties and job status coevolve through time. Our key assumption is that the probability of formation of a new tie is greater between two employed individuals than between an employed and an unemployed individual. We show that this assumption generally generates negative duration dependence of exit rates from unemployment. Our model has a number of novel testable implications. For instance, we show that a higher connectivity among unemployed individuals reduces duration dependence and that exit rates depend positively on the duration of the last job held by the unemployed worker.     

An agent-based early warning indicator for financial market instability

Inspired by the Bank of America Merrill Lynch global breath rule, we propose an investor sentiment index based on the collective movement of stock prices in a given market. We show that the time evolution of the sentiment index can be reasonably described by the herding model proposed by Kirman in his seminal paper “Ants, rationality and recruitment” (Kirman in Q J Econ 108:137–156, 1993). The correspondence between the index and the model allowed us to easily estimate its parameters. Based on the model and the empirical evolution of the sentiment index, we propose an early warning indicator able to identify optimistic and pessimistic phases of the market. As a result, investors and policy-makers can set different strategies anticipating financial market instability. Investors can reduce the risk of their portfolio while policy-makers can set more efficient policies to avoid the effects of financial instability on the real economy. The validity of our results is supported by means of a robustness analysis showing the application of the early warning indicator in eight different worldwide stock markets.

     

From FDI network topology to macroeconomic instability

Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination - Fragmentation of production undoubtedly constitutes a possible channel of economic contagion and could play a key role in the study of systemic...     

Social optimal pricing in a spatial market

This paper investigates optimal spatial price patterns derived on the basis of welfare maximization (in terms of consumer surplus plus profit) under alternative spatial pricing policies, including discriminatory, fo.b., and c.i.f. pricing. It shows that under all forms of spatial pricing policies, optimal spatial prices should equate marginal costs of production with the mill price, and that transportation costs incurred are always charged to consumers, even in the case of c.i.f. pricing. In addition, it shows that society never prefers c.i.f. to any other pricing policies, and is always indifferent between discriminatory and Lo.b. pricing. Some additional properties of optimal spatial prices are also presented.     

Social influence on software piracy

In this paper, we extend the basic principles of Michel's model to a dynamical setting that allows us to study the effect of social influence on software piracy. We consider that social dynamics affect the decision-making process in two different ways: producing a positive network externality on individual consumers' preferences for the product but at the same time providing the knowledge and ability to pirate. We obtain that, on one hand, permeability of society accepting piracy culture has no significant effects on sales. On the other, scenarios with a positive ‘optimal’ value of piracy exist when there is a slight quality differential between originals and pirate copies. This can explain some interesting cases present in the real-world software industry.     

Welfare effects of network neutrality in mobile Internet market

ABSTRACT

The network neutrality can enhance the profitability of content providers but reduce carrier platforms’ profits and consumer surplus. What is more, network neutrality can improve the total social welfare level when the external utility of mobile phone users to content providers is greater than that of content providers to those users. In addition, it is also found that both profitability of content providers and pricing power of carrier platforms for mobile phone users are directly proportional to the basic utility that carriers themselves can provide.     

网络外部性、市场锁定与AVS标准的竞争策略

随着技术的进步和市场的发展,行业的竞争早已由产品之争发展到标准之争。AVS（数字电视音视频标准）作为我国自主研发的第一个国家数字音视频标准,其竞争策略直接关系到我国整个数字音视频行业能否脱离国外标准的限制。文章在回顾整个数字音视频标准发展的历史进程的基础上,采用产业经济学的分析方法,研究了我国数字音视频标准的市场结构和市场特征,并建立一个直观的经济学模型分析了在这种市场结构和市场特征下影响AVS用户选择的多种竞争因素。文章最后给出了标准拥有者应当采取的竞争策略的相关建议。     

Leadership instability in hospitals: the influence of Board-CEO relations and organizational growth and decline

This study tested whether leadership instability--a systemic pattern of frequent succession in the top management position of an organization--was associated with sociopolitical structures that define the relationship between the board and chief executive officer (CEO), controlling for temporal patterns of the organizational life-cycle stage. In organizations that are not profit maximizing and subject to considerable uncertainty, such governance properties were hypothesized to affect leadership instability independent of organizational growth or decline. Results of regression analyses demonstrate strong main effects of board-CEO relations, net of the impact of organizational life cycle, on leadership instability.     

