(Monopolistic) resource extraction and limit pricing: The market penetration of competitively produced synfuels

This paper analyzes the market penetration of a competitively produced synfuel, e.g., solar energy, in a market that is initially dominated by a resource extracting monopoly. The availability of the renewable substitute depends not only on the price/cost ratio but also on the installed capacities, which reflect historical investments. As a consequence, the resource monopoly faces a discontinuous residual demand schedule. The dynamic interactions between the resource cartel and the synfuel industry are modelled as a differential game; the (open loop) Nash equilibrium is applied to this game. It will be shown that the commodity price will exceed the production costs of the backstop and that the transition from the periods of resource dependence to the backstop technology will be gradual.     

(S,s) inventory dynamics and self-organized criticality

This paper proposes a new model of self-organized criticality in order to explain large fluctuations of aggregate production in an (S,s) economy. It is shown that the inventory distribution in an (S,s) economy always converges to a unique steady state, and that aggregate production exhibits a peculiar instability at the steady state: the propagation effect of a demand shock on aggregate production follows a power law.The model differs from previous models of self-organized criticality in that it incorporates a global interaction in the network. The global interaction is interpreted as a representation of market transactions with which economists are familiar. The other novelty of the paper is that an intrinsic instability of (S,s) economies is found. Many small non-linearities in the (S,s) economy may not be cancelled out in aggregation. Instead, they play a key role in organizing the fluctuations of aggregate production.     

Healthcare resource utilization and direct costs associated with frequent nausea in episodic migraine: results from the American Migraine Prevalence and Prevention (AMPP) Study

Abstract

Background:

Nausea is a common migraine symptom that is associated with impaired quality-of-life and functional disability. In this study, population-based data were used to elucidate the relationship between nausea frequency and headache-related healthcare utilization and costs in persons with migraine.

Research design and methods:

Participants with episodic migraine who completed the 2009 American Migraine Prevalence and Prevention (AMPP) Study survey rated their headache-related nausea as occurring never, rarely, <half the time, or ≥half the time with their headaches, and completed questions on symptom frequency and healthcare resource utilization.

Main outcomes measures:

Ordinal logistic regression models were used to assess the association between nausea frequency and headache-related healthcare utilization. Healthcare cost equivalents were calculated.

Results:

Among the 6488 respondents with episodic migraine, the number of respondents observed across headache-related nausea frequency strata were 6.9% for never, 14.5% for rarely, 29.1% for <half the time, and 49.5% for ≥half the time. In unadjusted models, the odds of having ≥1 healthcare encounter for headache in the preceding year increased with frequency of nausea for primary care/obstetrics-gynecology visits (OR?=?1.41; 95% CI?=?1.30–1.52, p?<?0.001), nurse practitioner/physician assistant visits (OR?=?1.52; 95% CI?=?1.25–1.85, p?<?0.001), neurology/headache clinic visits (OR?=?1.33, 95% CI?=?1.18–1.51, p?<?0.001), pain clinic visits (OR?=?1.31, 95% CI?=?1.01–1.71, p?<?0.05), emergency department visits (OR?=?1.85; 95% CI?=?1.56–2.19, p?<?0.01), and overnight hospital stays (OR?=?1.50, 92% CI?=?1.12–2.00, p?<?0.01). The odds of having ≥1 lifetime CT scan or MRI also increased with the frequency of nausea (p?<?0.001 for both). Results remained significant in these analyses when controlling for sociodemographics and overall symptom severity except in the case of pain clinic visits (p?<?0.107). Visits for Mental Health and visits for Chiropractic/Alternative care did not differ significantly by nausea group in unadjusted or adjusted models. Mean estimated direct headache-related healthcare cost equivalents per person per year generally increased with increasing headache-related nausea frequency across categories of healthcare utilization. Average per person healthcare cost for nausea ≥half the time vs nausea never was $179 and $49 yearly for outpatient services, $183 vs $20 yearly for overnight hospital stays, and $314 vs $257 for lifetime diagnostic services/imaging.

Conclusions:

Direct costs of migraine increase with increasing frequency of migraine-associated nausea. Both frequency and severity of headache-related nausea should be monitored as part of ongoing care of persons with migraine. Headache-related nausea, like headache pain, should be considered an area of central concern during clinical, diagnostic, and treatment optimization assessments.

Study limitations:

This study relied on self-reported headache frequency and healthcare costs which are subject to recall bias and under-reporting; however, reporting bias is unlikely to be different as a function of nausea frequency. In addition, medication use costs and indirect costs (which may be higher than direct costs for migraine) were not assessed.     