Analysis of a network structure of the foreign currency exchange market

We analyse structure of the world foreign currency exchange (FX) market viewed as a network of interacting currencies. We analyse daily time series of FX data for a set of 63 currencies, including gold, silver and platinum. We group together all the exchange rates with a common base currency and study each group separately. By applying the methods of filtered correlation matrix we identify clusters of closely related currencies. The clusters are formed typically according to the economical and geographical factors. We also study topology of weighted minimal spanning trees for different network representations (i.e., for different base currencies) and find that in a majority of representations the network has a hierarchical scale-free structure. In addition, we analyse the temporal evolution of the network and detect that its structure is not stable over time. A medium-term trend can be identified which affects the USD node by decreasing its centrality. Our analysis shows also an increasing role of euro in the world’s currency market.     

Social exclusion and labour market transitions: a multi-state multi-spell analysis using the BHPS

In this empirical paper, we assess how social exclusion arises in the context of labour market transition behaviour. We estimate a multi-state multi-spell competing risks model and identify five states: high skilled employment, intermediate skilled employment, low skilled employment, unemployment and out-of-the-labour market. Using data from the first seven waves of the British Household Panel Survey, we show that a substantial number of workers were trapped in a vicious circle of low-skilled employment, unemployment and inactivity in the 1990s. Workers who are part of the so-called flexible workforce are more likely to suffer social exclusion.     

Social influence in technology adoption: taking stock and moving forward

Social influence has been shown to profoundly affect human behavior in general and technology adoption in particular. Over time, multiple definitions and measures of social influence have been introduced to the field of technology adoption research, contributing to an increasingly fragmented landscape of constructs that challenges the conceptual integrity of the field. Consequently, this paper sets out to review how social influence has been conceptualized in technology adoption research. In so doing, this paper attempts to inform researchers’ understanding of the construct, reconcile its myriad conceptualizations, constructively challenge extant approaches, and provide impulses for future research. A systematic review of the salient literature uncovers that extant interpretations of social influence are (1) predominantly compliance-based and as such risk overlooking identification- and internalization-based effects; (2) primarily targeted at the individual level and non-social technologies, thereby precluding the impact of socially enriched environments; and (3) heavily reliant on survey-based and US/China-centric samples, which jeopardizes the generalizability and predictive validity of the findings. Building upon these insights, this paper develops an integrated perspective on social influence in technology adoption research that encourages scholars to pursue a multi-theoretical understanding of social influence at the interface of users, social referents, and technology.     

Identifying states of global financial market based on information flow network motifs

Stock markets exhibit different states due to internal and external shocks. It is of great significance to identify the status of global financial markets. Based on 48 global stock indices from 1996 to 2018, we constructed a global stock index transfer entropy network, which represents the information flow between stock markets in different economies. By analyzing the triadic motifs in the transfer entropy network, we divided the global stock market into different market states based on the distribution of motifs. The characteristic structure of information flow was observed in different market states. We found that the information flow in the global stock market increases significantly during major financial events, indicating that the global stock index has a mutual influence and a close relationship with each other. In addition, stock indices in the Asia-Pacific, Middle East, and Africa are the main sinks of information, while stock indices in the Americas and Europe are the primary sources of information.     

The influence of supply network structure on firm innovation

In this study, we examine the structural characteristics of supply networks and investigate the relationship between a firm's supply network accessibility and interconnectedness and its innovation output. We also examine potential moderating effects of absorptive capacity and supply network partner innovativeness on innovation output. We hypothesize that firms will experience greater innovation output from (1) higher levels of supply network accessibility and supply network interconnectedness, (2) the interaction between the levels of these two structural characteristics, (3) the moderating role of absorptive capacity on supply network accessibility and the moderating role of supply network partner innovativeness on supply network interconnectedness. Supply network partner relationships are drawn in the context of the electronics industry using data from multiple sources. We use social network analysis to create measures for each supply network structural characteristic. Using regression techniques to test the relationship between these structural characteristics and firm innovation for a sample of 390 firms, our findings suggest that supply network accessibility has a significant association with a firm's innovation output. The results also indicate that interconnected supply networks strengthen the association between supply network accessibility and innovation output. Moreover, the influence of the two structural characteristics on innovation output can be enhanced by a firm's absorptive capacity and level of supply network partner innovativeness. By addressing the need for deeper structural analysis, this study contributes to supply chain research by accounting for the embedded nature of ties in supply networks, and showing how these structural characteristics influence the knowledge and information flows residing within a firm's supply network.     

A measure of regional influence with the analytic network process

The metropolitan region is commonly defined by a socio-spatial network of urban nodes that are linked in territory and function. Such a network is differentiated by size and dominance of the linked nodes, characterized by physical or virtual flows of a wide-ranging variety. The analytic network process (ANP) is a multi-criteria analytic method that measures the influence or dominance of the nodes in a network with feedback. We illustrate how ANP determines county rank as a measure of influence in a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) defined by its interrelated socio-economic and spatial elements qualitatively and quantitatively. We compare the ANP results to similar measures of regional influence in the literature.     

Comparative study of hybrid artificial neural network methods under stationary and nonstationary data in stock market

In this study, a new methodology is proposed to automatically determine six parameters of artificial neural network using population‐based metaheuristics. We considered following three issues: What is the effect of used metaheuristic on performance? Which parameters are mostly selected? Is there a difference between the forecasting results when using stationary or nonstationary dataset that are selected according to the augmented Dickey–Fuller test statistics? Based upon results of performance measures, proposed method leads to significant opportunities to forecast stock market more effectively. We also expect proposed methodology can provide remarkable advantages for other complex, dynamic, and nonlinear forecasting problems.     

证券民事赔偿新规及其对证券监管的影响

文章针对最高人民法院于2003年1月9日颁布的《关于审理证券市场因虚假陈诉引发的民事赔偿案件的若干规定》中关于案件受理前置条件的规定，进行了探讨，并认为虽然还存在有争议的地方，但却全面的影响了证券市场的监管。     

Credit market constraints and labor market decisions

In this paper, we examine whether imperfections in credit markets spill over to other markets, particularly the labor market. We take the case of Italy, a country that experienced changes in the mortgage market brought about by the 1992 European unification and other institutional shifts. These events make Italy a good laboratory to study the effects of financial markets on the labor market. Using household data from the Bank of Italy between 1989 and 1993, we estimate the relationship between female participation and mortgage use. We find a significant impact of mortgages on women's participation in the labor market.     

On the optimal size of Social Security in the presence of a stock market

The paper develops a stylized overlapping generations economy with random production and a stock market. The impact of a Social Security system on production, asset markets, and consumer welfare is analyzed. It is shown that any reduction in the contribution rate fosters capital accumulation and increases asset prices, wages, and production output. Different welfare criteria are applied to determine the optimal size of Social Security. It is shown that there exists a unique contribution rate which is long-run optimal, socially optimal, and time-consistent in the sense that no generation has an incentive to change it.     

Social and cultural capital in project marketing service firms: Danish architectural firms on the German market

This article analyses the marketing activities of three Danish architectural firms in Germany during the 1990s from a perspective that is new to project marketing, in that the Bourdivan concepts of social and cultural capital are applied to the offerings and activities of firms. In architecture, cultural capital accumulation entails such things as building visible buildings, winning design competitions, or obtaining important tenders, whereas social capital is accumulated through the recognition by other construction industry actors that one is a member of their circles. The cases presented provide support for our claim that the accumulation of social and cultural capital is crucial to acquiring architectural projects, while also indicating that cultural and social capital are internationally transferable to a limited extent only. This in turn suggests that national construction industries are best viewed as distinct project marketing milieus.