Literature-related discovery (LRD): Lessons learned, and future research directions

Literature-related discovery (LRD) is the linking of two or more literature concepts that have heretofore not been linked (i.e., disjoint), in order to produce novel, interesting, plausible, and intelligible knowledge (i.e., potential discovery). The open discovery systems (ODS) component of LRD starts with a problem to be solved, and generates solutions to that problem through potential discovery. We have been using ODS LRD to identify potential treatments or preventative actions for challenging medical problems, among myriad other applications. The five immediately preceding papers in this Special Issue describe the application of ODS LRD to Raynaud's Phenomenon (RP), cataracts, Parkinson's Disease (PD), Multiple Sclerosis (MS), and Water Purification (WP). We describe the lessons learned from each application, and how the techniques can be improved further.Generation of much potential discovery using ODS LRD is possible when the conceptual roadblocks to discovery are removed. Some of these roadblocks include use of numerical filters that are unrelated to generating discovery, and excessive reliance on literatures directly related to the problem literature of interest. The issue of how to handle large amounts of potential discovery has not been addressed in the literature, since most ODS LRD researchers have tried to find a relatively few potential discovery items. We present a development strategy that capitalizes on the large amounts of potential discovery we have identified.     

Political aspects of household finance: debt,wage bargaining,and macroeconomic (in)stability

The recent literature has shown that income inequality is one of the main causes of borrowing and debt accumulation by working households. This article explores the possibility that household indebtedness is an important cause of rising income inequality. If workers experience rising debt burdens, their cost of job loss may rise if they need labor-market income to continue borrowing and servicing existing debt. This, in turn, will reduce their bargaining power and increase income inequality, inducing workers to borrow more to maintain consumption standards, and so creating a vicious circle of rising inequality, job insecurity, and indebtedness. We believe that these dynamics may have contributed to observed simultaneous increases in income inequality and household debt prior to the recent financial crisis. To explore the two-way interaction between inequality and debt, we develop an employment rent framework that explicitly considers the impact of workers’ indebtedness on their perceived cost of job loss. This is embedded in a neo-Kaleckian macro model in which inequality spurs debt accumulation that contributes to household consumption spending and hence demand formation. Our analysis suggests that (a) workers’ borrowing behavior plays a crucial role in understanding the character of demand and growth regimes; (b) debt and workers’ borrowing behavior play an important role in the labor market by influencing workers’ bargaining power; and (c) through such channels, workers’ borrowing behavior can be a decisive factor in the determination of macroeconomic (in)stability.     

Intelligence, Human Capital, and Economic Growth: A Bayesian Averaging of Classical Estimates (BACE) Approach

Human capital plays an important role in the theory of economic growth, but it has been difficult to measure this abstract concept. We survey the psychological literature on cross-cultural IQ tests and conclude that intelligence tests provide one useful measure of human capital. Using a new database of national average IQ, we show that in growth regressions that include only robust control variables, IQ is statistically significant in 99.8% of these 1330 regressions, easily passing a Bayesian model-averaging robustness test. A 1 point increase in a nation’s average IQ is associated with a persistent 0.11% annual increase in GDP per capita.     

Treatment experience,burden and unmet needs (TRIBUNE) in MS study: results from Turkey

Abstract

Objective:

To estimate the economic burden of multiple sclerosis (MS) in Turkey, including the relapses and disease severity, and to evaluate the quality-of-life of MS patients.

Methods:

The Treatment Experience, Burden and Unmet Needs (TRIBUNE) study was a multi-national, cross-sectional, retrospective, burden-of-illness survey. Total costs were calculated using unit costs derived from price lists or published literature, where relevant, and inflated to 2011 TL prices.

Results:

A total of 295 MS patients (74% females) were included in the analysis. The population had a mean age of 36 years; 73% had the relapsing–remitting form. Mean Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS) score was 2.2. Twenty-two per cent of the MS patients required hospitalization in the past year and spent an average of 29.2 days/year in hospital. These values were 43% and 5.6 days for the outpatients, respectively. Total cost per patient/year was 18,700 TL (Turkish Lira). Total costs for patients with mild, moderate, and severe disability were 15,418 TL, 26,002 TL, and 44,208 TL per patient/year, respectively. The mean EuroQol 5D scores in the same groups were 0.73, 0.52, and 0.05, respectively.

Conclusions:

Multiple sclerosis imposes a significant economic burden on patients and society in Turkey.     

Public Debt,Terms of Trade and Welfare: The Role of Capital Production Shares,External Balances,and Dynamic (In)efficiency

In view of still large external imbalances across the world economy and dramatically risen public debts in major advanced economies, this paper reconsiders the relationship between public debt, the terms of trade and welfare in a two-good, two-country overlapping generations model with technological differences across countries. We find that the terms of trade effect of a public debt shock depends only on international differences in capital production shares and the dynamic (in)efficiency of the world economy. As in a model with similar capital production shares, domestic welfare rises and foreign welfare decreases when Home has a positive external balance and the Golden Rule holds. Under dynamic efficiency, welfare decreases in the debt-expanding, net foreign creditor country if she has a relatively smaller capital production share, and if the welfare effect through the accumulation channel is negative. In contrast, under dynamic inefficiency she can increase her welfare by debt expansion.     

Treatment experience,burden, and unmet needs (TRIBUNE) in Multiple Sclerosis study: the costs and utilities of MS patients in The Netherlands

Abstract

Background:

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an important, highly disabling neurological disease, common among young adults in The Netherlands. Nevertheless, only a few studies to date have measured the burden imposed by MS on society in The Netherlands.

Objectives:

To estimate the cost and quality-of-life associated with MS in The Netherlands, while focusing on the burden of relapses and increasing disease severity.

Methods:

MS patients in The Netherlands (n?=?263) completed a web-based questionnaire which captured information on demographics, disease characteristics and severity (Expanded Disability Status Scale [EDSS]), co-morbidities, relapses, resource consumption, utilities, fatigue and activities of daily living (ADL).

Results:

Most patients included in the study were receiving treatment for MS (76% of the sample). The mean cost per patient per year increased with worsening disability and was estimated at €30,938, €51,056, and €100,469 for patients with mild (EDSS 0–3), moderate (EDSS 4–6.5), and severe (EDSS 7–9) disability, respectively. The excess cost of relapses was estimated at €8195 among relapsing-remitting patients with EDSS score ≤5. The quality-of-life of patients decreased with disease progression and existence of relapses.

Conclusions:

The cost of MS in The Netherlands was higher compared to the results of previous studies. The TRIBUNE study provides an important update on the economic burden of MS in The Netherlands in an era of more widespread use of disease-modifying therapies. It explores the cost of MS linked to relapses and disease severity and examines the impact of MS on additional health outcomes beyond utilities such as ADL and fatigue.

Conclusions:

Study limitations:     

Capabilities, Structures and Strategies Re-Examined: Incumbent Firms and the Emergence of Complex Product Systems (CoPS) in Mature Industries

This paper re-examines theories about firm capabilities, industrial co-ordination and competitive strategies in the context of Complex Product Systems (CoPS). In particular, it looks at the applicability of concepts of technological and organisational capabilities, transaction and governance cost analysis and industry lifecycle models to the performance of mature industries under conditions of technological change. It does so in the light of empirical evidence from one sector of a mature but fast-changing industry in which CoPS are currently emerging: offset lithographic print and publishing technologies—the capital goods and systems used to produce printed mass media, particularly newspapers. In this sector of the graphic arts industries, three major incumbent producer firms which were previously similar had each begun to pursue different capabilities, structures and strategies, with apparent success. The complexity of CoPS and of the organisational arrangements for their design, development and commissioning are capable of supporting a wide variety of firm capabilities, structures and strategies.     

我国中小银行成长分析(1999～2003)机遇、挑战与对策

本文围绕银行成长这一核心,以部分股份制银行为考察对象,对1999～2003年期间我国中小银行成长现状、特征以及面临的机遇和挑战进行了分析,并提出了相应的对策建议.研究认为,中小银行成长具有"两不"、"两外"和"两小"的特点,具有这些特点的中小银行成长在新的银行竞争格局下面临新的挑战与机遇.要应对挑战、维持中小银行成长,就要在竞争策略、内部治理和政策扶持等方面加以改进.     

集体化时期的分配制度与人口生育——以日照市东村为中心（1949～1973）

过去关于集体化时期高生育率研究着重于家庭经济支撑能力对生育的影响,认为子女的经济效用刺激了家庭的普遍多育。本文通过实证材料分时段、分家庭人口结构具体分析了集体化时期子女的经济效用,发现在整个集体化时期多生孩子对家庭经济支撑能力的贡献并不明显.进一步分析发现,不是“财富流”而是集体财富的分配模式成为影响家庭生育的重要因素,具体体现在“吃大锅饭”对家庭经济支撑模式所产生的影响。20世纪60年代中后期普遍多育的表象下面涌动着节育的要求,生育意愿的代际差异逐渐呈现。     

Harassment, corruption and tax policy: A comment on Marjit, Mukherjee and Mukherjee [Eur. J. Political Economy 16 (2000) 75–94]

Our comment on Marjit et al. [Marjit, S., Mukherjee, V., Mukherjee, A., 2000. Harassment, corruption and tax policy. European Journal of Political Economy 16, 75–94.] addresses the equilibrium concept used in the game with imperfect information, Section 4 of the original paper. The solution represented in the original paper does not constitute a perfect Bayesian Nash-equilibrium. We develop an alternative solution of the game given the assumptions made by Marjit et al. [Marjit, S., Mukherjee, V., Mukherjee, A., 2000. Harassment, corruption and tax policy. European Journal of Political Economy 16, 75–94.] and find that the results concerning the optimal amount of over-evaluation of income and the existence of a pooling or separating equilibrium are altered.     

Harassment, corruption and tax policy: a comment on Marjit, Mukherjee and Mukherjee [Eur. J. Political Economy 16 (2000) 75–94]

This comment on Marjit, Mukherjee and Mukherjee [Eur. J. Political Economy 16 (2000) 75–94] shows that their basic model can be simplified by an alternative formulation. A corrupt auditor gives two choices to a taxpayer: pay bribe and evade tax or be overtaxed. Although harassment can be redressed through court, the taxpayer chooses to pay bribe. However, as this note discovers, the bribe–income ratio will critically depend on whether the taxpayer can afford the court fees. This may lead different income groups to have different preferences for corruption.